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Business, finance, politics.

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There's a lot going on out there and the Wall Street

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This is your tech news briefing for

0:22

Friday, January sixth I'm

0:24

Zoe Thomas for The Wall Street Journal.

0:27

The industry trade shows CES

0:29

expects to welcome a hundred thousand people

0:32

this year. That's half of what

0:34

it saw before COVID. But it's

0:36

not stopping companies big and small

0:38

from showing off some exciting and

0:40

sometimes wild new gadgets.

0:43

On today's show, Shahriar Tufkin, a news

0:45

editor for the WSJ's personal tech

0:47

team joins us from CES and

0:49

Las Vegas to talk about some of the

0:52

best things she's seen at the show

0:54

and what they might be able to tell us about

0:56

tech trends to come. That's

0:58

after these headlines.

1:05

We report exclusively that OpenAI,

1:08

the research lab behind the chatbot, chat

1:10

and GPT, and the image generator

1:12

Dolly is looking to raise new funding.

1:15

Sources say the startup is in talks to

1:17

sell existing shares and a deal that would evaluate

1:19

at around twenty nine billion dollars.

1:22

That would make it one of the most valuable startups

1:24

on paper, despite generating little

1:26

revenue. And it would roughly double

1:28

Open AI's valuation in twenty twenty

1:31

one, along with its free products that

1:33

have caught the public's attention and gone viral.

1:35

The lab sells AI software to developers,

1:38

though some investors are skeptical it

1:40

can generate meaningful revenue. Sources

1:43

say no final deal on a new investment has

1:45

been reached and terms could change. OpenAI

1:48

didn't respond to request for comment.

1:51

More fallout from FTX. The

1:53

crypto exchanges collapse has sparked

1:55

a more than eight billion dollar run

1:58

on Silvergate Capital, a bank

2:00

that caters to companies in the crypto business.

2:02

Silvergate was forced to sell assets

2:05

to cover the withdrawals. It liquidated

2:07

debt at a loss of seven eighteen

2:09

million dollars, more than the bank's

2:12

total profits since at least twenty

2:14

thirteen. Silver Gate has laid

2:16

off about two hundred employees or

2:18

forty percent of its staff, and

2:20

it said it would pair back its businesses including

2:23

shelving plans to launch its own digital

2:25

currency. The bank has said it

2:27

remains committed to crypto and that it has

2:29

plenty of funding It said it had

2:31

more cash on hand than its remaining deposits.

2:35

Tesla's deliveries of Chinese made

2:37

EVs fell sharply in December,

2:39

leading the company to extend discounts

2:41

to boost sales. Deliveries

2:43

of Model three and Model Y vehicles

2:46

were down twenty percent from a year ago. And

2:48

just over half of what they were in November.

2:51

Chinese carmakers and dealers overall

2:53

saw a drop in retail sales during

2:55

the last month of the year. As demand weakened

2:58

due to an unprecedented nationwide COVID

3:00

nineteen outbreak. An

3:02

update on the layoffs at Amazon. More

3:05

than eighteen thousand workers are

3:07

expected to be affected. That's the

3:09

biggest staff reduction at a big tech company

3:11

over the past year. The cuts are

3:13

concentrated in Amazon's ranks

3:15

in areas including its devices business,

3:17

recruiting, and retail operations.

3:20

The company began making thousands of those

3:22

cuts last year. Peloton

3:25

has agreed to pay a more than nineteen million

3:27

dollar civil penalty over how it

3:29

handled a recall of its treadmills

3:31

last year. The Consumer Product

3:33

Safety Commission alleges Peloton failed

3:35

to immediately report a defect

3:37

that caused people, pets, and objects to

3:39

be pulled under the rear of the treadmills.

3:42

Resulting in injuries and the death of

3:44

at least one child. The agreement

3:46

also settles charges. Peloton distributed

3:48

treadmills that had been recalled. The

3:51

payout isn't an admission of guilt for the company.

3:57

And we'll have more on the best

3:59

of CES coming up. But

4:01

first, something to raise your

4:03

eyebrows at. L'Oreal has

4:05

teamed up with a South Korean startup

4:07

to create a device to shape eyebrows

4:10

using tiny printer technology. Grieve

4:13

Balucholorio's global vice president

4:15

spoke with our personal tech reporter, Alvin

4:17

Brown, who started out by asking

4:19

him how it works. What

4:21

we've done is we created an application.

4:24

It's analyzing my face shape

4:26

with augmented reality to be able to

4:28

understand the concavity of my

4:30

face and to detect my

4:32

brow. So it will detect my

4:34

brow, and then it will show me different

4:37

shapes that I could have. So you see here

4:39

if I wanted to make it lighter or

4:41

thicker, I can click adjust

4:43

all of it you're seeing in real time with AR

4:45

and we will recommend shapes based on a

4:47

typology work we've done

4:50

with people from different ethnicities, from

4:53

Asian American, African American, Latino

4:55

that we've done to understand how shapes

4:58

of faces could lead to the

5:00

right brow transformation. Once I

5:02

decide which one I like,

5:04

the device itself has

5:06

pressure sensors and optical

5:09

sensors that it will automatically

5:11

detect the hair on my

5:13

face, on my brow. And also

5:15

will understand how fast I swipe it.

5:17

So all I will do is I just

5:20

move it across my eyebrow and it will

5:22

automatically print hundreds of hair like

5:24

structure in that shape that I had

5:26

in the a r.

5:28

So what all had to sort of

5:30

come together in order for this device

5:33

to exist. Why

5:35

why now? Yeah. There's lots of tech

5:37

embedded in this. And if we didn't have an

5:39

algorithm in it, that was inclusive of a dataset

5:41

of many different ethnic backgrounds and

5:43

cultural backgrounds. And it wouldn't

5:45

be what it is if it wasn't

5:47

beautiful and handheld. So all three

5:49

of those had to come together, which

5:51

took us by the time it launches, which

5:53

is in the next year, about three years

5:56

to perfect, two to three years to perfect.

5:58

But a lot of these technologies have been

6:00

worked on for five to ten years

6:03

as separate ones. So even though it's

6:05

two, three years, It's also a

6:07

multiple decades of work

6:09

on each of the different parts that come

6:11

together. Alright.

6:14

Coming up, ever folding screens,

6:16

always reachable phones, and man's

6:19

best friend in robot form. We'll

6:21

discuss the best of this year's

6:23

CES after the break.

6:28

I'm Danny Lewis, and I'm Alex

6:30

Ocella. On The Wall Street Journal's

6:33

Future of Everything Podcast, we explore

6:35

the projects reimagining the world

6:37

of tomorrow. Like using sound to

6:39

rejuvenate coral reefs. Moving

6:42

microchips beyond silicon, silicon

6:45

is no longer a energy efficient and

6:47

how animals are helping treat human

6:49

diseases. The

6:52

future of everything is happening right now.

6:55

Subscribe wherever you get your

7:01

podcasts. The

7:07

exhibition floor at CES

7:09

opened yesterday. And as we've been telling

7:11

you all week, this year's tech show has

7:13

been shaped by the pandemic, global

7:15

politics, and of course, the

7:17

different demands we have for our gadgets and

7:19

devices nowadays. With

7:21

me now to talk about some of the best things

7:24

she seen so far in Las Vegas, and

7:26

some of the trends that are emerging from this

7:28

year's show is news editor for WSJ

7:31

personal tech

7:31

team, Shahriar Tippkin. Hi,

7:33

Sharah. Thanks for joining me. Thank you for

7:35

having me. So,

7:36

Sharah, at CES, this is where you

7:38

guys on the personal tech team. You don't so

7:40

much look at the viability of products. You

7:42

look at some products that are sometimes a little bit out

7:45

there, a little bit weirder. So

7:47

tell us some of the things that really stood out

7:49

to you this year.

7:50

Yeah. So generally for personal tech

7:52

we really are only looking at things that

7:54

are real, that we can use, that are gonna

7:56

be significant in our lives, and

7:59

CES is the one place where we just ignore

8:01

all of that and just go crazy, looking

8:03

at all of the crazy stuff, whether

8:05

it will ever come to devices or

8:07

not. So for me, I've spent a lot of time

8:09

looking at some of the sort of components

8:11

that could form our new products. So

8:14

Samsung display has a bunch of

8:16

cool private demos of these

8:19

tablets and phones that fold

8:21

in different

8:21

directions. So they can fold like three sixty

8:23

degrees or you can fold this like giant

8:26

tablet, but then also slide out

8:28

the

8:28

edge of it to make it an even bigger

8:30

tablet. So these kind of flexible

8:33

screens Yes. Exactly. Flexible

8:35

screens. And LG showed

8:37

off this sound technology

8:39

that basically it's pieces of

8:42

kind of paper is honestly what

8:44

they look like that they

8:46

put around the interior of

8:48

the car. You don't see

8:50

them, but they replace speakers that you

8:52

would normally have in the car, and you could put them in the

8:54

headrest, you can put it in the

8:56

front display, And the idea

8:58

is it basically sends

9:00

like sound waves that

9:02

bounce off of this paper. So

9:04

instead of having speakers, which kind of

9:06

add costs, and add weight to things like

9:08

electric vehicles. You'd have

9:10

these around the car, so it would make the

9:12

car slightly lighter in the grand scheme of

9:14

an electric vehicle. I don't know how

9:16

much that really matters. But

9:18

it's cool to see that kind of stuff where

9:20

companies are really trying to think of ways

9:22

to improve the tech we

9:23

have, but also just show off cool

9:25

things that may never make it to

9:27

market, but some that we could see in a

9:29

couple years. Yeah. That is really

9:31

interesting. It's sort of these parts of

9:33

things that might end up in the technology that

9:35

we come to use. I mean, what's been

9:37

one of the coolest products that you've seen

9:39

so far? So there's something that

9:41

I just loved because I thought it was

9:43

adorable. Waui is this

9:45

robot kids toy company

9:47

that's just kind of been this giant forever,

9:49

and they made this pet

9:52

dog that there's like

9:54

millions of ways that can be customized.

9:56

When you set it up, it's just like

9:58

totally random. You don't know what colored eyes

10:00

are gonna be and you know, how it's gonna

10:02

act. Its bark could be high or could be low.

10:04

It could be a lazy dog. It could be a really

10:06

energetic dog. And

10:08

it's only eighty dollars and it's going on

10:10

sale this fall. And so

10:12

something like that I feel is

10:14

something that we could see a lot

10:16

of people buying for their kids for

10:18

the holidays. And it's just one of

10:20

those things at CES where you're

10:22

like, oh,

10:23

yeah. This is fun. This isn't going

10:25

to totally change our lives, but

10:27

it's just fun. I mean, that sounds like one

10:29

product that might, you know, help a lot of parents

10:31

and get kids begging for a

10:33

pet. But have you seen any other products

10:35

that maybe in the next year or coming

10:37

years might become staples of our

10:39

lives?

10:40

Yeah. There's one that I saw that is

10:42

pretty big news. Qualcomm is this

10:44

giant chipmaker. So

10:46

their chips are in basically all

10:49

android phones that we buy in the US

10:51

and globally as well. And it

10:53

formed a partnership with Iridium, which is

10:55

a satellite company, to bring satellite

10:58

messaging to Android phones.

11:00

So this is something that is already an iPhone.

11:02

So if you're stranded and

11:05

you don't have cell service, you can connect

11:07

with emergency services and

11:09

this has already been used to save people's

11:11

lives. With Qualcomm and Iridium,

11:14

what they're planning

11:15

to do

11:15

is they're partnering with Garmin to provide

11:17

emergency services. But then

11:19

they're also gonna let you message

11:22

whoever you want through

11:23

it. So it's gonna kind of be up to the

11:25

messaging company, the handset makers,

11:27

the carriers to decide what that looks

11:29

like and how much it costs and, you know,

11:31

what happens for the consumer. But that's

11:34

coming in devices the second half of this

11:36

year and that's something that's

11:38

real and something that people can be

11:40

using pretty

11:40

soon. So that means

11:43

what I'm communicating over satellites

11:45

or even when I don't have, say, my five

11:47

g

11:47

connection, I'll be able to message my

11:49

friends. Yeah. Exactly. Like, if

11:51

you're hiking in Northern

11:53

California, which there's not

11:55

self-service in a lot of places. You

11:57

can text your friend to

11:59

say, hey, I'm gonna be late for lunch. You

12:01

have to have a clear view of the sky

12:03

Iridium says that it works

12:05

in rain, snow, fog, everything.

12:08

So you don't have to wait for, like, the

12:10

only blue skies day. But basically, you'll

12:12

be able to text a friend and they

12:14

can text you back. And they took a

12:16

bunch of reporters out to the desert

12:18

in Las Vegas to

12:20

show us, you know, it was like an hour drive

12:22

and then a, you know, five minute demo. To

12:24

see this actually being

12:25

done. So

12:26

you can let your friends know you'll be late for lunch

12:28

when you're out in the desert. Exactly.

12:31

Like, sorry, I am running late for my next meeting.

12:33

That is that's basically me, all

12:35

of CES. Have

12:38

there been any big trends that you've

12:40

noticed this year? There's kind

12:42

of always the same stuff of

12:44

new flashy TVs, new

12:47

kind of weird stuff in computers

12:49

one trend that we were really interested in this

12:51

year that we were looking at is accessibility. So

12:54

these are products that are built for people

12:57

who have vision problems or hearing

12:59

problems or mobility issues. And

13:01

some of the stuff being shown is just really

13:03

cool. There are glasses that

13:05

do live captions as

13:08

someone's talking. There's a wheelchair

13:10

that can climb

13:12

stairs. So there's just

13:14

a lot going on here

13:16

that isn't just the,

13:18

like, Wizbang crazy

13:20

gadget, but are things that companies

13:22

are really trying to make to improve

13:24

people's

13:24

lives. And that is always really fun to see.

13:27

Does that tell us anything about where tech

13:29

might be headed in twenty twenty three and

13:31

beyond? Or is that just a CES

13:32

thing? I mean, it's interesting. I was thinking about this

13:34

a lot. I went

13:36

to CES in twenty twenty, so the

13:38

last in person before the pandemic,

13:41

and it was just so crowded, so many

13:43

people here And this year,

13:45

they're expecting about half

13:47

the kind of normal amount, so around a

13:49

hundred thousand people in Las Vegas. But

13:51

I feel like we aren't seeing a lot of kind

13:53

of the totally out

13:55

there products that we've seen in the

13:57

past. You know, there are robots here,

13:59

but usually there's more of that.

14:01

And, yes, there are flying cars here

14:03

for sure. There's some of this futuristic

14:06

stuff, but as my colleague,

14:08

Galvin Brown, reported, a lot of

14:10

startups. It's harder for them

14:12

to get funding, you know, to,

14:14

like, make hardware and with

14:16

inflation, kind of everything going on in the economy,

14:18

people are maybe being a little more

14:20

cautious with what they're showing and

14:22

not necessarily doing

14:24

as much at the show

14:26

or unveiling as much as they normally

14:28

would. So it's gonna be interesting to see

14:30

what kind of happens in

14:32

the coming weeks, you know, if there's

14:35

any sort of update or

14:37

kind of insight that we get looking back

14:39

at

14:39

CES.

14:40

Alright. That's our news editor for the WSJ's

14:42

personal tech team, Shar tip again. Thanks so much

14:44

for joining us, Shar.

14:45

Thank you for having me. And

14:47

that's it for tech news briefing this week.

14:50

Our producer is Julie Chang. Our

14:52

executive producer is Chris Sinsley,

14:54

and I'm your host, Zoe Thomas.

14:56

Thanks for listening and have a great weekend.

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