Hello there, welcome to another round of Global roundup. It was a remarkable week for the big tech firms as Google took another step in the use cases of AI technology, Apple consolidated its hold in India, Twitter’s troubles continued, and Amazon let people go.
Google is now testing a product codenamed ‘Genesis,’ that uses artificial intelligence to produce news stories. Similarly, there are now reports that Apple is quietly working on artificial intelligence tools that could challenge OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Google’s Bard and others, but the company has yet to devise a clear strategy for releasing the technology to consumers.
Away from AI, India has now emerged as Apple’s fifth-largest iPhone market in the second quarter for the first time, overtaking France and Germany. There have been reports that Apple is actively seeking to transition its major assembly plants to India, away from China, due to ongoing tension between the US and China.
Elon Musk has noted that Twitter’s cash flow remains negative still because of a nearly 50% drop in advertising revenue coupled with “heavy debt.” The Tesla owner says the company needs to find its way in the positive line before “thinking about anything else.”
Here is a summary of the bulletin
- India, now Apple’s 5th largest iPhone market
- Apple is quietly working on an AI tool to challenge Google, OpenAI, Microsoft
- Musk says Twitter’s cash flow remains negative
- Netflix removes its Basic ad-free plan for users in the US and UK
- Amazon lays off around 80 employees from its pharmacy division
India is now Apple’s 5th largest iPhone market
2023 is turning out to be quite a year for Apple in India. The company has been hitting record numbers when it comes to sales of its products as Apple opened not one but two retail outlets in the country. Reports now suggest that India has become the fifth-largest iPhone market behind the U.K., Japan, China and the U.S.
According to Counterpoint Research, India became Apple’s fifth-largest iPhone market in the second quarter for the first time, overtaking France and Germany. The country contributed close to 4% of all iPhone sales in the second quarter, growing 50% year-on-year. It’s the first time India has been one of Apple’s top five markets for iPhone sales.
Counterpoint Research said that Apple commanded a 5.1% market share in India’s total smartphone market in the period to the end of June, versus 3.4% in the same period last year. The rapid growth in India comes as Apple ramps up its presence in the world’s fifth-largest economy from both a retail and manufacturing perspective.
Apple has also shifted some iPhone manufacturing to India as it looks to diversify away from China, where the bulk of its flagship smartphone is currently produced. Apple has moved 7% of its entire production to India, which has greatly impacted the country’s export statistics, according to the Business Standard. In FY22, the smartphone export market was worth approximately US$5.4 billion to India.
Apple is quietly working on an AI tool
The buzz surrounding A.I. technologies has been hard to ignore this year, with the chatbot phenomenon ChatGPT making waves. While tech giants like Google, Microsoft, and Amazon are racing to develop powerful generative A.I., one notable absence from the competition is Apple.
Now, reports have emerged that Apple is quietly working on artificial intelligence tools that could challenge those of OpenAI Inc., Alphabet Inc.’s Google and others, but the company has yet to devise a clear strategy for releasing the technology to consumers.
The iPhone maker has built its framework to create large language models — the AI-based systems at the heart of new offerings like ChatGPT and Google’s Bard — according to people with knowledge of the efforts. With that foundation, known as “Ajax,” Apple also has created a chatbot service that some engineers call “Apple GPT.”
Although Apple has not publicly positioned itself as a competitor in the generative A.I. race, it has long been leveraging the technology to improve its devices. Siri, the world’s first A.I.-powered virtual assistant, was integrated into the iPhone 4S in 2011. Apple has recently incorporated “machine learning” into its Vision Pro headset.
Apple has sought generative A.I. talent for months, with numerous related job openings on its careers page.
Musk says Twitter’s cash flow remains negative
Elon Musk, the CTO and executive chairman of Twitter, said that cash flow remains negative at the social media company because of a nearly 50% drop in advertising revenue coupled with “heavy debt.”
“Need to reach positive cash flow before we have the luxury of anything else,” Musk wrote in response to a tweet.
Musk took over Twitter in October of last year in a deal valued at around $44 billion, including about $13 billion in debt. To finance that deal, he sold part of his Tesla shares worth billions of dollars.
By January, hundreds of advertisers had reduced or halted their ad spending on Twitter in response to Musk making steep staff cuts at the company and implementing changes to the platform, especially restoring previously banned accounts and changing its approach to content moderation.
In April, Musk told a BBC reporter that “almost all” advertisers had resumed buying ads on Twitter. He also claimed at that time that the company was “roughly breakeven,” and expected to become cash flow positive within the next quarter.
Netflix removes its basic ad-free plan for users in the US and UK
Netflix has removed its Basic ad-free plan for users in the United States and the United Kingdom, raising questions about whether the streaming giant will remove it from users in Nigeria.
While no official announcement has been made, Netflix’s plans and pricing page no longer offers the option to sign up for its Basic plan in the US and UK.
That means that the Basic plan, which bridged the gap between its $6.99 / £4.99 per month ad-supported tier and more expensive Standard ad-free plan of $15.49 / £10.99 per month, is no longer available to new or rejoining subscribers.
However, anyone already on the Basic plan, which costs $9.99 / £10.99 a month, can remain a subscriber at this tier until they choose to switch plans or cancel their account completely, Techradar reports.
As a result of the change, there will now only be three options to choose from. New subscribers are now limited to the Standard plan with adverts, Standard without ads, and ad-free Premium, based on what’s available on the company’s plans and pricing page for both the US and UK.
Amazon lays off around 80 employees
According to people familiar with the matter, Amazon laid off around 80 employees from its pharmacy division Thursday. The move comes after the e-commerce giant made large investments in its prescription drugs and healthcare businesses in recent years.
The affected workers include pharmacy technicians, as well as team leads. Registered pharmacists were largely unimpacted, the people said.
“Although eliminating roles is always difficult, we are making these changes now to keep investing in improving the customer experience, which will strengthen our business for the long term,” Kelvin Downes, director of fulfilment at Amazon Pharmacy, wrote in an email to staff.
A spokesperson for Amazon acknowledged the layoffs. “Like many businesses, we have been closely monitoring economic conditions and our organizational needs, and have made the decision to adjust resources. As a result, a small number of roles have been eliminated on the Amazon Pharmacy Services team,” the representative said in an email.
Amazon entered the pharmacy sector four years ago when it acquired PillPack, a startup that delivers different medications in a single package designed to help people remember to take them. In 2020, the tech giant introduced Amazon Pharmacy, a standalone prescription delivery service.
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