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...
AI developers will decide the outcome Amazon has said that it is considering using AMD’s latest AI training chips, but I suspect that it will be the developers and potentially Open AI that decides whether or not AMD makes any headway against Nvidia. Nvidia currently has around 84% market share in the market for silicon chips that are used to...
Edge cases highlight the ongoing problem. While the world is driving itself into a frenzy over the latest iteration of AI, the older version (over which everyone went crazy in 2017) continues to languish as it turns out that one needs to understand the road in order to drive it safely. The latest publicised problems come from Cruise which was...
The 4th AI bubble is in full swing. I will be the first to admit that large language models (LLMs) can do far more than I expected but the problem is that expectations are now that super-intelligence is just around the corner which has triggered all the usual irrational behaviour that precedes a large correction as reality re-asserts itself. RFM...
China vs. USA – AI moves to Vancouver. The technology war is spreading with Microsoft reallocating employees from its lab in China to Canada and other South Asian countries competing hard to win the business that is leaving China. Microsoft established MRSA (Microsoft Research Asia) in Beijing in 1998 and it has grown over the subsequent years to become Microsoft’s...
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.
China vs. USA – Inconsequential acceleration
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...