Asia's Tech News, Weekly: December 14th 2024

Vietnam e-government, China tariffs, NZ geothermal datacenter, VN-Cambodia QR payments, Malaysia National AI Office launches, Huawei Cloud & Philippines, HK and stablecoins, India semiconductors...

• Imports of solar-grade polysilicon, wafers, and tungsten products from China to the US face tariff increases of 25-50% from January 1st, 2025, in response to alleged unfair trade practices / full item

• Vietnam: Government inaugurates Core Data Centre Infrastructure, targeting infra as the backbone for ongoing moves into e-government services and data management / full item

• Australia: NAB is to pivot from traditional passwords to passkeys and biometrics for online banking - "...the bank was fighting off more than 50 million cybersecurity attacks a month...": / full item

• China's Ant International has joined the Swift Network Interoperability Reference Implementation program, a pre-pilot looking at transparency in cross-border end-to-end payments / full item

• Malaysia launches National Artificial Intelligence Office, looking at government-led national digitization, and with the wider goal of regional Asia leadership in the space / full item

• New Zealand gains its first hyper-scale data centre with opening of Microsoft facility, a centre part-supplied with geothermal energy / full item

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"...disruption from cybersecurity incidents extends to the private sector where... in Singapore, 3 out of 5 companies polled had paid ransom during cyberattacks in 2023." / full item

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• Philippines: Huawei Cloud launches its first public cloud availability zones in the country, offering over 100 cloud computing services / full item

• National Bank of Cambodia, ACLEDA Bank and State Bank of Vietnam launch cross-border QR code based payments / full item

• Australia's Country Liberal Party in the NT and Indonesia ink first-of-its-kind MOU on critical minerals development between an Australian jurisdiction and Indonesia / full item

• Hong Kong: Stablecoins bill is to be introduced, aiming to regulate virtual tokens, in ongoing fast-track moves to secure global cryptocurrency industry hub status / full item

• Malaysia's Solarvest partners Singapore's Vista Contracting & Investment for rooftop and utility-scale solar projects in Malaysia, Brunei, Taiwan, and Cambodia / full item

• India: What is the ONDC, India's Open Network for Digital Commerce, and what does it aim to deliver? / full item

Indo-Pacific Studies Center 2025 Emerging Leaders Policy Forum

• China: Bybit cryptocurrency exchange rolls out update allowing China users to trade on the platform using a VPN, but without yuan trading in order to comply with regulations / full item

• India: An overview of the Shakti semiconductor fabrication plant, a joint initiative between India's Bharat Semi, 3rdiTech, and the US Space Force / full item

• Malaysia: Penang Silicon Design @5km+ initiative launches, a further move to advance Malaysia in global integrated circuits design, dovetailing with the National Semiconductor Strategy / full item

• India: Netrasemi semiconductor firm secured $1.8M pre-A with machine learning-focused system-on-chip designs, targeting the enablement of edge-AI computing / full item

• Japan: United States Space Force activated its first unit in Yokota Air Base, Tokyo, in cooperation with Japan's Air Self-Defense Force's military space operations group / full item

• India: 4 key observations on the country's entrepreneurship and startup ecosystems, from the World Economic Forum / full item

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'About 90% of the world’s advanced chips are produced by [Taiwan's TSMC] whose model involves operating at massive scale... If [Japan's] Rapidus succeeds, it would challenge both the economics and geography of the industry' / full item

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• India: Hyperloop test track of 410 meters has been completed in Chennai, with final speeds potentially up to 1100kph, about 683mph / full item

• South Korea: SDT quantum computer manufacturing specialist raised $14M in pre-IPO funding, building on global partnerships / full item

• Australia: Quantum Brilliance secures Au$13M equity investment for quantum diamond foundry for devices capable of room-temperature operation / full item

• Vietnam: NVIDIA and Vietnam Government ink agreement for joint development AI R&D centre, and an AI service-focused data centre / full item

• Singapore-based Crypto.com exchange partners Deutsche Bank, gaining corporate banking services in Singapore, Australia and Hong Kong, and in future growth / full item

• Vietnam: Gov't suspends online retailers Temu and Shein from operating in the country, with the firms now working to register services with authorities / full item

Gartner: Top 10 Strategic Technology Trends for 2025

• Hong Kong: Cyberport Artificial Intelligence Supercomputing Centre has launched - here's an overview / full item

• Indonesia: State-owned PT PLN power company launches Connext Powered by PLN, seeking Asia-wide applications from startups working in sustainable energy / full item

• Japan: Here's a brief interview with the Co-Founder and General Partner of Incubate Fund Asia, Japan's largest venture capital firm / full item

• Singapore: Eureka Robotics raises $10.5M Series A with Controller and Camera products, enabling integration of AI-driven applications in factories and warehouses / full item

• Philippines: Central bank and partners have completed the testing phase for Project Agila, looking at wholesale central bank digital currency in large-value payments / full item

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Australia: "50% are choosing not to buy a product or service because an organisation asked to collect personal information they weren't comfortable sharing (up from 35% last year)" / full item

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• Japan-Australia: A brief look at the recent 2024 Innovation Leaders Summit in Tokyo, and the Australian tech firms and startups, including Quantum Brilliance and Novalith, that presented / full item

• India inks $2M agreement with the International Solar Alliance to establish solar projects in Comoros, Fiji, Madagascar, and Seychelles, boosting India's Indo-Pac diplomacy / full item

• Japan: Lawmaker has asked the government to launch a national Bitcoin reserve, citing similar discussions in Brazil and the United States / full item

• India: Government of Andhra Pradesh inks MOU with Google Cloud to boost AI adoption, innovation, skills development, and the Andhra Pradesh startup ecosystem / full item

• Australia: KPMG Fintech Landscape 2024 sees a decline in the number of active firms for the 2nd year in a row, with the crypto and blockchain sector showing the largest YoY drop / full item

• Malaysia: More detail on the Penang Silicon Design @5km+ initiative, creating an interconnected ecosystem for IC design and technology firms within 5km+ radius of the Bayan Lepas Industrial Park / full item

GITEX Asia 2025 tech conference: April 23-25 in Singapore

• India: A brief look at the nation's moves to boost national compute capacity, in response to the need to be a producer and provider of technology, rather than just a consumer / full item

• Japan: An overview of OpenAI's decision earlier this year to open its first Asia office in Tokyo / full item

• A quick overview of the Digital India initiative, boosting digital, physical and electric infrastructure in order to develop the country's e-commerce opportunities / full item

• South Korea: SK Telecom invests $3M in AI-backed video analysis firm, Twelve Labs, merging the two firms' AI expertise to further develop SK Telecom's AI Agent, and new services / full item

• Download: 'GenAI in Finance - Driving Financial Innovation in Southeast Asia' from KB Financial Group / full item

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Australia: "...without equipping citizens with media literacy, legislation can only have limited impact. Misinformation will remain part of our media diet..." / full item

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• Elon Musk's xAI reportedly landed priority access to Foxconn-made NVIDIA GB200 AI servers with a $1.08 billion order, with delivery as soon as January 2025 / full item

• Taiwan: International Startup Supporting Program in 2025 is now open for proposals from Taiwan's tech startups / full item

• Philippines: Department of Science & Tech launches Program PROPEL to provide a range of support and development services to Filipino innovators from startup to scaling-up / full item

• Thailand: India's Wipro, Thailand's SIAM AI, and NVIDIA partner for Sukjai, and AI-driven digital assistant enhancing domestic and international tourist experiences / full item

• Philippines: An intro to AgriConnect, national winner of the Red Bull Basement competition, AI-driven app that alerts farmers to crop threats to help manage risks / full item

• ICYMI: In October, the UK, US, Canada, New Zealand and Australian governments launched the Secure Innovation program to help tech firms and startups improve baseline cybersecurity / full item

• The 2025 Indo-Pacific Emerging Leaders Policy Forum: a dynamic, multi-day program for early-career professionals, policy analysts, and young leaders across the Indo-Pacific / Details

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"Now the chips that Advanced Micro Devices, known as AMD, and Amazon have created... are adding to signs that credible alternatives to NVIDIA are finally emerging." / full item

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In wider-world technology news:

» iGenius and NVIDIA partner for data center construction in southern Italy by mid-2025, set to feature around 80 NVIDIA servers, each containing 72 Blackwell chips / full item

» Google unveils new Willow quantum computing chip, claiming a major breakthrough with 5-minute computation near-impossible with current supercomputers / full item

» Ayar Labs raised $155M from backers including NVIDIA, AMD Ventures and Intel Capital with photonics for faster, more efficient chips / full item

» LambdaTest raised $38M with cloud-based platform that lets companies test their applications across more than 5000 browser and operating system combinations / full item

» NVIDIA preps for mass production of Blackwell AI-focused chips by TSMC in early 2025, for the first time considering TSMC Arizona plant for production / full item

» "The video game market reported $196 billion in revenue for 2023, outpacing streaming and box-office revenue combined; Bain forecasts 6% annual growth through 2028." / full item

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'A few of the things we’re excited about in crypto (2025)' from a16z: "Putting gov't bonds onchain would create a gov't-backed, interest-bearing, digital asset — without the surveillance concerns of a CBDC..." / full item

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