Latest news with #California-based
Mint
11 hours ago
- Business
- Mint
Meta acquires voice cloning startup Play AI to strengthen speech capabilities
nMeta has acquired California-based voice AI startup Play AI, in a move aimed at bolstering its capabilities in generative voice technology, according to a new report by Bloomberg. The deal sees the entire Play AI team joining Meta next week, where they will begin working under Johan Schalkwyk, a former senior speech AI leader at Google and a recent Meta recruit. Play AI is best known for its advanced voice cloning tool, which allows users to replicate their own voices or generate new human-like voices. These can be deployed across digital platforms, including websites, mobile apps, and phones, a functionality that aligns closely with Meta's growing ambitions in AI-driven interaction. According to an internal memo viewed by Bloomberg, Meta sees Play AI's technology as a "great match" for its existing AI initiatives, including Meta AI, AI Characters, and its wearables division. The financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed. This acquisition is the latest in Meta's aggressive recruitment and expansion efforts within the AI sector. The company recently launched a Superintelligence Lab, with a mission to build artificial intelligence systems smarter than humans. In June, Meta secured a $14.3 billion investment in Scale AI, a startup known for AI data labelling, and brought on Alexandr Wang, its CEO, to lead the new lab. Meta has been heavily investing in acquiring talent from rival companies. It has reportedly offered bonuses of up to $100 million to AI experts from OpenAI, Google DeepMind, and Apple. The company has already hired multiple engineers who worked on OpenAI's ChatGPT and GPT-4, as well as talent from the Google Gemini team. Notably, Apple's top AI executive working on advanced features also left for Meta earlier this year. With the integration of Play AI's voice technology, Meta appears to be doubling down on AI-generated voice as a core interface, both for future social experiences and its hardware roadmap, including possible use cases in AR/VR and smart glasses. As the AI arms race intensifies, Meta's latest move signals a strategic emphasis on speech and voice interfaces as the next frontier of human-computer interaction.
Korea Herald
13 hours ago
- Business
- Korea Herald
Krafton blames ousted founders for Subnautica 2 delay
Korea's leading game publisher Krafton pinned the blame for delays in the early access launch of Subnautica 2 on the founders of US subsidiary Unknown Worlds Entertainment, as a legal dispute simmers with the studio's dismissed executives. In a statement Friday, Krafton called its decision to replace the leadership at California-based Unknown Worlds a 'difficult but necessary step' to ensure the quality of the highly anticipated sequel. 'We allocated approximately 90 percent of the up to $250 million earn-out compensation to the three former executives, with the expectation that they would demonstrate leadership and active involvement in the development of Subnautica 2,' the company said. 'However, regrettably, the former leadership abandoned the responsibilities entrusted to them.' The three founders — Ted Gill, Charlie Cleveland and Max McGuire — were recently dismissed after remaining in their roles for about four years following Krafton's 2021 acquisition of the studio for $500 million, not including the earn-out clause. Krafton has since appointed Steve Papoutsis, former CEO of Striking Distance Studios, as the new head of Unknown Worlds. Krafton also announced Friday that Subnautica 2's early access launch has been pushed back to 2026, following earlier targets of 2024 and then 2025. The company cited a lack of sufficient content in the prerelease. In a statement on X the same day, Cleveland said the founders have filed a lawsuit against Krafton, insisting they remain committed to releasing an early access version of the game. 'Subnautica has been my life's work and I would never willingly abandon it or the amazing team that has poured their hearts into it,' Cleveland wrote. Subnautica 2 has been seen as a crucial release for Unknown Worlds, whose earlier entries in the franchise have sold about 18 million copies, according to securities firms. Delays to the sequel are viewed as a key factor behind the studio's declining performance. Unknown Worlds reported operating profit of 28.1 billion won in the first half of 2021, prior to its acquisition. Annual operating profit has since steadily fallen to 19.8 billion won, 16.9 billion won and 13.4 billion won over the past three years. While details of the lawsuit have not been disclosed, Krafton said it remains committed to supporting the studio and honoring promised compensation. 'We believe that the dedication and effort of this team are at the very heart of Subnautica's ongoing evolution, and we reaffirm our commitment to provide the rewards they were promised,' Krafton said.
The Hill
a day ago
- Business
- The Hill
Nvidia CEO dismisses Trump tariff concerns: ‘We'll work through it'
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang dismissed concerns over President Trump's tariff agenda, saying the California-based company will 'work through it' and emphasized that the U.S. needs to bolster its production of chips. 'Nobody likes disruptions and no one likes abrupt changes, but these settlements will — President Trump will settle these deals and countries will reorganize and resettle, and we'll work through it,' Huang said in an interview with USA Today published on Friday. Trump has reshuffled U.S. trade policy since returning to the White House, and he has recently notified countries about the tariff rates some will face at the start of next month. The president has alerted nations about the 'reciprocal' rate that will come into effect on Aug. 1, and some of warned of countermeasures and called for further negotiations. 'Every single year there were rules and taxes and tariffs and policies and regulations, and we survived. I have every confidence that the world is going to survive this, companies will survive this and whatever it turns out to be, we'll make the best of it,' Huang said. This week, Nvidia became the first public-traded company to hit a market capitalization above $4 trillion. Huang met with Trump at the White House the same day. The two have had five meetings since the president took office on Jan. 20, USA Today reported. Huang said on Friday that the U.S. has to manufacture more semiconductors, arguing the push will yield benefits across various sectors. 'Absolutely. I believe President Trump's vision, his bold vision to manufacture in the United States, it's great for our industries, it's great for our society,' the Nvidia head said to USA TODAY. 'We've lost a lot of manufacturing capability and skills, which is really great for skilled craft and people that work with their hands and build things,' he added. 'We want to celebrate that. We want to bring that back to the United States. It's very important to national security, industrial security, supply chain resilience.' His remarks come as a bipartisan duo, Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Jim Banks (R-Ind.), sent a letter to Huang this week, asking him to reconsider an upcoming visit to China over national security concerns.
Business Insider
a day ago
- Automotive
- Business Insider
I've never been off-roading or rock crawling. Watch Rivian's new $120K quad motor R1s make it easy.
EVs are a tough business, but Rivian is still out here trying to have fun. The California-based EV maker on Tuesday unveiled a quad motor package for its second-generation R1 truck and SUV. The company says the cars can deliver a combined 1,025 horsepower and 1,198 pound-feet of torque. The quad-motor R1T truck starts at $115,990, while the R1S SUV starts at $121,990. Cushioned San Francisco residents like me don't require that much power for their commute, let alone have the spare cash to burn $120K on a large car. Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe recognized that during a recent roundtable interview, telling Business Insider, "It's great for the brand, but it's sort of an exercise in unnecessary capability." "Unnecessary capability" is fair: The quad is a beast of a car that most people probably won't need. The company invited media outlets to South Lake Tahoe, California, near the end of June to demonstrate its quad R1T and R1S ahead of the public launch. I got a chance to get behind the wheel of both cars to drive up to Tahoe's Donner Ski Ranch, which has a summit elevation of more than 7,000 feet. There, I took the R1S and R1T off-roading and rock crawling — essentially driving up a rocky obstacle — to test out the torque and a feature Rivian calls "kick turn," which gives the cars the ability to do a 360-degree spin on the spot. I've never been off-roading or rock crawling. My humble Mazda 3, with its low profile and 155 horsepower, isn't really fit for those conditions, but it is very reliable for my trips to the grocery store. The Rivian's quad motor, however, made traversing the dirt roads and boulders a breeze. Rivian's climb Above: Business Insider's Lloyd Lee took the Rivian on what one company employee described as a moderate-level rock crawl. Reporters were first led to two rocky mounds at a Donner Ski Ranch peak for the rock crawl. Rivian representatives endearingly called one of the mounds "Grannie's Revenge" — a play on the much more precarious trail at "Hell's Revenge" in Moab, Utah, and a nod to the granite rock at the Lake Tahoe summit. For a first-time rock crawler, I was a little worried that I might flip Rivian's cars like a pancake or pierce the undercarriage if I made the slightest wrong turn while driving over a rock. Thankfully, that didn't happen. Spotters at every point of the mound were available to direct drivers on when to turn the wheel, which obviously made the rock crawls that much easier. But aside from following directions, scaling up the mounds was a simple exercise in turning the wheel and pressing the pedal. Both the R1S and R1T climbed over the mounds without the need for me to press down too far. Rivian's R1 chief engineer, Luke Lynch, an ex-software engineer for McLaren, told me that's the benefit of having four motors. "There's so much control that you can have in the pedal, you realize how delicate you can be and the vehicle still reacts," Lynch said. "When the vehicle detects some slip, it says, 'Okay, this wheel's not got enough traction, so I'm gonna slow that wheel down with fine motor control rather than brakes,' which is unique to quad motor control." According to Oren Birwadkar, another Rivian engineer, my drive was just a sneak peek of the quad's potential. He considered "Grannie's Revenge a moderate-level rock crawl. For further testing and validation, Birwadkar said the company tested the quad platform at an obstacle located at Hell's Revenge, which attracts more extreme rock crawlers. Tesla used the same track to advertise its Cybertruck. The 'kick turn' Above: Rivian demonstrated the quad motor Gen 2 cars' new feature called the "kick turn." One function made me feel like I was playing an off-road video game: "kick turn." The kick turn is a new iteration of Rivian's "tank turn" that was never released to the wider public. Rivian says the utility behind the kick turn is to allow drivers to make extremely tight turns without the need to do a three-point U-turn. The mode is activated through the center console, and then the driver is directed to press the two thumb controls on the left and right sides of the steering wheel simultaneously. Press the left buttons to turn counterclockwise and vice versa. Once the system detects that both buttons are pressed, the driver presses the accelerator pedal to make the spin. Rivian set up a course on a dirt field that directed us to drive in a square shape and drive through cones in a serpentine path. Reader: The kick turn is one hell of a mode to experience. The driver can activate the kick turn while the Rivian is already moving in a straight path. It's almost like drifting with training wheels. In theory, the driver should be able to complete the course Rivian set up solely by pressing the buttons on the steering wheel, while the actual steering wheel stays at a 12 o'clock position. Of course, a lot of the first-time drivers like me couldn't do that. Our instinctive reaction was to turn the steering wheel every time we approached a turn, rather than solely relying on the left and right buttons. But Rivian also took us through a narrow trail to show us where the kick turn could be useful. In those situations, you would drive slowly as you approached a tight turn, stop, and then activate the kick turn. Wassym Bensaid, Rivian's chief software engineer, said the kick turn was designed for "situations with tight maneuverability in off-road" environments. "It's mind-blowing the level of control that you can have on the car with such a feature," he said. I can't immediately imagine a scenario where I would need the kick turn on San Francisco's streets. Maybe it could help me get out of tight parking, but that's OK — my humble Mazda does just fine.
The Herald Scotland
2 days ago
- Business
- The Herald Scotland
NVIDIA CEO says U.S. companies will 'survive' Trump tariffs
Huang leads advanced chip-maker NVIDIA, which this week became the first company to reach a stock market value of $4 trillion, making it worth more than better-know tech rivals like Apple and Microsoft. He met with Trump at the White House on July 10 where, he said, the president was jubilant over NVIDIA's milestone. More: Trump threatens 35% tariff for Canada amid flurry of letters threatening hikes As Trump negotiates with China and other top trading partners, Huang's business sits dead center at the intersection of potentially costly United States tariffs, a boom in artificial intelligence - and the computer chips that power it. The California-based company makes advanced chips, which are then mass-produced by companies like the Taiwan-based TSMC that would be heavily affected by a possible Trump tariff on semiconductor imports. But Huang showed no signs of panic. Tariffs, taxes and all kinds of rules and regulations were in place long before he founded NVIDIA, said Huang. And if Trump moves ahead with steep semiconductor tariffs, it will be no different. More: Trump wants more factory jobs in the US. But is there anyone to hire? "Every single year there were rules and taxes and tariffs and policies and regulations, and we survived," Huang said. "I have every confidence that the world is going to survive this, companies will survive this and whatever it turns out to be, we'll make the best of it." NVIDIA became the first publicly-traded company to reach a $4 trillion market value this week. It has gained 22% in value this year alone during an artificial intelligence boom. Huang's own net worth, which Forbes estimates to be $143.6 billion, makes him one of the richest men in the world. Huang's July 10 meeting with Trump was his fifth in almost as many months, and he sat down with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent the next day. More: Is that product really made in the USA? FTC cracks down on deceptive claims In an interview with USA TODAY on July 11, Huang said he "absolutely" believes America needs to produce more semiconductors. "Absolutely. I believe President Trump's vision, his bold vision to manufacture in the United States, it's great for our industries, it's great for our society," he said. Trade wars: Trump keeps pushing on trade with tariff on copper imports; pharmaceuticals are next Huang, who was born in Taiwan and educated in the U.S., said that while manufacturing has economic and national security benefits - it also has health and social benefits. "We've lost a lot of manufacturing capability and skills, which is really great for skilled craft and people that work with their hands and build things. We want to celebrate that. We want to bring that back to the United States. It's very important to national security, industrial security, supply chain resilience," he said. Trump referenced NVIDIA's record stock price on social media in a July 10 post promoting his tariffs ahead of his meeting with Huang. Huang told USA TODAY that Trump said in their meeting that he was proud of the valuation. "He spent a lot of time congratulating me and telling everybody all around him what a great achievement it was," Huang said. They also discussed ways to help American tech companies maintain their competitive edge in the transition to AI and ways to bring skilled manufacturing back to America. He said NVIDIA is making supercomputers in Texas and packaging them in Arizona. Huang will be in China next week. He said he talked to Trump about the trip but they did not discuss trade negotiations between the two countries and did not know when a final agreement could come to fruition.
