Krishna Srinivasan is Founding General Partner at LiveOak Venture Partners, a firm focused on investing in Texas. Great conversation!
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Original author: Sramana Mitra
124 Hits
Nov
23
Nov
23
I barely slept my second night at Chunking Mansions. The loud neighbors, the hot Hong Kong air, the landlord banging on the door after midnight: None of these things are particularly conducive to a peaceful rest, and for once in my life I actually looked forward to attempts at shut eye on the 15-plus hour flight home in the morning.
For all the dread of returning to the notorious Hong Kong hostiles that evening, after a day of exploring the area, I was actually looking forward to strapping Silentmode’s PowerMask to my head — closing my eyes and embracing the luxury of forgetting where I was for a few precious minutes.
I’d tried this weird thing earlier in the day, in the middle of the Brinc accelerator’s well-lit meeting room. The whole thing was oddly soothing, if fairly awkward — a big, foam black-out mask with headphones embedded on either side. Probably not the sort of thing you want to wear out in the open, though Lucas Matney happily modeled it above — because we clearly don’t have enough pictures of our in-house VR guy wearing weird crap on his head over at TechCrunch.com.
I’d be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy the minute or two I spent with the mask on, wondering if this is how pet parrots feel when you cover their cages with a blanket for the night. Maybe that’s just the jet lag talking.
It’s a momentary respite from the cloying terrors of the world, a way to briefly trick our overactive brains into thinking, yeah, sure, everything is just fine with some New Age music, breathing exercises and, most importantly, just complete and utter darkness.
I’m a sucker for this stuff. I have the Calm app on my phone and started getting pretty into the Muse headset before leaving for my two-week trip. I’ve shared the fact that I’m a bad and anxious meditator plenty of times before on these pages, but find even my failed attempts to be useful.
Someone described the PowerMask as a kind of small-scale take on a sensory deprivation tank, and sure, why not? I’ve had worse nights.
A bit of a wrinkle in all of this: it isn’t a sleep device, exactly. Or at least the company isn’t branding it as such. Initially pitched as a “Power Nap” product, there does appear to be some in-house confusion with regard to how exactly to position the product. Certainly the startup wants to distinguish itself from the 8 million connected sleep masks I see at tech events, particularly when traveling in Asia.
The company surprisingly doesn’t discuss current zeitgeisty startup phrases like meditation or mindfulness, either.
“We are on a much bigger mission to train the world in the art of relaxation,” co-founder Bradley Young writes in a followup email. The company’s site is far less subtle, with language rarely heard outside of supplement ads. “Reach peak state,” it writes in bold all caps font, “become a peak human.” I mean, sure, why not?
That last bit of hyperbole is courtesy of the company’s focus on something called CVT (Cardiac Vagal Tone). Silentmode claims the device can be used to help us normal folk achieve the resting heart rate of an athlete. Look, here’s a graph:
I won’t go too deep into that stuff here, because frankly, I don’t know what I’m talking about. Though I can see how buying some blackout curtains for your head b/w “psychoacoustic and therapeutic sonic experiences” could go a ways toward helping one chill the eff out. It did bring a momentary and much needed respite from my vaguely horrific lodging experiences.
Despite the company’s move away from sleep talk, it also went a ways toward helping me crash on this flight. The music is soothing, and while the padded headset isn’t a pillow exactly, it’s a lot more comfortable than just leaning your head on the seat in front of you. Assuming you can get over the awkwardness of wearing a giant thing on your head. Of course, no one looks good sleeping on a plane, weird head accessory or no.
At $199, it’s not cheap. And the company plans to offer premium audio through an additional app subscription. Silentmode is also working with some large companies to pilot these products in office spaces where relaxation is a rare commodity, indeed.
28 Hits
Nov
23
It took all of 14 minutes for the Soundbrenner Core to hit full funding. Not too shabby. Last week, the wearable maker closed out its campaign with more than 10x its $50,000 goal. A few days later, we sat down with the startup at the headquarters of Hong Kong-based accelerator, Brinc.
Soundbrenner has already made a bit of a name for itself with Pulse. The connected, wrist-worn device brought some clever innovation to the metronome, that old familiar piano-mounted accessory long banished to the dustiest corners of the music shop. The wearable offers haptic feedback that can be synced across an entire band to keep everyone on the beat. The company sold 60,000 of the things.
Admittedly, simplicity is one of the best things the product has going for it, but Soundbrenner figured it could take things a bit further — and apparently 2,477 Kickstarter backers agreed. The Core (which can be pre-ordered through the a separate Indiegogo page), is being positioned as a “4-in-1 tool.”
First is the vibrating metronome, which allows up to five musicians to sync to a beat, via feedback that’s around 7x that of a standard smartwatch. Wearers can also tap the screen to create a manual beat.
The most introducing bit here is probably the modularity (which arrives, fittingly, around the time the company started receiving mentorship from Mistfit co-founder Sonny Vu). The magnetic display snaps off and attaches to a guitar tuning pegs, where it can test tuning via vibration. There’s also a built-in decibel meter and some standard push notifications — though it’s far from full smartwatch functionality, which is probably for the best.
The Core is smaller than its predecessor, but it’s not small, exactly. The company says this was intentional, at least in part, as these devices have become a kind of calling card among musicians. Beats a secret handshake, I guess.
94 Hits
Mar
31
Berlin-based Zizoo — a startup which self describes as booking.com for boats — has nabbed a €6.5 million (~$7.4M) Series A to help more millennials find holiday yachts to mess about taking selfies in.
Zizoo says its Series A — which was led by Revo Capital, with participation from new investors including Coparion, Check24 Ventures and PUSH Ventures — was “significantly oversubscribed”.
Existing investors including MairDumont Ventures, aws Founders Fund, Axel Springer Digital Ventures and Russmedia International also participated in the round.
We first came across Zizoo some three years ago when they won our pitching competition in Budapest.
We’re happy to say they’ve come a long way since, with a team that’s now 60-people strong, and business relationships with ~1,500 charter companies — serving up more than 21,000 boats for rent, across 30 countries, via a search and book platform that caters to a full range of “sailing experiences”, from experienced sailor to novice and, on the pricing front, luxury to budget.
Registered users passed the 100,000 mark this year, according to founder and CEO Anna Banicevic. She also tells us that revenue growth has been 2.5x year-on-year for the past three years.
Commenting on the Series A in a statement, Revo Capital’s managing director Cenk Bayrakdar said: “The yacht charter market is one of the most underserved verticals in the travel industry despite its huge potential. We believe in Zizoo’s successful future as a leading SaaS-enabled marketplace.”
The new funds will be put towards growing the business — including by expanding into new markets; plus product development and recruitment across the board.
Zizoo founder and CEO Anna Banicevic at its Berlin offices
“We’re looking to strengthen our presence in the US, where we’ve seen the biggest YoY growth while also expand our inventory in hot locations such as Greece, Spain and the Caribbean,” says Banicevic on market expansion. “We will also be aggressively pushing markets such as France and Spain where consumers show a growing interest in boat holidays.”
Zizoo is intending to hire 40 more employees over the course of the next year — to meet what it dubs “the booming demand for sailing experiences, especially among millennials”.
So why do millennials love boating holidays so much? Zizoo says the 20-40 age range makes up the “majority” of its customer.
Banicevic reckons the answer is they’re after a slice of ‘affordable luxury’.
“After the recent boom of the cruising industry, millennials are well familiar with the concept of holidays at sea. However, sailing holidays (yachting) are much more fitting to the millennial’s strive for independence, adventure and experiences off the beaten path,” she suggests.
“Yachting is a growing trend no longer reserved for the rich and famous — and millennials want a piece of that. On our platform, users can book a boat holiday for as low as £25 per person per night (this is an example of a sailboat in Croatia).”
On the competition front, she says the main competition is the offline sphere (“where 90% of business is conducted by a few large and many small travel agents”).
But a few rival platforms have emerged “in the last few years” — and here she reckons Zizoo has managed to outgrow the startup competition “thanks to our unique vertically integrated business model, offering suppliers a booking management system and making it easy for the user to book a boat holiday”.
96 Hits
Nov
22
Sramana Mitra: Let’s build on that and understand your geographical preferences. Are you investing only in Silicon Valley or are you investing more broadly? Dafina Toncheva: When it comes to...
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Original author: Sramana Mitra
67 Hits
Mar
31
Wluper, the London-based tech startup building a conversational AI to power knowledge-based voice assistants, has raised $1.3 million in seed funding. Leading the round is “deep tech” VC IQ Capital, with participation from Seedcamp, Aster, and Magic Pony co-founder Dr Zehan Wang.
Founded in 2016 and originally backed by Jaguar Land Rover’s InMotion Ventures, Wluper’s “conversational AI” is initially targeting navigation products with what it describes as “goal-driven dialogue” technology that is designed to have more natural conversations to help with various navigation tasks.
The ‘secret sauce’, as it were, is that Wluper believes voice assistants work much better when the underlying AI is tasked with becoming an expert in a more narrow and specialist domain.
“When we think of intelligent assistants like Alexa or Siri, the only time you’ll believe they’re really good is if they understand you properly; most of the time, they simply can’t,” says Wluper co-founder Hami Bahraynian. “It is not the speech recognition which fails. It is the missing focus and lacking reasoning of these systems, because they all can do a lot of things reasonably well, but nothing perfectly”.
Describing the goal of “general” conversation AI as one that could take 15, 20 or more years to achieve, Bahraynian says that in the interim what is needed is “intelligent agents” that are created for a certain purpose, now.
“This is exactly what we do,” he says. “We build domain-expert conversational intelligence, which does one thing, understanding everything transport-related, but that one thing perfectly”.
Furthermore, Wluper’s approach is able to make clear assumptions regarding what the user is talking about, and therefore claims to be able to understand much more complex questions and in a more natural way. This includes multi-intent queries, and follow-up questions to enable a “true” conversation, says Bahraynian.
In addition, Wluper has been conducting R&D in what comes after the “understanding” bit of the NLP pipeline, leading the startup to undergo further research on a machine’s “knowledge acquisition” capabilities, which it believes is a crucial piece of the puzzle needed to solve conversational AI.
“Even if naturally asked user queries are eventually understood correctly, extracting and providing relevant and useful information from the right places is even more challenging, and with current mostly ruled-based approaches, ultimately impossible to scale,” adds Bahraynian.
“We work on this problem by moving away from traditional handcrafted methods and work on new ways to optimise a machine’s knowledge acquisition and finding the right balance between structured and unstructured data in order to provide more meaningful results”.
Meanwhile, Wluper’s seed investment will be used to hire more engineers and research scientists to expand the startup’s research and development capabilities.
55 Hits
Nov
22
Sramana Mitra: Could you switch gears and tell me what you see out there as open problems around which people could be starting new companies? Patrick Mullane: That’s a broad question. I see a lot of...
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Original author: Sramana Mitra
66 Hits
Nov
22
Amazon warehouse workers are going to voice their anger at working conditions in coordinated protests across Europe on Black Friday.
British trade union GMB is working with hundreds of staff to stage demonstrations outside five fulfilment centres on Friday, while workers in Spain and Italy are planning a 24-hour strike.
In the UK, a mixture of off-shift Amazon workers and GMB members will demonstrate outside Amazon warehouses waving banners and handing out leaflets, a GMB spokesman told Business Insider.
The biggest protest will take place at Rugeley, near Birmingham, with upwards of 100 people expected to attend. After demonstrating at the warehouse, they will march to a rally at the Lea Hall Miners' Club, where shadow work and pensions minister, Jack Dromey, will speak.
The GMB spokesman said protestors are looking to raise awareness rather than disrupt Black Friday sales. "All we want is to get Amazon around the table," he said.
GMB General Secretary Tim Roache said in a statement that working conditions at Amazon are "frankly inhuman." He added: "They are breaking bones, being knocked unconscious and being taken away in ambulances."
Using a series of Freedom of Information requests, the GMB discovered in June that ambulances were called out 600 times to 14 Amazon warehouses over the past three years.
An Amazon protest in Germany earlier this year. Sean Gallup/Getty
At the Rugeley site, ambulances were called out 115 times over that period for electric shocks, bleeding, chest pains, and major trauma. Three times the ambulances were called out for "pregnancy/maternity."
"At a similar sized supermarket distribution warehouse a few miles away, there were just eight call outs during the same period," the GMB found.
Ahead of the protest on Friday, the GMB collected statements from members who work at the warehouses.
"I am pregnant and they put me to stand 10 hours without a chair ⦠They are telling me to work hard even [sic] they know I am pregnant. I am feeling depressed when I am at work," said one.
Another added: "It is an awful place to work, can't breath or voice an opinion, [sic] feel like a trapped animal with lack of support and respect."
Amazon's working conditions have come under fire before, notably from US Senator Bernie Sanders who campaigned to make CEO Jeff Bezos raise Amazon's minimum wage and said he would launch an investigation into "unsafe working conditions."
Amazon raised its minimum wage to $15 an hour in October, but it has refuted horror stories from its warehouses as a "myth."
Business Insider contacted Amazon for comment.
Original author: Isobel Asher Hamilton
96 Hits
Nov
22
French crowd-lending platform October (formerly known as Lendix), wants to educate more people about new ways to borrow money. That’s why the company is launching a project called Grandir Ensemble (grow together).
11 big companies are borrowing €100,000 each on October at a 2.5 percent interest rate. October users will be able to lend as little as €20 to one of these companies.
If you look at the list of companies, all those names will sound familiar to French readers and beyond. Most of them are public companies, most of them are originally from France — AccorHotels, Adecco Group, Allianz France, Arkéa, Edenred, Engie, Iliad, JCDecaux, Suez, Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield and Webhelp.
According to October, annual revenue of those companies ranges from €1.8 billion to €122 billion, with Allianz generating more revenue than anyone else.
At a press conference, October co-founder and CEO Olivier Goy explained the idea behind this project. Those credit lines won’t change anything for big public companies. But many of those companies work with small and medium companies.
Today’s partners will be able to refer small companies. October will wave the application fees for those companies up to €11 million in loans.
Thanks to this vote of confidence, you could imagine small companies applying to October because a big company they trust has done it before.
France’s Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire recorded a video message for the press conference, saying that he supports October and today’s campaign.
One of October’s key advantages compared to borrowing money from the bank is that it’s much faster. You can apply to a credit line and get an answer just a few days later. This is quite useful if you need to move quickly to launch a new product, open a new office and more.
October currently operates in France, Spain, Italy and soon the Netherlands. I already covered the company in depth back in June if you want to read more.
76 Hits
Nov
22
Original author: Isobel Asher Hamilton
114 Hits
Jun
20
There’s hardly enough room to turn around in Livin Farms’ office. Pretty standard, really, in Central, Hong Kong, where space is at a perpetual premium. It’s a small operation for the HAX-backed startup — there’s space for a few desks and not much more. The startup’s last product, the Hive, stands next to the door. It’s a series of innocuous trays stacked atop one another.
But it’s the Hive Explorer I’m here to see. The small tray sits in the middle of the room. Its top is open, the brightly colored bits of plastic drawing the eye from the moment you step through the door. Its contents pulsate with strange, random rhythms. Upon closer inspection, the browns are whites and blacks are alive, a small bed of mealworms wriggle atop one other, chowing down of the remnants of oats left behind by the team.
Above them, a neon yellow tray houses a trio of fully grown beetles and a couple dozen pupae. The former are constant on the move, butting up against one another and sometimes doing more with aims of continuing the life cycle. The pupae lie around, seemingly lifeless, occasionally twitching out a reminder that there’s still life inside.
The Explorer finds Livin Farms broadening its horizons into the world of STEM education. Where past products were focused on scalable sustainability, the new Kickstarter project is firmly targeted at youngsters. And there’s a fair amount to be learned in the bucket full of beetles. Mortality, for one. Founder Katharina Unger grabs a nearby jar and twists off the cap.
It’s filled to the top with dried mealworms. She pulls one out and pops it in her mouth, handing it to me, hopefully. I follow suit. It’s crispy. Not flavorless, exactly, but not particularly distinct. Maybe a bit salty. Mostly it just feels overwhelmingly morbid, showing down on on a little larva as its brothers continue to feast a few inches away.
Protein source of the future, now, to quote The Mountain Goats. Livin Farms also produces a unflavored larva-based powder and a surprising tasty granola as a kind of proof concept for its sustainable high-protein foodstuffs. The mission hits home here in one of the world’s most densely packed places.
[She gave me some to take home, if anyone’s hungry.]
The Explorer also offers youngsters a peak at what many consider the future of sustainable farming — assuming food manufacturers are ever able to break through the stigma of eating insects. Kids are encourage to harvest the larva to avoid overpopulation with a bit of dry roasting. The box serves as a relatively odor-free form of composting. Feeding the bugs simply entails tossing excess foodstuffs into the bin. The little buggers will tear through it, leaving a thin powder of waste in a tray below.
The setup also features a heat plate to keep the worms warm and a fan to regulate humidity, assuring that settings are ideal for the beetles to do their thing. Livin Farms is also opening up the controls to the system via Swift, in an attempt to bring a coding component to the system.
The Explorer went live on Kickstarter this week. Early bird pledges can pick up a the box of worms for ~$113.
58 Hits
Nov
21
Apple has considered the release a lower-priced Apple TV dongle similar to the Roku Streaming Stick or Amazon Fire TV Stick, according to a report by The Information on Wednesday.
It's not clear if Apple ultimately decided whether or not to move forward with plans to release such a device. For Apple, though, a lower-price TV dongle could make sense, given that the company's upcoming streaming service is set to launch as early as March 2019.
The streaming service will only be available on the iPad, iPhone, and Apple TV. Given that the Apple TV costs at least $149, a cheaper device for accessing the company's content could help broaden Apple's audience.
Today, Amazon and Roku dongles â which plug into the back of televisions and allow users to stream contentâ cost as little as $25 and $30 respectively.
Apple's streaming service will include a combination of original content and licensing deals with production companies. The company has already announced 19 original series, including a biographical drama about Kevin Durant and an untitled series starring Reese Witherspoon and Jennifer Aniston.
Read more: The 19 original shows Apple is producing in its push into TV as an 'expensive NBC'
Apple has already spent more than $1 billion producing its original content. In October, CNBC reported that Apple's original TV and movie content might be free for anyone accessing it through an iPhone or iPad.
Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Original author: Nick Bastone
92 Hits
Nov
21
The Insider Picks team writes about stuff we think you'll like. Business Insider has affiliate partnerships, so we get a share of the revenue from your purchase.
Maybe it's the shadow cast by Prime Day, or the need to be the biggest and best, or the seemingly infinite number of products available in its marketplace, but Amazon does not play around when it comes to Black Friday. As a result, plenty of shoppers will spend most of the holiday in the weeds of thousands of those deals â trying to stay on top of them while new discounts drop by the minute.
To make Black Friday on Amazon less overwhelming and more impactful for you, we 'll be logging the best deals below for easy reference: Amazon devices, robot vacuums, Instant Pots, HD TVs, and pretty much anything else you could need â and actually want â all in one scrollable place.
Below are the deals currently active to shop. We'll be updating this article as more deals become available. Bookmark this page and check back in if you want to be kept up-to-date.
Looking for more deals? We've rounded up the best Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals on the internet.
To potentially save more on Black Friday and Cyber Monday, you can visit Business Insider Coupons to find up-to-date promo codes for a range of online stores.
Original author: Mara Leighton
93 Hits
Mar
31
On Cyber Monday, while online shoppers hunt for deals, NASA will be trying to stick its first landing of a robot on the surface of Mars in six years.
The roughly $830-million mission is called InSight, which is short for "Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport."
NASA rocketed the InSight probe toward the red planet on May 5. The lander, which weighs about 789 lbs, is expected to complete a risky descent sequence around 3 p.m. ET on Monday, November 26. Part of that process is known as the "seven minutes of terror."
If all goes well, the golf-cart-size lander will be the first robot to touch down on Martian soil since NASA's nuclear-powered Curiosity rover, which landed there in August 2012.
Read more: 13 incredible facts you probably didn't know about the red planet
Scientists hope that InSight's two-year mission will probe Mars in ways they've only dreamed of until now.
"All of our past missions have really been surface missions," Robert Braun, NASA's former chief technologist, told Business Insider. "InSight's a very different mission in the sense that it is peering into the past by studying, really, the interior of Mars. In doing so, we're going to learn about Mars, but also about the early history of the Earth."
First, however, InSight will have to get safely to the surface.
How InSight might survive '7 minutes of terror'
An illustration of NASA's InSight Mars probe in the "seven minutes of terror" phase of its descent to the Martian surface.NASA/JPL-Caltech
Getting to Mars is relatively easy.
That's because modern rockets are safer and more reliable to launch than ever before. In fact, the vehicle that sent InSight toward Mars â an Atlas V rocket built by United Launch Alliance â has had only one partial failure since its debut in 2002.
Landing on the red planet, however, is one of the most challenging tasks an aerospace engineer can accomplish. About a third of robots sent there never make it.
"Although we've done it before, landing on Mars is hard, and this mission is no different," Rob Manning, the chief engineer at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said in a video. "It takes thousands of steps to go from the top of the atmosphere to the surface, and each one of them has to work perfectly."
The Martian atmosphere is about 1% as thick as Earth's. But that's still plenty of air to completely destroy a spacecraft like InSight, which will be moving at about 12,500 mph when it arrives at the red planet.
NASA tries to take advantage of the Martian atmosphere by putting its robots in an entry capsule with a heat shield. This helps reduce the spacecraft's speed while also protecting it from 1,400-degree-Celsius temperatures â hot enough to melt steel â caused by plowing through the thin Martian air.
An animation of NASA's InSight probe attempting to land on the surface of Mars.Lockheed Martin/YouTube
However, striking the atmosphere at anything other than the perfect angle â about 12 degrees, Manning said â can end a mission. Any shallower than this, and an entry capsule will "skip" off the atmosphere and out into deep space. Any deeper, and a robot gets vaporized.
This phase â when an entry capsule detaches from its mothership and descends â is sometimes called the seven minutes of terror. This is because NASA can't "hear" from its spacecraft for roughly seven minutes, and won't know if a landing has succeeded or failed until a radio signal arrives (or doesn't).
This time around, though, NASA is trying something new: It sent two briefcase-size satellites called MarsCubeOne with Insight. Both cubesats are trailing the lander en route to Mars, and they'll help relay landing data home.
"They'll be broadcasting that back to Earth so we know what's exactly happening at each step of the entry, descent, and landing process," Tom Hoffman, the InSight mission's payload manager, said during a press briefing in October.
An engineer tests the solar arrays of NASA's Mars Cube One satellite, or MarCO.NASA/JPL-Caltech
Once InSight plows through enough of the Martian atmosphere to not burn up, its entry capsule will deploy a big supersonic parachute, then discard the heat shield seconds later.
InSight's dangerous journey isn't over at this point. The robot still has to deploy three landing legs and use radar to calculate how close it is to the ground â NASA can't control the robot remotely in real time because it takes light (and radio signals) about 15 minutes to travel to and from Mars.
About a mile above the surface of Mars, InSight will drop out of its protective capsule, fire its retro-rocket engines, and try to touch down without crashing or tipping over.
How InSight will probe the ancient secrets of Mars â and Earth
A cutaway illustration showing what scientists think the interior of planet Mars might look like.NASA/JPL
InSight will try to land in a region known as Elysium Planitia, which is a relatively flat place close to the Martian equator. If the robot safely lands and unfurls its two circular solar panels, NASA will begin its mission in earnest.
Like InSight's nearly identical predecessor mission, the Phoenix Mars Lander, the probe won't move locations. But unlike Phoenix, which dug for water in Martian soil for a few months in 2008, InSight hopes to last for two Earth years.
During that time, it will perform the first "checkup" of the 4.6-billion-year-old planet.
"InSight's goal is to study the interior of Mars and take the planet's vital signs, its pulse, and temperature," NASA said on its mission website. "To look deep into Mars, the lander must be at a place where it can stay still and quiet for its entire mission. That's why scientists chose Elysium Planitia as InSight's home."
NASA plans to land its InSight robot at Elysium Planitia near the Martian equator.NASA; Business Insider
Once InSight is powered up and in communication with Earth, one of its first tasks will be to unfurl a robotic arm.
InSight will use that robotic appendage to place a dome down on the Martian surface. The dome will contain six extremely sensitive vibration-detection devices called seismometers.
Seismometers on the Earth and the moon (Apollo astronauts deployed some on the lunar surface) have recorded earthquakes and moonquakes, which helped scientists figure out the internal structure of those rocky worlds. On Mars, NASA researchers hope to accomplish a similar feat.
Whenever a meteorite strikes Mars, or there's a landslide, or a big blob of magma suddenly shifts, or there's tectonic movement, InSight's seismometer should detect such vibrations. The devices can even record seismic activity from all the way across the planet.
Over time, data about marsquakes could reveal hitherto unknown information about the internal structure of the planet.
One of the most challenging tasks InSight will attempt, though, is drilling a heat probe deep into the ground. The probe will slowly drill down and stop every so often to heat up. Then a sensor will detect how long it takes that warmth to dissipate.
An artist illustration of the InSight lander on Mars. NASA/JPL-Caltech
The probe is expected to dig 16 feet down â far deeper than any previous Mars mission has ever reached with scoops, shovels, or drills.
"When we get down that deep, we'll get away from all of the temperature variations of the surface," Suzanne Smrekar, the mission's deputy principle investigator, said during a press briefing. "That tells us about the heat coming out of the planet â that energy that's available for driving geologic activity."
Back on the surface, InSight will also use a sensitive radio science experiment to see how subtly Mars shifts during its two-Earth-year-long orbit around the sun. Such data should tell researchers what is going on in the deepest parts of the planet's core.
The lead scientists on the InSight mission to Mars, Bruce Banerdt, speaks during a press conference on October 31, 2018.NASA/Bill Ingalls
The ultimate goal is to figure out how Mars formed and what happened to the planet since then. Scientists know that Mars once generated an atmosphere-protecting magnetic dynamo, as Earth still does today. But the Martian core's dynamo eventually shut down and the planet's protective shield faded, which allowed the sun to blow away Mars' atmosphere and oceans of water.
In probing that history, scientists think we're bound to learn about our own planet's origins.
"Earth ... is a big planet that holds a lot of heat, a lot of energy, and it's been very geologically active over its entire history. So most of the record of the early processes that formed the Earth have been erased," Hoffman said. "We'd like to have a planet that's just a little bit calmer and that can retain that that evidence."
Mars, which is similar to Earth but has remained almost frozen in time, is thus the perfect place to go looking.
Original author: Dave Mosher and Hilary Brueck
107 Hits
Nov
21
Get the latest Google stock price here.
Original author: Alexandra Appolonia and Jasmine Kim
68 Hits
Nov
21
Sony isn't wasting any time capitalizing on the success of "Venom."
The studio announced two release dates for yet-to-be-titled Marvel movies on Wednesday: July 10, 2020 and October 2, 2020. The latter is described as an "untitled Sony/Marvel sequel." All signs point to that being a second "Venom" installment, as the movie broke the October box-office record for an opening weekend with $80 million. It's now grossed nearly $780 million worldwide.
Another possibility would be a sequel to the upcoming animated movie, "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse." It's gotten positive buzz, including from Business Insider's Jason Guerrasio, who called it the "best animated movie of the year" in his holiday movie preview. But even if Sony is confident in the movie, it has yet to be released.
Meanwhile, "Venom" has already shattered expectations at the box office and set the foundation for a sequel in its after-credits scene. It seems inevitable.
Sony's unique deal with Marvel Studios that it struck in 2015 allows the latter to use Spider-Man in its Marvel Cinematic Universe while Sony retains distribution rights and creative control. Sony owns the film rights to hundreds of Spider-Man characters, and can continue making its own movies using those characters (and Spider-Man) under the deal.
"Venom" was Sony's first Spider-Man spin-off since the commercial and critical failure of 2014's "Amazing Spider-Man 2." While reviews tore apart "Venom" (it has a 29% Rotten Tomatoes critic score), its success with audiences revitalized Sony's Spider-Man universe, according to box-office experts.
"If they consistently make films audiences want to see, Disney will have to buy Sony to get 'Spider-Man' back," Exhibitor Relations senior box-office analyst Jeff Bock told Business Insider earlier this month.
That's good news for Sony because it already had several other Spider-Man spin-off movies in development before "Venom" was a hit. The July 10, 2020 release date is likely "Morbius," starring Jared Leto as the vampire Spider-Man villain.
Other possibilities include "Black Cat," based on a frequent Spider-Man love interest, or "Kraven the Hunter," based on another longtime foe of the wall-crawling superhero. But since "Morbius" has already cast its lead actor, that's probably the best bet.
Original author: Travis Clark
70 Hits
Nov
21
To celebrate the release of "Battlefield V," Microsoft and Electronic Arts partnered to give a Florida veteran a limited-edition Xbox One X bundle, delivered via an outrageous skydiving stunt.
Motorsport driver and stunt performer Travis Pastrana of Nitro Circus dove from a height of 13,000 feet to deliver the first Xbox One X Gold Rush Special Edition "Battlefield V" bundle to retired Navy Corpsman Jeff Bartrom, who lives in Paisley Florida. Pastrana hit a peak speed of 140 mph during the dive, and the jump took less than 55 seconds.
The giveaway was meant to thank Bartrom for his service and coincides with Microsoft's #GiveWithXbox initiative. The company pledged to donate $5 worth of Xbox products for every picture shared to social media with the hashtag showing the importance of gaming. Microsoft will donate up to $1 million to be split between four charities, Child's Play, Gamers Outreach, SpecialEffect, and Operation Supply Drop. The social media campaign is running through December 9th.
Read more:Microsoft finally made an Xbox I actually want to buy
Original author: Kevin Webb
98 Hits
Jun
19
This is a preview of a research report from Business Insider Intelligence, Business Insider's premium research service. To learn more about Business Insider Intelligence, click here. Current subscribers can read the report here.
Business Insider Intelligence Consumers are finally starting to adopt smart home devices, with nearly 60% owning at least one device. This presents an opportunity for e-commerce companies to enter the smart home and encourage purchasing through the devices.
The smart speaker has become the face of the smart home in many ways, attracting the lion's share of attention as companies look for ways to take advantage of the growing platform. But there's a problem: Consumers aren't using the smart speaker to actually buy products very often.
Instead, one of the clearest opportunities outside of the smart speaker is home goods and grocery replenishment through large appliances. Smart devices in the home â especially appliances â can take advantage of built-in sensors to either tell consumers when they need to buy more of a product, or make that purchase autonomously. This will create an opportunity for appliance manufacturers, e-commerce vendors, and product suppliers to ink supply agreements to meet consumers' needs.
In this report, Business Insider Intelligence examines several areas of opportunity for e-commerce companies to leverage smart home technologies to provide new and better services to their customers. First, we explore how smart appliances, including connected dishwashers and laundry machines, are building on one-click purchasing systems to enable automated replenishment. We then discuss the smart fridge and detail how apps, cameras, and voice assistants are enabling takeout and grocery delivery through these appliances. Finally, we examine the role of the voice interface beyond smart speakers as it relates to purchasing products in the home, and how omnipresent voice will be used to organize and interact with automated services.
The companies mentioned in this report are: Amazon, Blue Apron, Costo, GE, Google, Instacart, Keurig, KitchenAid, LG, Ocado, P&G, Plated, Reynolds, Samsung, Target, Walmart, Whirlpool.
Here are some key takeaways from the report:
Companies have a clear opportunity to leverage sensors, cameras, and connectivity in a variety of home appliances to revolutionize the way consumers buy home goods. Smart appliance manufacturers, e-tailers, and CPG companies will be able to collaborate and partner to develop new methods of resupplying consumers' homes. The smart fridge will transform into the hub of the kitchen and become the autonomous organizing device that oversees grocery purchasing and food delivery.In full, the report:
Provides an overview of the key players and types of products in the smart appliance space. Highlights the models that companies can adopt to take advantage of the developing sector. Identifies the key services that will boost automated e-commerce engagement in the home.Original author: Peter Newman
208 Hits
May
25
Prepare for the year ahead with insights from today's brightest minds. Join us at Business Insider's flagship conference, IGNITION: Media, Technology & Transformation, now in its ninth year.
This year's speakers are innovators transforming media, technology, and society. The lineup is packed with top executives from some of the hottest tech startups and innovative corporate enterprises. Thought leaders from Uber, Y Combinator, Slack, Zipline, Dropbox, Hulu, Etsy, Salesforce, and Openwater will be discussing critical topics, from AI and robotics to the future of entertainment, healthcare, finance, and transportation.
Want to hear how Keller Rinaudo is working to build a life-saving drone-delivery service in the most remote regions of the world? Learn how Dropbox CEO and cofounder Drew Houston built his $12 billion company? Hear from AOL cofounder and entrepreneur Steve Case about his investing approach that he calls "Rise of the Rest"?
Check out the remarkable lineup of speakers confirmed so far:
Chris Albrecht, president and CEO, Starz Brad Bao, cofounder and executive chairman, Lime Henry Blodget, CEO, cofounder, and editorial director, Insider Inc. Julie Bort, chief tech correspondent, Business Insider Courtney Caldwell, cofounder and COO, ShearShare Tye Caldwell, cofounder and COO, ShearShare Victoria Canal, singer-songwriter Nicholas Carlson, global editor-in-chief, Business Insider and INSIDER, chief content officer, Insider Inc. Troy Carter, founder and CEO, Atom Factory Steve Case, chairman and CEO, Revolution; cofounder, AOL David Oliver Cohen, founder and CEO, Swish Beverages Wendy Clark, CEO, DDB Worldwide Felicity Conrad, cofounder and CEO, Paladin Barbara Corcoran of ABC's "Shark Tank" Gordon Crovitz, cofounder and Co-CEO, NewsGuard Mark Cuban, entrepreneur, Mark Cuban Companies Ray Dalio, founder, co-chief investment officer & co-chairman, Bridgewater Associates Richard Feloni, Writer, Strategy; Host, "This Is Success" Podcast, Business Insider Ron Fleming, partner, head of Emerging Companies, Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP Randy Freer, CEO, Hulu Craig Fuller, founder and CEO, FreightWaves Scott Galloway, founder, Gartner L2; professor of marketing, NYU Stern Mandy Ginsberg, CEO, Match Group Paul Graham, founder, Y Combinator Jason Guerrasio, senior entertainment reporter, Business Insider Sarah Harden, CEO, Hello Sunshine Chris Hayes, host, "All In with Chris Hayes" Jessi Hempel, senior editor at large, LinkedIn Cal Henderson, cofounder and CTO, Slack Rachel Holt, head of New Modalities, Uber Drew Houston, cofounder and CEO, Dropbox Award-winning rapper, entrepreneur, actor and producer Curtis "50 Cent" JacksonMary Lou Jepsen, CEO and founder, Openwater Libby Kane, deputy editor; strategy, careers, executive life, and personal finance, Business Insider Brad Katsuyama, CEO and cofounder, IEX Sallie Krawcheck, CEO and cofounder, Ellevest Darren Laybourn, corporate vice president of Microsoft News, Microsoft Corp. Joey Levin, CEO, IAC David Levy, president, Turner Bryan Logan, global news editor, Business Insider Andy Main, head of Deloitte Digital and principal, Deloitte Consulting LLP Jessica Matthews, CEO and founder, Uncharted Power Nathan McAlone, media editor, Business Insider Meek Mill, multi-platinum hip-hop artist and criminal justice reform activist Janice Min, media consultant, NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment and Valence Media Alexis Ohanian cofounder, Initialized Capital Olivia Oran, senior finance editor, Business Insider Josh "The Fat Jew" Ostrovsky, founder and CMO, Swish Beverages Danica Patrick, entrepreneur, GoDaddy spokeswoman Geoff Ramsey, chief content officer and cofounder, eMarketer Keller Rinaudo, CEO and cofounder, Zipline Cindy Robbins, president and chief people officer, Salesforce Scott Rosenberg, general manager of platform business, Roku Michael Rubin, founder and executive chairman of Fanatics; Philadelphia 76ers & New Jersey Devils co-owner Joe and Anthony Russo, codirectors of "Avengers: Infinity War"; cofounders, AGBO Ryan Rzepecki, CEO and founder, JUMP Bikes Aaron Samuels, cofounder and CEO, Blavity Alyson Shontell, U.S. editor-in-chief, Business Insider Josh Silverman, CEO, Etsy Susan Solomon, CEO and cofounder, The New York Stem Cell Foundation Kristen Sonday, cofounder and COO, Paladin Sir Martin Sorrell, executive chairman, S4Capital Limited Warren Spar, CEO, Sparring Partners LLC Cadie Thompson, deputy executive editor; tech, retail, and transportation, Business Insider Matt Turner, executive editor, Business Insider Hans Vestberg, CEO, Verizon Communications Padmasree Warrior, U.S. CEO and CDO, NIO Julie Zeveloff West, US editor-in-chief, INSIDER Martin Whittaker, CEO, JUST CapitalOriginal author: Business Insider
91 Hits
Nov
21
The Insider Picks team writes about stuff we think you'll like. Business Insider has affiliate partnerships, so we get a share of the revenue from your purchase.
Black Friday has officially begun, and as always, there is a ton of great tech on sale. We've rounded up the best tech deals in every category from smartphones, tablets, and laptops, to TVs, headphones, and speakers. Some of the deals aren't live yet, but you can see what's coming. We'll be updating the deals all Black Friday and Cyber Monday, so stay tuned! You can also check out all our deal coverage on Insider Picks. To potentially save more on Black Friday, you can visit Business Insider Coupons to find up-to-date promo codes for a range of online stores.Black Friday is all about the tech deals. Sure, you could snag some great clothing, home goods, and travel deals, too, but we all know you want that big-screen TV.
We've rounded up the best tech deals for Black Friday and we'll continue to update them through Cyber Monday as they pour in.
We check thousands of deals from dozens of retailers, so you can rest assured that these really are the best deals and the lowest prices.
Whether you want a TV, projector, tablet, phone, speaker, or great tech accessories for less, we've got the deals here.
Best TV deal: Sony 65-Inch 4K Ultra HD Smart LED TV, $998 on Amazon (originally $1,398) [You save $400] Best curved TV deal: Samsung UN65NU8500 Curved 65" 4K UHD 8 Series Smart LED TV (2018), $1,097.99 at Amazon (originally $1,799.99 ) [You save $702] Best streaming stick deal: Roku Streaming Stick, $29.99 at Target (originally $49.99) [You save $20] Best laptop deal: Surface Laptop 2, $999.99 at Microsoft (originally $1,299.99) [You save $300] Best gaming laptop deal: GIGABYTE Aero 15X v8-BK4 15" Ultra Slim Gaming Laptop, $1,749 at Amazon (originally $2,299) [You save $550] Best Chromebook deal: Google Pixelbook i5, 8GB RAM, 128GB storage, $699 at Amazon (originally $999) [You save $300] Best smartwatch deal: Apple Watch Series 3, $229-$329 at Macy's [You save $50-$80] Best fitness tracker deal: Fitbit Ionic GPS Smart Watch, $199.95 at Amazon (originally $269.95) [You save $70] Best smartphone deals: Samsung Galaxy S9, $519.99 at Amazon (originally $719.99) [You save $200] AND Samsung Galaxy Note 9, $799.99 at Amazon (originally $999.99) [You save $200] Best headphone deal: Bose SoundLink AE 2 Black, $199 at Jet (originally $229)[You save $30] Best gaming deal: Microsoft Xbox One X 1TB Fallout 76 Bundle, $429 at Jet (originally $499) [You save $70] Best VR headset deal: Lenovo Explorer Bundle, $179 at Walmart (originally $399.99) [You save $220.99] Best camera deal: PANASONIC LUMIX GX85 Camera with 12-32mm and 45-150mm Lens Bundle, $497.99 at Amazon (originally $999.99) [You save $502] Best Sony camera deal: Sony Alpha a6000 Mirrorless Digital Camera w/ 16-50mm and 55-210mm Power Zoom Lenses, $598 at Amazon (originally $848) [You save $250] Best smart home deal: Lenovo Smart Display 8" with Google Assistant, $99 at Walmart (originally $199) [You save $100]Click on a link to jump to a section: Amazon device deals | Google device deals | Apple device deals | Tech under $50 | Tech under $100 | Laptop and tablet deals | Gaming Deals | Printer, monitor, and PC accessory deals | TV, projector, and media streamer deals | Smart home deals | Smartphone and accessory deals | Headphone deals | Fitness tracker and smartwatch deals | Camera and drone deals | Speaker and soundbar deals
Original author: Malarie Gokey
104 Hits
