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Comprehensive report by 21st Century Business Herald New Productivity Research Institute

Good morning, a new day has begun. What interesting things have happened in the technology industry in the past 24 hours? Let's take a look with 21tech.

【Giant weathervane】

1. OpenAI releases a new model, is the rumored "Strawberry" coming?On August 13, OpenAI announced on the social platform of its chatbot ChatGPT that a new GPT-4o model has appeared in ChatGPT since last week, and encouraged users to take a look. The low-key release of the model did not attract much attention, and even OpenAI's official account and CEO Sam Altman did not introduce or forward it. According to ChatGPT's response to netizens in the comment section, the new model is "different" and is not OpenAI's latest API-side GPT-4o 0806 model. Currently, free users can also use this model, but there is a limit on the number of uses. Combined with Altman's posting of a picture with strawberry elements on the social platform a few days ago, and the advance "spoilers" of many media, netizens have speculated that this new GPT-4o model may be the mysterious "strawberry"-that is, the AI ​​model formerly known as Q*, which has stronger reasoning capabilities. (Securities Times)

2. The US Department of Justice is considering pushing for the breakup of Google.After winning a landmark court ruling that Google has a monopoly in the online search market, the U.S. Department of Justice is considering options that include a rare push to break up the Alphabet Inc.-owned company, according to people familiar with the matter. If so, it would be the first time the U.S. government has attempted to break up a company on the grounds of illegal monopoly since its failed attempt to break up Microsoft two decades ago. Less severe options include forcing Google to share more data with competitors and taking steps to prevent it from gaining an unfair advantage in artificial intelligence products, people familiar with the matter said. In any case, Washington may seek to ban exclusive contracts that are at the heart of the Google case. People familiar with the matter said that if the Justice Department moves forward with the split plan, the most likely units to be divested are the Android operating system and Google's web browser Chrome. One of the people familiar with the matter said that officials are also considering forcing the company to sell AdWords, a platform for selling text ads. (Cailian News)

3. Huang Renxun sold Nvidia stocks continuously and cashed in 4.1 billion yuan.According to documents from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Nvidia CEO Huang Renxun sold a record-breaking $323 million worth of company stock in July, breaking his personal monthly cash-out record of nearly $170 million in June. In August, he did not stop reducing his holdings. A rough calculation shows that in seven trading days, Huang Renxun sold 120,000 shares of Nvidia stock every day, a total of 840,000 shares, and a total cash out of $86.7652 million. From June to now, Huang Renxun has continuously cashed out about $578 million (equivalent to about 4.1 billion yuan). Relevant documents show that in addition to Huang Renxun, Nvidia board member Mark Stevens also sold about $125 million worth of stock, and Jay Puri, executive vice president of global business operations, sold about $10 million worth of stock.

4. An American team announced a new breakthrough in high-temperature superconductivity.On August 7, local time, a research team from the University at Buffalo, State University of New York reported in the latest issue of Nature Communications the preparation of an ultra-high-performance superconducting wire based on rare earth barium copper oxide (REBCO), which is the world's highest-performance high-temperature superconducting wire segment, and the cost-effectiveness index has been significantly improved. Superconductors refer to materials with zero resistance and complete anti-magnetism (i.e., Meissner effect) below a specific transition temperature. They can be widely used in power transmission and energy storage, medical imaging, maglev trains, quantum computing and other fields. High-temperature superconductivity has many applications in the power industry, defense, medical care and transportation. For example, the ability of HTS wires to transmit electricity without resistance at higher temperatures than those required by traditional superconductors will likely change the power grid; combining high-temperature superconductivity and maglev technology, high-temperature superconducting maglev trains will have higher operating speeds and lower energy consumption.

5. A human first: SpaceX will carry out a manned polar flight mission this year.SpaceX, an American space exploration technology company, has announced that it will carry out the first manned mission around the Earth's poles before the end of this year. The private space flight mission is led by cryptocurrency entrepreneur Chun Wang, and the other three members include a polar explorer, a roboticist and a filmmaker. The mission, called "Fram2", is named after the Norwegian exploration ship "Fram". It will enter the polar corridor from SpaceX's launch site in Florida with the "Endurance" Dragon spacecraft, flying directly over the North Pole and the South Pole. The spacecraft will not dock with the International Space Station (ISS), but will fly around the Earth alone. For optimal lighting conditions, the three- to five-day mission is planned to fly over Antarctica around the summer solstice in the southern hemisphere, and the spacecraft will be equipped with a cupola for photography.

6. Ali Tongyi open source audio language model Qwen2-Audio.On August 13, Ali Tongyi's model continued to be open source, and the Qwen2 series open source family added an audio language model Qwen2-Audio. It is reported that Qwen2-Audio can directly conduct voice questions and answers without text input, and understand and analyze the audio signals input by users, including human voice, natural sound, music, etc.

7. Southeast Asian e-commerce platform Lazada achieved profitability in July.Southeast Asian e-commerce platform Lazada recorded a positive EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) in July this year and achieved profitability. On the morning of August 13, Lazada revealed the above news at an internal meeting. Lazada Thailand has been profitable in 2022. According to Alibaba's financial report, since 2023, Lazada has continuously narrowed its order losses for several consecutive quarters by increasing monetization rates, reducing logistics costs, and providing more value-added services. It is revealed that Lazada CEO Dong Zheng said in an internal speech that this profit proves the effectiveness of Lazada's business strategy.

8. Tencent launched a function to query game accounts linked to ID cards.On August 13, Tencent's official Weibo account announced the launch of a function to query game accounts linked to ID cards, which will be used to prevent minors from becoming addicted. This function can query the login and recharge status of all Tencent game accounts under the parent's ID card account within a month. In addition, parents only need to authorize the "Tencent Growth Guardian" applet and follow the "Tencent Growth Guardian" public account to receive real-time notifications.

9. Faraday Future completed the delivery of a new FF 91 2.0.On August 13, Faraday Future’s official blog announced that FF senior employee and head of global communications and community sales Gao Wei became the latest owner of the FF 91 2.0 Futurist Alliance. This is the second FF 91 2.0 Futurist Alliance delivered recently since the restart of the second phase of delivery (SOD2).

10. Tesla stops accepting orders for the cheapest version of Cybertruck.The website of Tesla, an American electric car manufacturer, shows that Tesla has stopped accepting orders for the cheapest version of the electric pickup Cybertruck, priced at $61,000, while the $100,000 version of Cybertruck can be ordered immediately and delivered as early as this month. Industry analysts believe that this adjustment may indicate that demand for Cybertruck is lower than expected. The supply and demand of Cybertruck has always attracted much attention because CEO Musk has invested a lot of resources in its development and plans to produce 200,000 Cybertrucks per year. However, because the higher-priced version of Cybertruck has a lower range than originally predicted, many customers now prefer the cheaper version of Cybertruck.

11. As the peak season for Apple mobile phone production arrives, the recruitment remuneration of workers at Foxconn in Zhengzhou may be lower than in the past two years.The Zhengzhou Foxconn recruitment public account "Zhengzhou Foxconn Joint Recruitment" has been posting "highest price of the year" recruitment information for several days, indicating that the peak season for Apple mobile phone production has arrived. The article said that after working in Foxconn's A business group in the port area for three months, the expected return salary can be up to 21,500 yuan. However, compared with the high salary offered by Zhengzhou Foxconn in August in the past two years, if the recruitment salary is not increased again this year, it may not be as good as in the past two years.

12. Terminating cooperation with Huawei? iFlytek said the information was untrue.On August 13, an investor asked iFlytek whether it was true that Huawei and iFlytek were going to terminate their cooperation. iFlytek said on the interactive platform that the information was untrue. iFlytek and Huawei have always maintained a good cooperative relationship in many aspects such as Ascend computing power, smart terminals, Hongmeng ecosystem, sports and health. On the same day, Huawei and iFlytek announced a cooperation in the field of sports and health, and the two sides will jointly develop cutting-edge sports and health solutions.

13. Cainiao announced the official launch of local express delivery service in Hong Kong.Alibaba's Cainiao announced that it has officially launched local express delivery services in Hong Kong, launching a one-stop e-commerce logistics solution for "business to consumer" (B2C) and a "Cainiao EASY delivery" service for "consumer to consumer" (C2C). Zhu Rui, head of local express delivery at Cainiao Group in Hong Kong, pointed out that the service will be launched in phases at more than 700 self-pickup points in Hong Kong. Currently, about 80 self-pickup points have been opened, and it is expected to be expanded to all by the end of this year.

14. Ecovacs responded to product security vulnerabilities: it will use technical means to enhance product security.In response to the security vulnerabilities of Ecovacs products recently released by two security personnel, Dennis Giese and Braelynn, at the Def Con Security Conference, Ecovacs responded to reporters that this is a means of cracking in technical attack and defense, but it is an abnormal means in daily life. The company will use technical means such as limiting the login of the second account and strengthening the secondary verification of the connection between Bluetooth devices to strengthen the security of the product in terms of Bluetooth connection. According to the previous findings of the two security personnel, after connecting to Ecovacs' sweeping robots and lawn mowers through Bluetooth, hackers can remotely control them through the product's built-in WiFi connection function and access functions and information such as room maps, cameras, and microphones in the operating system.

15. India unexpectedly recalls Apple's antitrust investigation report.India's antitrust regulator has ordered a recall of its investigation into Apple's violations of competition law, a move that surprised global investment institutions. Apple previously said its trade secrets were leaked to competitors including Tinder owner Match. The move will extend the investigation process that began in 2021, the core issue of which is Apple's alleged abuse of its dominant position in the application market, forcing developers to use its proprietary in-app purchase system and charging up to 30%. (Interface)

【The most core news】

1. AMD completed the acquisition of Silo AI, Europe's first private AI laboratory.AMD officially announced on August 13 that it has completed the acquisition of Silo AI, the largest private AI laboratory in Europe. The transaction is worth about $665 million. This is the largest private AI innovation company acquisition in Europe since Google acquired DeepMind in the UK for about 400 million pounds in 2014. AMD said that the acquisition of SiloAI reflects AMD's determination to provide end-to-end AI solutions based on open standards and its good cooperative relationship with the global AI ecosystem.

2. Intel sells its shares in Arm to raise funds.Intel sold its stake in Arm in the second quarter. Intel is currently laying off employees and cutting expenses to turn around its business. The company said in a regulatory filing that it no longer holds 1.18 million shares of Arm. Based on the average price of Arm shares in the same period ($124.34), the sale will raise about $147 million for Intel.

3. Hu Weiwu: The performance of Loongson 3B6600 will be comparable to Intel's 12th/13th generation high-end Core.Hu Weiwu, chairman of Loongson Technology, recently revealed in an interview that although the 3B6600 eight-core desktop CPU currently being developed by Loongson uses mature technology, it is expected that the single-core/multi-core performance can still reach the level of Intel's high-end Core 12-13 generation processors using advanced technology. Hu Weiwu pointed out that in the five years from 2016 to 2020, Loongson achieved a "double tenfold" leap in performance and revenue: first, the single-core performance of the processor increased by 10 times, roughly equivalent to the level of Intel's third and fourth generation Core, reaching a basically usable or even usable level; second, the company's revenue increased by 10 times, achieving revenue of 1 billion yuan in 2020, and realizing hundreds of millions of net profits.

4. Tianyu Semiconductor's silicon carbide epitaxial project is about to start trial production.According to Dongguan's official microblog, Guangdong Tianyu Semiconductor's headquarters and production and manufacturing center project is about to start trial production. According to the data, the project has a total investment of 8 billion yuan and is located in Songshan Lake Ecological Park. It covers a total area of ​​about 114.65 acres and a construction area of ​​about 240,000 square meters. The construction content includes factory buildings, R&D buildings, dormitories and supporting facilities. After completion, it will be used to produce 6-inch/8-inch silicon carbide (SiC) epitaxial wafers with a production capacity of 1.5 million pieces per year. The project construction period is from 2023 to 2026, and the annual output value is expected to be about 10 billion yuan in the future. At present, Tianyu Semiconductor is actively deploying the construction of 8-inch SiC epitaxial wafer production lines, and is expected to become one of the earliest domestic companies to achieve 8-inch mass production.

5. Jefa Technology’s smart cockpit domain control SoC uses multiple IPs from VeriSilicon.VeriSilicon announced that Hefei Jiefa Technology Co., Ltd., an automotive chip design company, has adopted VeriSilicon's high-performance IP combination in its new generation of smart cockpit domain control SoC AC8025, including neural network processor (NPU) IP, video processor (VPU) IP, and display processor (Display Processing) IP. AC8025 is Jiefa Technology's latest generation of smart cockpit domain control SoC, using an eight-core Arm Cortex-A76+A55 high-performance CPU combination, and meets AEC-Q100 and ISO 26262 ASIL B (instrument display) certification requirements.

6. The merger of two AI chip companies failed. Pliops, an Israeli DPU (data processor) startup that develops acceleration solutions for artificial intelligence (AI) and data center storage servers, originally planned to merge with Kalray, a French provider of advanced data processing solutions (massively parallel DPU). However, the deal will not go through because Kalray's market value has shrunk by more than 50% in the past two months and the merger is an all-stock transaction. Kalray said in the announcement: "Economic conditions, especially financial market trends, are not conducive to a capital-intensive merger that can create value for shareholders. The two parties will study commercial ways to cooperate by combining Pliops' kV technology with Kalray's MPPA (massive parallel processing array) architecture."

【Listing Capital Flow】

1. Chenxin Semiconductor completed a C round of financing of tens of millions of yuan.Recently, Chenxin Semiconductor (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd., a power management chip design company, received tens of millions of yuan in Series C financing. This round of financing was exclusively invested by a fund jointly established by Jinding Capital and Lixin Micro. The financing funds will be used to accelerate the company's new product research and development, product mass production and market expansion. Chenxin Semiconductor was established in 2017 and is a high-tech company that focuses on the research and development of power management and battery management chips. Its main products are battery management products such as switch fast charging and charge pump chips.

2. The SOP delivery of Xpeng Motors' acquisition of Didi's smart car development business assets has occurred.Xpeng Motors issued an announcement stating that the board of directors announced that the company had started production of the mass-produced vehicle Mona on July 30, 2024 for sale and delivery to ordinary customers, and therefore the SOP milestone under the share purchase agreement had been achieved. Since August 1, 2024, the first batch of exhibition vehicles of the intelligent pure electric hatchback coupe Xpeng MONA M03 have arrived at Xpeng Motors showrooms across the country. Accordingly, the SOP delivery took place on August 13, 2024. Pursuant to the share purchase agreement, the company has allotted and issued 4,636,447 Class A common shares to Didi as SOP consideration shares, accounting for approximately 0.24% of the company's issued and outstanding share capital after the company's allotment and issuance of SOP consideration shares. Previously, Xpeng had announced the acquisition of DiDi Global Inc.'s smart car development business assets and the first delivery.

【Technology Financial Report View】

Foxconn Industrial Internet's AI server revenue in the first half of the year increased by more than 230% year-on-year.According to the semi-annual report released by Foxconn Industrial Internet for 2024, revenue during the period was 266.09 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 28.69%; net profit attributable to shareholders was 8.74 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 22.04%, both of which set a record high for the same period since the company went public. The strong growth of AI-related businesses is the main driving force for performance changes. Among them, cloud computing revenue increased by 60% year-on-year in the first half of the year, and the proportion of AI servers in overall server revenue increased to 43%, with revenue increasing by more than 230% year-on-year. Communications and mobile network equipment achieved high single-digit year-on-year growth, and revenue from 400G and 800G high-speed switches related to AI servers increased by 30% year-on-year.