Last week, rumors about a possible iPhone 14 delay rumors gained traction due to several lockdowns in China in the past few weeks. While Foxconn was just 4% down in revenue in April compared to the previous month, iPhone assembler Pegatron and MacBook maker Quanta Computer saw revenues down 35% and 40%, respectively. While things look bright for Apple and Foxconn, the iPhone maker says it will continue to closely monitor the COVID-19 situation in China.
The China state-owned media outlet, the Economic Daily, has signaled that the Chinese government may introduce even tighter regulations on cryptocurrencies and stablecoins due to the collapse of the Terra ecosystem. After banning crypto exchanges back in 2017, the Chinese government has been toughening its stance on crypto again since mid-2021. Multiple agencies warned of the risk of investing in crypto, and a major crackdown on mining within the country took place.
U.S. efforts to build a national network of electric vehicle charging stations are moving slowly as states figure out how to fairly dole out public funding to kick-start a new service industry. As the Biden administration prepares to give states $7.5 billion for new charging stations, a similar recent effort suggests a difficult path is ahead. States received $424 million that could be used for charging stations as part of a $2.8 billion settlement by Volkswagen to resolve allegations that it cheated on diesel emissions tests. So far, more than four years later, they have spent about 48% of those charging dollars.
Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo says the iPhone 14 Pro's "A16" chip may be a minor upgrade over the iPhone 13's A15 Bionic. He also says there are questions about the "M2" chip in the next-generation MacBook Air. The "true" M2 chip may not be released until 2023, according to Kuo.
Shenzhen will airdrop 30 million digital Chinese yuan (e-CNY) to local residents in an attempt to revitalize consumer spending. The airdrops are a joint effort between the city of Shenzhen and Meituan Dianping, China's leading food delivery app.
The Prada Timecapsule NFT Collection launches June 2. The limited edition items will be available for 24 hours only. The price won't be announced til the day of the drop but it will be in Fiat currency. The 100 gender-neutral shirts, designed in collaboration with artist Cassius Hirst, will come with a gifted NFT.
Tesla has restored weekly output at its Shanghai plant to nearly 70% of the level which it had operated at before the city’s COVID-19 lockdown. The U.S. automaker added a second shift of workers in the middle of last week and is expected to increase output further this week.
The United States is on top of the supercomputing world in the Top500 ranking of the most powerful systems. The Frontier system from Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) running on AMD EPYC CPUs took first place from last year's champ, Japan's ARM A64X Fugaku system. It's still in the integration and testing process at the ORNL in Tennessee, but will eventually be operated by the US Air Force and US Department of Energy.
According to aggregator.fyi, more than 15,000 tech workers have lost their jobs this month, while Meta and Twitter have publicly announced hiring freezes, while Snap confirmed this week that it is slowing hiring as it misses revenue targets. A change in hiring cadence, along with the Great Resignation, could mean that headcount is net decreasing at the aforementioned companies, as people leave and companies are slow to refill empty positions.
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Swiss voters backed proposals to make global TV streaming services such as Netflix Inc, Amazon, and Disney invest some of their revenues generated in Switzerland into domestic film-making, the latest European country to introduce measures to support local TV and film production and boost locally-produced content.
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