BRICS Summit 2023: PM Modi to attend 15th BRICS Summit in South Africa along with Xi Jinping, Lula da Silva BRICS, which includes Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa as its member nations, is scheduled to take place from August 22-24, in Johannesburg. South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has invited 55 members of the African Union (AU) and 20 other leaders from across the globe to be a part of this annual summit which is taking place in-person for the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic. Watch to know more!

The Covid-19 pandemic ushered in a new culture — forced and then for some voluntary — of working from home. To keep employees safe, organisations had little choice but to allow them to work from home. However, in the last 12 months or so, a lot of organisations have some form of working from office policy. One of them is Meta, which has a three-day work from office rule. However, it seems like employees are flouting that rule. According to a report by Business Insider, Lori Goler, head of people, Meta sent a memo to employees warning them about the rule. Performance drop, termination and more In the memo, as per Business Insider, Goler said that, “Managers will review badge and Status Tool information on a monthly basis and follow up with those who didn’t meet the requirement, subject to local law and works council requirements.” Meta has different work from office policies in different regions but three-day is pretty much the norm. It is something that a lot of other tech companies follow. Apple, Google also have a similar three-day work from office policy. Goler warned employees not to violate the work from office policy and urged employees to follow it strictly. “As with other company policies, repeated violations may result in disciplinary action, up to and including a Performance@ rating drop and, ultimately, termination if not addressed,” she said in the memo. It’s not as if Meta is making all employees come to office. According to the report, the company has “remote” workers who are advised not to come to office for more than four days every two months. “We believe that distributed work will continue to be important in the future, particularly as our technology improves,” a Meta spokesperson said in a statement.“In the near-term, our in-person focus is designed to support a strong, valuable experience for our people who have chosen to work from the office, and we’re being thoughtful and intentional about where we invest in remote work,” the spokesperson added.

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eSIMs, slowly, but steadily gaining popularity. Apple made the entire iPhone 14 series lineup sold in US eSIM only. Now, Google is taking a step forward with the entire eSIM idea and is reportedly making it easier for users to transfer eSIM from one device to another. Google has already announced, earlier this year, that it is working on an eSIM transfer feature that will allow users move eSIMs from one device to another natively. Right now, there’s no way to move eSIMs between two devices and that leaves users with only the option to disable the eSIM from one device and activate it again on another device and that requires telecom service provider’s support and good luck with that. QR code system is supposed to get implementedAnyhow, the native eSIM transfer support allows users to move eSIM from one device to another natively based on QR codes. As per the report, the new system will ask users to scan a QR code to initiate the entire eSIM transfer process. The report mentions that the next steps are currently not available as the feature isn’t live right now. When the feature is expected to arriveWell, there’s no official timeline announced by the company as of now. And, we also don’t know if the upcoming Android 14 will include this feature in the first rollout phase. But, previous rumours suggest that it could become a part of Pixel smartphone’s setup process which makes sense. Eventually, Google could also make this standard through the Android ecosystem. How this will make things easier for usersGoogle’s forthcoming native eSIM transfer feature, employing QR codes, promises user-friendly convenience. Currently, transferring eSIMs between devices can be cumbersome. This innovation streamlines the process, eliminating reliance on telecom providers and simplifying the activation process. Its introduction, potentially with Pixel smartphones, aims to enhance user experience within the Android ecosystem.

Honor has signed a licencing deal with former Relame India CEO Madhav Sheth-led HonorTech to manufacture smartphones in India Gurugram-based HonorTech will invest INR 1,000 Cr to set up software and hardware teams and service centres in India and launch three new smartphones by September this year All Honor-branded smartphones will eventually be manufactured in the country via a ‘PLI (production linked incentive)-approved domestic contract manufacturer’ by 2024 Chinese smartphone major Honor is reportedly gearing up for a relaunch in India in partnership with a local company. Honor has signed a licensing deal with Gurugram-based HonorTech, a joint venture between former Realme India top executive Madhav Sheth and Honor India distributor PSAV Global, to manufacture smartphones in India, news agency PTI reported. HonorTech will reportedly invest INR 1,000 Cr to set up operations for the Chinese smartphone brand’s reentry in the country. A major chunk of the infusion will go towards establishing software and hardware teams as well as to establish service centres in the country.  As per a Reuters report, the deal centres around an ‘agreed-upon cost’ linked to the transfer of technology and hardware.  “Their global expertise will be transferred to us. Honor’s global team will come to India to help with this know-how transfer. They will work as an ODM to us, while the partnership will help them expand globally,” Sheth told the publication. Under the pact, the duo will launch three ‘mid-range’ smartphone models under the Honor brand by as early as September this year. These smartphones will likely sell in the price range of $100-$1,000, including foldable phones, and will initially be imported.  As per Sheth, all Honor-branded smartphones will eventually be manufactured in the country via a ‘PLI (production linked incentive)-approved domestic contract manufacturer’ by 2024. Meanwhile, HonorTech expects to rake up a revenue of INR 10,000 Cr by December 2024 and is eyeing a 5% market share in the smartphone market by the end of 2022. As per Sheth, the partnership will generate 4,000 jobs in the country across operations,retail and R&D by the end of the next calendar year. The Chinese original equipment manufacturer’s (OEM’s) reentry into India comes nearly a year after it pulled the plug on its India smartphone operations as geopolitical tensions raged on between New Delhi and Beijing.  “The biggest challenge with the (Indian) government in the past was how can a (Chinese) brand be accountable in India?” Sheth told Reuters.  In partnership with HonorTech, the Chinese brand is expected to see some tailwinds as it regathers its India operations, alleviating a majority of the concerns of the Indian authorities.  Besides, this is potentially the first major development after the Centre reportedly directed Chinese smartphone makers to partner with local ‘equity partners’ to operate in India. Meanwhile, the move is expected to bring another Chinese player back to the country but with better data safeguards in place.  Honor will compete with other smartphone giants operating in the country such as Samsung and other Chinese competitors Xiaomi, Oppo, Vivo and Realme.  The development comes at a time when other Chinese companies have been under regulatory scrutiny in India for alleged money laundering and tax evasion. While Xiaomi has shut some of its services in India, others have steadily offloaded their investments in Indian startups.  Meanwhile, Chinese and other global OEMs continue to make a beeline for India owing to the lucrative PLI schemes and have scaled investments in manufacturing facilities in the country. While Xiaomi has partnered with a local player to produce wireless audio products, tech major Apple has scaled up its production to billions of dollars in India.  With much at stake, it remains to be seen what kind of impact the relaunch creates in India. Meanwhile, the reentry could ramp up competition in the already heavily populated Indian smartphone space. 

In 2021, Intel announced a shift in strategy with the IDM 2.0 and the chipmaker strides towards reclaiming its position in the market by 2025. The chipmaker continues expansion in the Asia Pacific and Japan (APJ) region with growing investments towards packaging facilities, foundries and research and development across the globe. Spearheading this revival is the Asia Pacific and Japan (APJ) region, with India emerging as the fastest-growing market.Steve Long, Intel’s General Manager for Asia Pacific and Japan, highlighted India’s demographic advantage, encapsulated by its representation of 50 per cent of the global population. Speaking at the inauguration of the Intel Tech Tour in Malaysia, Long pointed out the country’s dynamic growth in contrast to others facing stagnation and decline.“APJ (Asia Pacific and Japan region) has a demographic advantage, I boil it down to having 50 per cent of the world population. India is growing, and its population is unlike other areas that are stagnant and declining,” Steve Long, General Manager for Asia Pacific and Japan at Intel, said in a keynote during a facility visit in Penang, Malaysia.Long emphasised that this trend is clearly reflected in India’s robust gross domestic growth, surpassing that of the rest of the world. He underlined that the region is shouldering the responsibility of driving innovation, underscoring its pivotal role in propelling global progress.Referring to India as an illustration and expressing Intel’s perspective on the potential, Long indicated that the nation is the world’s most rapidly expanding internet market, having gained 400 million new users following the Covid-19 pandemic.“It is a massive change in the country. This is both a domestic consumption opportunity and an opportunity for India to change what they mean on the global stage. This is once in a generation kind of a thing,” he further added.Long pointed out the attributes of India that contribute to the APJ region’s distinction, including its diversity, demographics, and robust services industry.Intel’s bid to catch up with competitors as the use cases for artificial intelligence advances relies significantly on its Indian engineers. Sandra Rivera, EVP & GM of Intel’s Data Center and AI Group, told the TNN that teams based out of India, in addition to Israel, are central to developing hardware and software for Intel’s Gaudi deep learning training processor aimed at AI applications, which is a contender to Nvidia’s offerings. Rivera noted Indian centre is a hub for diverse cutting-edge silicon products, spanning CPUs, GPUs, FPGAs, and AI accelerators.Long, during his keynote, also mentioned how researchers in India have been working towards embracing artificial intelligence, giving an example of researchers from the Cochin University of Science and Technology’s AI & Computer Vision Lab, who developed a CPU-powered solution for early breast cancer detection in medical images. Since assuming the CEO role in 2021, Pat Gelsinger has steered Intel towards fresh objectives, including securing market supremacy and establishing a foundry services enterprise for producing chipsets catering to customers and competitors.Under Gelsinger, the chipmaker has committed to achieve five nodes within four years, and out of the planned five nodes, two — 7nm and 4nm –are already under production, with 3nm nodes being ready for production in the latter half of the year.(Disclaimer: The author is covering the Intel Tech Tour at Penang, Malaysia, on the invite of Intel.)

75 CaratLane employees are in line to receive ESOP payouts as Titan looks to acquire most of the remaining 1.72% stake in startup by October The payouts will not cover a majority of CaratLane’s 1,500 retail and manufacturing workforce, which is largely compensated through bonuses and hikes Tata-owned Titan, last week, said it would acquire an additional 27.18% stake in CaratLane for INR 4,621 Cr, effectively pegging the jewellery startup at a mammoth $2 Bn valuation Employees of CaratLane are reportedly set to receive INR 340 Cr to INR 380 Cr from ESOP buyback by Titan as the Tata-backed company aims to own a 100% stake in the omnichannel jewellery startup. It must be noted that Titan, last week, announced its plan to acquire an additional 27.18% stake in CaratLane for INR 4,621 Cr, increasing its stake in the startup to 98.28% from 71.09%. While the deal is still subject to regulatory approvals, the startup raked up a valuation of INR 17,000 Cr ($2 Bn), effectively turning it into a unicorn. CaratLane cofounder and CEO Mithun Sacheti told Moneycontrol that employee stock option plan (ESOP) comprises the remaining 1.72% of the startup’s shareholding and this remaining stake will be bought out by Titan by the time the deal closes in October this year.  “The ESOP component (of 1.72% in the company) will also be bought out at the same time by the end of October. A bunch of it will be done by then and whatever remains, Titan will buy as and when the vesting happens,” said Sacheti. As per the report, the omnichannel brand has a workforce of 1,500 people. Of this, 75 employees, who are part of the corporate team, are expected to receive ESOP payouts in the range of INR 340-380 Cr as they account for around 1.72% shareholding in the company.  It is pertinent to note that a majority of its employees, around 1,100, work across retail and manufacturing verticals and are largely compensated through bonuses and hikes only. ESOPs are only imparted to the corporate team which accounts for 400 employees. Founded in 2008 by Sacheti and Srinivasa Gopalan, CaratLane is an omnichannel startup that sells and manufactures jewellery items in India and the US. The company logged a total income of INR 2,177 Cr in FY23, up 71% from INR 1,267 Cr in FY22.  The development comes at a time when a bunch of Indian startups have announced ESOP payout initiatives. Just months ago, ecommerce giant Flipkart announced its $700 Mn ESOP buyback scheme, offering employees a one-time cash payout owing to the demerger of PhonePe.  In July, Swiggy commenced the second phase of its ESOP liquidation initiative pegged at $50 Mn, while Zypp Electric also announced a ESOP buyback programme worth INR 1.5 Cr. Apart from this, a slew of Indian startups have announced additional stock options to retain employees as they look to chart out a profitable growth and spend cautiously.  In the past one month, major listed new-age tech startups such as Nazara, Paytm and Zomato have either received board approval or initiated the allotment of additional ESOPs for its employees as they look to further scale profitable growth. As per an Inc42 report, employees of homegrown startups made more than $196 Mn via various ESOP buyback schemes in 2022.

Given enough data, one can feel like it’s possible to keep dead loved ones alive. With ChatGPT and other powerful large language models, it is feasible to create a more convincing chatbot of a dead person. But doing so, especially in the face of scarce resources and inevitable decay, ignores the massive amounts of labor that go into keeping the dead alive online. Someone always has to do the hard work of maintaining automated systems, as demonstrated by the overworked and underpaid annotators and content moderators behind generative AI, and this is also true where replicas of the dead are concerned. From managing a digital estate after gathering passwords and account information, to navigating a slowly-decaying inherited smart home, digital death care practices require significant upkeep. Content creators depend on the backend labor of caregivers and a network of human and nonhuman entities, from specific operating systems and devices to server farms, to keep digital heirlooms alive across generations. Updating formats and keeping those electronic records searchable, usable, and accessible requires labor, energy, and time. This is a problem for archivists and institutions, but also for individuals who might want to preserve the digital belongings of their dead kin. And even with all of this effort, devices, formats, and websites also die, just as we frail humans do. Despite the fantasy of an automated home that can run itself in perpetuity or a website that can survive for centuries, planned obsolescence means these systems will most certainly decay. As people tasked with maintaining the digital belongings of dead loved ones can attest, there is a stark difference between what people think they want, or what they expect others to do, and the reality of what it means to help technologies persist over time. The mortality of both people and technology means that these systems will ultimately stop working. Early attempts to create AI-backed replicas of dead humans certainly bear this out. Intellitar’s Virtual Eternity, based in Scottsdale, Arizona, launched in 2008 and used images and speech patterns to simulate a human’s personality, perhaps filling in for someone at a business meeting or chatting with grieving loved ones after a person’s death. Writing for CNET, a reviewer dubbed Intellitar the product “most likely to make children cry.” But soon after the company went under in 2012, its website disappeared. LifeNaut, a project backed by the transhumanist organization Terasem—which is also known for creating BINA48, a robotic version of Bina Aspen, the wife of Terasem’s founder—will purportedly combine genetic and biometric information with personal datastreams to simulate a full-fledged human being once technology makes it possible to do so. But the project’s site itself relies on outmoded Flash software, indicating that the true promise of digital immortality is likely far off and will require updates along the way. With generative AI, there is speculation that we might be able to create even more convincing facsimiles of humans, including dead ones. But this requires vast resources, including raw materials, water, and energy, pointing to the folly of maintaining chatbots of the dead in the face of catastrophic climate change. It also has astronomical financial costs: ChatGPT purportedly costs $700,000 a day to maintain, and will bankrupt OpenAI by 2024. This is not a sustainable model for immortality. There is also the question of who should have the authority to create these replicas in the first place: a close family member, an employer, a company? Not everyone would want to be reincarnated as a chatbot. In a 2021 piece for the San Francisco Chronicle, the journalist Jason Fagone recounts the story of a man named Joshua Barbeau who produced a chatbot version of his long-dead fiancée Jessica using OpenAI’s GPT-3. It was a way for him to cope with death and grief, but it also kept him invested in a close romantic relationship with a person who was no longer alive. This was also not the way that Jessica’s other loved ones wanted to remember her; family members opted not to interact with the chatbot.

Google Chrome, Apple Safari, and Microsoft Edge are three of the most popular web browsers, each with its own advantages and disadvantages. One critical aspect of a browser’s performance is its RAM consumption, as it has a direct impact on the user experience and system resource utilisation. In the realm of web browsers, there is a trade-off between performance, features, and memory consumption. The RAM consumption of these browsers is determined by factors such as the number of tabs open, extensions installed, and the overall optimisation for the operating system. Let’s compare the RAM consumption of these three browsers.In general, Google Chrome is known for being a memory hog, while Apple Safari and Microsoft Edge are more efficient in their use of RAM. However, the specific RAM consumption of each browser will vary depending on the factors mentioned above. For example, if you have a lot of tabs open and extensions installed, Chrome will likely consume more RAM than Safari or Edge. Conversely, if you only have a few tabs open and no extensions installed, Chrome may be more efficient than the other two browsers.Ultimately, the best way to determine which browser is right for you is to try them all and see which one performs the best on your system. Here we explain the RAM consumption process for each browserGoogle ChromeGoogle Chrome is renowned for its speed and rich feature set, but it’s often criticised for its high RAM consumption. Chrome’s design philosophy prioritises speed and compatibility, which can lead to elevated RAM usage, especially when multiple tabs are open.The browser uses a process-per-tab model, which means each tab runs in its own separate process. While this provides security and isolation benefits, it also results in a higher RAM overhead. When users open numerous tabs simultaneously, Chrome’s memory usage can quickly escalate.However, Google has been actively working on mitigating Chrome’s memory issues. Chrome’s task manager allows users to identify and terminate memory-intensive tabs or extensions. Additionally, the introduction of features like “Tab Discarding” and “Tab Freezing” helps reduce the impact of inactive tabs on memory usage.Apple SafariSafari, Apple’s default web browser, is known for its efficiency and optimisation for macOS and iOS devices. Apple has focused on keeping Safari’s RAM consumption low while delivering a smooth browsing experience.Safari employs a different approach compared to Chrome. It uses a process hierarchy that groups related tabs into a single process. This grouping reduces memory overhead by sharing resources among tabs in the same group. The browser also employs techniques like Intelligent Tracking Prevention to limit the background activities that contribute to RAM usage.Safari’s low RAM consumption is particularly evident in devices with limited memory, such as iPhones and iPads. Apple’s tight integration of hardware and software enables Safari to optimise resource allocation, resulting in efficient browsing even on devices with modest memory capacities.Microsoft EdgeMicrosoft Edge has undergone a significant transformation in recent years. The new Chromium-based Edge inherits some of the memory consumption patterns of Chrome, but Microsoft has made efforts to optimise its performance.Like Chrome, the Chromium-based Edge uses a process-per-tab model, contributing to higher RAM usage when multiple tabs are open. However, Microsoft has implemented features to reduce memory consumption, such as “Sleeping Tabs,” which places inactive tabs in a low-resource state to free up memory.Microsoft has also improved its memory management, ensuring that Edge releases unused memory more efficiently. This reduces the browser’s overall footprint and prevents unnecessary memory hogging.

Engineering is a wide-reaching sector that encompasses numerous specialities. While this means that it can be easy to set up in your niche, you may also find that you have a lot of competition. Setting up a successful business, regardless of your industry, comes with unique challenges that will need to be overcome, but with dedication and determination, you can turn your brand into a thriving business. Are you looking to turn your engineering company into the success story that you’ve always dreamed of? Here are just five fantastic tips to help you get started. 1. Conduct Continual Market Research Markets are constantly changing and evolving, and therefore conducting continued market research will help you to stay on top of technologies and trends. Getting feedback from your clients and customers is a great place to start, and with services such as SurveyMonkey, you can put together useful surveys that will provide you with actionable insights for your brand. When you’re able to stay on top of industry trends, you’ll be able to keep customers engaged and outperform your competition. 2. Ensure Staff are Skilled With an industry such as engineering, it’s vital that all of your staff are trained to the highest standard. You want to ensure that you hire engineers that are able to complete jobs on time and to budget, but most importantly, to meet health and safety requirements. Consider scouting from universities to find engineers who have received all of the latest qualifications. 3. Use Quality Materials To ensure that your jobs are completed to a high standard and are built to last, you want to use only top-quality materials in your projects. If you’re looking to source your materials from a trusted supplier, then consider a brand such as Accu. These experts will be able to advise you on the perfect products for your project, and supply you with the materials you need to help you succeed. photo credit: ThisisEngineering RAEng / Unsplash 4. Deliver on Your Promises No business, regardless of industry, can hope to succeed if they fail to deliver on the promises that they give their customers. You want to ensure that you give realistic estimates when it comes to costs and the time it will take you to complete a job. Unfortunately, while word of mouth recommendations are a powerful tool, customers are far more likely to be vocal about negative experiences than they are about positive ones. This makes it essential to leave every client singing your praises. 5. Create a Positive User Experience on Your Website Ensuring that you create a website that is easy for your customers to use and navigate, and find the information that they need, is essential. With platforms such as WordPress, you can create a high quality website with a range of plugins that makes the experience pleasant for all involved – you and your customers. Now Over to You! Have you launched an engineering business? Share your tips and tricks in the comments below!