Source: Engadget | Facebook buys startup using AI vision to find your location (updated)
- Death of American Fuels Concern Over China’s Approach to Coronavirus The New York Times
- Coronavirus outbreak: Live updates CNN International
- Widespread Outcry in China Over Death of Coronavirus Doctor The New York Times
- The virus that shook China’s system The Washington Post
- Can We Please Just Blame the Virus? The New York Times
- View full coverage on Google News
- Samantha Mewis’ two goals help U.S. clinch Olympic spot ESPN
- 2020 Concacaf Women’s Olympic Qualifying: USA vs. Mexico – Lineup, Schedule & TV Channels U.S. Soccer
- Tokyo bound: USWNT punches ticket to Olympics with 4-0 win over Mexico Yahoo Sports
- USWNT Qualifies for Olympics With Rout of Mexico Sports Illustrated
- U.S. Women’s Team Qualifies for Olympic Soccer Tournament The New York Times
- View full coverage on Google News
- 7 takeaways from the Democratic debate in New Hampshire CNN
- 2020 Democrats take the debate stage following messy Iowa caucuses Fox News
- 5 Takeaways From The Virtual Tie Out Of Iowa Between Buttigieg And Sanders NPR
- Scared of Bernie? Not Feeling Pete? The Unity Candidate Has Been Right Here the Whole Time. Slate
- Who won the last Democratic debate? Our panelists’ verdict The Guardian
- View full coverage on Google News
‘A city where you can pilot almost anything and figure out if it’s going to work’
February 8, 2020As founding executive director of Tech:NYC, Julie Samuels is one of the state’s most prominent advocates for the tech sector, both in Albany and at City Hall.
Samuels, a lawyer by training, came to New York after serving as executive director of Engine, a San Francisco organization on which Tech:NYC is modeled. In an interview with TechCrunch, Samuels spoke about several issues, including her rationale for why, despite the controversy over Amazon’s decision not to build its second headquarters in Queens, the area is well-positioned for the next wave of tech innovation.
TechCrunch: What is the need for organizations like Tech:NYC and Engine?
Julie Samuels: As the tech industry matures, it is incredibly important that there are organizations [that] represent these companies politically, civically, making sure they have a seat at the table with so many public policy debates. There is no shortage of public policy debates surrounding technology.
It is also incredibly important that there are organizations who are talking from the viewpoint of smaller companies and startups. There are a lot of organizations that represent the biggest and most well-known companies, including Tech:NYC. But [we] also have hundreds of members who are small and growing startups. We think that diversity of the ecosystem is what really sets the technology sector apart and it is something we want to foster and celebrate.
Who are your members, then?
Source: Tech Crunch Startups | ‘A city where you can pilot almost anything and figure out if it’s going to work’
Hitting the Books: The Y2K bug could come back sooner than you think
February 8, 2020
Source: Engadget | Hitting the Books: The Y2K bug could come back sooner than you think
Why wait until Tuesday to find out what Samsung will unveil? A tipster sent us these pictures of what appears to be Samsung's next foldable phone. The Galaxy Z Flip has appeared in earlier leaks, but these are t…
Source: Engadget | The Morning After: A Samsung Galaxy Z Flip sneak peek
Iowa might have screwed up the whole nomination process
Nate Silver,
FiveThirtyEight
By now you probably know the story. The Iowa Democratic Party decided to use an app to report results from its caucuses this week. These events were the first pri…
Source: Engadget | Recommended Reading: The lasting effect of the Iowa Caucuses
Facebook has acquired Scape Technologies, the London-based computer vision startup
February 8, 2020Scape Technologies, the London-based computer vision startup working on location accuracy beyond the capabilities of GPS, has been acquired by Facebook, according to a regulatory filing.
Full terms of the deal remain as yet unknown, although a Companies House update reveals that Facebook Inc. now has majority control of the company (more than 75%). However by looking at other filings, including a recent share issue, I understand the price could be about $40 million.
Further filings show that Scape’s previous venture capital representatives have resigned from the Scape board and are replaced by two Facebook executives.
Scape’s backers included Entrepreneur First (EF) — the startup is an alumni of the company builder program — along with LocalGlobe, Mosaic Ventures, and Fly Ventures.
Noteworthy is that EF and Fly Ventures have both already had a joint exit to Facebook of sorts, when Bloomsbury AI was acqui-hired by the social networking behemoth (a story that I also broke).
Founded in 2017, Scape Technologies was developing a “Visual Positioning Service” based on computer vision which lets developers build apps that require location accuracy far beyond the capabilities of GPS alone.
The technology initially targeted augmented reality apps, but also had the potential to be used to power applications in mobility, logistics and robotics. More broadly, Scape wanted to enable any machine equipped with a camera to understand its surroundings.
Scape CEO and co-founder Edward Miller previously described Scape’s “Vision Engine” as a large-scale mapping pipeline that creates 3D maps from ordinary images and video. Camera devices can then query the Vision Engine using the startup’s “Visual Positioning Service” API to determine their exact location with far greater precision than GPS can ever provide. The Visual Positioning Service was made available to select developers via Scape’s SDK.
Meanwhile the acquisition by Facebook, no matter what form it takes, looks like a good fit given the U.S. company’s investment in next generation platforms, including VR and AR. It is also another — perhaps, worrying — example of U.S. tech companies hoovering up U.K. machine learning and AI talent early.
Update: A Facebook spokesperson provided the following statement: “We acquire smaller tech companies from time to time. We don’t always discuss our plans.”
Source: Tech Crunch Startups | Facebook has acquired Scape Technologies, the London-based computer vision startup
Death of American Fuels Concern Over China’s Approach to Coronavirus – The New York Times
February 8, 2020Source: Google News | Death of American Fuels Concern Over China’s Approach to Coronavirus – The New York Times
Source: Engadget | US House panel will discuss self-driving cars next week
Source: Google News | Samantha Mewis' two goals help U.S. clinch Olympic spot – ESPN
Source: Google News | 7 takeaways from the Democratic debate in New Hampshire – CNN