USA looks to tighten further. The US Department of Commerce is looking to tighten restrictions on China still further by again lowering the performance bar above which exports to China of AI training chips will be restricted, but I am far from convinced that this will set China back that much. In October 2022, the USA set a limit of...
Baidu highlights the CCP’s conundrum. Baidu’s latest model release claims to be better than ChatGPT but raises more questions than answers with opaque testing and an uncertain regulatory environment which may prevent this innovation from seeing the light of day. Internal testing by the state-owned China Journal of Science (see here) claims that Wenxin 3.5 (aka ERNIE) had surpassed ChatGPT...
Eddie and Jack can only do so much. After a string of failed strategies to ignite interest in the company and its stock, Jack Ma is making a very behind-the-scenes return to Alibaba in the hope that he can bring the company back to life and break the overwhelmingly negative sentiment on his creation. However, the recovery remains hostage to...
Dutch restrictions do not make much difference. The Netherlands is moving far faster than anyone expected in increasing restrictions on exports to China but restrictions put in place by Japan mean that this action by the Netherlands is inconsequential. The Dutch government is planning on enacting restrictions as soon as the end of next week (June 30th 2023) which is...
Nanny regulator comes to the rescue. It is no coincidence that it is the German regulatory authority that is taking issue with Google’s automotive business model as it is German industry that has the most to lose should Google turn cars into Android handsets on wheels. The German Federal Cartel Office has informed Google that its Google Automotive Services (GAS)...
Tesla is becoming a standard in charging. Tesla is becoming a standard in-vehicle charging but even if it were to take over the entire world for chargers, this would be very unlikely to justify the valuation at which the company still trades. Rivian is the latest company to announce a switch to Tesla’s NACS charge point standard following both Ford...
Intel – Germany 1. Intel 1. Intel has announced that it will nearly double its investments in Germany in return for a 47% increase in subsidy from the German state which to me looks like a win-win. Intel is increasing its investments in Germany from €17bn to €30bn while the German government will increase the subsidies from €6.8bn to somewhere...
AI needs to reside in the vehicle to work well. Mercedes is exploring enabling ChatGPT in the vehicle but I think it should be looking at implementing it directly in the vehicle rather than the cloud-based service that it is going with today. Mercedes is running a beta program where those that opt in will be able to access ChatGPT...
Micron – Collateral damage In an attempt to overturn the ban that China has placed on its chips, Micron has committed to invest $602m in its chip-packaging plant in China in a move that I suspect is not going to change very much. I have previously argued (see here) that China’s move to ban Micron is a sign of just...
Richard is founder, owner of research company, Radio Free Mobile. He has 16 years of experience working in sell side equity research. During his 11 year tenure at Nomura Securities, he focused on the equity coverage of the Global Technology sector.
Micron – Supercycle pt. XI
Bottoming out? Micron reported lower-than-expected losses and guided better for the coming quarter as the company thinks that the worst is over in terms of weak demand and inventory correction giving a much-needed positive signal for the rest of the industry. FQ3 2023 revenues / Adj-EPS were $3.75bn / LOSS$1.43 compared to forecasts of $3.68bn / LOSS$1.57 but it was...