Lime monitors data from their scooters and bikes in real-time in order to ensure that all bikes are charged and available to riders. In fact, in 2018 Lime monitored 26 million scooter and bike trips worldwide according to their year-end report. The average ride was just over one mile totaling 28 million miles for the year.
Not only does Lime monitor data from their scooters they also remotely slow them down depending on where they are in a city, all in real-time.
Xiuming Chen, Engineering Manager of Infrastructure at Lime, discussed how Lime uses AWS and Amazon Kinesis to ingest all of this real-time data:
Lime Sends Commands to Scooters in Real-Time
Lime is a company about urban transportation and we provide a green and affordable transportation option for the users. Our scooter is connected to our servers to ensure a higher quality of service. We need to send commands to scooters in almost real-time. Maintaining hundreds of thousands of concurrent connections is a huge engineering challenge and that number is only growing.
Lime Slows Scooters Down Depending on Geolocation
We collect all kinds of information between these vehicles. For example, GPS, location, velocity battery level, and motor information. Safety is a top priority for Lime. As an example, we have a feature that requires us to slow down vehicles when they enter certain areas of the city. To achieve that we have had to increase the frequency of data collection drastically. We have a team of data scientists and machine learning engineers. The team analyzes this data to help us understand how people use our service.
On-Demand “Juicers” Use App to Collect Scooters
Normally we see spikes from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., depending on where you are, but sometimes we also notice a very interesting spike at 9:00 p.m. So we have a network of on-demand workers that charge our scooters. We call them Juicers. Every night at 9:00 p.m. we start to allow Juicers to collect scooters. All of them open the app at the same time which causes the traffic to flatten our servers and causes a traffic spike. In the past, the traffic came directly into a relational database and our service become slower and unusable.
Amazon Kinesis Ingests Real-Times Scooter Data
We started to use Amazon Kinesis to ingest real-time data coming from our vehicles. The speed of the growth of this industry is incredible. Scalability is one critical issue we have to deal with and we can let Kinesis do the heavy lifting behind the scene. We can spend the time to work on some more important features that users really need.
Former CKE Restaurants CEO Andy Puzder says that brands that adjust to the new economy are going to be more successful. He says that Walmart and Target adjusted to the new economy and that’s why they are doing great. Similarly, the fast food chains that don’t adjust will not do as well as those that have like Chick-fil-A, In-N-Out Burger, and Shake Shack.
Andy Puzder, Former CKE Restaurants CEO, discussed the how brands need to adjust to the new economy on Fox Business:
Fast Food Industry Needs to Adjust to the New Economy
I think there is a lot of competition now from grocery stores. Grocery store sales are up and people are eating at home. So that’s something that people that are running restaurants need to keep in mind. Secondly, people need to adjust to the new economy. It’s much like in retail. Sears is failing but Walmart is doing great. Kmart’s failing but Target’s doing great. That’s because Walmart and Target adjusted to the new economy.
It used to be if you ran a fast food restaurant you had an advantage with the drive-thru because a soccer mom coming home from a soccer game could pick up some food and drive home and it was very convenient. Now, maybe it’s not as convenient. You could call Uber Eats and you can choose from 40 different restaurants and it’s delivered to your door. You don’t even have to sign for it. Uber uses your credit card just like when you go with an Uber driver.
Brands That Adjust Are Going to be More Successful
The convenience element is changing. Brands that pick up on that are going to be more successful than brands that don’t. You see brands like Chick-fil-A doing very well, In-N-Out Burger, Shake Shack, these kinds of niche brands that aren’t these larger brands that have been associated with the traditional service. Millennials react differently to that. The world is changing and restaurants need to react just like other industries.
Markets Are Overreacting – Economy is Booming
Transportation and construction are particularly relevant because if the economy is growing that’s where you are going to see the jobs. You will see it in people building and you will see it in people delivering goods. We are seeing continued economic growth. I would also point out that consumer spending was the best since 2006 this last holiday season and consumer spending drives two-thirds of our GDP growth. The economy is doing very very well.
I don’t know why the markets are so overreacting to the negative news that comes out. The economy is booming, people are doing very well. Wages are up, more people are working, we have 7 million job openings, and people are taking home more of what they earn because of the tax cuts. There is really nothing on the horizon that would indicate that we are heading into a recession or even much of a slowdown.
A Good Economy is Not Good News to Certain Party
I think we are going to see continued accelerated growth this year despite what you are hearing in the news media. A lot of it is political. A lot of it is because there’s a Party out there for whom a good economy is not good news. That Party happens to control a lot of the news media so they’re having an impact. I think we are really having a dynamic economy and it can and will continue. The American people should be patient.
DiDi will be one of the frontrunners in autonomous vehicle technology development says Henry Liu, VP and Chief Scientist for DiDi Smart Transportation Initiatives. Liu says DiDi is unique in that it is not just an Internet company and not just an AI company but also is a transportation company.
The CEO of DiDi has long had a high-level focus on autonomous driving technology. “Autonomous driving and artificial intelligence are the future of mobility,” noted Cheng Wei, Founder, and CEO of DiDi. “Vehicles might be the first generation of robots with massive AI technology application.”
Henry Liu, VP and Chief Scientist for DiDi Smart Transportation Initiatives, discussed DiDi’s extensive focus on autonomous vehicles in an interview on CNBC International:
We Are a Frontrunner in Autonomous Vehicle Technology
We have developed this autonomous vehicle technology roughly three years ago and we have development teams in both the US as well as China. We have 40 autonomous vehicles being encrypted with our sensors and we have licenses in both Mountain View, California as well as Beijing, China. We are on our way to developing autonomous vehicles and we also think we will be one of the frontrunners in terms of autonomous vehicle technology development.
DiDi Has a Lot of Advantages in Autonomous Vehicle Development
We’ll start with small areas in terms of testing. DiDi has a lot of advantages in autonomous vehicle development because we have this transportation network and we know where the origin and the destination is and we know if this area is suitable for autonomous vehicle operation as well. If it’s suitable we can send an autonomous vehicle to serve for this trip or otherwise we can send a human-driven vehicle.
An Internet Company, AI Company, and Transportation Company
We are not only an Internet company and we’re not only an AI company, but we also are a transportation company which runs for people from origin to destination. That’s a lot of responsibility and we need to make this safely and efficiently. As a service provider, we utilize our technology conscientiously while we use this AI technology. We also cooperate with the government because our service actually complements public transportation systems.
Nokia President and CEO Rajeev Suri says that 5G is moving very fast and will have massive benefits for consumers. Suri also believes that Nokia will see benefits from the 5G rollout because of their end-to-end portfolio.
“Our strategy is to benefit from the end-to-end portfolio that we have which is going to be critical to 5G because 5G is not just a step change from 4G, it is not just a radio technology,” Suri noted. “It is a change of the end-to-end architecture.”
Rajeev Suri, Nokia President, and CEO discussed 5G and how it will impact Nokia in an interview this morning:
5G is Moving Very Fast
5G is moving very fast. It started in the U.S. in this second half. After that, we will see activity in South Korea, Japan, and China during next year, also Europe at the back end of next year, some Middle Eastern countries and also Nordic and Scandinavia is starting to happen in 2019.
Our Strength is Our End-To-End Portfolio
Our strength is that we have an end-to-end portfolio. We are the only ones that have an end-to-end portfolio at scare and are operating in all countries. We did talk about some pricing pressure in regards to some customer situations in Q2 that have already reflected in our Q3 numbers. Overall, the pricing or the competitive intensity have not worsened or changed in the last few quarters. It is somewhat stable.
Our End-To-End Portfolio is Going to be Critical to 5G
Our strategy is to benefit from the end-to-end portfolio that we have which is going to be critical to 5G because 5G is not just a step change from 4G, it is not just a radio technology. It is a change of the end-to-end architecture.
First, it’s time for us to benefit from our end-to-end portfolio after the acquisition of Alcatel-Lucent. Second, we have a strong growth rival in enterprise and we’ve established a new enterprise business group and we’ve been growing at 18 percent a year in that business. Of course, with some of this software where we’ve had good growth in the quarter at 4 percent, which is a stand-alone software business at scale. For us it’s all about driving this end-to-end, benefitting from 5G as well as enterprise and software. Our distinction, first of all, is the installed base and second is this end-to-end portfolio.
5G is Going to Have Massive Benefits
5G is going to have massive benefits, is going to have a lower cost per bit, and huge capacities for consumers. It’s going to have reliability in performance to enable all kinds of enterprise users; manufacturing, ports, transportation, energy sector, and a lot more. We’ve been getting a lot of technical first in setting the pace with that which is the benefit of our end-to-end portfolio.
Cutting €700 Million in Expenses
We believe the ones that win in this industry discipline cost management is a key competitive advantage. We are trying to get ahead of the curve and we will not slow the pace of change. We haven’t talked about the magnitude of the actual headcount numbers but we have said it’s €700 million. We have to work on headcount numbers country by country. Some of it is headcount and some of it is digitalization and automation to drive productivity.
Uber is preparing to launch a new on-demand staffing business ahead of its first initial public offering. Called Uber Works, the new business could show prospective investors that the company can be a strong and lucrative platform for on-demand services.
Uber is banking on the fact that their “on-demand” transportation model was a huge success. The company is also betting that its massive database of contractors can be utilized toserve as temporary staff, like security personnel, waiters, or cooks, for corporate functions and various events.
While Uber Works is targeting people who are not Uber drivers, there’s no denying that the program could also help the company retain its drivers, or “partners,” by providing them with an alternative means of making money.
Some of the ride-hailing company’s drivers are already moonlighting at Uber Eats, the company’s food delivery platform. Aside from the additional income, opting for a staffing job can also break the monotony of driving the whole day.
Sources have reported that the Uber Works project had an initial trial run in Los Angeles before being developed further in Chicago.
There’s no word yet on when Uber Works would be formally launched. However, the company is said to have alreadystarted its recruitment drive. Job ads stating that a Chicago-based special projects team is looking for applicants that have a “strong interest in the on-demand labor space” have already been posted.
Uber Works will reportedly operate in the same vein as Freight and Uber Eats. The former connects shippers with the appropriate truckers. The latest “internal start-up” will fall under the office of Rachel Holt, the present head of Uber’s “new modalities” department. Holt’s division is in charge of the company’s multi-modal transportation drive. Aside from ride-sharing, the department is also expanding into scooters and bike sharing.
On-demand staffing is said to be among the numerous initiatives Holt’s division is studying. However, there’s no guarantee that Uber Works or any of these other projects will become the main business line.
The recent massive data breach at Facebook have brought to focus that if one of largest technology companies in the world can have their data compromised then any company, regardless of the security measures they may have in place is also vulnerable. This included sectors such as healthcare, banking, and transportation.
The CEO of Rapid7, a company which offers vulnerability management solutions, says that cybercriminals have recently realized that data is money and that vulnerabilities are happening because of our speed of innovation. This is compounded because almost all companies are in essence becoming software companies.
Corey Thomas, Rapid7 President and CEO, discussed the challenges of cybersecurity on CNBC this morning:
Cybersecurity Attacks Affecting the Fundamentals of Business
What we’re finding is that more and more things are actually causing people to really understand that cybersecurity attacks are going to affect the fundamentals of the business. I think with Facebook, it was the additional layer of so much turmoil and scrutiny already that it’s just another sign that it’s going to be troubling days ahead.
I was surprised by the recent breach in some ways because of how seriously Facebook takes security. On the other hand, when you look at the details of the breach it was completely understandable. They have lots of technologists, they’re moving fast, and the compromise itself and the vulnerability itself was the interplay of a whole bunch of different errors that actually went wrong at the same time.
We Have Not Designed Our Technology Ecosystem to be 100% Secure
One way to think about it is that we have not designed our technology ecosystem to be a 100 percent sure and secure. We value speed and one of the reasons that so many companies are successful is because they’re fast at building technology that all of us love and adopt and use. The side effect of that, unfortunately, is that speed comes at a cost.
Speed of Innovation Raises Security Risks
I don’t know if we’ll be able to put the speed of innovation genie back in the box. I do think we’re going to have to raise standards and I think there are lots of fundamental things that people can and should be doing.
What actually scares me more are not the Facebook’s of the world, because I think Facebook and many companies have good security. It’s the fact that our entire economy is becoming more digital and frankly most of the companies that are starting to actually turn their services into technologies that are digitally connected are just not as sophisticated with security as a company like Facebook.
Almost Every Company is Becoming a Software Company
If you look at healthcare and the transportation ecosystem we’re connecting more and more aspects of our lives and we’re turning them into compute. You have a bunch of companies in the software industry which just ten years ago used to be an industry of relatively few names in the overall ecosystem.
If you look toward the next ten years, almost every company is becoming a software company in some way.
Cybercriminals Have Recently Realized that Data is Money
Banks have been focused on security for longer because they’ve been the targets of fraud people have always gone after the money. You can argue that it’s a relatively recent focus area to realize that data’s money. That’s something that the internet companies realized 10 plus years ago and criminals have now realized that in the last five years, so that’s a change.
The other aspect of it is banks do innovate less. If you look at one of the biggest disruptions that are coming along now is the in the financial services sector and in the consumer financial services sector. I would argue that banks are having the other outcropping of that because they innovated a slower pace typically they are now being disrupted.
The automobile business has become a technology business with the advent of driverless cars that learn on their own via artificial intelligence. Now we have learned that Ford is involved in working on a cloud-based central monitoring system that will revolutionize transportation. There are privacy implications too, where governments will know where your car is at 24 hours a day.
From a technology standpoint, this cloud system will help prevent accidents, keep traffic moving, enable smart intersections and promote environmental advantages by bringing more efficiency to every transport mile.
Ford’s advantage in the future is that it’s got in its hand in three technologies that have been transformative. The first is the nature of propulsion which is moving from gas to electric. It might surprise you that less than 5 percent of the market right now is electric, but it’s estimated to be 30 percent in the near future.
The second technology has to do with robotics. You’ve heard about AI where the vehicle is so smart that it can drive itself in the future. The third technology, which isn’t as public, is the notion of a cloud-based system over the vehicles. The confluence of the three of these technologies means that we can now design transportation systems differently and with a system that enables and empowers a better CO2 outcome.
A New Cloud-Based System Being Developed to Control All Driverless Cars
This cloud-based structure is something that hasn’t been here and what it allows is the vehicle and the city to now have a connection. I was in a discussion yesterday with Prime Minister Trudeau and he asked while we were sitting in a traffic light late in the evening when there is nobody in the intersection, why does the red light stay on. In the future, the vehicle will be mediated through intersections like that with this smart system.
If you are an investor looking at this it will be over an $11 trillion industry. This is why the tech industry is so interested in our business because it’s a systems play of the smart technologies of the vehicle and the environment coming together. It’s talking about building bandwidth so the vehicles can communicate, 5G is really important. It’s also about making smart intersections so that the navigation of the vehicles are safe.
Then a third idea is parking where we can have the vehicle communicate with parking spaces. You lose more fuel efficiency trying to find a parking space than you do being stuck in traffic.
Combination of Vehicles and Technology Now Defines the Car Business
I look at the car business as a combination of vehicles and technology which is what’s defining it in the future, versus just thinking about it as a pure vehicle. Think of it this way, the cars have a number of computers and software in them today but the way they are in the future is really rolling computers. You have to think of the business differently because of that.
Ford Committed to be “In Market” with a Driverless Car by 2021
Ford is committed by 2021 to be in market with a driverless electric car. But this is a marathon, the cars will be super smart and they learn. The way they learn is by being driven. When they hit the market they will be safe, probably have narrow assignments as to what they can do, but over time they will expand.
The great thing is that when you hear about serving the world, this is going to allow us to do things because the vehicle is intelligent, like getting goods to people that couldn’t get it, helping people have jobs that don’t have transportation today or helping take older people to the doctor. This kind of assistance will be available with that technology.
This aspect of the car business is one where there is no profit yet, the technology is new, the design of the systems is emerging, but it’s where all the future will be.
Congress is set to approve a Federal Aviation Administration bill that authorizes a significant increase in spending for the FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation (AST). However, what has brought excitement to astrophysicists and space enthusiasts is the provision on spaceports.
Per SpaceNews, this requires AST to develop a report on spaceport policies, including recommendations on government actions to “support, encourage, promote, and facilitate greater investments in infrastructure at spaceports.”
“The bill creates a category of commercial spaceflight vehicles known as “space support vehicles” that cover parts of launch vehicles systems flying for other purposes, such as training or testing. Such vehicles would include the aircraft used by air-launch systems. The bill allows commercial flights of space support vehicles without the need for a full-fledged airworthiness certificate from the FAA.” – SpaceNews
Renowned astrophysicists, author, and TV host Neil deGrasse Tyson is very excited that the United States is finally getting serious again about space, following the seeming lack of interest by Obama and previous administrations. Many space exploration supporters including Tyson believe this spaceport focus “should have been in progress decades ago”.
Neil deGrasse Tyson spoke to Fox Business News about the spaceport announcement:
In my field, we are overwhelmingly liberal and anti-war. Yet, the entire history of my field goes back to the service of military conquest, hegemony, and empire building. We were the ones who knew how to navigate the night’s sky and how to apply those navigational tools to the earth’s surface, enabling for you to find out what countries you want to conquer or to colonize. There have been astronomers sitting next to explorers right from the beginning.
Just look at GPS, something that started out as a military intended utility has now become a fundamental driver of so many elements of our modern economy from Uber to Tinder. So this relationship is long and deep.
There’s a lot of interesting things going on today with the FAA’s announcement that they want to stimulate and promote spaceports and commercial access to space. That really should have been in progress decades ago. This is important because you need someone to think it through from the beginning so if and when it becomes a thing there has been a lot of intelligent analysis regarding the safety of who’s sending you to space, regarding the safety of who’s down range from whatever is launched, and the safety of your duration in space.
Think of what the FAA has done for us to this day. We have one of the safest aviation records the world has ever seen. You want that to also be true for any activities that occur in space, especially space tourism, which will get you the average person taking these trips rather than just the flyboy macho person who will take the 50 percent risk of dying. You want to turn this into something that people might want to do.
The first trillionaire will be the person who exploits space resources on asteroids, comets, etc…
A recent LinkedIn employment report has revealed that the US job market is hale and hearty. The country’s unemployment rate is down across the board while hiring is 4.5% higher when compared to this same time last year. While the news certainly is encouraging, the report also underlines the challenges that small businesses are facing with regards to hiring and keeping the right people.
Numbers Point to Good News
Aside from the news that hiring rates are high and unemployment rates are down, the LinkedIn Workforce Report for June alsorevealed some interesting specifics. For instance, there’s a 12.4% increase in hiring in cities that rely heavily on the oil industry. Tech firms, financial and insurance services, architecture and engineering firms, and automotive and transportation companies are also hiring more people.
However, there are also several cities where the demand for skilled workers is simply not being met. These cities include Austin, Washington DC, the San Francisco Bay Area, New York, Los Angeles, and Seattle. Conversely, Hartford, Miami-Ft. Lauderdale and West Palm Beach have thriving communities of skilled workers, making it easy for small and big businesses to fill their employment requirements.
The LinkedIn study isn’t the only one touting these numbers.Reuters has also reported that job growth in the US went up in May while the unemployment rate dropped to 3.8 percent, an 18-year low for the country. Total payrolls rose to 223,000 and the average hourly earnings have increased by 0.3 percent month-to-month.
The report does paint a rosy outlook for American households. Tom Porcelli, Chief US Economist of RBC Capital Markets admits the news aboutunemployment rates “literally checks off all the right boxes.” He also said that they have been looking for any negatives about the findings but admits that so far, they haven’t found anything.
What it Means for Small Businesses
The LinkedIn report doesn’t mean everything’s smooth sailing though. One key takeaway from it is the fact that with more businesses hiring, the labor market has become a tight one. This means companies are fighting for a workforce that’s steadily growing smaller.
The labor shortage means that the majority of businesses will have no other option but to increase wages in order to attract the workers they need and keep the ones they want. This is good news on the side of the employees, as it implies that salary growth is picking up.
Unfortunately, not all small businesses can go head to head with bigger and more established companies who have better financial backing. This year’s Randstad US Salary Guide says that wages have risen by as much as 3% across different industries, a rate that not all small businesses can meet.
Low unemployment rates also mean small companies will start to lose out on business. A Federal Reserve survey showed that in some states, restaurants struggle to find waiters and cooks while construction and manufacturing companies simply can’t find workers, regardless of whether they’re skilled or not. This lack of workers has translated to rising production costs, as well as canceled or delayed projects.
So what can small businesses do to attract skilled workers? Aside from matching the going rate, they can offer an incentive program or a profit sharing option. Work from home options and extensive training can also be used to sweeten the deal. In short, small businesses would have to be more creative with their perks.
In the early 2000s, only established companies or enterprises could afford to conduct webinars. However, in more recent years, advances in teleconferencing have made hosting a webinar more feasible for small businesses and even solopreneurs.
It’s clear that webinars are one of the more effective and useful online marketing tools today. Industry analysts have also determined that as businesses continue to use more video and incorporate social media into their marketing strategies, webinars will continue to be a trend. But how can you use this technology to attract more customers and sell more products?
Explaining the Webinar
A webinar, or “web seminar,” is a video conference conducted over the web. It utilizes the internet to connect the host (person conducting the webinar) to the audience (viewers and listeners).
Webinars can be conducted in several ways. The hosts can choose to show themselves on camera during a live presentation or switch their screens to show demonstrations or slideshows. The webinar could also just be an audio presentation and speakers from different locations can be invited to co-host.
Instead of using the technology for seminars, businesses, schools, and other organizations can also use it to give lectures. As a matter of fact, 2 out of 3 webinars are used for educational purposes. According toClickmeeting’s research, 40 percent of webinars are staff training, how-tos, and product training while 15 percent are e-learning classes and online education courses. It could also be used as a promotional presentation to launch or sell a product and connect with new customers.
Why Webinars are Popular
The webinars rise in popularity is due to one very simple fact—it’s very effective in getting your message across.
Webinars can be utilized to provide fundamental training for employees at a lower cost. Instead of paying for a conference or class just for continuing employee education, companies can offer a free webinar. It provides the same knowledge that employees would get from a conference without having to shoulder transportation or food expenses.
This marketing tool is also very effective in allowing customers to interact with content. Customers who sign up for a webinar can quickly provide feedback or ask the company questions. More importantly, content is delivered in real-time.
How to Boost Sales with Webinars
Webinars have so much potential to do your company good. Conversely, it also has the capacity to do some damage if it’s not done right. Here are some suggestions onhow you can conduct a webinar that will boost conversions.
1. Make it Engaging With Visuals
Visuals are the way to go if you want your webinar to be engaging and memorable. People prefer infographics over bullet points, as the former is easier to understand and more interesting to look at. This has been proven to be true on social media, as more users click or shared posts with images. For example, Facebook posts with images reportedly received 87 percent of engagement among users while Tweets with images receive 18 percent more clicks that ones that on have text.
2. Keep Audience Interest Up
Webinars typically run for about an hour, with half of that time devoted to getting your message across. You want to keep your audience interested throughout the entire seminar. Remember that you can quickly lose the attention of your audience if your presentation is boring or has too many instances of inactivity.
One way to keep things lively is to opt for an interactive presentation. For instance, ask the attendees to answer a poll or write something down every 15 minutes or so. Entertain live callers who ask questions. Not only will this liven things up, it also makes the session sound more conversational.
3. Practice, Practice, Practice
Practicing a speech or a presentation, even one you’ve done a thousand times before, is always a good idea. Go over your notes and check your visuals a few days or hours before you air your webinar. Rehearse with a colleague or a friend. Record yourself. Doing these things will give you the chance to identify possible problems with your material or how you present it.
4. Keep it Fun With Freebies
Freebies and bonuses make life fun. Offering the audience a chance to win a prize will incentivize them and keep them engaged. The rewards don’t even have to be big or expensive. Cash, gift cards, discounts or a private consultation with you or one of your expert staff will suffice.
Don’t underestimate the power of webinars. If you’ve never considered using this marketing tool, perhaps 2018 is the year to give it try.
Intel CEO Brian Krzanich told his Keynote audience at CES that data has now become the foundation of innovation. Data started as a static tool used by companies to see trends and process information, but it has now reached the point where it is the critical element that is driving technology and is revolutionizing all aspects of society.
Below is an excerpt of Krzanich’s talk about data’s amazing impact on our world.
Data is Driving the Technology Revolution
Data is the unseen driving force behind the next wave of the technology revolution. In fact I think it is even bigger. Data is going to introduce social and economic changes that we only see perhaps once or twice in a century.
In the 19th Century we saw this change with the combustion engine. That led to the rise of the automobile which ushered in the modern transportation system of trains, cars and planes. Just 50 years ago we saw another inflection point with the creation of the integrated circuit and the rise of the semiconductor industry. This is the story of Moore’s Law which has shaped every aspect of modern technology. We need to think about data changing our society in the same way.
It is Time to Rethink the Importance of Data
Data will redefine how we experience life in our work, at home, in school, and even how we enjoy sports and entertainment. It’s going to make possible experiences that know one has even started to imagine. I think the time has come for us to entirely think about the importance of data differently. The breakthrough came from computing power. Computing has become so fast and so powerful that we can now generate and capture information capable of prediction, decision making, recognition, and even thinking.
What Do We Mean by Data?
Let’s start with some basics. Almost everything associated with technology generates data. Any device with a plug, every email, every podcast, every picture you post on Instagram, and even the blog you are writing about this Keynote tonight. All of it creates and shares an incredible amount of data, and it’s all connected. Today, the cloud is filled with billions of bytes of data, going from our devices to the data center and back again. We’ve created literally a flood of data.
That’s really staggering, by 2020 the average person will generate one and a half gigabytes of data a day, which is about 2 times what a person creates today! That’s small in comparison to an autonomous car which will generate about 4 terabytes of data per day, or 2,500 times the data a person will generate. A connected airplane will generate about 40 terabytes a day and a smart factory will generate 1 petabyte of data per day. That’s the equivalent of 700 thousand people.
That data is moving all around us at an unimaginable speed. That speed allows the device in your hand to make decisions in an instant, and this is a big shift in how edge devices provide value.
All Technology Starts with Data
There was a time when data was something that was stored and processed and very carefully shared. Some businesses would analyze that data and that led to some pretty interesting insights, but basically data was a static commodity. All that has shifted in just the last few years. Today, data is the foundation of innovation.
Almost everything you will see here at CES, virtual reality, smart cities, autonomous driving, and above all artificial intelligence, all start with data. People have been writing about artificial intelligence since the 1950’s, but what we are seeing emerge today is a rush of breakthroughs using data and AI. This includes facial recognition, devices controlled by voice commands, robots, autonomous vehicles, and even art itself.
Art and space are just two examples of how data is going to reshape our world. Devices operated by voice command, visual intelligence and precision medicine… I spent my whole life watching technology dramatically leap forward, and the advances with data and AI we’ll see in the coming years will dwarf all of that.
If you are impressed in what you see today, well stay tuned. We are still discovering new ways to apply the power of artificial intelligence and data and these discoveries will impact almost every sector and that is what is meant to reimagine data.
Watch Intel CEO Brian Krzanich’s full CES keynote below:
Amazon’s decision to build a second headquarter has resulted in a bidding frenzy, with the company amassing 238 proposals.
Bidders for the project come from at least 43 states, with the Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia also showing interest. Three Mexican states and seven Canadian provinces also tendered their bid. Selection for Amazon’s second headquarters campus (HQ2) will be made next year.
Amazon has set some pretty high standards for the project though. The company described their ideal location to be in a city with at least a million citizens and is near an international airport. The location should also have an environment that’s stable and business-friendly.
The promise that the winning state’s local economy will receive a major boost and secure as much as 50,000 high-paying jobs have pushed city administrators to put on their thinking caps. Thesubmitted video proposals range from the creatively brilliant to the downright strange but inventive. Here are some of the more memorable ones:
Talent and Diversity in Philly
There’s no denying that Philadelphia is one of the most diverse regions and the city is proud of it. Its proposal to Amazon definitely shows this as its pitch focused on the city’s deep cultural diversity. The clip also aimed for a human element as it showcased vital business and community leaders to emphasize local talent.
Vibrant Las Vegas
The city’s 5-minute pitch is the longest video proposal Amazon has received. It comes as no surprise though as Las Vegas boasts of a dizzying range of industries and activities. The resulting proposal is an overwhelming barrage of facts and videos crammed in one clip.
Moving to Detroit
Detroit’s Move Here pitch is one of the more compelling proposals of the lot. The video’s clean and crisp visuals and lyrical narration tugs at the heartstrings and celebrate the city’s tenacity in climbing back to greatness.
It’s the Bottom Line for Boston
No one can claim to be surprised that Boston opted to forgo the frills and just state the facts. The city’s video pitch emphasized how the region’s infrastructure would be beneficial to Amazon. The sleek but short clip underlined key points like the city’s public transportation and tracts of open land.
Forging Ahead in Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh is another city that opted to go for realism and facts instead of flowery statements and visuals. The city’s video pitch highlighted Pennsylvania’s tenacity and strength, which can be seen in its companies to its workers. The short clip unabashedly admits to the city falling on hard times and how it’s now clawing back up, thanks to technology. It’s a move and a mindset that the e-commerce icon would no doubt appreciate.
Arizona’s Prickly Proposal
Of course, there was no dearth of bewildering proposals as well. Tucson decided that the best way to capture Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos’ attention was to go big. It did so by sending Amazon a 21-foot saguaro cactus. A representative of Arizona’s main economic agency, Sun Corridor, explained the massive cactus was a symbol of the long-term growth the company can enjoy if it chooses to build HQ2 in the state.
Stonecrest, Georgia is pulling all stops in its bid to convince the company to build HQ2 in the area. Stonecrest doesn’t meet one of the company’s key requirement – that of having more than a million citizens – but it’s not letting that detail stop it. Stonecrest’s City Council is hoping that the idea of renaming 345 acres of de-annexed land Amazon would be enough to catch Bezos’ interest.
It’s not surprising thatcities are thinking outside the box. After all, Amazon will be investing $5 billion outright in the design and construction of its new headquarters. There’s also the possibility that the region will see the influx of tens of thousands of staff members. The company would also build its workforce from the area itself, a move that will provide employment opportunities for countless people.
In what is being touted as the “Olympics of the corporate world,” Amazon has set off a ferocious bidding war among North American cities to host the online retailer’s second headquarters. While deals of this kind are usually done behind the scenes, Amazon has publicly solicited bids from cities to become the location of its second home, dubbed as “HQ2.” As a result, cities are now trying their best to outdo each other to come up with enough enticing perks to woo the internet firm.
And it’s not hard to understand why cities would be motivated to bag Amazon’s HQ2. Aside from the prestige of having one of the world’s largest firms, the chosen city’s economy would receive a giant boost from the $5 billion Amazon intends to invest in the project.
But that’s not all. The biggest impact would come from the high-paying jobs that Amazon’s second headquarters will create. According to the company’s solicitation, it plans to hire around 50,000 full-time employees for the new location with annual salary projected to be in the $100,000 range.
With a month to go before the October 19, 2017, deadline, the list of cities vying for Amazon’s HQ2 has ballooned to over 100. Currently, the top contenders include Austin, Boston, Chicago, Denver, New York, Toronto, and Ottawa.
Amazon has revealed some requirements for a city to qualify as a possible second headquarter location. For instance, the company prefers a metro area with over a million in population. Accessibility for transportation and communication are also important as the company requires that a city should be close to an international airport, with a mass transit system in place, must be located near a major highway and must have good internet access.
Since every business must have an eye trained on its bottom line, Amazon states that it prefers a “stable and business-friendly environment.” It is probably the company’s way of saying that an attractive financial incentive–which could include reduced business fees, grants for relocation and some tax cuts–will be a major factor in its final decision, adding that “the initial cost and ongoing cost of doing business are critical decision drivers.”
Understandably, cities are trying to highlight their strengths along the lines of Amazon’s requirements. For instance, Aurora Economic Development Council VP Yuriy Gorlov asserts that “Colorado is perfectly aligned with the company’s culture of collaboration and innovation and focusing on its customers.” Meanwhile, Scott Levitan or North Carolina-based Research Triangle Foundation says “We have sites that are ready, that are transit-oriented. We have tremendous fiber backbone at our site and we have a region that is absolutely focused on being the best possible location for HQ2.”
But not everyone is very optimistic about the prospect of living next door to a global behemoth. One major concern is that the swarm of high-paying Amazon workers will eventually wreak havoc on the local standard of living, driving up the cost of housing and exerting an upward force on wages which is bad for local businesses, according to Globe columnist Evan Horowitz as quoted by Business Insider.
And then there is the company’s approach that had some quarters fuming. According to Los Angeles Times’ Michael Hiltzik, “The company’s approach is arrogant, naive and more than a teensy bit cynical. Rather than be offered bribes to move its headquarters into a community, Amazon should be made to pay for the privilege.”
Tesla is still the recognized leader in the autonomous vehicle concept on the strength of its Model S and Model X. But the new partnership between Google’s Waymo and Lyft aims to give Elon Musk a run for his money.
The two Silicon Valley companies have agreed to unify their resources and expertise to commercialize self-driving cars.
A spokesperson for Lyftsaid, “Waymo holds today’s best self-driving technology, and collaborating with them will accelerate our shared vision of improving lives with the world’s best transportation.”
The partnership was also confirmed by a spokesperson for Waymo who remarked, “Lyft’s vision and commitment to improving the way cities move will help Waymo’s self-driving technology reach more people, in more places.”
Waymo may possess the “best technology” since its self-driving cars are already averaging 5,000 miles without any human help, according to a report from the California DMV. In contrast, GM’s Cruise Automation is only averaging in the “hundreds of miles.”
However, Waymo does not have the knowledge on transportation networking to really make the jump between the deployment of its automated cars and mass commercialization. This is where Lyft will come in.
For those who are not familiar with Lyft, it’s similar to Uber but targets ordinary drivers looking to make some extra buck as partners. Customers also pay through the company’s app, but while the tip is already integrated into the final cost for Uber, Lyft asks users to add the tip through its app.
By the end of the year, Lyft will beavailablein 300 key US cities.
But this partnership will be beneficial not just for Google’s Waymo, but Lyft as well. It’s not an accident that people have not heard about Lyft because it comes a distant second to Uber. For instance, the company only has a $5 billion market valuation compared to Uber’s $68 billion.
The problem with ride-sharing networks is their heavy dependence on their partner drivers in order to scale up their business. In fact, drivers—along with the vehicles and fuel—make up 85% of the cost. Uber has the money to invest on a grand scale to cut the difference, a luxury that Lyft does not possess.
One solution is to cut the human drivers and go fully automated, the reportsaid. Instead of sharing the revenues with their human partners, they can quickly recoup their investments by operating an automated fleet.
Facebook announced today a new feature for it’s Safety Check called Community Help, which makes it easier for people to find and offer help to others needing food, housing or transportation during or after a regional crisis such as an earthquake, flood or other disaster.
“Our belief is that the community can teach us new ways to use the platform,” noted Naomi Gleit, VP Social Good for Facebook. “We saw people using Facebook to tell friends and family they were OK after crises, so in 2014 we launched Safety Check to make that behavior even easier. Since then, Safety Check has been activated hundreds of times, but we know we can do more to empower the community to help one another.”
Facebook Safety Checks are an alert allowing people to mark themselves as safe during times of a regional emergency. When Facebook’s algorithm notices a surge in posts about a crisis near you a safety check is triggered which then prompts all Facebook users within the crisis area with a notification and link to mark yourself as safe.
Gleit says that Community Help will initially be available for natural and accidental incidents, such as an earthquake or building fire, with plans to add additional types of disasters later upon evaluation of how the new feature is used. The feature is launching in the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, India and Saudi Arabia.
For the community to use Community Help after an incident, Safety Check must first be activated. For Safety Check to activate, two things need to happen:
First, global crisis reporting agencies NC4 and iJET International alert Facebook that an incident has occurred and give it a title, and we begin monitoring for posts about the incident in the area.
Second, if a lot of people are talking about the incident, they may be prompted to mark themselves safe, and invite others to do the same.
And starting today, if an incident is a natural or accidental disaster, people will see Community Help. They can find or give help, and message others directly to connect from within Safety Check.
Amazon had a record Christmas and its own Alexa devices, Echo Dot, Fire TV Stick, Fire tablet and Amazon Echo, lead the way. Sales were up over last year’s holiday season an amazing 9 times.
“Echo and Echo Dot were the best-selling products across Amazon this year, and we’re thrilled that millions of new customers will be introduced to Alexa as a result. Despite our best efforts and ramped-up production, we still had trouble keeping them in stock. From turning on Christmas lights and playing holiday music to shopping for gifts and asking for help with cookie recipes, Alexa continues to get smarter every day,” commented Jeff Wilke, CEO Worldwide Consumer, Amazon. “We couldn’t have made this holiday season possible for customers without the dedication and hard work of our customer service, transportation, and fulfillment associates along with our carrier partners – it’s amazing to see the teams come together to serve customers during the holidays. On behalf of Amazonians all around the world, we wish everyone happy holidays and the very best for the coming year.”
Prime was huge for Amazon this season, with over 1 billion items shipped for free to Prime Members worldwide. Another interesting tidbit is that Amazon recorded its fastest shipped item on Christmas Eve at 13 minutes from order to delivery that was most likely a last minute gift for a loved one. The order included a Tile Slim Item Finder and a Tile Mate Key Finder.
The last Prime Now order delivered in time for the holiday was delivered at 11:59 p.m. on December 24, 2016 to a Prime member in Irvine, California. The order included a Heated Mattress Pad, NyQuil and Afrin Nasal Spray.
Here is Amazon’s full release of holiday shopping data points:
Holidays with Alexa:
Alexa helped mix hundreds of thousands of cocktails this holiday season with Tom Collins and Manhattans being the most requested drinks from skills like The Bartender, Mixologist and DrinkBoy.
Chocolate chip and sugar cookies were the favorite recipes from Alexa skills like Food Network and Allrecipes.
Home Alone and Elf were the most requested holiday movies with Alexa.
Alexa helped play millions of holiday songs this year, and the top songs were Jingle Bells (1999 – Remaster) by Frank Sinatra, All I Want for Christmas Is You by Mariah Carey and Feliz Navidad by José Feliciano.
What was Alexa asked to cook? The most popular cooking tips requested on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day were turkey, prime rib and chocolate chip cookies.
Who played the most holiday music with Alexa? Customers in Seattle, New York and Chicago asked “Alexa, play holiday music” more than any other city in the U.S.
Who turned on Christmas Lights the most with Alexa? Customers in Seattle, San Diego and New York asked, “Alexa, turn on Christmas lights” more than any other city in the U.S.
What games were the most requested with Alexa this holiday? Alexa entertained families with popular games like Jeopardy!, Twenty Questions and The Magic Door.
Amazon Prime:
More than one billion items shipped worldwide with Prime and Fulfillment by Amazon this holiday season.
More people around the world tried Prime this holiday season than any previous year.
The fastest Prime Now delivery on Christmas Eve took 13 minutes and was delivered at 9:05 p.m. to a Prime member in Redondo Beach, California. The order included a Tile Slim Item Finder and a Tile Mate Key Finder.
December 23, 2016 was the biggest day ever for Prime Now deliveries worldwide and members ordered 3x more items compared to last year with one and two hour delivery worldwide. Echo Dot, Amazon Echo, Fire TV Stick and Oreo Cookies were some of the most popular items ordered that day in the U.S.
The last Prime Now order delivered in time for the holiday was delivered at 11:59 p.m. on December 24, 2016 to a Prime member in Irvine, California. The order included a Heated Mattress Pad, NyQuil and Afrin Nasal Spray.
Prime members in Dallas, Texas ordered more items with Prime Now than any other city in the U.S. this holiday season.
The last Prime FREE Same-Day Delivery order from Amazon.com that was delivered in time for Christmas was ordered at 10:23 a.m. on December 24, 2016. The order included Venum Contender Boxing Gloves, and was delivered to a Prime member in Richmond, Virginia at 2:42 p.m. – the same day.
Mobile Shopping:
More than 72 percent of Amazon customers worldwide shopped using a mobile device this holiday.
Shopping on the free Amazon mobile app grew by 56 percent this holiday, worldwide.
On Cyber Monday, Amazon customers worldwide purchased about 46 electronics per second on a mobile device.
On Cyber Monday, Amazon customers worldwide purchased about 36 toys per second on a mobile device.
Amazon Operations:
December 19 was the peak worldwide shipping day this holiday season.
In the U.S., more than 200,000 full-time and seasonal associates made the record-breaking shipping season possible.
In the last two years, Amazon launched operations at over a dozen new facilities, many of which house robotic technology.
Amazon fulfillment centers in San Marcos, Texas and Kent, Washington, as well as two Polish fulfillment centers, in Poznan and Wroclaw, shipped more than one million items in a single day.
There are now 45,000 robotics units working alongside Amazon associates in more than 20 fulfillment centers.
Amazon Digital Media:
The most streamed Amazon Original Series over the holidays was Goliath.
The most streamed Amazon Original Movie over the holidays was Love & Friendship.
The most watched TV series (non-Amazon Original) streaming on Prime Video this holiday was The Night Manager.
The most watched movie (non-Amazon Original) streaming on Prime Video this holiday was Eye in the Sky.
Customers listening to holiday music on Amazon Music more than tripled this year, compared to 2015.
The most streamed holiday song on Amazon Music was It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year by Andy Williams.
Michael Bublé – Christmas was the most played holiday album on Amazon Music this season.
Amazon Music is the exclusive streaming home for all 16 studio albums by the best-selling solo artist in U.S. history, Garth Brooks – since his debut to streaming exclusively on Amazon, Brooks has become one of the top-streamed artists on Amazon Music.
The hours that kids spent interacting with educational content in Amazon FreeTime this holiday season was enough time to sail around the earth more than 6,000 times.
Popular FreeTime Unlimited holiday titles enjoyed by kids in the U.S. 2016 were Holiday Jokes (Hah-larious Joke Books), Elsa’s Ice Puzzles – FreeTime Unlimited Edition, and Caillou’s Winter Wonders.
The top foodie book Kindle customers are reading this holiday season is Anthony Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential, currently available in Kindle Unlimited.
The #1 magazine downloaded in Prime Reading in 2016 by Kindle customers was People.
The top non-fiction book downloaded in Prime Reading in 2016 was The 5 Love Languages: The Secret to Love that Lasts by Gary Chapman.
In 2016, more than 3 million readers took the Goodreads Challenge and read a collective 38.1 million books this year.
Authors answered more than 26,000 reader questions on Goodreads in 2016.
The highest rated audiobook of 2016 on Audible is Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah, host of The Daily Show, and narrated by the author.
The bestselling audiobook of the year on Audible was The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins, narrated by Claire Corbett, Louise Brealey, and India Fisher.
Holiday Fun Facts:
Amazon.com customers purchased enough Hamilton: the Revolution collectible books and Hamilton albums to give every patron at the Richard Rodgers Theatre in New York City a copy for 96 consecutive shows.
Amazon.com customers purchased enough 4K TVs to reach the peak of Mount Everest more than 9 times.
Amazon.com customers purchased enough KitchenAid Mixers this holiday to make nearly 7.5 million cookies at once.
On Cyber Monday 2016, Handmade at Amazon saw a 200 percent increase in sales versus Cyber Monday 2015.
If each Amazon.com customer who purchased Pokémon Sun and Moon this holiday spent at least an hour a day playing the game since its release, our customers would have spent the equivalent of more than 24 thousand lunar cycles capturing Pokémon.
Amazon.com customers purchased enough copies of the Harry Potter: Complete 8-Film Collection to play consecutively for more than 300 years.
Amazon.com customers purchased enough Hasbro Connect 4 Games this holiday season to give each resident of Dallas, Texas a single disc from the game.
Amazon.com customers purchased enough Sphero Star Wars BB-8 App-Controlled Robots to roll as a relay around the Earth more than two times before the batteries run out.
Amazon.com customers purchased enough Razor Jett Heel Wheels this holiday to roll a fully loaded space shuttle to the launch pad at Cape Canaveral.
Amazon.com customers purchased enough Wilson footballs this holiday to give every fan at a sold-out Seahawks game a chance to throw a pass like Russell Wilson.
Amazon.com customers purchased enough golf balls this holiday that, if lined up, would equal the length of Pebble Beach golf course four times over.
Amazon.com customers purchased more Marvin the Moose dog toys this holiday than the number of actual moose in New England.
Amazon.com customers purchased enough copies of The Secret Life of Pets that if each one were a tennis ball, they would fill Central Parkover two and a half feet deep.
Amazon.com delivered enough men’s jeans to fill one Olympic-size swimming pool.
Amazon.com customers purchased enough ugly Christmas sweaters for every seat at all three NCAA College Football Playoff games.
Amazon.com customers purchased enough running shoes to run 18,603 times around the globe.
Amazon.com customers purchased 2.5 million watches – that is a watch purchased every 1.5 seconds this holiday season.
Amazon.com customers purchased 10,451 carats of diamonds, which is equal to 6.5 Russian Kokoshnik Tiaras, one of the Queen of England’s most famous tiaras.
Amazon.com customers purchased the weight of a grizzly bear in gold and the weight of a rhinoceros in silver.
Amazon.com customers purchased enough Etekcity camp lanterns this holiday to replace the beacon lights on top of the Eiffel Tower nearly 11 times.
Amazon.com customers purchased enough luggage to fill 20 Boeing 747 airplanes.
Amazon.com customers purchased enough electric vehicle home charging kits to make 2,196 emissions-free trips around the globe in a year.
Amazon.com customers purchased enough Char-Broil’s The Big Easy Turkey Fryers to cook 225,000 pounds of turkey.
Holiday Best Sellers (Amazon.com only):
All Categories: Echo Dot, Fire TV Stick, Fire tablet, Amazon Echo
Amazon Launchpad: Watch Ya’ Mouth Family Edition – The Authentic, Hilarious, Mouthguard Party Game, Tile Mate – Key Finder. Phone Finder. Anything Finder., Anki Overdrive Starter Kit
Audio & Accessories: Panasonic ErgoFit In-Ear Earbud Headphones, AmazonBasics 6-Outlet Surge Protector Power Strip, Sonos PLAY:1 Compact Wireless Smart Speaker for Streaming Music
Baby: Baby Einstein Take Along Tunes Musical Toy, Nuby Octopus Hoopla Bathtime Fun Toys (Purple), Baby Banana Infant Training Toothbrush and Teether (Yellow)
Beauty & Grooming: Philips Sonicare Essence Sonic Electric Rechargeable Toothbrush (White), Philips Norelco Multigroom Series 3100 with 5 attachments, Oral-B Pro 1000 Power Rechargeable Electric Toothbrush Powered by Braun
Books: Diary of a Wimpy Kid # 11: Double Down, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them: The Original Screenplay, First 100 Words
Camera: Fujifilm Instax Mini 8 Instant Film Camera, AmazonBasics 60-Inch Lightweight Tripod with Bag, GoPro HERO5
Fashion: Levi’s Men’s 501 Original Fit Jean, Fossil Emma Large Zip RFID Wallet, kate spade new york Cedar Street Cami Convertible Cross-Body Bag
Grocery: The Original Donut Shop, Regular, Medium Extra Bold, Keurig K-Cups (72 Count), San Francisco Bay OneCup, Fog Chaser (80 Single Serve Coffees), KIND Nuts & Spices, Dark Chocolate Nuts & Sea Salt
Handmade: First Christmas in New Home Wood Ornament, Personalized Nameplate Gold Bar Necklace, World Travel Map Pin Board
Home: BLACK + DECKER 16V Cordless Lithium Hand Vac, Lasko Ceramic Heater with Adjustable Thermostat, Poo-Pourri Before-You-Go Toilet Spray 2-Ounce Bottle (Original Scent)
Home Improvement: WBM Himalayan Salt Lamp, 3M Indoor Window Insulator Kit, Woods Outdoor 24-Hour Photoelectric Timer
Home & Personal Care: AmazonBasics AA Performance Alkaline Batteries (48-pack), Bounty Select-a-Size Paper Towels, Huge Roll (12 Count), Cottonelle Ultra ComfortCare Big Roll Toilet Paper (12 Count)
Kitchen: RTIC 30 oz. Tumbler, Instant Pot 7-in-1 Multi-Functional Pressure Cooker (6 quart), Keurig K55 Single Serve Coffer Maker
Luxury Beauty: stila Stay All Day Waterproof Liquid Eye Liner, L’Occitane Shea Butter Hand Cream, BaBylissPRO Ceramix Xtreme Dryer
Movies: The Secret Life of Pets, Finding Dory, Harry Potter: Complete 8-Film Collection
Music (CDs & vinyl): A Pentatonix Christmas, Hamilton(Original Broadway Cast Recording),Blue & Lonesome
Musical Instruments: Blue Yeti USB Microphone, Kala Learn To Play Ukulele Starter Kit (Amazon Exclusive), Singing Machine Top Loading CDG Karaoke System with Sound and Disco Light Show
Outdoors: LifeStraw Personal Water Filter, Etekcity 2-pack Portable Outdoor LED Camping Lantern with 6 AA Batteries (Black, Collapsible), Yeti Coolers Rambler
Patio, Lawn & Garden: iDevices iGrill Mini, Bounty Hunter BHJS Junior Metal Detector, Snow Joe Telescoping Snow Broom with Ice Scraper
PC: SanDisk Ultra 32GB microSDHC UHS-I Card with Adapter, Seagate Expansion 1TB Portable External Hard Drive USB 3.0, AmazonBasics Mini DisplayPort (Thunderbolt) to HDMI Adapter
Pets: KONG Cozie Marvin the Moose Dog Toy Medium Dog Toy (Brown), GREENIES PILL POCKETS Soft Dog Treats, Chicken (Capsule, 15.8 oz), Fancy Feast Wet Cat Food – Gravy Lovers – Poultry & Beef Variety Pack, 3-Ounce Can (Pack of 24)
Sports: Spalding NBA Street Basketball, Bushnell Falcon 7×35 Binoculars w/ Case, Simply Fit Board
Tools: TEKTON 5941 Digital Tire Gauge, MagnoGrip 311-090 Magnetic Wristband, DEWALT DW2166 45-Piece Screwdriving Set with Tough Case
Toys & Games: Hasbro Pie Face Game & Pie Face Showdown Game, Scientific Explorer Mind Blowing Science Kit, Snap Circuits Jr. SC-100 Electronics Discovery Kit
TV: Samsung 32-Inch 1080p Smart LED TV, Avera 32-Inch 720p LED TV, Samsung 40-Inch 1080p Smart LED TV
Video Games: Pokémon Sun – Nintendo 3DS, Pokémon Moon – Nintendo 3DS, Final Fantasy XV – PlayStation 4
Grab, a Singapore based Uber type service, is so popular that if their IT infrastructure didn’t remain stable during peak usage transportation would literally ground to a halt. Grab is the leading ride sharing service in Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam and the Philippines.
“Grab is the leading ride sharing service in Southeast Asia,” says Ditesh Kumar, Director of Engineering at Grab. “We do 1.5 million bookings (a day). If we are not running basically transportation comes to a standstill.”
Kumar says that Grab has the biggest land fleet in Southeast Asia and that they are very concerned about uptime both for their passengers and their drivers, who he says depend on them for their livelihoods.
“With this comes two challenges, because of the tremendous amount of demand we need to scale, but because so many people depend on us, we need to stay stable.”
Scale and Stability are Two Opposing Forces
Kumar notes the difficulties of keeping your IT infrastructure stable while simultaneously scaling platform usage. “You can scale easily if you don’t have to be stable, and you can be very stable if you don’t have to scale.”
He says that the answer to this huge problem, after a lot of reflection, is addressing their infrastructure fundamentals.
“If we can make sure that our infrastructure is built not just for the needs of today, but also meets the needs of the future, it completely changes the types of conversations we have,” says Kumar.
That’s why Grab decided on the AWS infrastructure from the start. All of the AWS components he says are built to allow infinite scaling and are also extremely reliable.
Grab started out using a basic AWS setup but as they expanded they added the full gamut of AWS services in order to support their scaling needs. “We needed to start thinking about caching layers so we started using Amazon ElastiCache,” said Kumar.
They also started using Amazon Redshift, which is s petabyte-scale data warehouse service based in the cloud.
“It’s huge, it’s massive,” exclaimed Kumar. “Everybody in the company uses it. It’s not just the engineers, the product guys, the marketing team and the ATM team all use it.”
Real-Time Computation Requires Real-Time Data Streams
“In addition to that, we are doing real-time computation, and in order to do real-time demand and supply matching we need to have real-time data streams,” says Kumar.
“The end result is that our drivers will be told the demand is at this place right now, because with this high demand the drivers will be paid more.”
Building Predictive Models
Moving forward the company wants to build predictive models to make their service even more efficient for both passengers and drivers.
“In two hours time this area will have high demand and if you want to take advantage of that move to this area,” explains Kumar. “The way we can do that is by taking into account multiple factors, building data models around it and using the infrastructure to compute those models and come up with an actionable item.”
Why Grab is on AWS
Their are many benefits to being on the cloud,” says Kumar. “Such as not having to deal with physical issues, going down to a data center at 3am to the change a failed hard disk or deal with a server that is overheating because a fan has stopped rotating.”
He noted how companies of his size in the past had to have dedicated operational teams to deal with these sorts of issues. He sees little value in that for the organization and is not a great use for an engineering team. Grab gives every engineer an AWS account to run “full-blown experiments in their sub account” to look for potential problems.
“They would find things that might be a problem 3 months from now or six months from now, and giving engineers that ability is unparalleled,” he says. “I estimate that we have saved 30-40% of our resourcing and manpower that then went to serving our core focus, and our core focus is about serving our customers.”
He says this allowed our team to move significantly faster. “In the startup environment that is make-or-break!”
Driverless vehicles have the ability to literally change the world by making driving safer, more energy efficient, more accessible, and many will be happy to hear… eliminate congestion and gridlock. The government today made an important first step in truly making this possible.
“Today is an important moment at the Department of Transportation,” announced Anthony Foxx, US Secretary of Transportation. “We have issue record recalls, we still have too many people dying on our roadways and we have too many Moms and Dads stuck in traffic losing productive time with their families. In the 50 years of the Department of Transportation there has never been a moment like this.”
He added, “A moment where we can build a culture of safety as new transportation technology emerges that harnesses the potential to save even more lives and that will improve the quality of life for so many Americans. Today, we put forward the first Federal policy on automated vehicles. The most comprehensive national automated vehicle policy that the world has ever seen. It is a first of its kind.”
“It is taking us from the horseless carriage to the driverless car,” says Foxx. The policy is effective today, but the agency welcomes ongoing dialogue and will make changes as time goes on. “The focus on this technology will always be safety.”
The New Driverless Vehicle Policies
The new policies by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) will also let those “drive” without a drivers license, just like they do currently with Uber, Lyft and taxis. The government differentiates rules and regulations for cars requiring a driver and those that don’t.
If you were wondering, driverless cars will not have to have steering wheels or brake pedals. The agency says they have been charged with creating a path toward fully autonomous vehicles.
The 15 point assessment is designed to recognize that driverless vehicles are a rapidly changing and emerging technology. It does however, let the industry see a roadmap for how the government will deal with the regulatory environment for autonomous vehicles. Their goal is to build a safety culture now around autonomous vehicles, instead of as an afterthought.
The bottom line is that the NHTSA is extending its rulemaking authority to driverless vehicles.
Autonomous Vehicles Will End Drunk Driving
Also speaking during the announcement was the National President of Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD), Colleen Sheehey-Church, saying “over ten thousand people continue to die each year needlessly due to drunk driving.” She added, “A fully autonomous vehicle would stop a drunk drive simply because they can’t physically drive the vehicle.”
“I would also like to point out the driverless cars can do much more than simply stop drunk driving, these vehicles could potentially stop most of the traffic deaths in our country,” says Sheehey-Church. “A driverless car is not distracted, it ensures that the occupants are traveling at appropriate speeds and it would avoid pedestrians and bicyclists.”
“While improving safety, a driverless car would also create new mobility opportunities,” she said. “Older drivers who may be shut in or unable to drive may be able to drive at night again. Members of the disabled community who may not be able to drive could now have new opportunities for transportation like never before.”
“To that end, MADD is proud to support the new proposal on autonomous vehicles,” she said.
Watch the HAV Press Conference here:
Overview of Federal Automated Vehicles Policy
The Obama Administration today has released the first set of guidelines for fully autonomous vehicles called the Federal Automated Vehicles Policy. The 8 page policy release predicts a driverless car future that will create safer roads and many more energy efficient transportation options. Although the main focus of the new policy is about highly automated vehicles (HAVs), there are portions that also apply to lesser levels of automation such as the driver assist systems found in Tesla’s and other high end cars.
“We’re envisioning a future where you can take your hands off the wheel and the wheel out of the car, and where your commute becomes productive and restful, rather than frustrating and exhausting,” said Jeff Zients, who is Director of the National Economic Council and Assistant to the President for Economic Policy, in announcing the new policy.
The government sees autonomous vehicles as a way to leap current hurdles for the 4 million Americans who are living with a disability as well as older people who have difficulty seeing at night. They also view it as a way to make our society more fair and just, where vehicles are made assessable for all. They even believe that blind people will eventually be able to use driverless cars to get around, with innovative technology that will be developed to assist.
The policy guidelines which were developed over several years are a work in progress and will be updated annually with the goal of keeping the regulations up-to-date with the rapidly evolving technology.
Components of the Policy
Vehicle Performance Guidance for Automated Vehicles: The guidance for manufacturers, developers and other organizations outlines a 15 point “Safety Assessment” for the safe design, development, testing and deployment of automated vehicles.
Model State Policy: This section presents a clear distinction between Federal and State responsibilities for regulation of HAVs, and suggests recommended policy areas for states to consider with a goal of generating a consistent national framework for the testing and deployment of highly automated vehicles.
Current Regulatory Tools: This discussion outlines DOT’s current regulatory tools that can be used to accelerate the safe development of HAVs, such as interpreting current rules to allow for greater flexibility in design and providing limited exemptions to allow for testing of nontraditional vehicle designs in a more timely fashion.
Modern Regulatory Tools: This discussion identifies potential new regulatory tools and statutory authorities that may aid the safe and efficient deployment of new lifesaving technologies.
Vehicle Performance Guidance
The policy creates a 15-point Safety Assessment which outlines objectives on how to achieve a robust design. It allows for varied methodologies as long as the objective is met:
Operational Design Domain: How and where the HAV is supposed to function and operate;
Object and Event Detection and Response: Perception and response functionality of the HAV system;
Fall Back (Minimal Risk Condition): Response and robustness of the HAV upon system
failure;
Validation Methods: Testing, validation, and verification of an HAV system;
Registration and Certification: Registration and certification to NHTSA of an HAV system;
Data Recording and Sharing: HAV system data recording for information sharing,
knowledge building and for crash reconstruction purposes;
Post-Crash Behavior: Process for how an HAV should perform after a crash and how
automation functions can be restored;
Privacy: Privacy considerations and protections for users;
System Safety: Engineering safety practices to support reasonable system safety;
Vehicle Cybersecurity: Approaches to guard against vehicle hacking risks;
Human Machine Interface: Approaches for communicating information to the driver,
occupant and other road users;
Crashworthiness: Protection of occupants in crash situations;
Consumer Education and Training: Education and training requirements for users of
HAVs;
Ethical Considerations: How vehicles are programmed to address conflict dilemmas on
the road; and
Federal, State and Local Laws: How vehicles are programmed to comply with all
applicable traffic laws.
Model State Policy
The policy emphasizes that states will continue with their traditional responsibilities for vehicle licensing and registration, traffic laws and enforcement, and motor vehicle insurance and liability regimes while also carving out a new Federal role for autonomous vehicles. The goal is to not have states stepping all over themselves with a hodgepodge of rules, making it impossible for self-driving cars to drive between states.
The Federal responsibilities include setting safety standards and enforcing them, investigating safety issues and managing recalls, public education on driverless safety and communicating future guidance to the public in order to achieve national safety goals.
The Feds also created a regulatory framework model for states to follow in order to create a consistent approach to governing autonomous vehicles:
Application by manufacturers or other entities to test HAVs on public roads;
Jurisdictional permission to test;
Testing by the manufacturer or other entities;
Drivers of deployed vehicles;
Registration and titling of deployed vehicles;
Law enforcement considerations; and
Liability and insurance.
Current Regulatory Tools
Especially interesting is the governments forward looking approach in trying to make existing laws work to allow the use of driverless vehicles. This will be done via government agency reinterpretation of existing laws, using Letters of Interpretation, basically stretching them as far as they can go without changing their intent.
The policy is also going to use its current power to provide limited exemptions to vehicle manufactures to test new designs of cars that are not currently allowed. For instance, all cars must have a steering wheel, except that you don’t need one in a driverless car and it could even add danger because people could bump into it. Exemptions will allow manufacturers to bypass “buggy whip” rules that aren’t applicable in a vehicle that nobody is driving.
They have also created a path to more permanent ways to bypass old safety and design rules using a petition for rulemaking. This allows manufactures to adopt new standards, modify existing standards, or repeal an existing standard.
Modern Regulatory Tools
The new policy identifies new tools that could be created under current law while also laying the foundation for new laws requiring Congressional action. Within this section the policy is a first step toward reinventing laws and regulations of the world’s likely driverless future revolving around safety issues, software updates, regulation processes, record keeping and data sharing.
Data sharing is an area the self driving industry may not be too happy about. They are likely to focus their army of lobbyist on Congress to make sure they aren’t giving up their proprietary data that they have spent millions obtaining.
There will soon be a lot more business transactions happening within Facebook Messenger if a recent discovery buried within the app is any indication.
According to Forbes, a “forthcoming software release” will let users pay for goods in person or “pay directly in Messenger when you pick up the item,” effectively turning Messenger into another Wallet service.
It sounds like rather than trying to compete with Apple Pay, Android Pay, and the like, Facebook will work to partner with such existing payment services, which could go a long way toward getting people to actually use it. If it works with services people are already using, people may be more inclined to try it out. On the other hand, it’s unclear what reason they would have to do so if they are in fact already using the other service.
As Forbes notes, however, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said a couple months ago that the company would be willing to partner with other companies that do payments.
Zuckerberg said during the company’s earnings conference call (via Seeking Alpha’s transcript), “On payments, the basic strategy that we have is to make it especially in products like Messenger that where the business interaction maybe a bit more transactional, to take all the friction out of making the transactions that you need. So, we don’t view ourselves as a payments business, that’s not the type of company that we are. We’ll partner with everyone who does payment. We look at the stuff that Apple is doing with Apple Pay for example as a really neat innovation in the space that takes a lot of friction out of transactions as well. And our view is that the less friction, the better the user experience, the more people can easily interact with businesses that they care about. And ultimately for our business that will drive up the amount that businesses are willing to pay to advertise to send people into those interactions because they perform well. So it’s good for everyone but that’s how we think about that.”
During the call, Zuckerberg said with Messenger, they had been focused on two things. The first was expanding the the types of content people can share with the service. The other thing would be business.
“But in terms of the business, the more important piece is how people can interact with businesses through Messenger,” he said. “And we started some early small tests around f8 last year where with some ecommerce services made it so that people who were buying things could follow up with the business and get customer support and buy more things. And we went through this process of integrating that and making sure that it’s integrated with all these system well. And I think everyone is really happy with that so far. So we started off pretty slowly, but that’s going to be some of the basis for how we look to make Messenger a business going forward. And we’re happy with the initial results. There is obviously a lot more there that we need to do and we’ll have more to talk about this year and beyond.”
It was about a year ago that Facebook began allowing for P2P payments with Messenger.
As Zuckerberg alluded to, Facebook introduced some things at F8 last year. For one, they turned Messenger into a platform, and opened it to developers to build new experiences. Secondly, they revealed business features like the ability to let your customers connect with you via Messenger and then send them personalized updates and talk to them in real time.
In August, Facebook launched Pages Messaging, which gave customers more ways to send messages to businesses and ways for Page admins to manage and respond to them. People can send messages to Page from a local awareness ad. They’ll see a button that says “Send Message” from which they can initiate a onversation in a Messenger window that appears. For Pages, the incoming messages include an attachment that shows the ad that prompted the message. Once the user initiates the conversation, the business can respond as they like. They also started letting businesses respond via FB message to public comments.
Late last year, Facebook announced its Request a Ride service, which let users request, track, and pay for Uber rides all within Messenger. Messenger got new Lyft integration earlier this month as well. Now, you can also check into KLM flights with Messenger.
A December report found that Messenger is the fastest growing of the top apps in the U.S. It has 800 million people using it each month. Earlier this year, Facebook shared this infographic looking at last year’s additions to the product as well as trends for this year.
F8 is coming back on April 12, and the company is expected to make new announcements pertaining to Messenger’s progress and plans for business. This may very well include new payment partners.
Do you expect Messenger to be a valuable tool for business?
Storm, who appeared on Season 12 of the ABC show The Bachelor, was reportedly the only passenger in the private aircraft, which crashed right after taking off. Storm, 41, who got her pilot’s license from Pacific Blue Air, had been flying on her own since her solo flight in November last year, according to the Pacific Blue Air’s Facebook page.
Police reports said they were alerted that an airplane had crashed into the Hawthorne streets near 120th and Crenshaw, near the Hawthorne Municipal Airport at noon on Monday, March 21. The aircraft was reportedly on fire when police arrived on the crash site. A construction crew witnessed the incident and pulled Storm out of the damaged aircraft.
Erin Storm was immediately treated by the Los Angeles Fire Department and the medical team at the UCLA Medical Center in Carson but the reality star died.
Byron Mayes, an employee at nearby Best Drilling Pump Inc. also saw the Airborne XT-912 as it crashed a few feet from them.
“All of a sudden, my partner started yelling, ‘Watch out, there’s a plane coming! And it looked like the plane veered up, lost control and hit a couple feet away from the truck, a couple feet away from us,” he recalled.
FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board authorities are currently investigating the incident.
Friends of Storm’s have expressed their grief on her Facebook page.
The Bachelor star Matt Grant was “massively shocked” by her tragic death. Grant remembers Storm as a “genuine, self-assured, beautiful and hilarious” person.
Rebel Wilson hopes her recent experience in a bar serves as a warning to women everywhere. The Pitch Perfect 2 star took to Twitter to tell her followers all about her frightening incident.
Hey guys, but especially to all the girls out there, please be super careful about what you drink when out at clubs and bars at night X
Hopefully everyone–men and women–are mindful of Rebel Wilson’s experience. Keep drinks close at hand when out at bars. If something doesn’t seem right, go with your gut and arrange for safe transportation home.
DiDi Has a Lot of Advantages in Autonomous Vehicle Development
