Tech Brew Ride Home - Thu. 08/17 – Sometimes Startup Acquires You

Episode Date: August 17, 2023

OpenAI makes its first acquisition. Has AI really done anything for Bing marketshare? A really cool looking new gaming handheld. The most recent tally of tech industry layoff numbers. And Eric Schmidt says he wants to pull a Sam Altman. Sponsors: Zbiotics.com/ride code ride Links: OpenAI acquires AI design studio Global Illumination (TechCrunch) Microsoft Struggles to Gain on Google Despite Its Head Start in AI Search (WSJ) Exclusive Images: This is the Lenovo Legion Go Gaming Handheld (WindowsReport) Cyber security researchers become target of criminal hackers (FT) Tech Firms Are Slowing Layoffs But Still Not Yet Resuming Hiring (Bloomberg) Ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt to launch AI-science moonshot (Semafor) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On April 4th, 2023, around 2 in the morning, a man was found stabbed multiple times on a sidewalk in downtown San Francisco. Hey, who did this to you? What happened next turned the story into a political firestorm. Reports have identified the victim as Bob Lee, the founder of Cash App. From Bloomberg Podcasts, this is Foundering, the Killing of Bob Lee, beginning April 16. Welcome to the TechMeBright home for Thursday, August 17th, 2020. I'm Brian McCullough today. Open AI makes its first acquisition.

Has AI really done anything for Bing's market share? A really cool-looking new gaming handheld. The most recent tally of tech industry layoff numbers and Eric Schmidt says he wants to pull a Sam Altman. Here's what you miss today in the world of tech. If you raise enough money, you can be an acquirer too. Open AI has acquired New York-based AI Design Studio Global Illuminations. marking the company's first public acquisition, the terms of the deal weren't disclosed,

quoting TechCrunch. Global Illumination, launched by Thomas Dimson, Taylor Gordon, and Joey Flynn, has been involved in a range of projects since its founding in 2021. Backed by VC firms' paradigm benchmark and slow, Global Illumination's team designed and built products early on at Instagram and Facebook, as well as YouTube, Google, Pixar, and Riot Games. As director of engineering at Instagram Dimson was instrumental in iterating the platform's discovery algorithms. While there, he helped to start the teams responsible for Instagram's Explore tab experience, feed, and stories ranking, IGTV, and general data engineering. Global Illumination's most recent creation is Biomes, a Minecraft-like open-source sandbox multiplayer online role-playing game built for the web.

The game's fate is unclear, but one would presume that the team's work at OpenAI will have less of an entertainment bent. OpenAI might have avoided acquisitions until now, but the company backed by billions in venture capital from Microsoft and major VC players, has for several years run funds and grant programs to invest in emerging AI companies and organizations. Certainly, OpenAI is on the hunt for a commercial win. While ChatGPT achieved global fame, OpenAI reportedly spent upwards of $540 million last year to develop it, including funds it used to poach talent from the likes of Google, according to the information. OpenAI made $30 million in revenue last year, but CEO Sam Altman has reportedly told investors

that the company intends to boost that figure to $200 million this year and $1 billion next year, end quote. Meanwhile, how has the bear hug with OpenAI worked out for Microsoft so far? I mean, as we've said, it's done a ton for their stock price, almost doubling this year. But the attempt to use GPT as a wedge against Google search, maybe not so much. An analysis has found that Bing had 1 to 3% market share in search globally in July. about the same as January 20203, despite adding Bing chat in the interim. Quoting the journal, When Microsoft unveiled an AI-powered version of Bing in February,

the company said it could add $2 billion of revenue if the revamp search engine could pry away even a single point of market share from Google. Six months later, it looks as if even one percentage point could be a tough target, with some new data showing Bing's place in search has barely budged, partly because of how Microsoft handled its high-profile rollout. In July, Bing had 3% market share worldwide, according to analytics firm Stat Counter. That is the same share it had in January, the month before the launch of the new Bing. Another report from analytics firm's similar web shows Bing had around 1% of Google's monthly visitors in July, around the same it had in January.

Microsoft is calling the new Bing a success. It disputed outside data, saying third-party data companies aren't measuring all the people who are going directly to Bing's chat page. A chat interface is still an unusual way for people to try to find information on the line, said Daniel Tunkalang, a search consultant who has worked with Google and LinkedIn, now owned by Microsoft. The new Bing is, quote, cute, but not a game changer, he said. The addition of AI helped boost Bing's user base by 10% to 98 million in the months from its February launch through June, according to measurements from analytics firm Yippit Data. Even with the growth, Bing's user tally is still tiny compared with Google's 1.12 billion users, end quote.

leaked images have surfaced online showing a new Windows 11-based gaming handheld from Lenovo that appears to combine features of the Steam Deck, Asis Raj Ally, and Nintendo Switch. Quoting Windows report, Lenovo is working on a gaming handheld called Legion Go, which might be the best on-the-go gaming device yet. And if you think this is just another rumor like Lenovo's Legion play from a few years back, as we did, think again we've obtained some super-exclusive images with the device which looks fantastic. At first glance, it doesn't look that much different from its competitors, but the thing that sets it apart, we think it's the similarities with another huge player in the space

the Nintendo Switch. Why is that important? Well, because it's more of a cherry-picked design that combines the best features of all of its competitors, starting with the removable joycons, or however Lenovo will call them, then the placement of the buttons, similar to Raj Ali, and a supposedly bigger screen of eight inches, finishing up with a trackpad like on the steam deck. and it's not even the best part. It will sport Windows 11, which means that it has the potential to replace your gaming PC fully, and you'll be able to play your AAA titles on the go. Pair that with the fact that it's heart and soul will allegedly be AMD's new Phoenix processors, and you'll get a fully-fledged gaming experience right at your fingertips whenever you want it. Another thing that hints at Legion Goes Power is the huge air vents on the back of the device alongside a stand that will help you when you want to pair another controller. We can't say anything about the noise levels yet, but we'll surely test it as soon as it will be available, so stay tuned for that.

Regarding the I.O, the shoulder buttons and side triggers aren't anything new for this kind of device. The back triggers are a welcome addition, while maybe the most interesting thing hidden on the back of the right JoyCon is a wheel. We also see two USBC ports, one at the bottom, one at the top, a power button, a headphone jack, plus and minus buttons for adjusting volume, and thanks to the gaming gods, a microSD slot. We can't confirm any info yet, but because the joycons are removable, we can safely assume the screen will also be touch-sensitive. And so it should be, as Windows 11 is more friendly than ever for touch inputs. In conclusion, Lenovo's Legion Go looks like a complete package that promises to address some of the issues with the other big players in this market. Can you imagine opening Steam or any other platform on your way home, playing your favorite game, then removing the joycons and browsing through YouTube on your crisp touchscreen device?

And all of that without breaking a sweat, end quote. Hey, security folks. Negative trend alert. According to the Financial Times, a number of cybersecurity professionals called in by companies and governments to tackle organized hacking groups say their work is attracting actual physical threats, IRL. Quote, Robert M. Lee, the chief executive of cybersecurity company Dragos, received an ominous message earlier this year. An organized criminal hacking group had broken into Dragos's employee network, telling Lee, they would release the company's proprietary data unless a ransom were paid. He refused to negotiate so the hackers raised the stakes. They found his son's passport online, school and telephone number. Lee said the message was clear,

pay up, or your family is in danger. When you start talking about the life and safety of your kid, things take a different spin, said Lee, a veteran of the U.S. military and the national security agency. A number of Western cybersecurity professionals told the financial times that online threats had increasingly turned real in recent times, called in by companies to thwart hacking groups, computer engineers are then becoming a target. The criminal group that threatened Lee, which he declined in name, was known to resort to swatting, a practice when someone maliciously calls the local authorities pretending to be a victim of an armed attack, prompting a police SWAT team being sent to a target's home.

Basically, they're trying to get someone killed, said Lee, who was told by local police that their best option in that situation was to lie down on the floor. The threats are broad and often inventive. One Ukrainian hacker mailed a gram of heroin to the home of Brian Krebs, a journalist turned cybersecurity analyst. They followed up by having a florist deliver a giant bouquet in the shape of a cross to Krebs's home. Some hacking victims have been told to send money to bank accounts of cybersecurity professionals in an effort to frame them. A North Korean hacking group pretended to be security researchers on LinkedIn with prospective contexts, then sent hidden malware

and encryption keys. We're an organization that calls out threat actors all the time, and so we have to think about our own security from a company perspective, from an individual perspective, from a physical perspective, said Charles Carmacal, the chief technology officer for Mandant Consulting, which is called in to investigate major breaches, including recently at the State Department and other U.S. agencies. There are certain countries that I will not visit, particularly because I've been very vocal about offensive operations from those countries, he said. I am outing a lot of very expensive intrusion operations, so I'm very careful and mindful about

that perspective of, are we going to become a victim? The ability of criminals based in Eastern Europe, China, or North Korea to target security professionals based in Western Europe or the U.S. highlights the transnational nature of an industry that has grown to reap billions of dollars from their victims, end quote. Earlier this year, for a couple months at least, almost every day, I was telling you about new layoffs at various tech companies of various sizes. Almost every company we cover on the show had one layoff notice or another. Well, you might have noticed that those stories have tailed off a bit, but data from Jeffries and Trueup have tallied up the true toll of the tech layoffs this year.

year as of this point, quoting Bloomberg. The tech sector had some of the earliest and steepest workforce reductions as the economic downturned forced companies to cut costs and eliminate a glut of staffing created during the pandemic boom. So far this year, there have been 342,671 layoffs in the tech industry, according to Jeffries and Trueup well ahead of the 243,075 for all of last year. Data from layoffs.fyi shows a similar trend. Still, the job cuts in the tech industry appeared to slow in June and July and are on track to be even lower this month, according to an analysis from research firm Jeffries, citing proprietary data as well as that from job marketplace, true up. The number of open jobs in the tech industry remains tepid the data show, mirroring trends

in the broader economy that suggests some softening in demand for workers. U.S. job openings fell in June to the lowest level since April 2021, according to a government report earlier this month. Layoffs also declined to the lowest since the end of last year, suggesting employers are reticent to let go of staff, end quote. Finally today, why should Sam Altman have all the fun? Sources are telling semaphore that Eric Schmidt is building an organization modeled on OpenAI to tackle scientific challenges by using AI. Most of the funding is coming from Schmidt's own personal wealth. Quote, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt is building an ambitious new organization to tackle scientific challenges with the help of artificial intelligence, according to people,

briefed on the plans. Schmidt has already hired two accomplished scientists to spearhead the nonprofit initiative, Samuel Rodriguez, founder of the Applied Biotechnology Laboratory at the Francis Crick Institute, and Andrew White, a University of Rochester professor and a pioneer in the use of artificial intelligence in chemistry. People familiar with the plans say the effort is modeled after OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, which was founded with great fanfare as a philanthropic organization. Schmidt wants the new nonprofit to become a big draw for top talent in science and AI, two areas that are converging to potentially create breakthroughs and everything from drug discovery to

material sciences. Funding will come mostly from Schmidt's personal wealth, but outside funds may be necessary, given the ambition of the project, people familiar with the plan said. Schmidt intends to offer competitive salaries and resources, in particular, compute power that can be difficult to come by in academia. The project is still in the early stages the people said, and exact plans could change. Breakthroughs in both computer science and in the lab have created new excitement about the application of deep learning and other forms of AI to longstanding scientific challenges. At the same time, the cost of training AI models using massive data sets have come down, making the methods more accessible to researchers. Schmidt outlined his vision in an

article last month in MIT technology review titled, This is How AI Will Transform the Way Science Gets Done. With the advent of AI, science is about to become much more exciting and in some ways unrecognizable. The reverberations of this shift will be felt far outside the lab. They will affect us all, he wrote. Schmidt has also been supportive of risky bets. With his wife Wendy, co-founded Schmidt Futures, a philanthropic organization that funds research projects that have the potential to generate big impact, but don't have a clear business model that would be attractive to venture capital investors. The couple has funded several other AI-related projects, including the nonprofit AI 2050 and the AI and Science Post-Doctoral Fellowship Program,

both focused on pushing forward the use of the technology to benefit humanity. Rodriguez and White are both relatively young and highly decorated stars in their field and have been prolific publishers. And according to what they've written in articles, blog posts, and social media, they both share an intense belief that software is about to upend science. Roderikas, who has been tasked with establishing the new organization, delivered a TED Talk in 2017 where he outlined his vision of the next hundred years of brain science. His laboratory's website describes moonshot ideas such as curing common conditions like allergies and tackling schizophrenia, depression, and Alzheimer's disease, all with the help of AI. In April, Rodriguez wrote that in order for AI to

transform drug discovery, biologists and AI researchers need to be brought under one roof. Quote, AI researchers who are exposed to the nitty-gritty details of how biology actually works, often get scared away by the complexity and biology researchers exposed to the details of how AI works often conclude that it cannot be trusted, he wrote. We will need teams of hardcore AI researchers and hardcore scientists working together with a rapid iteration cycle in order to build tools that leverage the cutting edge and that actually add value for the scientists, end quote. I'm walking through time, deluded as the next guy,

pretending and hoping to find that distant peace of mind. Talk to you tomorrow.