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Alphabet's latest moonshot aims to make industrial robots more practical
Alphabet has launched its latest X moonshot company, Intrinsic, with the goal of making industrial robots more practical for many people.
Alphabet will 'wind down' Loon's internet-broadcasting balloons
Google's parent company is shutting down its balloon internet project.
Project Delta's food waste moonshot is now part of Google
Food waste in America is a big problem with an estimated 30 - 40 percent of our groceries getting tossed out, costing retailers $57 billion each year. To address this issue, X launched a food waste moonshot in search of a smarter food distribution system. Two and a half years of research and prototyping later, the project is moving up to Google proper for further development at scale.
Alphabet's next moonshot: protect the ocean
Alphabet's moonshot factory is turning its attention back toward the ocean. But whereas Project Foghorn looked to turn seawater into a carbon-neutral fuel, the newly-announced Tidal has a broader mission to protect the sea and its aquatic inhabitants. "This is a critical issue," Neil Davé, general manager for Tidal said in a blog post. "Humanity is pushing the ocean past its breaking point, but we can't protect what we don't understand." The team, which operates under the company's "X" lab for now, is starting with a camera system that can help fish farmers monitor and, hopefully, better understand every living creature inside their pens.
Alphabet quits work on its energy-generating kites
Alphabet's years-long involvement with energy-making kites is no more. The Google parent is ending its work on Makani's wind power technology, with X's Moonshot lead Astro Teller warning that the path to a viable business was "much longer and riskier" than expected. Alphabet liked Makani's environmental focus, but felt that it was important to pour effort into those areas where it believed it could "have the greatest impact."
Google needs a sustainable phone moonshot
"Developing sustainable solutions to mass production and consumption is one of the biggest challenges we face today as an industry," Rick Osterloh, Google's senior vice president for devices and services said onstage yesterday. "It impacts all of us and it will for generations to come." Sustainability was a major focus of the Pixel 4 event. The company said it would spend another $150 million on renewable energy projects, for instance, that will generate the same amount of electricity that is currently required to build Made by Google products. Ivy Ross, the head of Google's hardware design team, revealed that all of its 2019 Nest products will include some amount of recycled material, too. The new Nest Mini speaker, for example, has a fabric top made entirely from old plastic bottles.
Microsoft, Alphabet help you learn quantum computer programming
The very concept of a quantum computer can be daunting, let alone programming it, but Microsoft thinks it can offer a helping hand. It and Alphabet's X are partnering with Brilliant on an online curriculum for quantum computing. The course starts with basic concepts and gradually introduces you to Microsoft's Q# language, teaching you how to write 'simple' quantum algorithms before moving on to truly complicated scenarios. You can handle everything on the web (including quantum circuit puzzles), and there's a simulator to verify that you're on the right track.
Alphabet’s Chronicle finally reveals its cybersecurity moonshot
Last year, Google's parent company Alphabet announced Chronicle, a cybersecurity division spun out of X (previously Google X). Now, Chronicle has launched its first commercial product -- a global telemetry platform called Backstory. According to Chronicle, it's a bit like Google Photos, but for business network security.
Nubia X avoids a notch by adding a rear display for selfies
While local competitors like Vivo, Oppo, Xiaomi and Honor have been trying various sliding mechanisms to achieve all-screen, notch-free smartphone designs, Nubia decided to take the easy approach: Getting rid of the front cameras and forcing you to use the rear cameras for selfies. This is why the freshly-announced Nubia X is a dual-screen flagship smartphone, with its 6.26-inch FHD+ LCD covering almost the entire front side, and the back featuring a smaller 5.1-inch 1,520 x 720 OLED panel to go with the dual cameras. A bit like Yota's implementation, except it's OLED instead of E Ink on the back; plus no front cameras, of course.
How Dandelion is making geothermal heating affordable
Millions of US citizens still use oil and natural gas to heat their homes during the winter. Many would like to switch to geothermal, a cleaner and ultimately cheaper system that leverages the natural temperature of the earth. A few feet below the surface, the soil sits at a reliable 50- to 60-degree Fahrenheit all year round. Pipes known as 'ground loops' push round a special antifreeze solution that absorbs this constant temperature in winter and disperses unwanted warmth in the summer. A large indoor heat pump uses the mixture to boil a refrigerant fluid; the resulting gas is then compressed to higher temperatures and distributed around the home. Installing the necessary equipment is expensive, however. Dandelion, a company that started inside Alphabet's X division, is trying to make geothermal cheaper and easier to install. While not the most eye-catching technology, especially compared to electric cars and sea-cooled data centers, it's arguably one of the most important for the environment.
Alphabet's Loon and Wing are now more than just 'projects'
Google parent company Alphabet's internet-delivering balloon service and its drone delivery project have graduated from X programs to full-fledged businesses at Alphabet. From here, Alphabet says that Loon will maintain its mission of working with carriers worldwide to deliver internet to underserved areas. Wing will similarly continue building out its network of delivery UAVs, not to mention its air-traffic control system for the unmanned aircraft.
Alphabet's X lab explores using AI to improve food production
Add Alphabet to the growing number of companies hoping that AI will solve food production problems. The Google parent brand's X lab has revealed that it's exploring ways machine learning could improve farming. While X hasn't focused on any specific solutions, lab leader Astro Teller told MIT Technology Review that AI could be combined with drones and other robotics. It could help determine when to harvest crops, or adapt farms in areas where climate change makes forecasting difficult.
Project Loon cleared to help restore wireless in Puerto Rico
Project Loon -- the balloon delivered internet project that started life as part of Google and now calls Alphabet's X "innovation lab" home -- has moved one step closer to becoming a part of the relief efforts in Puerto Rico. The FCC has issued an "experimental license" for it to provide emergency cellular LTE service. In a statement, an X spokesperson explained that the next step is to integrate with a telco partner's network, which it's "making solid progress on."
Alphabet is using salt and antifreeze to store power from wind farms
The latest from Alphabet's experimental X division? A storage solution for renewable energy. Code named "Malta," the system uses tanks of salt and antifreeze (or another hydrocarbon liquid) to create and store energy.
Alphabet's internet balloon chief leaves after 6 months
Alphabet's Project Loon is running into some figurative turbulence in addition to the literal kind. Tom Moore, the satellite executive who was brought on as CEO to help Project Loon become a full-fledged business, has left the leadership position after just 6 months. It's not clear why he's on the way out (neither he nor Alphabet are commenting), but he's being replaced by Alastair Westgarth, a wireless industry veteran best known for turning startups into viable companies. His "vision" for the internet balloon project matches the strategy of Alphabet's X division, "approaching huge programs, at scale, to improve the lives of millions or billions of people," the company says.
Alphabet won't need all those internet balloons after all
Since it launched nearly four years ago, Alphabet's Project Loon experiment has shifted from an unlikely moonshot to an idea that might actually work. As Alphabet's experimental X division chief and "Captain of Moonshots" Astro Teller wrote today, the project team has "now exceeded even their own expectations," in the attempts to build a network of self-navigating, internet-beaming balloons. "And in the process they've leapt much closer to a day when balloon-powered Internet could become a reality for people in rural and remote regions of the globe."
Alphabet dropped its plan for solar-powered internet drones
Wondering what happened to Google's solar internet drone project? Unfortunately, we don't have good news. An Alphabet spokesperson has confirmed to 9to5Google that its X division quietly dropped the Titan project shortly after it folded into X in late 2015. It won't surprise you as to why: Project Loon's high-altitude balloons are a "much more promising" way of getting people online in remote locations, the company says. Staffers who were working on Titan have found their way into other "high flying" initiatives, such as Project Loon and Project Wing. You can read the full statement below.
ICYMI: Google's so much closer to delivery by drone
try{document.getElementById("aol-cms-player-1").style.display="none";}catch(e){}Today on In Case You Missed It: Google's Project Wing is about to take off now that the US Government signed off on the company testing drone delivery within the country; perfect timing for Google's commercial launch of the service sometime in 2017. Physicists from the University of New Mexico created a laser that can cool a crystal down to negative 296 degrees Fahrenheit, which could be useful for infrared detectors on satellites or to detect skin cancer. In case you didn't see Instagram's video launching its new story function, you should see it just to sound informed when your friends talk about whether the company blatantly stole from Snapchat. Then wash that all down with YouTuber Eric Mouellic's video showing how close he came to a huge fin whale. As always, please share any interesting tech or science videos you find by using the #ICYMI hashtag on Twitter for @mskerryd.
NYT: Alphabet's reorganized 'X' division now includes robots
Last year Google shipped off some of its wilder projects for administration under new parent company Alphabet, which included its efforts with robots and the lab formerly known as Google X. A New York Times report says that the latter, now just known as the X research division, is in control of the disparate robotics projects acquired by Andy Rubin. To help manage the team, a former Nokia exec (with some interesting ideas about how Android can beat iPhone) named Hans Peter Brøndmo also joined up this month.
Nokia announces the X and X+, its first Android phones
Nokia is officially launching its very first Android devices, known as the X and the X+, on stage at its annual Mobile World Congress press conference. We were all taken aback by the second (and third) device (since only one leaked), so it's incredible to see Nokia make such a huge foray into enemy territory. The X will have a 4-inch, 840 x 480 IPS screen, 512MB RAM, 4GB of storage expandable storage via microSD slot and 3-megapixel camera, while the X+ sports the same specs but more RAM (768 MB) and an included 4GB microSD card. You won't be getting Google's apps or Play store, however as both handsets will be based on the forked AOSP Android OS. Nokia says that'll have the advantages of the Android ecosystem, but with a "differentiated experience." So far, Here Maps, MixRadio, Skype and Outlook are being featured on the Nokia Store. You can access the Nokia and third party stores using the devices, but not Google Play, obviously. We've heard SwiftKey will be available on the Nokia X range (and for free, too), as will BBM, which is also coming to Windows Phone sometime "this summer." The new devices are featuring a ported version of FastLane for Asha devices as a sort of skin, to give a similar experience as its other budget handsets. When you swipe across it, it'll bring up a sort of notification bar showing recently used apps, missed calls and texts and other activities. During the demo, Elop showed both the Nokia Store and Yandex, where he pulled down Aero Express, a Russian-flavored app. The X will be available immediately in growth markets (ie, not the US) and run 89 euros. The X+, meanwhile, will run 99 euros but won't arrive until sometime in Q2 this year.
