Nokia Oyj plans to spend US$100 million backing companies that develop intelligent-car technologies, joining the likes of billionaire Elon Musk and Google Inc in betting that future vehicles will be smarter and more connected.
The investments, to be made by a new Nokia fund, are meant to support the mobile-technology company’s digital map business, Nokia said yesterday.
It will be run by Nokia’s venture-capital arm, Nokia Growth Partners, which manages about US$700 million.
Nokia is rebuilding itself and expanding to new fields after selling its mobile-phone unit to Microsoft Corp for about US$7.5 billion last month. While Nokia now gets most of its revenue from wireless-network equipment, the Espoo, Finland-based company is also seeking to make its maps business a stronger competitor against rivals, including Google.
“We’re seeing innovation that’s happening across the auto ecosystem through the combination of mobility and the Internet,” Paul Asel, a partner at the Nokia venture capital arm, said in an interview. “The car is really becoming a platform like when the mobile handset became a smartphone and all the apps and services developed around that.”
Nokia built its location-technologies business by buying Chicago-based map provider Navteq Corp for US$8.1 billion in 2008 and 3D map technology maker Earthmine Inc in 2012. Nokia provides map data to Amazon.com Inc, Microsoft, Yahoo Inc and four out of five car-navigation systems, a crucial segment as future connected-device systems use more location data.
Nokia discussed the new fund yesterday at the Global Mobile Internet Conference in Beijing.
Carmakers are introducing smarter dashboard navigation systems, adding features such as real-time traffic information and automated calls to emergency services in case of accident.
Manufacturers are also gradually adding automated-driving systems that may ultimately lead to self-driving vehicles. Mountain View, California-based Google has been testing driverless cars in the US.
Toyota Motor Corp said in October last year it would introduce systems in about two years that will enable cars to communicate with each other to avoid collisions. Detroit-based General Motors Co is planning vehicles by 2020 that will be able to drive themselves on controlled-access highways.
Musk, who leads California-based Tesla Motors Inc, said a year ago the electric-car maker is considering adding driverless technology to its vehicles, calling it a logical step in the evolution of cars.
Tesla vehicles already include Internet access and connections for services such as roadside assistance and stolen-vehicle location.
“People tend to look at BMW, Tesla and Google, but we think of this as a global play,” Asel said.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
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