Salesforce’s venture capital arm raises second European tech fund at $125m May 23, 2019 The venture capital arm of Salesforce has closed its second fund for European tech startups at $125m (£98.7m), with a renewed focus on enterprise cloud. Salesforce Ventures said it was the most active corporate VC in Europe last year, making investments across the spectrum in digital payments, artificial intelligence, and blockchain. It follows the software giant's [...]
Malevolent superintelligence? That’s science fiction, not reality May 22, 2019 In Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, HAL 9000 was an all-knowing robot that decided to destroy a spacecraft and its crew. Naturally enough, the crew didn’t care for this. The film was an important crossover moment from science fiction to science fact. Many who saw HAL came to believe that there are indeed such computers [...]
The robots are coming – and they’re (potentially) after your job May 22, 2019 By Ian Hall (City AM, for the CFA Institute) ‘You want your robot to be smarter than the other team’s robot’: advice that sounds like it belongs to a participant in combat competition TV show Robot Wars. But, actually, it’s the increasingly competitive and technology-affected situation that many investment professionals will face in the workplace [...]
Ministers must resist a bailout of British Steel May 21, 2019 Timing is everything, whether in business or politics. British Steel’s cap-in-hand plea to the government for an emergency, job-saving bailout just 48 hours before the country goes to the polls is either an extraordinary coincidence or an audacious political ambush. Either way, there’s never an easy time for a government to face such a decision. [...]
Don’t let trust become the next plaything of the cyber criminals May 21, 2019 The last 200 years have been a whirlwind of technological invention. Aeroplanes have allowed us to transcend borders, MRI scanners have enabled us to explore the innermost workings of our brains, and the internet has put the world at our fingertips. Our dependency on connected services is more extreme than ever, but between the Cambridge Analytica [...]
Mobility software firm raises $4.6m from Amadeus and Global Brain May 21, 2019 Artificial intelligence mobility startup Immense Simulations has closed its series A funding round at $4.6m (£3.6m), after spinning out from the government’s Catapult tech programme in 2016. The round was co-led by Amadeus Capital Partners, previously named one of Europe’s most active AI investors, and Japanese venture capital giant Global Brain. Additional investment was provided [...]
Tencent backs top AI startup in $24m injection May 20, 2019 A host of major businesses and venture capital firms have joined in a $24m (£18.9m) funding round for a Prowler.io, valuing the Cambridge artificial intelligence (AI) startup at $100m. Chinese media giant Tencent led the round, with publishing house Pearson and Monzo-backer Passion Capital also joining. Other investors included Amadeus Capital Partners, Atlantic Bridge, Cambridge [...]
The secret to the productivity puzzle? Work fewer hours May 20, 2019 The UK faces a tough productivity problem. According to the Office for National Statistics, British productivity has improved by just 0.5 per cent per year since 2008, and lags 15 per cent behind other G7 countries. Productivity is measured as value added per hour worked. Obviously it rises if we produce more value – which [...]
HPE buys supercomputer firm Cray for $1.3bn May 17, 2019 Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) has acquired US supercomputer manufacturer Cray in a huge takeover deal worth roughly $1.3bn (£1bn). HPE said it has signed a deal to buy the Seattle-based firm for $35 per share in cash, a premium on its closing price yesterday of $29.81. Read more: Ex-HP boss 'did not read all Autonomy [...]
Why is the mortgage market strangely resistant to technological change? May 16, 2019 Technology is so pervasive that it is easy to forget just how fundamentally it has impacted our lives. In fact, it is hard to think of an area of life that hasn’t been made more accessible, faster or cheaper. Personal finance is no exception. Price comparison websites, mobile banking, and other innovations have all transformed the [...]