With the first week of July coming to an end, we saw some real movement happening in the tech world. Here, we at IndianWeb2, list the top ten top happenings that took place in the world of tech.
1) Xiaomi To Acquire Key Patents of Nokia
In a move that surprised many in the mobile technology space, China’s Xiaomi and Finland’s Nokia came together this week to sign a business collaboration and patent licensing agreement which will see the Chinese tech major acquiring key patent assets from the Finnish mobile phone manufacturer.
The patent licensing deal, which is multi-year in nature, is inclusive of a cross license to each of the company’s cellular standard essential patents. The figures involved in the deal haven’t been disclosed by either of the parties yet.
As per the agreement signed between Nokia and Xiaomi, the Finnish Mobile phone manufacturer, which recently gave its classic 3310 a modern revamp, has agreed to provide its network infrastructure equipment, which was designed to deliver high capacity at low power requirements for large web providers and data centre operators.
The two companies will be coming together to work on IP routing based on Nokia’s recently announced ‘FP4’ network processor, a data centre fabric solution and optical transport solutions for data centre interconnect.
2) India, Israel Launch 5-Year Technology Fund To Further Business Ties
The India-Israel relationship has been in news this whole week courtesy Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Israel. And yesterday, the two nations further deepened their relationship by announcing the launch of a technology fund, the Israel India Innovation Initiative Fund, or I4F, that will focus towards growing the two countries’ business relations. In addition to the tech fund, the two countries also signed a total of seven accords aimed at boosting India and Israel’s cooperation in a number of crucial sectors right from agriculture and water to space research etc.
The Israel India Innovation Initiative Fund would see each government putting in a sum of $4 million a year for five years. The fund is aimed at encouraging Indians to invest in Israel’s technology ecosystem and attract large Indian companies into opening their development centres there.
3) Samsung is Developing Amazon Echo Competitor
South Korean tech giant, Samsung, which is considered as one of the biggest and best electronics manufacturers in the world, has decided to give Amazon Echo a run for its money. According to a recent article in theWall Street Journal (WSJ), the South Korean company is currently meticulously finishing up work on its very own voice-controlled home speaker, which could outdo the likes of Amazon Echo, Google Home, and other such devices scheduled to be launched over the next couple of months.
Since the project is still under wraps with no official word from the company, the specifics available about the tech are scarce, but the WSJ report did mention that there’s a high probability that the Samsung’s voice-controlled home speaker will be powered by Bixby, which is Samsung’s answer to Apple’s Siri and Amazon’s Alexa.
4) Soon A 100Gbps Submarine Cable System Connecting India To Asia, Africa, Europe
Reliance Jio, the name which took the Indian telecom sector by storm last year by gaining over 100 million 4G mobile subscribers in just over an year, has announced that it will soon be launching its very own submarine cable system with 100Gbps capacity. The new system will be linking Asia-Africa-Europe (AAE-1).
According to Reliance Jio, the AAE-1 system longest 100Gbps-technology based submarine system, and it will stretch over a distance of 25,000 km.
The new cable system will stretch from Marseille in France and go all the way to Hong Kong. There are going to be total of 21 cable landings across Asia and Europe.
Jio claims that the cable system’s design and route will ensure lowest latency routes between Hong Kong, India, Middle East and Europe. AAE-1 cable system deploys 100Gbps transmission technology, with a minimum design capacity of 40 Tbps.
5) Time For Dogmented Reality After Augmented Reality?
What started as an April Fools joke last year, is now turning into a reality, a Dogmented Reality. Yes, you read that right. The term “Dogmented reality” was coined by Meta last year as an April Fools gag, but little did it know that its foolish gag would turn into a full-blown reality for numerous pet lovers and smartphone users who cannot afford a real life pet due to financial reasons or several other reasons.
According to a tweet sent out on June 28th, 2017, from the Twitter account of Good Dogs Game app, which is a quite popular mobile game from the WeRateDogs, its Dogmented Reality app will be coming out soon to Apple’s ARKit and iOS11. If the announcement is true, it would take Dogmented Reality to a whole new level. With the ARKit coming into picture, dogs in the Dogmented Reality will soon be actually able to understand the real world environment and act/react according to it.
6) Bajaj Allianz Using Blockchain To Hasten Claims Settlement
Bajaj Allianz General, a private general insurance company in India, which is a joint venture between Bajaj Finserv Limited owned by the Bajaj Group of India and Allianz SE, a German financial services company, has decided to embrace this learning and make way for in trend technologies in order to provide their customers the best service possible. The company recently announced that they have started using Blockchain technology to provide people a smooth settlement process in the travel and motor segments.
Talking to Business Line, Sourabh Chatterjee, Head-IT, Web Sales and Digital Marketing, Bajaj Allianz General Insurance said that employing Blockchain technology has significantly helped the company in bringing down the current settlement turnaround time for some plans from days to just a few minutes, which is great for customers and the company alike.
7) Kado Is A Wall Charger That's Thinner Than Your Phone
A new charger called Kado is creating real buzz in the charger market. The charger, which is just over 0.2 inches (7mm) thick comes with a choice of an equally thin Lightning, USB-C, or Micro USB cable for charging convenience. The wall charger, which is currently seeking funding on Kickstarter, charges devices at up to 10W, and supports the QuickCharge 2.1A spec.
8) Indian Scientists Develops Mobile App for Colour-Blind and Visually Impaired Students
Indian scientists from Bandyopadhyay Lab, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) Kolkata have developed a smartphone app called Titration ColorCam that can help colour-blind and visually impaired students become independent and more active participants in their student life.
The idea of Titration ColorCam was conceived in an effort to develop a smartphone aid that would enable colorblind and visually impaired students to perform acid-base titration experiments in chemistry labs. The app analyzes the color changes involved in a titration, translates data into sound (beeps) and tactile (vibrations) feedback for detecting an endpoint.
To put it simply, the app provides a multi-sensory perception of colour change observed in a titration experiment, wherein a solution of known concentration is used to find out the concentration of an unknown solution.
9) Nandan Nilekani To Invest $10- $25 Million In Consumer and Enterprise Tech Startups
In what could be considered as a sure short good news for the Indian tech industry, two of India’s most acknowledged businessmen, Infosys co-founder and tech billionaire, Nandan Nilekani and venture capital veteran and founder of BPO-firm Daksh, Sanjeev Aggarwal have come together and set up a whopping USD 100 million venture fund.
Being called as ‘The Fundamentum Partnership’, the venture fund will act as a scale up platform for startups that have successfully achieved a certain product market fit and are now looking to grow. It will be leading investments rounds ranging between USD 10-25 million in such aforementioned startups.
The venture fund, which will be backed by long-term institutional investors, has decided to specifically focus its attention on the consumer technology space, especially ventures are working towards solving problems unique to India and its citizens, and enterprise technology/outsourcing companies that cater to global corporations.
10) Tesla Building 'World's Biggest' Lithium-ion Battery In Australia
Elon Musk is a man with a vision. The South African-born Canadian-American business magnate, investor, engineer, and inventor, recently announced that Tesla is building the world's biggest lithium-ion battery in South Australia by the end of the year. The company has teamed up with French-based renewable energy company Neoen for the same.
1) Xiaomi To Acquire Key Patents of Nokia
In a move that surprised many in the mobile technology space, China’s Xiaomi and Finland’s Nokia came together this week to sign a business collaboration and patent licensing agreement which will see the Chinese tech major acquiring key patent assets from the Finnish mobile phone manufacturer.
The patent licensing deal, which is multi-year in nature, is inclusive of a cross license to each of the company’s cellular standard essential patents. The figures involved in the deal haven’t been disclosed by either of the parties yet.
As per the agreement signed between Nokia and Xiaomi, the Finnish Mobile phone manufacturer, which recently gave its classic 3310 a modern revamp, has agreed to provide its network infrastructure equipment, which was designed to deliver high capacity at low power requirements for large web providers and data centre operators.
The two companies will be coming together to work on IP routing based on Nokia’s recently announced ‘FP4’ network processor, a data centre fabric solution and optical transport solutions for data centre interconnect.
2) India, Israel Launch 5-Year Technology Fund To Further Business Ties
The India-Israel relationship has been in news this whole week courtesy Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Israel. And yesterday, the two nations further deepened their relationship by announcing the launch of a technology fund, the Israel India Innovation Initiative Fund, or I4F, that will focus towards growing the two countries’ business relations. In addition to the tech fund, the two countries also signed a total of seven accords aimed at boosting India and Israel’s cooperation in a number of crucial sectors right from agriculture and water to space research etc.
The Israel India Innovation Initiative Fund would see each government putting in a sum of $4 million a year for five years. The fund is aimed at encouraging Indians to invest in Israel’s technology ecosystem and attract large Indian companies into opening their development centres there.
3) Samsung is Developing Amazon Echo Competitor
South Korean tech giant, Samsung, which is considered as one of the biggest and best electronics manufacturers in the world, has decided to give Amazon Echo a run for its money. According to a recent article in theWall Street Journal (WSJ), the South Korean company is currently meticulously finishing up work on its very own voice-controlled home speaker, which could outdo the likes of Amazon Echo, Google Home, and other such devices scheduled to be launched over the next couple of months.
Since the project is still under wraps with no official word from the company, the specifics available about the tech are scarce, but the WSJ report did mention that there’s a high probability that the Samsung’s voice-controlled home speaker will be powered by Bixby, which is Samsung’s answer to Apple’s Siri and Amazon’s Alexa.
4) Soon A 100Gbps Submarine Cable System Connecting India To Asia, Africa, Europe
Reliance Jio, the name which took the Indian telecom sector by storm last year by gaining over 100 million 4G mobile subscribers in just over an year, has announced that it will soon be launching its very own submarine cable system with 100Gbps capacity. The new system will be linking Asia-Africa-Europe (AAE-1).
According to Reliance Jio, the AAE-1 system longest 100Gbps-technology based submarine system, and it will stretch over a distance of 25,000 km.
The new cable system will stretch from Marseille in France and go all the way to Hong Kong. There are going to be total of 21 cable landings across Asia and Europe.
Jio claims that the cable system’s design and route will ensure lowest latency routes between Hong Kong, India, Middle East and Europe. AAE-1 cable system deploys 100Gbps transmission technology, with a minimum design capacity of 40 Tbps.
5) Time For Dogmented Reality After Augmented Reality?
What started as an April Fools joke last year, is now turning into a reality, a Dogmented Reality. Yes, you read that right. The term “Dogmented reality” was coined by Meta last year as an April Fools gag, but little did it know that its foolish gag would turn into a full-blown reality for numerous pet lovers and smartphone users who cannot afford a real life pet due to financial reasons or several other reasons.
According to a tweet sent out on June 28th, 2017, from the Twitter account of Good Dogs Game app, which is a quite popular mobile game from the WeRateDogs, its Dogmented Reality app will be coming out soon to Apple’s ARKit and iOS11. If the announcement is true, it would take Dogmented Reality to a whole new level. With the ARKit coming into picture, dogs in the Dogmented Reality will soon be actually able to understand the real world environment and act/react according to it.
6) Bajaj Allianz Using Blockchain To Hasten Claims Settlement
Bajaj Allianz General, a private general insurance company in India, which is a joint venture between Bajaj Finserv Limited owned by the Bajaj Group of India and Allianz SE, a German financial services company, has decided to embrace this learning and make way for in trend technologies in order to provide their customers the best service possible. The company recently announced that they have started using Blockchain technology to provide people a smooth settlement process in the travel and motor segments.
Talking to Business Line, Sourabh Chatterjee, Head-IT, Web Sales and Digital Marketing, Bajaj Allianz General Insurance said that employing Blockchain technology has significantly helped the company in bringing down the current settlement turnaround time for some plans from days to just a few minutes, which is great for customers and the company alike.
7) Kado Is A Wall Charger That's Thinner Than Your Phone
A new charger called Kado is creating real buzz in the charger market. The charger, which is just over 0.2 inches (7mm) thick comes with a choice of an equally thin Lightning, USB-C, or Micro USB cable for charging convenience. The wall charger, which is currently seeking funding on Kickstarter, charges devices at up to 10W, and supports the QuickCharge 2.1A spec.
8) Indian Scientists Develops Mobile App for Colour-Blind and Visually Impaired Students
Indian scientists from Bandyopadhyay Lab, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) Kolkata have developed a smartphone app called Titration ColorCam that can help colour-blind and visually impaired students become independent and more active participants in their student life.
The idea of Titration ColorCam was conceived in an effort to develop a smartphone aid that would enable colorblind and visually impaired students to perform acid-base titration experiments in chemistry labs. The app analyzes the color changes involved in a titration, translates data into sound (beeps) and tactile (vibrations) feedback for detecting an endpoint.
To put it simply, the app provides a multi-sensory perception of colour change observed in a titration experiment, wherein a solution of known concentration is used to find out the concentration of an unknown solution.
9) Nandan Nilekani To Invest $10- $25 Million In Consumer and Enterprise Tech Startups
In what could be considered as a sure short good news for the Indian tech industry, two of India’s most acknowledged businessmen, Infosys co-founder and tech billionaire, Nandan Nilekani and venture capital veteran and founder of BPO-firm Daksh, Sanjeev Aggarwal have come together and set up a whopping USD 100 million venture fund.
Being called as ‘The Fundamentum Partnership’, the venture fund will act as a scale up platform for startups that have successfully achieved a certain product market fit and are now looking to grow. It will be leading investments rounds ranging between USD 10-25 million in such aforementioned startups.
The venture fund, which will be backed by long-term institutional investors, has decided to specifically focus its attention on the consumer technology space, especially ventures are working towards solving problems unique to India and its citizens, and enterprise technology/outsourcing companies that cater to global corporations.
10) Tesla Building 'World's Biggest' Lithium-ion Battery In Australia
Elon Musk is a man with a vision. The South African-born Canadian-American business magnate, investor, engineer, and inventor, recently announced that Tesla is building the world's biggest lithium-ion battery in South Australia by the end of the year. The company has teamed up with French-based renewable energy company Neoen for the same.
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