02-05-18

22
BUSINESS A.M. FEBRUARY, MONDAY 05 - SUNDAY 11, 2018
Tech giants under scrutiny
as regulators tighten noose
Tiamiyu Adio, with agency
SOME OF THE WORLD’S
biggest technology companies
are facing off with
regulators in what’s being
called a “tech lash”.
As society struggles to catch up
with the pace of technological change,
governments around the world are
waking up to the fact that our Internet
economy and how it operates is unaccountable
and undertaxed.
The European Union is reviewing
Google for allegedly abusing its
dominant market position in search.
Germany is already investigating
how Facebook profits from user data.
The US is looking at whether Apple
broke laws with software updates
which slowed older iPhones. And
Congress is holding more hearings
on the use of social media platforms
to allegedly disrupt US elections.
Even so, with the increased scrutiny
over disinformation, fake news
and malicious actors buying ads, the
internet companies could still find
themselves hit by regulation sparked
by the big tech backlash.
Consumers, too, are asking if
things like smartphones, designed
to keep us online for longer are just
making companies richer at the
expense of children’s mental health.
“Since the Russia meddling and
fake news, you’re seeing a lot more
heat on Facebook, Twitter and Alphabet
- not just on Capitol Hill, but the
EU and abroad,” says Daniel Ives, chief
investment officer at GBH Insights.
Samsung squares up to Bitmain in cryptocurrency chip mining
Business a.m with agency
SAMSUNG’S FORAY
into the crypto-mining
space will pose
serious competition
to the existing
leader in the industry, Beijingbased
Bitmain, which claims
to supply 70 percent of the
world’s bitcoin applicationspecific
integrated circuits
(ASICs), according to analysts.
Bitmain is also said to control
around 30 percent of all the
processing power of the global
bitcoin network through the
two mining pools it operates,
for which it may have to relinquish
some share when Samsung
fully enters the market.
TECHNOLOGY&INNOVATION
The Korean tech giant
announced late last week
that it has started mass
producing chips designed
for cryptocurrency mining,
known as ASICs.
While reporting its fourthquarter
revenue, which came
in at 66 trillion won ($61 billion),
a 24 percent increase
year-on-year, the company
said in the first quarter of
2018, earnings are expected
to rise on the ramp-up of second
generation 10mm process
products for this year’s
flagship smartphones and
growing demand for cryptocurrency
mining chips.
The statement thus confirmed
previous reports that
Samsung has entered the
Facebook has recently changed its
news feed algorithm to reflect communication
from friends and family,
as opposed to news outlets, and Ives
believes “they’re definitely in the
crosshairs of legislatures. And I think
you’re seeing Twitter, Alpha, and Youtube
be a lot more strict and a lot more
focused on some of the content that’s
coming through as we’re seeing the
double-edged sword of social media.”
European regulators aren’t shy
against tech giants, explains Ives.
“There’s a boxing match between
Silicon Valley and the EU that’s getting
more intense. Part of the focus has been
on Apple and Microsoft, but now you’re
seeing stricter potential for regulatory
oversight. I think part of it is, these companies
need to play nice in the sandbox.
They need to have an olive branch to the
crypto-mining sector. Earlier
last week, Korean news
outlet, the Bell, reported
that the company would
produce ASICs in its own
foundry in a deal with Taiwanese
chipmaker, TSMC.
Later, a Samsung spokesperson
confirmed with Tech-
Crunch that the company
is “currently engaged in the
manufacturing of cryptocurrency
mining chips,” but refused
to provide more details.
Bitmain also contracts
with TSMC to produce customized
silicon. In the third
quarter of 2017, the Taiwanese
chipmaker received $350
million to $400 million in
revenue from crypto miners.
One advantage Samsung
might have over Bitmain, as
some note, is that the Korean
giant operates one of the
world’s largest semiconductor
EU. You’ve seen that with Facebook and
their change to the tax code and what
they’ve done in Ireland.”
According to Ives, “these companies,
at this point, basically own the
consumer kingdom...I don’t think their
core business model will change, but ...
transparency and a lot more oversight
around content” could be one example
in extending the olive branch.
“Facebook said they’re going to
stop crypto advertising and bitcoin
advertising, so they said if this could
be an issue [for the EU] then they’re
going to take it off.”
UK-China relations: Britain’s
Prime Minister Theresa May has
been in China this week to boost
trade between the two nations as the
UK looks to forge new partnerships
for when it leaves the EU. But China
will want to see what a final Brexit
deal looks like before making any
big commitments. There’s a great
deal at stake for both countries, as
Adrian Brown reports from Beijing.
In Germany, opposition MPs are
demanding answers from the government
about a scandal involving
well-known carmakers and diesel
fume tests. A research group funded
by BMW, Daimler and Volkswagen
reportedly exposed volunteers and
monkeys to toxic exhaust gasses.
VW’s suspended one of its senior
executives following the public
outcry about the secret tests, as
Dominic Kane reports from Berlin.
Panama has its famous canal,
the Suez canal cuts through Egypt,
and now there’s a plan to resurrect
a 400-year-old plan for a sea link in
the south of Thailand. The waterway
would link the Indian Ocean and Andaman
Sea, with the Gulf of Thailand
and the South China Sea. Wayne Hay
reports from Si Kao, which is home to
a coastal community.
Myanmar’s economic prospects
with the West are at risk, after mounting
international criticism over its
handling of the Rohingya crisis, as Scott
Heidler reports from Yangon. Recently,
a top US diplomat quit the government’s
advisory panel after a heated
exchange with Myanmar’s leader
Aung San Suu Kyi. Bill Richardson’s
departure shows how Aung San Suu
Kyi appears to be pushing away critics
- and relying on old allies for support.
Scientists in the West have long
disputed the therapeutic value of traditional
Chinese medicine, but it seems
the ancient craft is gaining popularity
at home and abroad. It’s even been
hailed by Xi Jinping’s government as
“the gem of Chinese science”. Rob
McBride reports from the country’s
biggest traditional medicine market in
the city of Bozhou, where business has
never been better.
plants, capable of matching
orders of any size. Bitmain
has in the past put its models
for sale in intermittent batches
in order to keep vendors from
placing large orders.
In its fourth-quarter earnings
report mid-last week,
the consumer-electronics
purveyor and world’s largest
chipmaker by revenue said
it expects its foundry business
to get a bump-up from
“growing demand for cryptocurrency
mining chips.”
Mining for cryptocurrencies
like Bitcoin means putting
your computer to work
solving thorny math problems
that are used to verify
cryptocurrency transactions.
In return for your gobs
Apple iOS 11.3
upgrade release
exposes new
product secret
Tiamiyu Adio
IN ROLLING OUT its first iOS
11.3 public beta, Apple has
unwittingly again given away
product secrets. Analysts
say after digging through
the code, 9to5Mac, they found it
is filled with references to a brand
new ‘modern iPad’, a name, which
according to them reveals a lot.
They said prior to release of
iPhone X, Apple’s reference for
it was ‘modern iPhone’. So the
terminology is a clear distinction
between it and what came before.
And of course what the iPhone X
brought to the table as ‘modern’
differentiators was a near bezel-less
display without a home button and
Face ID in place of Touch ID. Consequently
a ‘modern iPad’ strongly
suggests the same steps: goodbye
home button, goodbye chunky bezels
and hello facial recognition.
Furthermore, this move is said to
have precedent. Acclaimed Apple
analyst, Ming-Chi Kuo, stated back
in October that Apple will release
overhauled versions of the iPad Pro
during 2018. And it is easy to see
how a more compact design and
integrated 3D facial modeling could
prove very popular editions, given
their target market.
The downside, according to the
analysts, is that ‘modern’ will not
mean the new iPad Pros would get
dual cameras since the iPhone 7
Plus and iPhone 8 Plus both have
dual cameras, so this clearly isn’t a
prerequisite of ‘modern’ status.
“My guess is the camera from
the iPhone 8, and the inclusion of
3D Touch is surely long overdue
for such productivity-focused
devices,” an analyst noted.
“So while iOS 11.3 does have
more immediate fires to put out,
it’s interesting to see one essential
update has accidentally exposed
another,” he added.
of processing power, you can
be rewarded with coins.
And with some cryptocurrencies
worth thousands of
dollars per coin, and huge
hype around the phenomenon,
it’s no surprise a rush of
gold diggers are pumping up
their computer systems with
high-powered chips to get in
on the act.
In fact, despite a dip in the
value of Bitcoin, things have
gotten so frenzied that computer
gamers who want to
make home-brew systems for
playing Call of Duty (or whatever)
are having a tough time
getting hold of graphics cards.
It seems the cards have turned
out to be great for mining cryptocurrencies
like Ethereum.