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Europe must act against AI-written reviews before it’s too late

Parts of modern life are inescapable. We all use mapping software for directions, check the news on our phones, and read online reviews of products before buying them.

Technology didn’t create these things, but what it has done is democratise them, make them easier to access or add to. Take online reviews. Nowadays, people can share their honest opinions about products and services in a way that, back in the times gone by, would’ve been impossible.

Yet, what the internet giveth, it can, uh, taketh away too?

It didn’t take long for nefarious actors to realise they could exploit this new-found ability technology to flood the market with fake reviews, creating an entirely new industry along the way.

In recent years, much of the discussion around fake reviews has dissipated, but now? They’re back with a vengeance — and it’s all because of AI.

The ascension of large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT means we’re entering a new era of fake reviews, and governments in Europe and the rest of the world need to act before it’s too late.

AI-written reviews? Who cares?

As pithy as that sounds, it’s a valid question. Fake reviews have been part of online life for almost as long as the internet has existed. Will things really change if it’s sophisticated machines writing them instead of humans?

Spoiler: yes. Yes it will.

The key differentiator is scale. Previously, text-generating software was relatively unsophisticated. What they created was often sloppy and vague, meaning the public could immediately see it was untrustworthy, crafted by a dumb computer rather than a slightly less dumb person. 

This meant that for machine-written fake reviews to be successful and trick people, other humans had to be involved with the text. The rise of LLMs and AI means that’s no longer the case.

Using ChatGPT, almost anyone can produce hundreds of fake reviews that, to all intents and purposes, read like they could be written by a real person.

But, again, so what? More fake reviews? Who cares? I put this to Kunal Purohit, Chief Digital Services Officer at Tech Mahindra, an IT consulting firm.

He tells me that “reviews are essential for businesses of any size.” The reason for this is it helps them “build brand recognition and trust with potential customers or prospects.”

This is increasingly important in the modern world, as the competitiveness of the business sector is causing customers to become more aware and demanding of companies.

Now that user experience is a core selling point — and brands prioritise this aspect of their business — Purohit says that bad reviews can shatter organisations’ abilities to do business effectively.

To put that another way, fake reviews aren’t just something that can convince you to buy a well-reviewed book that, in reality, is a bit boring. They can be used for both negative and positive reasons, and, when levelled at a company, can seriously impact that business’ reputation and ability to work.

This is why we — and the EU — must take computer-generated reviews seriously.

But what’s actually going on out there?

At this point, much of the discussion is academic. Yes, we’re aware that AI-written reviews could be a problem, but are they? What’s actually happening?

Purohit tells me that, already, “AI-powered chatbots are being used to create fake reviews on marketplace products.” Despite the platforms’ best efforts, they’ve become inundated with computer-generated reviews.

This is confirmed by Keith Nealon, the CEO of Bazaarvoice, a company that helps retailers show user-generated content on their site. He says he’s seen how “generative AI has recently been used to write fake product reviews,” with the goal being to “increase the volume of reviews for a product with the intent to drive greater conversion.”

AI-written reviews are gaining momentum, but, friends, this is just the beginning.

Long, hard years are on the horizon

The trust we have in reviews is about to be shattered.

Nealon from Bazaarvoice says the use of AI at scale could have “serious implications for the future of online shopping,” especially if we reach a situation where “shoppers can’t trust whether a product review is authentic.”

The temptation to use computer-generated reviews on the business side of things will also only increase.

“We all want our apps to be at the top of the rankings, and we all know one way to get this is through user engagement with reviews,” Simon Bain — CEO of OmniIndex, an encrypted data platform — tells me. “If there’s the option to mass produce these quickly with AI, then some companies are going to take that route, just as some already do with click farms for other forms of user engagement.”

He continues, saying that while the danger of computer-written reviews are bad, the fact this methodology becomes an extra tool for click farms is even worse. Bain foresees a world where AI-generated text can “be combined with other activities like click fraud and mass-produced in a professional way very cheaply.”

What this means is rather than AI-written reviews being a standalone problem, they have the potential to become a huge cog in an even bigger misinformation machine. This could lead to trust in all aspects of online life being eroded.

So… can anything be done?

Hitting back against AI-written reviews

There were two common themes across all the experts I spoke with regarding fighting computer-generated reviews. The first was that it’s going to be tough. And the second? We’re going to need artificial intelligence to fight against… artificial intelligence.

“It can be incredibly difficult to spot AI-written content  — especially if it is being produced by professionals,” Bain says. He believes we need to crack down on this practice in the same way we’ve been doing so for similar fraudulent activities: with AI.

According to Bain, this would function by analysing huge pools of data around app use and engagement. This would use tactics like “pattern recognition, natural language processing, and machine learning” to spot fraudulent content.

Purohit and Nealon agree with this, each of them pointing towards the potential AI has to solve its problems in our conversations.

Despite this, it’s Chelsea Ashbrook — Senior Manager, Corporate Digital Experience at Genentech, a biotechnology company — who summed it up best: “Looking into the future, though, we might need to develop new tools and techniques. It is what it is; AI is getting smarter, and so must we.”

The government must get involved

At this stage, we encounter another problem: yes, AI tools can combat computer-generated reviews, but how does this actually work? What can be done?

And this is where governing bodies like the EU come in. 

I put this to Ashbook: “They certainly have their work cut out for them,” she says. Ashbrook then suggests one way governments can combat this upcoming plague may be to “establish guidelines that necessitate transparency about the origin of reviews.”

Bain from OmniIndex, on the other hand, mentions the importance of ensuring that existing laws and regulations around elements like “fraud, and cybercrime keep up to date with how [AI] is being used.”

Purohit from Tech Mahindra believes we’re already seeing many positive initiatives and policies from governments and key AI industry professionals around the responsible use of the tech. Despite this, “there are several ways official bodies such as the EU … can prevent [it] from getting out of hand.”

He points towards “increasing research and development, [and] strengthening regulatory frameworks” as two important elements of this strategy.

Beyond that, Purohit believes governments should update consumer protection laws to combat the dangers posed by AI-generated content. This could cover a range of things, including “enforcing penalties for the misuse or manipulation of AI-generated reviews” or “holding platforms accountable for providing accurate and reliable information to consumers.”

There you go, Europe, feel free to use those ideas to get the ball rolling.

AI-written reviews: Here to stay

Want to read the least shocking thing you’ve seen in some time? AI is going to change the world.

Despite that, the topics the press tends to be obsessed with are things like the singularity of a potential AI-driven apocalypse. Which, to be honest, sound far sexier — and drive far more clicks.

But in my mind, it’s the smaller things like AI-written reviews that will have the most impact on our immediate lives.

Fundamentally, society is based on trust, on the idea that there are people around us who share a vague set of similar values. AI being used in these small ways has the potential to undercut that. If we can no longer believe what we see, hear, or read, then we no longer trust anything. 

And if that happens? Well, it won’t take long until things start crumbling around us.

This is why governmental bodies like the EU can’t adopt a “wait-and-see” approach to regulating areas as seemingly inconsequential as AI-written reviews. There must be regulation — and it must be fast. Because if we delay too long, it may already be too late.

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Netherlands first in Europe to approve lab-grown meat tastings

Yesterday, the Dutch government released an official letter announcing it will allow the tasting of meat and seafood products cultivated from animal cells under specified conditions.

Following in the footsteps of the US and Singapore, the Netherlands is now the first country in Europe to permit tastings of lab-grown meat, a move that is particularly welcome by leading Dutch startups in the field. 

Collaborative competition in the lab-grown meat space

Cellular agriculture might not make a huge dent in the food industry for many years yet. However, given time, the breakthrough technology of growing meat in labs can form part of a desperately needed solution to transforming our food systems. 

There is no shortage of cultivated meat startups around the world, and in Europe. One of the keys to their success, apart from food safety and energy efficiency, is taste. For omnivores to pick lab-grown meat over that from a slaughtered animal, it needs to deliver when it comes to taste and texture. 

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However, up until now, scientists in Europe have faced a tremendous hurdle — they haven’t actually been able to let people try their products. As such, the move from the Dutch government to allow tastings under certain conditions is crucial to moving the budding industry forward.

Lawmakers established the “code of practice” in collaboration with cultivated meat startups Meatable and Mosa Meat, and sector representative HollandBIO. 

Maarten Bosch, CEO of Mosa Meat which calls itself a food technology company making the “world’s kindest beef burgers,” called the landmark announcement a “great achievement.” 

“Mosa Meat will use these controlled tastings to gather invaluable feedback on our products and to educate key stakeholders about the role cellular agriculture can play in helping Europe meet our food sovereignty and sustainability goals,” Bosch said. 

“This is great news for the Netherlands,” said Krijn de Nood, co-founder and CEO of Meatable, with whom TNW sat down for an interview earlier this year. He further added that it meant the country would maintain its pioneering position in the field. “Meatable is looking forward to inviting the first people to try our sausages, dumplings, and pulled pork!”

Following in the footsteps of the US and Singapore

As previously mentioned, the landmark decision makes the Netherlands the first country in Europe to make pre-approved tastings of cultivated meat possible. The government has previously set aside €60mn to build a “cellular agriculture ecosystem” and make the country a hub for the emerging technology. It has also established the organisation Cellular Agriculture Netherlands, which will now be tasked with overseeing the code of practice for tasting approvals. 

A little over a week ago, the US approved the sale of chicken made from animal cells from startups Upside Foods and Good Meat, both based in California. Singapore, which was also the location for Meatable’s first public tasting of its cultivated pork products earlier this year, has been way ahead on the regulatory side. 

The city-state formed a Novel Food Safety Expert Working Group in March 2020, and approved the first product (cultivated chicken from Eat Just) for sale in November the same year. Meatable has chosen to create a base in Singapore, and over the next five years, the company plans to invest over €60mn and employ more than 50 people there.

Meanwhile, at the beginning of May this year, Mosa Meat opened a new 2,760 square metre scale-up facility in Maastricht in the Netherlands. When it comes to solving one of the key drivers of climate change and halting the killing of more than 70 billion land animals per year, a little healthy competition never hurt. 

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Spotify CEO’s startup for AI-powered preventive healthcare raises €60M

Spotify founder and CEO Daniel Ek’s preventive healthcare startup just received a very strong vote of confidence from venture capitalists. Earlier today, Neko Health announced it had raised €60mn in a round led by Lakestar and backed by Atomico and General Catalyst.

The funds will be put towards expanding the concept outside of the company’s native Sweden, where it currently operates a private body-scan clinic. 

Neko Health, named after the Japanese word for cat, was founded in 2018 by Ek and Hjalmar Nilsonne. After much secrecy, its first clinic opened in February this year in Stockholm. Within two hours, it was fully booked out and 5,000 people were placed on a waiting list. 

“I’ve spent more than 10 years exploring the untapped potential of healthcare innovation,” Ek said in a statement. “We are dedicated to building a healthcare system that focuses on prevention and patient care, aiming to serve not just our generation, but those that follow.”

3D body scans

At the clinic, people go through a 3D full-body scan in a minimalist booth that would not look out of place in an episode of Star Trek, fitted with dozens of sensors and powered by, you guessed it, artificial intelligence. In particular, algorithms can immediately detect potential skin conditions and risk of cardiovascular disease. 

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Patients (are they still called that in preventative care?) also go through laser scans and an ECG, which, altogether, takes between 10 and 20 minutes. They may not be met by Bones himself after the examinations, but their results are looked over and explained by an actual, human, doctor. 

“We have our own nurses, doctors and specialists,” Nilsonne told Bloomberg. “We have dermatologists employed just to review the skin images. There is a doctor on site who can make qualified medical judgments for anything that comes up.”

The price for a Neko Health assessment is €250, and the company has performed over 1,000 scans since launch. Close to 80% of customers have reportedly prepaid for follow-up scans after a year. 

AI does indeed hold great potential for disease prevention and early detection — but only if the results are interpretable. It is unclear how much insight Neko Health physicians have into how the algorithm makes its predictions (as in, which factor contributes to the risk of cardiovascular disease so the patient/client can be better informed about what measures to take).

Purpose and ambition

One of the company’s backers is Skype co-founder and founder of Atomico, Niklas Zennström, who will also be taking a seat on the board. He sees enormous potential in the new venture from the man who essentially changed how we consume music. 

“Neko Health is exactly the type of mission that gets us excited at Atomico. It’s that rare combination of a firm with a purpose and outsized ambition, and founders with a world class track record,” Zennström said. “They’re solving a problem we can all relate to, with the potential to fundamentally transform global healthcare forever.” 

Spotify CEO’s startup for AI-powered preventive healthcare raises €60M Read More »

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The startups on a mission to upgrade Ireland’s meagre EV charging network

Next month, 50 homeowners in Ireland will start renting out their home electric car charging points to their neighbours with the help of a new app. It’s “the Airbnb of electric vehicle (EV) home chargers,” says GoPlugable co-founder Maebh Reynolds.

The app’s trial launch will be limited to that first group of 50 people who have their own charging point at home, and around 50 people with electric cars who would like to park up and pay to use them. If all goes well, a wider public launch could follow in September or October. 

“We are drastically falling behind in terms of public charger availability,” says Reynolds of the charging network in Northern Ireland, as she explains why she and her co-founder decided to develop the app. “For a lot of people, it’s the main reason why they won’t switch to electric vehicles.”

Such is the dearth of charging points that Reynolds says she has heard from individuals in Ireland who are already handing over cash to neighbours with chargers on an ad hoc basis, just so they can juice up their EV. In the GoPlugable app, such neighbours are defined as “hosts,” and the platform is designed to help them manage payments and advertise their charging point to more EV owners in their area. 

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To date, Belfast-based GoPlugable has raised £50,000 via competitions and grants, and the company has a headcount of two co-founders and two interns.

Worst in Europe?

It’s just one of many private businesses aiming to improve the EV charging network across Ireland. In Northern Ireland, there are 20 public charging points per 100,000 people — far below the UK average of 60 per 100,000. And last year, price comparison service Uswitch named the Republic of Ireland the worst place to own an EV out of a list of 34 European countries.

In the Republic, 80% of charging occurs at home, which suggests a severe lack of public charging infrastructure. The Irish Electric Vehicle Association estimates that there are around 2,000 public chargers in the country – but not many of them are rapid chargers

These devices can fully power up some EV batteries in less than an hour. But in the Republic, a country of five million people, there are only a few hundred such chargers available to the public, though this number is set to more than double under government plans.

GoPlugable’s approach is based on opening up access to domestic chargers in communities in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. Hosts will be able to set whatever price they like for, say, a 60-minute charge, says Reynolds, and EV owners will have to go through identity verification and submit their vehicle registration to the app before being able to book a slot.

This might be convenient if you live near someone with a charger who’s willing to rent it out – but what if you just need some power, quickly, while out and about? 

“There needs to be some good on-street solutions, possibly some good local hubs,” says Jade Edwards, head of insights at Zapmap, which has charted the location of thousands of public chargers around the island of Ireland.

If hubs are the answer, someone is going to have to build them. Weev, a Belfast-based startup recently received £50 million in funding from UK energy firm Octopus to greatly scale up the EV charging network in public areas in Northern Ireland. The firm will focus on establishing hub-style sites with multiple chargers, including at locations along major arterial routes.

The need is growing. EV ownership is rising in Northern Ireland at a noticeably high rate – with a 72% increase in battery electric vehicle registrations there in the third quarter of 2022 compared to the third quarter of 2021.

“We have about 30 sites at the moment with 70 public chargers,” says Weev chief executive Philip Rainey. “Moving from that position to having over 3,000 chargers around the province is the challenge.”

Don’t make me wait

Weev wants to achieve this in just three years and the vast majority of chargers will be rapid chargers, he emphasises. The devices are popular with users because they let them power up their vehicles even while making a quick visit to a shop or while attending a work event at a hotel, for example. The company currently has a headcount of just over 20 people but is planning to increase this to 50 during the next 12 months.

One huge hurdle in Northern Ireland, according to the Electric Vehicle Association Northern Ireland (EVANI), a non-profit, is the sheer cost of setting up new connection infrastructure whenever someone decides to build an EV charging hub. 

Unlike the rest of the UK or Ireland, in Northern Ireland, installers must sometimes stump up 100% of the funds required for upgrading the electricity network in the area in order to connect the new chargers to it. Elsewhere, such costs are often “socialised” or spread across multiple users of the network.

It is a kind of “first mover disadvantage”, argues Mark McCall, EVANI co-founding director and chairman: “Not only does that affect EVs, it affects connection of wind turbines and heat pumps, solar — all these low-carbon technologies.”

Depending on the scale and location of the hub, it could mean that the price tag for installing it runs into the millions whereas, in Great Britain, the same hub might only cost a few hundred thousand pounds to set up, EVANI suggests.

TNW asked NIE Networks, which owns the electricity network in Northern Ireland, for comment on this situation but did not receive a response. 

Charging ahead

Rainey says that Weev intends to be “strategic” about where it sites new hubs, and will piggyback on under-used electricity network infrastructure at certain locations, to avoid excessive charges for new connections.

Meanwhile, in the Republic of Ireland, there is also a huge push to improve the public EV charging network, says Ricky Hill, Ireland Country Manager at Monta, a Danish startup that has developed software to help charging point operators manage their devices.

“We know we need to put more in because the rate that EVs are being bought now is really increasing,” he says, adding that Monta covers just under 3,000 charging points across the island of Ireland. Within 18 months, that number should rise to between 17,000 and 20,000 chargers, estimates Hill. Monta employs 170 people and has raised €50 million to date.

The company’s software gives operators a live view of available charging points on their own network, including whether a specific charger is currently in use, and any indications of downtime. 

In the near future, the platform will introduce new features such as smart charging based on variable energy prices, says Hill. In total, Monta helps to manage 90,000 chargers, most of which are in Europe, where growth of EV charging infrastructure has, in general, been “phenomenal” lately, says Hill. 

Ireland might have been slow off the mark — but it now seems ready to join the EV party in earnest.

New EV registrations across Ireland since 2013

Year Northern Ireland Republic of Ireland
2013 86 56
2014 223 268
2015 436 604
2016 502 704
2017 551 986
2018 589 2,056
2019 579 5,115
2020 1,680 7,271
2021 3,779 17,327
2022 5,947 23,928

Source: Electric Vehicle Association Northern Ireland (EVANI) / UK Department for Transport / Irish Electric Vehicle Association (IEVA)

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Crystals, jets, and magnets — is this how to make cooling greener?

Crystals, jets, and magnets — is this how to make cooling greener?

Chris Baraniuk

Story by

Chris Baraniuk

In a world scorched by climate change, cooling technology is far from a luxury. It saves lives, keeps food fresh and ensures comfort at home or in the office. Ten new air conditioners are to be sold every second between now and 2050, according to the International Energy Agency.

But all those machines, running for hours on end, gobble up vast quantities of electricity. These devices also tend to contain refrigerant gases that are many thousands of times more damaging in terms of global warming potential than CO2. The gases gradually leak, including after old air conditioning units or fridges are thrown away.

Ironically, then, cooling ourselves down to survive the climate crisis could actually make the problem far worse. That’s why there are multiple startups in Europe, as well as around the world, investigating new technologies that could make cooling much more efficient than it is today. And they are coming up with some unusual ideas.

No fluids, no leaks

At a lab in Cambridge, Xavier Moya, co-founder of Barocal, has a prototype machine that applies pressure to plastic crystals – lattices of organic molecules. This produces a strong cooling effect, dropping temperatures by, say, 20˚C or 30˚C.

“We are not using a gas, so it’s not going to leak,” says Moya. Barocal currently has six employees and has raised £1.5 million in funding.

The technology relies on the fact that molecules in the solid refrigerant are naturally spinning but when pressure is applied, they stop. “When you remove pressure, the molecules want to rotate again and they need to absorb energy – this is why they cool down,” says Moya.

He adds that the process is a little bit like what happens inside liquid crystal displays. Such displays contain molecules that change their orientation when an electric field is applied, so you can see numbers appear on your calculator screen, for example.

Barocal’s solid refrigerant could be used inside air conditioners or fridges, and on either a domestic or commercial scale, Moya says. He claims the system will be extremely efficient. In cooling and heating systems, one kilowatt hour (kWh) of electricity is often used to produce multiple kilowatt hours of thermal energy – known as the coefficient of performance (COP). Modern heat pumps, for instance, might get you a COP of 3 at home, which means 3 kWh of heat resulting from every kWh of electricity consumed.

“We are expecting efficiencies that are twice or more,” says Moya, though he adds that his firm is still years away from releasing a commercial product.

Another startup that aims to do away with refrigerant fluids is Dynamic Air Cooling, in Poland. The firm employs 13 people and has raised €3.5 million in funding, €2.3 million of which has been in the form of grants.

‘Mini tornado’

Co-founder and chief executive Pavel Panasjuk says his team came up with the idea more or less by accident when experimenting with the same technology used in jet engines.

“We created a process which is very similar to a mini tornado,” he says. It’s the twisting and spinning of the air that achieves a cooling effect since it converts thermal energy in the air to kinetic energy instead, he explains. The system can reliably push temperatures down by about 45˚C and in experiments this has worked from starting points ranging from 0˚C to 35˚C or so, adds Panasjuk.

One tricky aspect is that, currently, there’s no finalised method of determining a specific output temperature, so the team is working on a control unit to do that. “There is a solution,” hints Panasjuk, who adds that the system should achieve a COP of around 4.

If all engineering challenges are dealt with, he adds that Dynamic Air Cooling hopes to have a commercial product ready in as little as one year from today. The firm is targeting industrial refrigeration for food storage and transport.

Magnotherm, in Germany, is also determined to make fridges greener but with a totally different kind of technology. Timur Sirman, co-founder and managing director, explains that his startup’s device relies on rotating magnets. Imagine two of them, like burger buns, above and below the “burger”, which in this case is a special iron alloy full of pores, through which water may be pumped. The magnetic field created by the rotating magnets has the effect of cooling the metal alloy, and therefore any water that passes across it.

The quest for efficiency

The company, which has 32 members of staff and has raised €6.3 million to date, already has a small commercial product – a fridge that it rents out to event organisers. The fridge, dubbed Polaris, can hold between 100 and 200 drinks, says Sirman, but only has a COP of 1, which isn’t very efficient. However, this can be solved by making a bigger fridge, he adds.

“The cooling power scales linearly with the amount of material that you put inside,” says Sirman. So with the same motors and water pump, but more of the porous iron alloy, the team hopes to achieve more cooling and a COP of up to 5 in 2024.

In principle, the same technology could be used in an air conditioning system, though that is not Magnotherm’s focus at present. The hope is that their system will be used in commercial fridges, in a modular unit that can be taken out and placed into a new fridge whenever the customer, for instance a supermarket, decides to update their hardware.

It’s “fantastic” to see so many innovations in the field of cooling, says Nicole Miranda, a researcher on the Future of Cooling Programme at the Oxford Martin School, part of the University of Oxford. She emphasises that, in the coming years, passive cooling techniques – from textiles that keep our bodies cool to increased shade in city centres – will be just as important as technologies that require electricity to work.

But the demand for air conditioners and fridges really will be huge across the world, she adds, so it’s important to develop sustainable systems now that will not guzzle excessive amounts of energy, or be constructed from materials that have a high carbon footprint.

Consider also the many homes around Europe that were never designed to keep out excessive summer heat. And it’s not yet clear that the energy systems in such countries will be able to cope with booming demand for cooling tech in the coming years.

“It’s an easy solution to just go to a shop and get an air conditioner,” says Miranda. “That’s a huge risk for those places’ electrical networks.”

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Zero-emission cruise ship with retractable solar sails set to launch in 2030

Zero-emission cruise ship with retractable solar sails set to launch in 2030

Linnea Ahlgren

Story by

Linnea Ahlgren

Linnea is the senior editor at TNW, having joined in April 2023. She has a background in international relations and covers clean and climat Linnea is the senior editor at TNW, having joined in April 2023. She has a background in international relations and covers clean and climate tech, AI and quantum computing. But first, coffee.

By travelling on modern day cruise ships, we inevitably leave our (carbon) footprint behind, in an ironic twist of fate destroying the very nature we have come so far to admire.

That could soon change, at least along the magnificent fjord landscape of Norway. Weeks before its 130th anniversary, cruise company Hurtigruten has revealed the concept design for its very first zero-emission ship. 

Cruise ships are among the most polluting means of travel. They utilise enormous amounts of fuel, and generate a ridiculous amount of waste. Noise pollution from the engines disturbs marine life, harming the sensitive hearing of dolphins and killer whales, and destroying entire ecosystems. 

Meanwhile, some economies rely on cruise ships and their passengers. Norway, as a whole, may not be entirely dependent on income from Hurtigruten. However, the communities along the route count on regular visits from the cruise ships for their livelihood. 

Batteries supplemented by solar and wind

Enter Sea Zero, “the world’s most energy-efficient cruise ship,” according to Hurtigruten and its 12 maritime partners for the project. The ship will feature 60 watt batteries that will be charged with renewable energy (while Norway is a huge oil and gas exporter, 98% of domestic energy consumption comes from renewables) while in port.

Rendering of Sea Zero in the fjords
Oh to silently cruise through the fjords. Credit: VARD Design

This will be supplemented with wind and solar energy from retractable sails with solar panels, to charge the batteries while cruising. These will extend to a maximum height of 50 metres with 1500m² of photovoltaic panels and a wind surface of 750m². 

Sea Zero will also feature what the company refers to as “other firsts,” including artificial intelligence manoeuvring, mimicking that of an aeroplane cockpit. Other novel additions include contra-rotating propellers, and multiple retractable thrusters. 

Rendering of Sea Zero from the side
The sails extend to a maximum height of 50m. Credit: VARD Design

In order to meet the 2030 launch target the company has set for itself, the 135-metre long streamlined design has to enter construction in 2027 at the latest. Current R&D is focused on battery production, propulsion technology, hull design, and sustainable building practices. 

“Following a rigorous feasibility study, we have pinpointed the most promising technologies for our groundbreaking future cruise ships,” said Hedda Felin, CEO of Hurtigruten Norway. “We are committed to delivering a ship that surpasses all others in terms of energy efficiency and sustainability within just a few years.”

Hospitality makes up 50% of energy consumption

The 500 guests across the 270 cabins (served by a crew of 99) will be invited to reduce their own energy consumption through an interactive app. Hurtigruten says it will also be “crucial” to develop new technologies for currently energy-intensive onboard hotel services. 

Currently, only 0.1% of the world’s ships use zero-emission technology. A large cruise ship can have the carbon footprint of 12,000 cars. And yet, according to figures from the Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA), the industry will see record highs in both passengers and revenue this year. Furthermore, by 2026, passenger numbers are set to grow to 12% above pre-COVID levels. 

If there is to be anything left to admire as we cruise by (unless, of course, you are only in it for the aquatheaters, the on-deck cocktail bar, and the improv), we need more initiatives like Sea Zero, and fast. Although, of course, if Norway keeps up its oil and gas production, zero-emissions cruise ships may be a mere blip in the ocean.

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Apple’s rumoured mixed reality headset may be the miracle the European XR industry needs

Apple’s rumoured mixed reality headset may be the miracle the European XR industry needs

Callum Booth

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Callum Booth

Managing Editor

Callum is the Managing Editor of TNW. He covers the full spectrum of technology, looks after editorial newsletters, and makes the occasional Callum is the Managing Editor of TNW. He covers the full spectrum of technology, looks after editorial newsletters, and makes the occasional odd video.

Apple is a sector definer. While the company rarely creates entirely new products, its hardware ends up being the baseline other devices are measured by. You only need to look at how the iPod, iPhone, and iPad defined what people expect from MP3 players, phones, and tablets.

Now, Apple is hoping it can repeat this trick with an entirely new product: its rumoured VR/AR headset, expected to be announced on June 5th.

This is a huge moment for not only the company, but the European extended reality (XR) sector as a whole. While Apple has had some successes with products like the Apple Watch, it’s not released anything in recent years that has grabbed the world by the scruff of its neck in the way, say, the iPod did.

With its VR/AR headset, the Cupertino giant is on the brink of jumping into an entirely new industry, one that could either reinforce or destroy its reputation as a sector definer.

And for European XR companies? Apple’s hardware has the potential to do miraculous things. To find out exactly what and how, we spoke with several European companies — but before we get there, let’s spend some time analysing what’s actually happening with XR on the continent.

The state of extended reality in Europe

There are two sides you need to consider when looking at mixed reality in Europe: the consumer and the professional.

Let’s begin with the former. Various studies have found the European public are largely nonplussed about virtual reality and the metaverse — two of the current biggest elements of XR. This is something I’m certain many of us have experienced colloquially. It feels as though most people are generally unexcited by extended reality; hell, even those I know with headsets seem to stop using them quickly.

Where the consumer side of XR seems jaded, things are very different on the professional front. These sectors drive the majority of growth in the extended reality market, with the healthcare, industrial, and education sectors embracing the technology wholeheartedly and rapidly.

To put it another way, professional sectors have found uses for XR in Europe — while consumers are still waiting for a reason to adopt the technology. Despite this separation between the two markets, analysts are united in believing the continent’s XR market is about to get bigger. Much bigger.

According to Statista, the AR and VR market in Europe was worth $2.8 billion (€2.61 billion) in 2021. By 2025, this is expected to hit $20.9 billion (€19.4 billion), a 7.5x increase over four years.

This places consumer-focused European companies in the sector in a precarious situation. There’s potential to make a lot of money, but no guarantee that the public will actually embrace the technology.

An Apple-sized gamble

“The magnitude of the opportunity is enormous, but there’s a real risk that the technology could just not take off,” Leo Gebbie — Principal Analyst of Connected Devices at CCS Insight — tells TNW. “We’ve seen Meta pour billions of dollars into VR and the metaverse in recent years, but the technology has failed to inspire the masses.”

When I asked Gebbie why this is the case, he pointed to one major cause: “a lack of killer apps.”

The B2B XR market is growing because those tools have a clear use case, thinking training for surgeons or drivers. The thing is, that’s not the market Apple is after. It wants to put headsets into the homes of the public at large and, with no clear use cases for the public, Apple is taking a gargantuan risk.

The question, then, is what impact this dice roll will have on European companies already working in the sector?

More eyes means more money

There was one common response across all the companies TNW spoke with for this article: the release of Apple’s AR/VR headset will bring a lot of attention to the industry — and that will have financial implications for everyone.

“We expect it to have a substantial impact on the XR space,” Jerome Botbol — the Group Head of Immersive at Happy Finish, a creative production agency — says to TNW. When you consider Apple’s track record, especially when it comes to products that “command market share and drive adoption,” the headset could be “a major milestone for the industry.”

This is coming from a consumer perspective — precisely the market Apple’s headset will be targeting — as, generally, Happy Finish creates immersive experiences for the public on behalf of B2C clients

But will it have the same impact on the B2B sector? Or will things be different?

I put this question to Jakob Way, the CEO of Gleechi, a Stockholm-based development company making VR training software. So far, Gleechi has raised over $33 million (€30.78 million) in funding.

“The launch of Apple’s VR/AR headset holds tremendous potential for our industry,” Way says. “Apple has a history of disrupting markets, and their entry into the VR/AR space could have a transformative effect.”

Way continues, telling me that an Apple headset “could have a significant impact on the adoption and mainstream acceptance of [XR] technologies.”

Apple creating a consumer-focused VR/AR headset will pay dividends for the professional market too. In fact, it will be beneficial for the European industry as a whole, as it increases the knowledge and understanding of the technology across a wide spread of people.

Gebbie from CCS Insight confirms this though: “The VR industry would welcome an Apple entry into the market as it would immediately drive interest and investment from all quarters.”

In other words, Apple entering the XR market will deliver a lot more attention, which will turn on the money taps for European companies and startups in the sector, no matter whether they’re consumer or B2B focused.

An antidote for developer woes

While attracting more eyes to XR in general will be a boon for the European industry, another interesting advantage of Apple’s headset will be the reaction it’s likely to inspire from developers.

As Gebbie previously mentioned, one of the big issues impacting the progression of the consumer XR space in Europe is “a lack of killer apps.” One way this could be remedied is bringing more developers into the fold.

Max Kraynov — Group CEO of FunCorp, an app development company — tells TNW that Apple entering the market could alter the talent balance in the industry. “Another major player providing a platform to develop on” makes it “highly likely” that the industry will see “a spike in VR software development, and talent procuring/nurturing.”

This is something that Gebbie from CCS Insight also believes, saying that “developers who may have stayed away from VR so far due to the small size of the market are likely to show willingness to work with Apple given the potential for a headset from the company to sell in volume.”

The swell in interest that Apple entering the market will cause may motivate European developers who previously didn’t see the point in developing XR applications, or thought the sector was merely a flash-in-the-pan. But when the Cupertino giant gets involved, that’s a signal to professionals everywhere that there may be a shift afoot. 

User experience: A helpful baseline

Apple “has a habit of redefining expectations around a technology and turning new ideas into smash hit products,” Gebbie tells TNW.

As previously discussed, one of the things Apple is most famous for is taking pre-existing devices and giving people a reason to use them. Generally, it has achieved this by creative thinking, attention to user experience, and delightful form factors — a trio of points that the XR industry has historically struggled with.

“The problem we’ve had so far is that people put on a headset, and may have only experienced content that was created by enthusiasts, not professionals,” Matt Littler, CEO and founder, ARK Immersive, a VR production house, says. “There [is] no governance, cinematic language, or real stringent base to build an experience from, which leaves people not wanting to do it again.”

Apple excels at these factors. The company “creates compelling use cases that provide purposeful experiences,” Littler says. “Immersive optimisation is about to begin.”

These factors — and particularly the focus on user-centric design — are key in encouraging consumers to overcome their distrust of extended reality. 

Consider the advent of smartphones. At the beginning of the sector’s journey, there were a myriad of different designs and user experience languages. Yet, with the iPhone, Apple effectively defined the way handsets should operate — many of these elements being adopted by other manufacturers along the way. 

The hope for European XR developers and creators, then, is that Apple’s headset provides a baseline user experience and design language. This may then not only draw the public towards XR as a whole — as the benefits of using it will be clearer — but also provide structure for those making software and content in the space on the continent, something that will benefit B2B applications too.

Will it be all rainbows and stardust?

While we’ve seen that developers and creators of XR content in Europe are likely to benefit from Apple’s headset, one element we haven’t discussed are the businesses making competing hardware.

On first inspection, one would assume Apple’s entry would be negative, with the company usurping those companies’ user bases and gobbling up market share. But is this the case? We put this to Varjo, a Finnish company making advanced VR headsets. To date, it has received over $165.8 million (€154.58 million) in funding over ten rounds.

“Varjo is the only company currently offering high-fidelity video passthrough technology, similar to what Apple is rumoured to be using,” Timo Toikkanen, Varjo’s CEO says. This, he tells TNW, is a validation of his work — and a technology that will be “​​the winning approach [to XR headsets] for a very long time.”

Where Toikkanen is particularly positive though is in how Varjo’s target audience differs from that of Apple’s.

“Instead of trying to go after consumer applications that are untested and unproven, we’ve built a whole market around advanced professional use cases,” he says. “Today, already 25% of Fortune 100 companies are using our products.”

Once again, the separation between consumer and professional XR rears its head.

If B2B-centric XR companies like Varjo are unworried about any negative impact Apple’s headset might have on their own hardware, what about other companies making consumer-focused VR/AR devices?

“Apple would pose a direct threat to headset makers already in the market, such as Meta and Pico,” Gebbie from CCS Insight says. This could somewhat explain why the former company unveiled its Meta Quest 3 headset merely days before the rumoured announcement of Apple’s device. It’s trying to both remain relevant in the XR hardware discussion and ride the wave of publicity Apple is generating.

Despite this, Gebbie believes that the launch of Apple’s headset could actually benefit businesses like Meta, saying that “this negative [threat] would likely be offset by a swell in interest in VR overall, which would likely help all companies to sell more devices.” 

Final thoughts: One headset to rule them all

Whatever happens with the launch of Apple’s headset, it’ll be good for European XR companies —in the short term, at least.

The interest and investment that Apple’s legacy and reputation brings will drag the extended reality market into a previously unseen amount of light. Whether that’s getting more consumer eyes on the market, encouraging developers to get involved, or providing a baseline for XR design language, Apple’s entry will have a positive knock-on effect for any European company in the industry. 

At first. Because if Apple’s headset falls flat, the initial spike in attention will swiftly drop, and this failure will likely be seen as a sign that the whole consumer side of the XR industry is untenable. If Apple can’t make a VR/AR headset an attractive proposition for the public, who can?

Of course, there will remain a thriving B2B market for the technology, but this will hardly be unscathed by the potential failure of Apple’s headset. The more money and interest that flows into a product category, the better and more efficient it will become. The reason laptops and phones are so advanced isn’t because they’re good for business, it’s because everyone wants them — and the same goes for XR headsets.

Apple is on a precipice, one that will shape the fate of the whole European XR industry. But, as Littler from ARK Immersive puts it, “If anyone can simplify the process, improve UX and ultimately get your grandma in a VR headset, it’s Apple.”

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Italy to launch €150M fund for AI startups

Italy to launch €150M fund for AI startups

Linnea Ahlgren

Story by

Linnea Ahlgren

Linnea is the senior editor at TNW, having joined in April 2023. She has a background in international relations and covers clean and climat Linnea is the senior editor at TNW, having joined in April 2023. She has a background in international relations and covers clean and climate tech, AI and quantum computing. But first, coffee.

Italy is the latest country looking to quickly shore up domestic development of an AI ecosystem. As part of its Strategic Program for Artificial Intelligence, the government will “soon” launch a €150 million fund to support startups in the field, backed by development bank Cassa Depositi e Prestiti (CDP). 

As reported by Corriere Communazione, Alessio Butti, Italy’s cabinet undersecretary in charge of technological innovation, relayed the news of the state-backed fund yesterday. While he didn’t provide specific details on the amount to be made available, government sources subsequently told Reuters the figure being discussed in Rome was in the vicinity of €150 million. 

“Our goal is to increase the independence of Italian industry and cultivate our national capacity to develop skills and research in the sector,” Butti said. “This is why we are working with CDP on the creation of an investment fund for the most innovative startups, so that study, research, and programming on AI can be promoted in Italy.”

Navigating regulation and support

Indeed, the AI boom is here in earnest. Yesterday, Nvidia became the first chipmaker to hit $1 trillion in valuation. The boost to stocks followed a prediction of sales reaching $11 billion in Q2 off the back of the company’s chips powering OpenAI’s ChatGPT (which, coincidentally got off on a bit of a bad foot with Italy).

Those who do not yet have their hands in the (generative) AI pie are now racing to be part of the algorithm-driven gold rush of the 21st Century. 

While intent on regulatory oversight, governments are also, for various reasons, keen on supporting domestic developers in the field of artificial intelligence. Last month, the UK made £100 million in funding available for a task force to help build and adopt the “next generation of safe AI.” 

Italy is also looking to set up its own “ad hoc” task force. Butti stated, “In Italy we must update the strategy of the sector, and therefore the Department for Digital Transformation is working on the establishment of an authoritative group of Italian experts and scholars.”

Part of national AI strategy

Italy adopted the Strategic Program for Artificial Intelligence 2022-2024 in 2021 but, of course, the industry is evolving at breakneck speed. The strategy is a joint project between the ministries for university and research, economic development, and technological innovation and digital transition. Additionally, it is guided by a working group on the national strategy for AI. 

The program outlines 24 policies the government will have implemented over the course of the three years. Beyond measures to support the domestic development of AI, these include promotion of STEM subjects, and increasing the number of doctorates to attract international researchers. Furthermore, they target the creation of data infrastructure for public administration and specific support for startups working in GovTech and looking to solve critical problems in the public sector.

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Twitter’s withdrawal from disinformation code draws ire of EU politicians

Twitter’s withdrawal from disinformation code draws ire of EU politicians

Linnea Ahlgren

Story by

Linnea Ahlgren

Linnea is the senior editor at TNW, having joined in April 2023. She has a background in international relations and covers clean and climat Linnea is the senior editor at TNW, having joined in April 2023. She has a background in international relations and covers clean and climate tech, AI and quantum computing. But first, coffee.

Following a decision to pull Twitter out of the EU’s (voluntary) disinformation Code of Practice last week, the reactions have not been long in coming. Upon receiving the news, the bloc’s industry chief Thierry Breton said that Twitter would still need to abide by EU rules soon enough.

Or, as Monsieur Breton put it (tweeted, in fact) when referring to the Digital Services Act (DSA), which will make fighting disinformation a legal obligation from 25 August, “You can run, but you cannot hide.” 

Twitter leaves EU voluntary Code of Practice against disinformation.

But obligations remain. You can run but you can’t hide.

Beyond voluntary commitments, fighting disinformation will be legal obligation under #DSA as of August 25.

Our teams will be ready for enforcement.

— Thierry Breton (@ThierryBreton) May 26, 2023

Commissioner Breton was joined in his vexation today by France’s Digital Minister Jean-Noël Barrot. As reported by Politico, Barrot stated to the radio network France Info that, should Twitter fail to follow the new (and obligatory) rules laid down by the DSA, the company would get kicked out of the European Union. 

“Disinformation is one of the gravest threats weighing on our democracies,” said Barrot, as translated by Politico. “Twitter, if it repeatedly doesn’t follow our rules, will be banned from the EU.” 

First-of-its-kind self-regulatory rules

The code of conduct requires companies to measure their work on combating disinformation and issue regular reports on their progress. This includes things such as demonetising the dissemination of disinformation, ensuring transparency of political advertising, enhancing the cooperation with fact-checkers, and providing researchers with better data.

Google, TikTok, Microsoft, and Meta are all voluntary signatories. Twitter, obviously, was also part of the group up until last week.

There has been no official statement (or tweet for that matter) on the decision to leave, but it seems Elon Musk has changed his mind from four years ago, which was when the industry first agreed on the self-regulatory EU rules.

In an interview at the time, he stated that, “I think there should be regulations on social media to the degree that it negatively affects the public good. We can’t have like willy-nilly proliferation of fake news, that’s crazy.”

Blocking accounts on the behest of governments has increased

A $44 billion impulse purchase or not, changes have abounded at Twitter since Elon bought it. More than supplying the accounts of dead people with little blue ticks, it would seem that the new “era of free speech” he proclaimed is highly mutable.

Since Musk’s takeover, Twitter has actually become more compliant with government authority requests, including those of India and Turkey to block journalists, foreign politicians, and even poets. 

Musk has previously stated that he believes free speech to be that “which matches the law.” However, with the recent withdrawal from the disinformation code of conduct he has demonstrated he is not adverse to extracting his recently acquired company from regulations. 

By “free speech”, I simply mean that which matches the law.

I am against censorship that goes far beyond the law.

If people want less free speech, they will ask government to pass laws to that effect.

Therefore, going beyond the law is contrary to the will of the people.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 26, 2022

For once, it is not a tech lord threatening to leave the EU, but rather the bloc intimating that it might kick one out. Let’s see which way the DSA cookie will crumble. 

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Another European eVTOL startup delays launch amid certification hurdles

Another European eVTOL startup delays launch amid certification hurdles

Linnea Ahlgren

Story by

Linnea Ahlgren

Linnea is the senior editor at TNW, having joined in April 2023. She has a background in international relations and covers clean and climat Linnea is the senior editor at TNW, having joined in April 2023. She has a background in international relations and covers clean and climate tech, AI and quantum computing. But first, coffee.

If you, like me, have been waiting for the day when urban sprawls begin to resemble your favourite sci-fi scene with flying taxis journeying in silent files high up amongst the skyscrapers, it seems you may have to wait a little while longer. 

Bristol-based urban air mobility (UAM) startup Vertical Aerospace is the latest in a long line to announce the (second) delay of entry into service of its aircraft, the VX4. The company has told investors it is now targeting certification from the UK’s Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) by the end of 2026 – two years behind the original timeline. 

Setting dates to get the first electric vertical takeoff and landing vehicle (eVTOL) certified was always bound to be something of a gamble. Most of the companies developing these zero-emission ‘air taxis’ are aerospace startups (albeit supported by established OEM partners) with little to no experience of the actual aircraft certification process required. 

As acknowledged by Vertical’s CEO Stephen Fitzpatrick in a letter to investors seen by the Financial Times, “Attempting to predict a date with certainty when it is several years away is challenging and achieving it depends on agreeing compliance methods for new technology with the authorities.”

First mover problems

Straddling the axis of innovation and sustainability, eVTOL technology has the potential to revolutionise urban and regional mobility of both passengers and cargo. However, with new technologies come new regulatory requirements. This will be especially true for the fully autonomous aircraft predicted to enter the market in a decade or so. 

A report by Morgan Stanley in 2019 predicted that the global eVTOL market would grow to $1.5 trillion by 2040. Two years later, the figure was downgraded to $1 trillion. However, by 2050, the company estimates the market will have reached a staggering $9 trillion.

Furthermore, the report acknowledged that the industry’s first movers had a “regulatory Mount Everest” to confront before launching their aircraft into service.

It’s not as if Vertical hasn’t been groundbreaking in the sector; the company has already been flying full-scale prototypes for the past four years. In March it received what is known as a design organisation approval (DOA) by the CAA – the first time any regulator has granted one to an eVTOL maker. 

And there are many customers waiting eagerly to begin making a dent in net-zero pledges; Vertical Aerospace has a pre-order book of 1,400 aircraft. Prospective customers of the four-passenger-one-pilot VX4 include American Airlines and Virgin Atlantic, as well as Irish aircraft leasing giant Avolon. 

Who will actually make it to market?

Currently, there are about 500 electric vertical takeoff and landing developers worldwide. The market is concentrated in North America (with the notable exception of Embraer in Brazil), Europe, and Asia.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in the US and the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) have taken slightly different approaches to certifying eVTOL. The FAA has adapted its existing aircraft certification framework, whereas the EU has developed draft regulations and a new eVTOL certification framework. The UK CAA announced in June last year it would use the same standards set out by EASA. 

Both approaches seem to be having the same kind of impact on many manufacturer timelines. In the US, notable new developers such as Joby Aviation and Archer first proclaimed entry-into-service dates in 2024, but recently pushed them to 2025. 

Brazil’s seasoned aircraft manufacturer Embraer has taken a more conservative approach, stating it will have its EVE eVTOL delivered to customers in 2026. Meanwhile, European aerospace giant Airbus has had to push back the first flight of its CityBus NextGen prototype to 2024, a year later than planned when announcing the project back in 2021. 

Nonetheless, there are developers that are still bullish on their original plans. Germany’s Volocopter is adamant that it will have certified its aircraft in time for the Paris 2024 Olympics. Its compatriot Lilium (setting itself apart from other companies by developing a eVTOL jet), however, has delayed its early estimate of 2024 by a year.

Meanwhile, Lilium has commenced wind tunnel testing of a 40%-scale prototype at a joint German-Dutch facility in the Netherlands after securing a new round of funding at the beginning of May. 

Most likely, as predicted by Morgan Stanley, the first movers will have the largest regulatory mountain to climb. Perhaps after the summit, the UAM revolution will begin in earnest, and we can all catch a silent, zero-emission rideshare and reminisce about the time we used to waste in noisy, polluting traffic jams. 

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Google launches €10M social innovation AI fund for European entrepreneurs

Google launches €10M social innovation AI fund for European entrepreneurs

Linnea Ahlgren

Story by

Linnea Ahlgren

In conjunction with a visit of CEO Sundar Pichai’s visit to Stockholm yesterday, Google announced the launch of the second Google.org Social Innovation Fund on AI to “help social enterprises solve some of Europe’s most pressing challenges.” 

Through the fund, Google is making €10 million available, along with mentoring and support, for entrepreneurs from underserved backgrounds. The aim is to help them develop transformative AI solutions that specifically target problems they face on a daily basis.

The fund will provide capital via a grant to INCO for the expansion of Social Tides, an accelerator program funded by Google.org, that will provide cash support of up to $250,000 (€232,000). 

In 2021, Google put up €20 million for European AI social innovation startups through the same mechanism. Among the beneficiaries at that time was The Newsroom in Portugal, which uses an AI-powered app to encourage a more contextualised reading experience to take people out of their bubble and reduce polarisation.

Mini-European tour ahead of AI Act

Of the money offered by the tech giant this time around €1 million will be earmarked for nonprofits that are helping to strengthen and grow social entrepreneurship in Sweden.

During his brief stay, Pichai met with the country’s prime minister and visited the KTH Royal Institute of Technology to meet with students and professors.

Googles vd Sundar Pichai gästade KTH och pratade om artificiell intelligens. Han konstaterar att det är ok att vara rädd om rädslan används till någonting vettigt. https://t.co/imbtxxbSVn pic.twitter.com/oWal43dc2a

— KTH Royal Institute of Technology (@KTHuniversity) May 24, 2023

Sweden currently holds the six-month-long rotating Presidency of the European Union. Pichai’s visit to Stockholm preceded a trip to meet with European Commission deputy chief Vera Jourova and EU industry chief Thierry Breton on Wednesday. 

Breton is one of the drivers behind the EU’s much-anticipated AI Act, a world-first attempt at far-reaching AI regulation. One of the biggest sources of contention — and surely subject to much lobbying from the industry — is whether so-called general purpose AI, such as the technology behind ChatGPT or Google’s Bard should be considered “high-risk.” 

Speaking to Swedish news outlet SVT on the day of his visit, Pichai stated that he believes that AI is indeed too important not to regulate, and to regulate well. “It is definitely going to involve governments, companies, academic universities, nonprofits, and other stakeholders,” Google’s top executive said. 

However, he may be doing some convincing of his own in Brussels, further adding, “These AI systems are going to be used for everything, from recommending a nearby coffee shop to potentially recommending a health treatment for you. As you can imagine, these are very different applications. So where we could get it wrong is to apply a high-risk assessment to all these use cases.” 

Will Pichai be successful in convincing the Commission? Then, just maybe, Bard will launch in Europe too

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The future of Dutch aerospace? Meet Fokker Next Gen’s hydrogen plane

The future of Dutch aerospace? Meet Fokker Next Gen’s hydrogen plane

Linnea Ahlgren

Story by

Linnea Ahlgren

Dutch aerospace pioneer Fokker is looking to make a comeback. This time however, it won’t be polluting Jet A fuel propelling the company’s aircraft. Instead, in the revived guise of Fokker Next Gen, it is playing the long game and joining in on the clean-burning hydrogen hype. 

With €25 million in funding from the Dutch government, and an additional EU Clean Aviation grant of undisclosed amount, Fokker is aiming at a 2035 entry into service of a clean-sheet aircraft design operating on liquid hydrogen. The plane’s intended range is 2,500 km, meaning it could fly across Europe from London to Kyiv – without generating any CO₂ emissions.

Fokker Next Gen intends to be done with the conceptual design stage of the aircraft by 2027, with a critical design review coming up three years later. Assembly of the new plane will happen in 2032, with the first prototype flight scheduled for 2033. That is, if everything goes according to plan, which is seldom the case with new aircraft projects. 

Meanwhile, the envisioned timeline is understandable, given that 2035 is the year proclaimed by European aerospace giant Airbus as the arrival of its ZEROe hydrogen-powered commercial aeroplane. 

Spacious and quiet

Looking at the first digitally generated images of the airframe-to-be, Fokker Next Gen is  hoping to build a dual-aisle aircraft with 2-3-2 seating, most closely resembling the layout of an Airbus A330. 

Airplane seats rendering
Flexible display panels will offer “customisable views or entertainment options” (that middle seat isn’t going anywhere though). Credit: Fokker Next Gen

It is difficult to glean the total passenger capacity though, as there is no length specification. What’s more, plenty of space in the fuselage has been dedicated to the storage of the hydrogen – one of the trickiest puzzles to solve in making hydrogen-powered commercial flight a reality, considering volume and weight constraints. 

What we do know is that Fokker has opted for liquid hydrogen and direct combustion, as opposed to hydrogen-electric fuel-cells favoured by a majority of startups in the clean aviation space. Furthermore, it has already found an intended engine partner in the UK’s Rolls-Royce.

Rendering of hydrogen storage and engines
The hydrogen would be stored in the back of the fuselage. Credit: Fokker Next Gen

Meanwhile, just in case there won’t be enough green hydrogen to go around (a projected future constraint in the scaling of the technology), Fokker Next Gen has safeguarded its commercial appeal by designing the plane to also be able to fly on both good old kerosene and sustainable aviation fuel. 

Much more investment needed

Of course, €25 million is not going to cut it when it comes to delivering a brand new plane with tremendous R&D demand. Billions more will be needed in investment to hit the intended target of 150 units rolling off the final assembly line per year. But, as Fokker Next Gen CEO Juriaan Kellermann told Luchtvaartnieuws over the weekend, “We think it’s realistic.”

Meanwhile, building both an entirely new airframe and propulsion architecture at the same time would be a tall order. As such, the company will first convert one of its Fokker 100 regional jets. In fact, Fokker Next Gen has already begun adapting the plane to run on liquid hydrogen. The first test flight of the modified jet is currently scheduled for the start of 2028.

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