Look, Kids! No Hands!
What the hands-free driving ads miss is the primordial urge to grab the steering wheel.
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Metaverse, Omniverse–How Versed Can We Get?
By Jon Peddie
Anyone who has read anything about the metaverse probably knows Neal Stephenson coined the term in Snow Crash in 1992. William Gibson wrote about a similar place he called Cyberspace in 1984, and the idea of an alternate digital reality has been a staple of science fiction ever since. This generation’s version was described by Ernest Cline’s 2011 book Ready Player One and the eponymous film that followed.
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Proposed ‘Reverse CFIUS’ Would Curb China Investments
What’s at stake:
Backers of proposed bipartisan legislation to create a Committee on National Critical Capabilities have failed to win over Congress thus far. But the latest version of the “reverse CFIUS” bill stands a better chance of passage, with implications for U.S. tech concerns looking to invest in China.
Intel Seeks to Lessen Cash Squeeze With Brookfield Deal
By Bolaji Ojo
What’s at stake?
Intel needs far more money than it can generate from operations or receive from governments to fund its massive fab construction program. A partnership with investor Brookfield may help ease the pains.
Untether AI Aims to Become Nvidia of AI Inference
What’s at stake?
Armed with its own unique at-memory compute architecture, Untether AI wants to lead the general-purpose AI inference accelerator market. Can the startup unseat leading CPU and GPU vendors that dominate the AI training sector and are extending their reach into AI inference? Is the knock-your-socks-off performance enough to pull that off?
BMW iX Crash: Getting at the Cause
A BMW iX “test vehicle” that crashed on Aug. 15 near Römerstein, Germany, initially generated a lot of justifiable media coverage.
The accident killed one woman and seriously injured nine others, including the 43-year-old driver of the BMW and the driver’s 18-month-old passenger. The BMW vehicle had veered onto the oncoming lane, hitting two vehicles and indirectly causing another collision.
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Chiplets Are a Second Path to Higher Integration
By Ron Wilson
What’s at stake:
As the industry moves down the Moore’s Law path toward 2nm, increasing design and process costs and spiraling complexity threaten to limit the game to only two or three fabrication companies and only a few of their customers. But a reconsideration of an old idea—building a system out of multiple dies in a single package—could break through these strictures, reopening the industry to smaller customers and giving many organizations and many countries opportunities to participate.
Unanswered Questions in the Aftermath of Fatal BMW Crash
By Colin Barnden
What’s at stake?
Who ensures the public’s safety when automakers test experimental automated driving technology on public roads? The answer may actually be nobody.
Finwave Looks to Disrupt RF Markets With First FinFETs on GaN
By Adele Hars
What’s at stake:
While carriers have tried to roll out the superfast millimeter-wave part of the 5G promise, they’ve been hampered by hot and power-hungry uplink technology in handsets. Finwave says its FinFET-on-GaN power amplifiers will fix that problem, and more.
Intel Foundry Future Explained
By Bolaji Ojo
What’s at stake?
The future of Intel is in manufacturing semiconductors for other chipmakers, which could help fulfill U.S. geopolitical objectives but require the company to spin off its design operation.