Archives January 2024

Last week, Sony scrapped its plans for a $10 billion merger of its Indian unit with Zee Entertainment. At that time, Sony said in a statement that certain “closing conditions” to the merger were not satisfied. A new report has said that the Japanese company abandoned the proposed merger because Zee failed to meet financial terms and address concerns.
Citing a termination notice, news agency Reuters reported that Sony alleged that Zee Entertainment “failed to take commercially reasonable” efforts to fulfil certain financial requirements outlined in the agreement, including with regards to cash availability, while a “lack of commercial prudence” by the Indian network contributed to its decision.
In the 62-page notice, Sony said several breaches of the merger agreement were “not remediable and any further attempts to mutually discuss would be an empty formality, especially given … plain denial (by Zee) and failure to provide a proposal to protect” Sony’s interests.
“The breaches committed by Zee are not ‘procedural or technical’ in nature and will have a substantive impact on the transactions,” Sony was quoted as saying.
In a statement on January 22, Sony announced the termination of the merger, stating that the “closing conditions” were not met after two years of negotiations.
What Zee Entertainment has to say
In response, Zee denied the allegations in a letter to Sony, also reviewed by Reuters, accusing the Japanese company of acting in “bad faith” by calling off the merger. Zee labelled Sony’s demand for a $90 million termination fee as “legally untenable.”
The proposed merger between Zee and Sony in India aimed to create a media giant with over 90 channels covering sports, entertainment and news.
Zee was “unable to realistically assess the timeline required to resolve all the outstanding issues,” Sony’s termination notice noted.

Google introduced its AI-powered digital assistant, Assistant with Bard, in October 2023. The tech giant has also rolled out the new version of Google Assistant to early testers. The Assistant with Bard has now appeared on the Pixel Tips app. The latest appearance also suggests that the smarter version of Google Assistant is expected to arrive soon for some devices.

Google’s Assistant with Bard: What to expect

A tipster named Nail Sadykov shared Google’s demo of Assistant With Bard on social media platform X. This demo video offers a look at how the feature will work once it goes live.

The leaker also shared a link to the Google News page on Telegram on the X post. The post also explains how the Assistant with Bard will work.

Earlier this month, another tipster named Dylan Roussel also shared some images with Android Authority showing how Assistant With Bard will look. The images showed its UI, functions and settings which aligns with the official demo in the Pixel Tips app.
Android expert Mishaal Rahman has also noted that the Assistant with Bard’s demo in the Pixel Tips app also suggests it could be a part of the March 2024 Pixel Feature Drop.

Rahmann also mentioned that the new AI-powered Assistant may remain restricted to Tensor-powered Pixel phones. This means Pixel 6 and above devices. He added that the Pixel Fold, Pixel Tablet, and the rumored Pixel Fold 2 may not get the Assistant with Bard feature.
However, this is just a rumour and may turn out to be incorrect in the coming days. It will be weird for Google to roll out Assistant with Bard on all the latest Tensor-powered Pixel devices and leave out the Pixel Fold and Pixel Tablet.
The Times of India Gadgets Now awards: Cast your vote now and pick the best phones, laptops and other gadgets of 2023

Companies have backed away from the once-hot digital realm, leaving metaverse leaders in the lurch. And yes, artificial intelligence is in.

Advertising giant Publicis Groupe SA made an unusual executive hire in mid-2022 – a lion-headed digital avatar named Leon who would serve as “chief metaverse officer,” guiding clients through the virtual realm that had seized real-world attention.

His moment in the spotlight didn’t last long.

Five months later, ChatGPT debuted, and the buzz that had surrounded the metaverse ever since Mark Zuckerberg rebranded Facebook as Meta Platforms Inc. shifted to artificial intelligence. Leon and other, human officers focused on the metaverse — an immersive digital reality where people can interact with one another — quickly became an endangered species. 

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Executives spearheading metaverse efforts at Walt Disney Co., Procter & Gamble Co. and Creative Artists Agency left. Leon’s LinkedIn profile (yes, he had one), no longer exists, and there’s no mention of him on the company’s website, other than his introductory press release. Publicis Groupe declined to comment on the record.

Instead, businesses are scrambling to appoint AI leaders, with Accenture and GE HealthCare making recent hires. A few metaverse executives have even reinvented themselves as AI experts, deftly switching from one hot technology to the next. Compensation packages average well above $1 million, according to a survey from executive-search and leadership advisory firm Heidrick & Struggles. Last week, Publicis said it would invest 300 million euros ($327 million) over the next three years on artificial intelligence technology and talent.

“It’s been a long time since I have had a conversation with a client about the metaverse,” said Fawad Bajwa, the global AI practice leader at the Russell Reynolds Associates executive search and advisory firm. “The metaverse might still be there, but it’s a lonely place.” 

The C-suite reshuffle illustrates the fickle nature of technology trends — and the difficulty corporations face distinguishing hype from reality.

Most companies have largely moved on from the metaverse. The word was uttered just twice on earnings calls at S&P 500 businesses last quarter, compared with 63 times in 2022’s first quarter, according to Bloomberg transcript data. That year, eight out of ten CEOs said they were either hiring dedicated talent with expertise in the space or expanding the responsibilities of their leadership teams to cover it, according to Russell Reynolds. All were chasing a piece of a global business opportunity that McKinsey & Co. consultants at the time optimistically estimated could be worth $5 trillion by 2030.

Apple’s decision to refer to its new mixed-reality headset Vision Pro as a “spatial computing” device, with no meta-mentions whatsoever, is another sign that “the focus has definitely shifted,” according to Nada Usina, chief executive officer and co-founder of NU Advisory Partners, an executive search and advisory firm focused on boards and the c-suite. Microsoft Corp. this month overtook Apple as the world’s most valuable public company, largely thanks to investors’ enthusiasm for its aggressive investment in AI. Even Meta’s Zuckerberg — who once proclaimed the metaverse “the next frontier” — has recently focused instead on generative AI after spending billions on metaverse initiatives that have borne little fruit.

All that has left some meta-mavens seeking new pastures or rejiggering their roles. Joanna Popper, CAA’s chief metaverse officer, left the talent agency after just over a year and then served a stint as a “board observer” at entertainment-focused AI startup Metaphysic.ai, which has a partnership with CAA. (Popper did not respond to a request for comment.) Pratik Thakar, who spearheaded Coca-Cola’s metaverse efforts  with its interactive “Real Magic” marketing campaign in 2021, is now global head of generative AI for the beverage giant.

But not every metaverse guru can follow suit. The skill sets of artificial intelligence leaders “are quite different,” Bajwa said. “You don’t just want to repurpose somebody. You will not get the deep expertise you want.”

At least one metaverse executive fell victim to a corporate coup. Disney’s Michael White left after Bob Iger returned to run the Mouse House and axed White’s metaverse department amid a broader overhaul. He’s now chief product officer at the self-driving car business Zoox, owned by Amazon.com Inc. Typically, there’s less palace intrigue: P&G’s Ioana Matei quietly left the Pampers maker last summer and is now running innovation at a global agricultural firm. White did not respond to Bloomberg interview requests, and Matei declined to comment. 

Some metaverse chiefs remain, including Yaiza Rubio at Spanish telecom Telefonica and Nelly Mensah at LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton SE. But their expertise spans several emerging technologies, such as digital ledger blockchain. And even companies that want to explore the metaverse’s uses may opt for a consultant now, said Aliceson Robinson with Heidrick & Struggles. “There is still interest in engaging with consumers in the metaverse, but not as a C-suite hire,” said Robinson, the executive search firm’s global sector leader for consumer, technology, entertainment and media.

Jeff Wong, global chief innovation officer at professional services giant Ernst & Young LLP, said his department has probably halved its metaverse investment over the past year or so. “Some folks are making a joke out of it, like it’s done and dusted,” he said, although he’s not one of them. “There’s a ton of promise in what the metaverse can deliver,” Wong said.

In contrast, EY now has two senior executives heading up its global AI program, making sure artificial intelligence is woven into each aspect of the business, he said. “This is a big deal for us,” Wong said.

Also, read these top stories today:

Video Surveillance! Police in the US will now have to get warrants to obtain video footage from Amazon Ring devices. But what about the millions of other cameras watching us? Know all about it here. 

Rising India! Indian smart electronics companies like Lava and Qubo are getting high ratings. Check it out now here. 

iPhone-maker’s loss! An Apple veteran who helped start efforts to develop an electric vehicle is leaving for Rivian Auto, marking yet another senior departure for the iPhone maker. Read all about it here. 

Nvidia’s RTX Remix, a resource platform that allows the modding community access to tools for remastering old titles with ease, has entered open beta and now we’re finally seeing the results. Unfortunately, those results look pretty mixed right now.

There’s been a recent demo showing the 23-year-old game Max Payne with RTX Remix enhancements, a mod that you can access here. Though it looks visually stunning while running on the RTX 4080 – one of the best graphics cards – and using path tracing, performance-wise it’s pretty bad. 

Microsoft is an old (in tech terms, at least) company – and a very successful one at that, but not every product it makes is a success.

For every Windows 7, there’s a Games for Windows Live. Every Microsoft Office, there’s a Clippy.

Indian online brokerage platform Zerodha went down early morning on Monday after it was hit by a technical glitch. The issue was resolved later during the day. Zerodha is the second-biggest online brokerage platform in India.
The company acknowledged the issue on social media platforms. “Due to a connectivity issue, some of our users were intermittently facing issues with order placement on Kite.This issue is now resolved. We regret the inconvenience caused,” Zerodha said on X, formerly Twitter.
Some affected traders were seen asking for compensation for the loss on social media platforms.
Incidentally, earlier this year, Zerodha Co-founder and CEO Nithin Kamath had said that it is impossible for tech companies like theirs to have zero glitches as the business is time sensitive and caters to a large number of users. In the year 2023 alone, Zerodha admitted to at least eight technical glitches with issues varying from those relating to login on Kite app, display of orders and positions as well as order placements.
To minimise the impact of any potential issues, he said that the company has made significant architectural changes over the years. “This is one of the reasons why any incidents that happen affect a small % of users. But, given the demographics of our customers, we tend to get disproportionately large social media attention and press coverage. The exchange data however indicates that we have the least complaints among the top brokers as a percentage of our active customers at the exchanges. All that said, minimising the probability of any issues is always at the absolute top of our list of priorities,” Kamath had said.
Groww too went down last month
Almost a week ago, another online broking platform Groww’s services were also hit by a technical glitch on its trading app. The company’s founder Lalit Keshre apologised for the same later. “Technical issues happen in our industry, and we have also faced them in the past; the last major one was on April 6, 2023. And each one of them still hurts and remains like a scar. However, this time, it hurt a lot more,” he wrote
According to NSE data, Groww is India’s largest broker with 76 million active clients in December vs Zerodha’s 67.3 million client base. The two biggest brokers control over 1/3rd of the market share. Angel One is the third largest and owns about 14.8% of the market share.

New footage has leaked for Google’s Assistant with Bard demonstrating how the digital AI helper could work at launch.

Nail Sadykov posted the video on X (the platform formerly known as Twitter) after discovering the feature on the Pixel Tips app. Apparently, Google accidentally spilled the beans on its tech, so it’s probably safe to say this is legitimate. It looks like something you would see in one of the company’s Keyword posts explaining the feature in detail except there’s no audio.

What if Apple is right about the App Store and its control of it?

I’ve never wanted an open App Store. Side-loading apps onto my best iPhone struck me as the perfect way to infect or ruin them. Granted, I was not an iPhone jailbreak kind of guy. I’ve also never felt constrained by that single App Store or even that I’m potentially being overcharged because Apple used to charge developers 30% for every transaction (it’s since come down a bit in some situations) – a cost that might’ve been passed along to me. Perhaps this is because the majority of apps I use are free and those I’ve paid for, like Procreate, and Star Walk 2 charged me once and then let me freely download updates.

Handling numerous Gmail accounts can pose a challenge, particularly for those balancing personal, professional, and other email addresses. Fortunately, Google provides a practical solution, enabling users to log in to multiple Gmail accounts at the same time.
Effectively managing several Gmail accounts simultaneously offers a streamlined approach to email communication.By adhering to the instructions mentioned in this article and following the below mentioned steps, you can easily manage and arrange your different Gmail accounts.

Steps to sign in to multiple Gmail accounts simultaneously

Step 1: Log in to your primary Gmail account, which will serve as the main hub for accessing and managing your other accounts. Visit the Gmail login page (https://mail.google.com/) and provide the credentials for your primary account. Once signed in, click on your profile picture in the top-right corner of the Gmail interface.
Step 2: In the drop-down menu, select ‘Add another account.’ A new window will appear, prompting you to enter the login credentials for the additional Gmail account you want to add. Input the email address and password for the account and click ‘Next.’
Step 3: After adding multiple accounts, you can effortlessly switch between them by clicking on your profile picture again and selecting the desired account from the list. Alternatively, you can use the ‘Sign in with a different account’ option in the menu to add more accounts as needed.
Step 4: To distinguish between accounts, assign unique labels and colours. Go to ‘Settings’ (gear icon) > ‘See all settings’ > ‘Labels’ to manage labels. Visit the Google Account settings page, scroll down to ‘Sign in to Google,’ and click on ‘Device activity & notifications.’ Enable ‘Allow less secure apps’ to facilitate multiple sign-ins.
Step 5: Choose a default account to ensure that certain Google services, such as Google Drive, always open with the preferred account. Navigate to ‘Settings’ > ‘See all settings’ > ‘Accounts and Import’ and set your default account.
Step 6: Consider using different web browsers or browser profiles for each Gmail account to avoid confusion and streamline your email management process.

The OnePlus 12 could improve gamers’ experience by providing 120 frames per second to all Android games, living up to its “Smooth beyond belief” title.

This feature was highlighted at the OnePlus launch event on January 23 along with an array of new features which could further improve gaming performance.