Nuro CEO Dave Ferguson at TC Sessions: Mobility on July 10 in San Jose

Autonomous delivery startup Nuro, fresh with nearly $1 billion in capital from SoftBank, is bursting with ideas — as some recent patent filings (and our recent deep dive into the company) suggest. And we can’t wait to learn more about what Nuro has planned. It’s only fitting that Nuro co-founder and CEO Dave Ferguson is […]

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The World Health Organization is setting up rules and oversight for human gene editing

Yesterday, the World Health Organization wrapped up its first meeting of a new advisory committee set up to create global governance and oversight standards for human gene editing. The committee was hastily pulled together in December after the revelation last year that a Chinese scientist had genetically modified two embryos using CRISPR technology to remove the […]

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Transportation Weekly: Waymo unleashes laser bear, Bird spreads its wings, Lyft tightens its belt

Welcome back to Transportation Weekly; I’m your host Kirsten Korosec, senior transportation reporter at TechCrunch . This is the fifth edition of our newsletter and we love the reader feedback. Keep it coming. Never heard of TechCrunch’s Transportation Weekly? Catch up here, here and here. As I’ve written before, consider this a soft launch. Follow […]

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Waymo to start selling standalone LiDAR sensors

Waymo, the Google self-driving project that spun out to become a business under Alphabet, will start selling its custom LiDAR sensors — the technology that was at the heart of a trade secrets lawsuit last year against Uber . The company announced Wednesday in a blog post that it will sell is light detection and […]

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Announcing the Agenda for TC Sessions: Robotics/AI at UC Berkeley on April 18

We’re bringing TC Sessions: Robotics + AI back to UC Berkeley on April 18, and we’re excited to announce our jam-packed agenda that highlights the best and brightest in robotics and – new for 2019 – artificial intelligence. For months we’ve been selecting the most innovative startups and top leaders from established tech companies working […]

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Europe is prepared to rule over 5G cybersecurity

The European Commission’s digital commissioner has warned the mobile industry to expect it to act over security concerns attached to Chinese network equipment makers. The Commission is considering a defacto ban on kit made by Chinese companies including Huawei in the face of security and espionage concerns, per Reuters. Appearing on stage at the Mobile […]

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JD.com’s drones take flight to Japan in partnership with Rakuten

Chinese e-commerce company JD.com is taking its drone delivery system to Japan. Rakuten, the Japanese e-commerce giant, just announced a partnership with JD that will see its drones and unmanned vehicles become a part of Rakuten’s own unmanned delivery service efforts. JD has been operating drones in its native China for a number of years, […]

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Fabula AI is using social spread to spot ‘fake news’

UK startup Fabula AI reckons it’s devised a way for artificial intelligence to help user generated content platforms get on top of the disinformation crisis that keeps rocking the world of social media with antisocial scandals. Even Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg has sounded a cautious note about AI technology’s capability to meet the complex, contextual, messy […]

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UK moves towards driverless car tests without safety drivers

The UK government has announced it’s working on a process to support so-called ‘advanced trials’ of autonomous vehicles — i.e. trials without human safety drivers. It also says it will be beefing up the existing Code of Practice for testing driverless cars to provide a framework to support the evolution of the tech, saying it’s on […]

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Japan’s “Society 5.0” initiative is a roadmap for today’s entrepreneurs

Mark Minevich Contributor Share on Twitter Mark Minevich is a digital fellow at IPSoft. Japan, still suffering the consequences of its ‘Lost Decade’ of economic stagnation, is eyeing a transformation more radical than any the industrialized world has ever seen. Boldly identified as “Society 5.0” Japan describes its initiative as a purposeful effort to create […]

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Argo.AI acquires permit to test autonomous vehicles in California

Argo.AI, the self-driving car startup that burst onto the scene in 2017 with $1 billion in backing from Ford, has obtained a permit to test its autonomous vehicles in California. The permit, issued by the California Department of Motor Vehicles, is for one vehicle and two drivers. Unlike other self-driving car companies, California isn’t the […]

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Waymo plans to open a self-driving car factory in Michigan

Waymo and Magna plan to build thousands of self-driving cars at a factory in southeast Michigan, including autonomous versions of the all-electric Jaguar I-Pace and Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid minivan. Waymo, the former Google self-driving project that spun out to become a business under Alphabet, announced Tuesday that the Michigan Economic Development Corporation voted to approve […]

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