Asia's Tech News, Weekly: July 10th 2024

Indonesia & EV batteries, India semicon, Australian spacetech, China smart-car cloud, Aus-Japan quantum, Pacific Islands security, Korean VC boost, Project Nexus SEA payments, Thailand & China EVs...

• Indonesia has launched SE Asia’s first electric vehicles battery plant, expecting to deliver an estimated annual capacity of 10GWh of battery cells, capable of powering 150,000 EVs

• Australian Space Week is set for July 22-26 in Adelaide, a showcase of technologies, innovations and more in the Australian space ecosystem

• China: 20 localities selected for 'vehicle-road-cloud integration' pilot program for intelligent connected vehicles, moving towards a unified, shared standard system for the country

• One ASEAN Startup Award applications close July 28th for 3rd pre-event in Cambodia, aiming to recognise, reward and promote innovators working on ASEAN-wide issues

• Australian National University inks agreement with Japan's Fujitsu for a new quantum research facility 'with ambitions to build an onsite quantum computer'

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"Taiwan's TSMC is increasing its supply of 3.5 nm semiconductors. However... China has no way to secure these products... we [China] need to find ways to effectively utilize the 7 nm semiconductors."

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• India's Silizium Circuits semiconductor startup, working with TSMC on 2 semiconductor chips and with more in development

• Download: 'The Pacific Security Outlook Report 2023-2024' from the Pacific Islands Forum, touching on issues in climate, food, cyber, transnational crime & more (pdf link)

• Japan’s Generative AI Accelerator Challenge to provide $180M in AI skills aid across SE Asia, alongside goal of training 100K ASEAN citizens across 5 years

• China's Tianlong-3 rocket suffered an unintended launch and crash, with parent firm Beijing Tianbing, aka Space Pioneer, acknowledging a structural failure

• Asian-Australian Startups Roadshow Competition's 2nd edition is set for July 30th at Wade Institute of Entrepreneurship in Melbourne

Deloitte: GenAI in Asia Pacific

• India: iVP Semi secures $5M pre-A and unveils chip design center plans for Chennai and Bangalore, alongside licensing semiconductor chip product IP from Taiwan, Japan and the US

• Download: 'Financial Scams Report - An Assessment of Scams in East Asia, in Australia, Hong Kong & Singapore' from the Global Coalition to Fight Financial Crime

• Reserve Bank of India joins Project Nexus, collaborating with Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand to facilitate instantaneous cross-border retail payments

• Japan: An interview overview of Rapidus' goal of becoming a global leader in the highest-value corner of the semiconductors market, the logic chips space

• South Korea: Ministry of SMEs & Startups unveils 15 'preliminary unicorns' and 50 'baby unicorns' selected for Global Unicorn Project, each working in 'critical growth industries'

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"...in 2023, 35% of [Asia Pacific] organisations say they have experienced data breaches costing anywhere from US$1M to US$20M over the last three years."

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• South Korea: Ministry of SMEs & Startups selects 15 VC funds for fund investment project, targeting new global fund worth over $863M

• Singapore moves into semiconductor space with NXP and Vanguard International plans for $7.8BN factory, adding to recent GlobalFoundries and Micron investments

• China: Huawei partners chip foundry, Wuhan Xinxin, and semicon packaging firms for high-bandwidth memory - HBM - chips, aiming for domestic control of AI-focused chips

• Thailand: China's BYD EV giant to open first SEA factory in Thailand's Rayong province, a $486M facility producing 150,000 vehicles per year

• Critical technologies: The June 2024 global news snapshot is now online, capturing 70 items across semiconductors, supply chains, AI, minerals, space & more

• China: StarShine Semiconductor adds Series B funding of $137.6M with focus on radio frequency filters and modules, with China Mobile and Wenzhou City investment platform taking part

• New Zealand: Government to proceed with legislation to make it compulsory for digital technology platforms to pay media companies for news in bid to protect domestic industry

• Hong Kong: Kodifly raises $750k with machine learning solutions that create digital replicas of environments using LiDAR and real-time video analytics in urban environments

• 8 bioengineering startups, including firms from Japan and China working on alternative proteins, collagen products and industrial biocatalysts

• Download: 'Realising "AI for all" in India', from EY (direct pdf link)

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"This year alone, researchers say, more than 60,000 commercial flights have been hit by bogus GPS signals, which can confuse pilots."

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• Call for Proposals: ASEAN Power Grid Integrates New Technologies - Enhancing Flexibility and Resilience for Low-carbon Energy Transition

• Vietnam: Foxconn Singapore gains licence to invest $551M in 2 manufacturing projects in smart-system equipment and products, adding to $383M printed circuit boards facility

•Taiwan's FinTechSpace and Fintech Association of Malaysia ink MOU to collaborate on industry matchmaking, aiming to grow cross-domain fintech opportunities

• New Zealand: Callaghan Innovation extends R&D Experience Grants deadline, intended to fund innovative businesses in employing tertiary students as interns over their summer break

• Download: 'Meeting the AI Skills Boom' from the Tech Council of Australia

KPMG: AI in financial reporting

• India: Matter EV startup secures $35M with focus on electric motorbikes and development of proprietary tech stack consisting of drive-train and energy storage devices

• Australia: Cicada x Tech23 deep tech event is set for August 7th in Sydney, gathering and celebrating the best in Australian science, innovation, and technology

• Malaysia: PitchIN digital fundraising and investments hub to launching PSTX, the pitchIN Secondary Trading Market, expanding the equity crowdfunding platform's footprint

• Hong Kong: Securities & Futures Commission issues warning about 7 entities suspected of crypto-related fraud as the city moves to develop its digital assets market

• Japan: Shinryo Fund sets sights on $6.7M corpus revolving around Okinawa both as a startup source and as a gateway to Japan and wider SEA markets

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Generative artificial intelligence: "Australia's Gen AI adoption rate is among the lowest in the Asia Pacific, suggesting we risk being left behind."

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• China: Tesla becomes the only foreign-owned EV car brand on purchase catalog of Jiangsu province gov't, meaning gov't agencies and public groups can procure them as service cars

• 'The Data Center is the New Compute Unit: NVIDIA's Vision for System-Level Scaling'

• Philippines: An overview of Science & Entrepreneurship Training Program - SCENT - a 6-month program to equip undergrads and grad students with a Japanese-style business mindset

• Antler Australia unveils 7 tech startups receiving overall pre-Seed funding of $1.575M working on solutions in e-commerce, education, regulatory compliance and more

• Taiwan: Cooby secures $1.75M funding with WhatsApp-based conversational sales platform, integrating with CRMs to boost sales

• The European Union is drafting plans for customs duties on cheap goods from online retailers including Temu, Shein and AliExpress, scrapping duty-free thresholds

• Malaysia: Tech in Asia Conference is set for July 24-25 in Kuala Lumpur, gathering startups, founders, investors, and business leaders from across SE Asia

• Australia: eSafety Commissioner gives internet firms 6 months to draft online child-safety rules covering app stores, websites, search, game and social media platforms

• Taiwan: Google has taken a stake in Taiwan's New Green Power, a solar power firm owned by BlackRock, looking to drive down emissions from data centers

• 'Underground network smuggles Nvidia's AI GPUs into China despite US sanctions — some smugglers even sell entire servers'

• 7 brief interviews with leading AI and related technology firm leaders, conducted at the recent 2024 Computex event in Taiwan

• Cambodia: A brief overview of CamDigiKey, a KYC - know your customer - app connecting users to the government's CamDX platform for digital services

• New Zealand: Road Ninja launches, aiming to streamline hiring and recruitment process for skilled, ready-to-work driving professionals, connecting businesses to drivers

• Australia: Hyzon, US hydrogen fuel cell specialists, to quit Australia as sales of battery electric commercial trucks climb

• Generative AI: "Developing economies are leading the charge with gen AI adoption, with take-up rates 30% higher than developed economies"

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"Despite the [algorithm] changes, spammy content created with the help of AI remains an ongoing, prevalent issue for Google News."

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In wider-world technology news:

» Central Bank Digital Currency Tracker from The Atlantic Council, mapping progress, developments and key findings from CBDC projects, globally

» 'A Global Digital Compact — an Open, Free and Secure Digital Future for All' brief is available from the United Nations

» Deloitte's take on the potential benefits of generative AI in government activities

» SpaceX unveils backpack-sized Starlink Mini satellite internet antenna

» 'The Mobile Economy 2024', a report from GSMA, providing the latest insights on the state of the mobile industry worldwide

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