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From the Valley to D.C., Big Tech players like Facebook, Google and Amazon are under more scrutiny than ever as new technology develops and privacy and antitrust concerns grow in lockstep with companies’ ambitions.

Technology

Axios Future

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Nimble Robotics machines picking goods at an e-commerce warehouse. Credit: Nimble Robotics

As more of our goods and gifts are being purchased online, robots are set to play a bigger role in e-commerce warehouses.

Why it matters: With retailers struggling to meet the demand for workers in a tight labor market, smarter robots that can adapt to the often chaotic conditions of a warehouse could help close the gap.

When you place an online order this holiday season, it will need to be fulfilled by a retailer, which means that good has to be physically picked and packed at a warehouse.

It's usually been humans doing the work — as of August, nearly 150,000 more people were employed in e-commerce warehouses than before the pandemic. 

While the often monotonous work might seem perfect for robots, the unpredictable environment of a warehouse and the varied nature of different goods — think everything from a tube of toothpaste to a crystal figurine — has "been considered un-automatable," says Simon Kalouche, the founder and CEO of Nimble Robotics.

Yes, but: Retailers — especially brick-and-mortar companies that are moving increasing amounts of their business to e-commerce — are having trouble finding enough workers, opening the door to automation.

"More companies are turning to robotic solutions not to get ahead of the e-commerce boom but just to keep up with their existing orders and have hope for the holiday season," Kishore Boyalakuntla, VP of products at robotic supply chain provider Berkshire Grey, told ZDNet this week.

How it works: Nimble Robotics is using computer vision-enabled AI — and human helpers — to train robots to pick and pack a wide variety of e-commerce goods.

"We use an algorithm called imitation learning, where you use a human to remotely operate a robot to accomplish a certain task," says Nimble's Kalouche. "If you do this hundreds or thousands of times over various tasks, you can train a neural network to say, 'I've seen this and I know how to pick it up.'"

As Nimble's robots are deployed in a warehouse, human remote operators are still available to help them through any unexpected obstacles, but over time, "you go perhaps from 90% autonomous to nearly fully autonomous."

Nimble's hybrid approach — as well as its subscription model, which charges customers per good picked — makes it easier to integrate automation into a warehouse without substantial upfront costs.

The bottom line: Robots won't be fully replacing human warehouse workers anytime soon, but an automated e-commerce Santa Claus may not be too far off.

Meet the robots that will help pick your Black Friday orders

Smarter robots are one solution to the e-commerce labor crunch.

Automation

Automation and AI

The growing synthetic biology industry is developing tools to allow companies to program living cells the way we program computers.

Why it matters: Turning cellular engineering from an art to an industry could open the door to more sustainable energy, food and materials, but it carries the risk of making it much easier to create the biological equivalent of malware.

What's happening: Earlier this month, the leading synthetic biology company Ginkgo Bioworks launched a Cell Development Kit (CDK) service for companies that want easy access to its biological engineering services.

Like much in the synthetic biology world, the name is directly taken from the computer world — tech companies have long offered software development kits that make it easier for people to build and test computer programs.

How it works: Biological engineering has long been slow and laborious — think rows of postgraduate students pipetting liquids by hand in a lab. But Ginkgo says its CDKs will streamline the process.

A customer like Motif FoodWorks — a Boston-based startup that makes ingredients for plant-based meat and dairy — can use a CDK to have Gingko rapidly engineer the necessary microbes in its automated biological foundry. 

"They can focus on product development rather than hiring a bunch of biologists to build DNA by hand," which helps them get to market faster, says Patrick Boyle, the head of codebase at Ginkgo.

By the numbers: Synthetic biology companies raised $9 billion from VCs and IPOs through the first half of the year, more than the amount raised through all of 2020.

"Biology and engineering are coming together in profound ways,” Drew Endy, a bioengineer at Stanford University, told the New York Times. “The potential is for civilization-scale flourishing, a world of abundance not scarcity, supporting a growing global population without destroying the planet."

The catch: Earlier attempts to use synthetic biology to develop sustainable biofuels largely failed, and Ginkgo has yet to bring in significant revenue.

Should the company's approach become successful, it will come with biosecurity risks. Endy says we should assume that in the near future, "anyone, anywhere can make any virus from scratch."

Yes, but: Boyle says Ginkgo is building biosecurity into its platform, in part by using automated tools that can scan synthesized DNA orders for potentially dangerous strains. 

How to program biology like a computer

Cellular engineering could open the door to more sustainable energy, food and materials.

Illustration of a scientist holding a petri dish full of binary code

Synthetic biology

A look at the scientific breakthroughs changing the world, explorations in space and in worlds beyond our own and the threats posed to us by our own planet, both out of our control and of our own making.

Science

"Battlefield 2042" will get at least two "major" updates in the weeks to come, with the first rolling out tomorrow.

Why it matters: The launch of "Battlefield 2042" has been bumpy, thanks to a mix of missing features, bugs and other performance problems.

EA DICE wrote on its site that "a further, substantial" update will arrive in December. "We are also working on another update that we are looking to deploy in advance of the Holidays."

Among the issues it's looking to fix in those updates: server stability, balance for the game's gunplay and map fixes, as well as improvements to user interface, progression and matchmaking.

On Steam, thousands of players have left negative reviews, making it one of the platform's worst-reviewed games.

The big picture: Even high-profile modern games still have bad launches that can potentially improve over time.

Games like "Cyberpunk 2027," or more recently "Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy," were released with a variety of bugs and glitches that make the experience unenjoyable for players.

EA DICE has already released an update in the form of a day-one patch to fix "critical" issues around bugs and gameplay stability.

"Battlefield 2042" is likely to be a better experience for players willing to wait it out.

"Battlefield 2042" has a lot of fixes coming

The launch of "Battlefield 2042" has been bumpy, thanks to a mix of missing features, bugs and other performance problems.

Video games

Gaming

The Roblox Corporation is suing a YouTuber for breach of contract and fraud.

Details: Social gaming platform Roblox is seeking $1,650,000 in damages against content creator Benjamin Robert Simon ("Ruben Sim"), alleging that he is the leader of a "cybermob" and "commits and encourages unlawful acts designed to injure Roblox and its users."

Grievances against Simon also include allegations of posting "false and misleading terrorist threats" in order to keep Roblox users from participating in events; this includes a threat that temporarily shut down the 2021 Roblox Developers Conference in San Francisco earlier this year, per the suit.

Simon — who the company says has a "long history of fixating on and then harassing people" — has been permanently banned from the platform, but continues to "circumvent" those restrictions.

Reasons for his ban include terms of service violations ranging from the use of slurs to "attempting to upload a sex game," inappropriate photos of himself and photos of Adolf Hitler, the company said.

Why it matters: The platform is massively popular among millions of kids; it's also a place where 1.3 million people make monetized content.

As of August, it had more than 48 million active daily users.

The big picture: Platforms are fighting back against users who turn their services into vehicles for hate and harassment.

In September, Twitch sued two users after accusing them of targeting marginalized streamers as part of "hate raids," which are coordinated attack campaigns.

How content creators use platforms is still subject to the judgment of those platforms themselves, especially in the case of abuse.

Roblox sues YouTuber over “terrorist threats”

Platforms are fighting back against users who turn their services into vehicles for hate and harassment.

Photo Illustration by Thiago Prudêncio/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

Adam Mosseri, head of Meta-owned Instagram, has agreed to testify before Congress in early December about Instagram's impact on young people, he said in a video posted to Twitter Wednesday.

Why it matters: Meta, formerly Facebook, is continuing to acknowledge mounting concern from the public and lawmakers over social media apps' effect on children and teens.

News of Mosseri's upcoming testimony was first reported by The New York Times.

What they're saying: "There's an important discussion happening right now about keeping young people safe online," Mosseri said. "I've been thinking a lot about how Instagram shows up, and I'm looking forward to sharing more of the work we're doing in the weeks ahead."

Mosseri said he thinks of his own three kids when he thinks of kid's safety on the Internet, and that he thinks it's his responsibility to keep children safe while they do "amazing things online."

Details: Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) will lead the hearing before the Senate Commerce consumer protection subcommittee the week of Dec. 6, his office confirmed to Axios. 

“After bombshell reports about Instagram’s toxic impacts, we want to hear straight from the company’s leadership why it uses powerful algorithms that push poisonous content to children driving them down rabbit holes to dark places, and what it will do to make its platform safer,"  Blumenthal said in an email statement. 

The growing concern over children's safety came to a head after whistleblower Frances Haugen's testimony before Congress and revelations about Instagram's research into teenagers and young girls were revealed in the Wall Street Journal.

Instagram head to testify before Congress

Adam Mosseri has agreed to testify before Congress in early December about Instagram's impact on young people.

Photo of Adam Mosseri wearing glasses on stage with his hands folded in his lap

Meta (company)

Nintendo of America president Doug Bowser has joined the chorus of industry figures criticizing Activision Blizzard and its leadership over recent reports of company harassment and abuse.

Driving the news: Fanbyte first reported on the memo in which Bowser called the accusations "distressing and disturbing. They run counter to my values as well as Nintendo's beliefs, values and policies."

The memo was reportedly sent on Nov. 19 to all levels of Nintendo of America staff.

Bowser adds that Nintendo is "in contact with Activision" and is considering further actions.

A Nintendo spokesperson confirmed the accuracy of the memo to Axios.

An Entertainment Software Association spokesperson told Axios that harassment, abuse or mistreatment in the workplace "is unacceptable and must never be tolerated."

"As an industry association, the ESA convenes its member companies to create dialogue and shape actions to ensure that these beliefs are realized."

"Any allegation needs to be acknowledged, thoroughly investigated, and addressed with meaningful consequences."

The big picture: Bowser joins Xbox's Phil Spencer and PlayStation's Jim Ryan in reassuring employees internally that they find Activision Blizzard's behavior unacceptable.

However, it's still unclear what action these companies will take or what conversations are being conducted among the industry giants.

Elsewhere: Activision Blizzard's board of directors announced it is forming a "Workplace Responsibility Committee," led by two members of that board.

That committee will "oversee the Company’s progress in successfully implementing its new policies, procedures, and commitments to improve workplace culture and eliminate all forms of harassment and discrimination."

The company also will add "a new, diverse director to the Board."

Between the lines: Activision Blizzard is still in damage control mode after the Wall Street Journal's damning report that CEO Bobby Kotick was both aware of harassment and abuse allegations, and has a history of his own.

WSJ reports that Kotick would consider stepping down if the company's ongoing issues cannot be fixed "with speed."

Nintendo executive calls Activision harassment allegations "disturbing"

Doug Bowser | Photo by Michael Kovac/Getty Images for Nintendo

Doug Bowser. Photo by Michael Kovac/Getty Images for Nintendo

Apple sues Israeli NSO Group over spyware use

Apple is also seeking a permanent injunction to ban NSO Group from using Apple devices, software, or services.

Photo: Budrul Chukrut/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

Apple

Big Tech

While China's sweeping new data privacy laws have left tech companies confused about how to comply, they also put the U.S. even further behind in the global race to set digital standards.

What's happening: China enacted its Personal Information Privacy Law earlier this month, following Europe as the second major international player to have its own sweeping data privacy regulations.

The law, regarded as China's version of Europe's General Data Protection Regulation, is a set of rules for how businesses can collect, use, process, share and transfer personal information. Another Chinese data regulation, the Data Security Law, went into effect Sept. 1.

The laws aim to protect Chinese citizens from the private sector, while the Chinese government still has easy access to personal data.

In May, influential U.S. business groups sent comments, viewed by Axios, to the National People’s Congress protesting that the draft law’s vague language, monetary penalties and criminal liabilities were harsh. They also said it would hurt innovation by being overly prescriptive and burdensome.

Why it matters: The U.S. still does not have a federal data privacy law, and China's move could allow it to set future global norms on its terms. Meanwhile, tech companies doing business in China will have to navigate the vague new rules, and that could be expensive.

Not having a federal privacy law "impairs America's global leadership on the issue, and the fact that there is this patchwork makes it difficult to have meaningful interaction on the international stage on these issues," Martijn Rasser, senior fellow and director of the technology and national security program at the Center for a New American Security, told Axios.

The big picture: While reeling in its own companies such as Alibaba and Tencent, China is making it increasingly difficult for non-Chinese companies to do business in the country. That complicates the global tech landscape, in which companies rely on sending, holding and receiving data overseas.

"When you have power growing in China, the government ensures its supremacy is kept," said Omer Tene, chief knowledge officer at the International Association of Privacy Professionals. "In that regard, it's another piece of a very quickly accumulating puzzle of market and tech regulation in China more generally."

What they're saying: "If I were a corporate leader with major business in China, I'd frankly be quite concerned right now," said Rasser, who found the law's language vague, and said the Chinese Communist Party could make compliance difficult. "That type of uncertainty makes it challenging for business leaders."

"The U.S. is meant to be the world geopolitical and technological leader, and it is being left behind from a policy perspective on the global stage as it relates to its view on data privacy," said Cillian Kieran, CEO of Ethyca, a company that creates developer tools for data privacy. "[The U.S.] becomes the laggard in what are acceptable rights around data usage in consumer-facing technology businesses."

Just like GDPR, China's law has broad extraterritorial reach, said Tene.

Companies will "have to submit to a security assessment by the Chinese regulator before performing data transfers, appoint local representatives to handle privacy issues and manage exposure to steep fines and penalties, including criminal, under the law," he said.

Companies who violate the law could be subject to fines of up to 5% of annual revenue, revocation of their licenses to do business in China and personal penalties against executives, according to a blog post by attorneys at Morgan Lewis, an international law firm.

"There are really significant compliance requirements for any company that handles Chinese user data — and they're re-evaluating their exposure, and asking is it worth it or not," said Samm Sacks, a cyber policy fellow at the New America Foundation.

Our thought bubble, from Axios China reporter Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian: China's data law addresses a real issue, and does so in more or less legitimate ways, posing a significant concern for those who prefer a democratic data governance model. Without its own data governance framework, the U.S. is leaving open a regulatory void. 

China's new privacy law leaves U.S. behind

The law, regarded as China's version of Europe's GDPR, could give China an edge in setting global standards.

Illustration of a rearview mirror with a pixelated American flag reflected in it.

Online privacy

Data privacy

Axios Gaming

A former IT security analyst at Sony PlayStation filed a lawsuit against the company in California on Monday, alleging gender discrimination and wrongful termination after speaking up “about discrimination against females” at the gaming giant.

Why it matters: Video game companies are under increased scrutiny for their treatment of women in an industry long dominated by men.

The Sony suit comes amid high-profile state and federal lawsuits against “Call of Duty” maker Activision over alleged sexual misconduct and gender-based pay disparities.

Game companies ranging from Ubisoft and Riot, to indies such as Fullbright, have faced a reckoning over women’s experiences working for them.

Driving the news: The former IT security analyst, Emma Majo, is seeking court approval to expand her effort into a class action on behalf of women who’ve worked for PlayStation in the past few years.

The suit alleges violations of the United States’ Equal Pay Act, saying: “Sony discriminates against female employees, including those who are female and those who identify as female, in compensation and promotion and subjects them to a work culture predominated by men.”

Majo alleges that she was ignored by a manager who only responded to men, was passed over for promotions, and was terminated this year after submitting a gender bias complaint to the company.

She says other women at PlayStation struggled to get promoted at the same rate as men.

Representatives from PlayStation did not immediately respond to questions about the lawsuit.

Majo notes in her suit that Sony says she was terminated because of the closure of an internal department, though she says she wasn’t in that department.

The big picture: Scrutiny of game companies over their treatment of women has been especially intense in California, where Sony’s U.S. headquarters is based.

In 2018, women from LA-based Riot Games filed a class-action suit alleging gender discrimination. Activision is also based in the state. 

California’s regulatory environment affords workers and state agencies many avenues for holding companies accountable.

The plaintiff in the PlayStation suit says she plans to invoke California’s Private Attorney General Act, which lets private citizens sue for breach of state labor laws. (Uber was sued via the same law in 2017.)

Lawsuit against PlayStation alleges gender discrimination

The suit comes amid a reckoning over women's experiences in the games industry.

Photo of a screen displaying PlayStation logos

Photo Illustration: Pavlo Gonchar/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

Axios Pro Rata

Niantic, an S.F.-based maker of augmented reality games like "Pokémon Go," raised $300 million from Coatue at a $9 billion valuation.

Why it matters: This is about the metaverse that Meta isn't interested in building.

History: Niantic previously raised $480 million, most recently in 2019 at a $4 billion post-money valuation. Existing backers include Alsop Louie Partners, Javelin Venture Partners, CapitalG, IVP and Spark Capital.

The bottom line: Niantic's vision is the world we already see around us, but with a digital overlay on top of it. Not a virtual world that people immerse themselves in with VR goggles or by way of a video game world like "Fortnite." 

Some of Niantic's recent games have struggled, but over a billion downloads of "Pokémon Go" make a strong case that it may be the ones to figure this all out. 

"Pokémon Go" maker Niantic now worth $9 billion

This is about the metaverse that Meta isn't interested in building.

 illustration a Pokémon Go logo. Photo: Pavlo Gonchar/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

After a record economic expansion, the coronavirus pandemic sent the U.S. economy into a recession as unemployment soared to staggering heights. The country now faces urgent questions about how much stimulus is needed for reeling consumers and businesses, and what a recovery might look like.

Economy & Business

Axios Media Trends

The Washington Post has hired Miki King — the company's former chief marketing officer, who most recently served as the President of Genius Media Group — to run The Post's Arc XP software arm. 

Why it matters: The hire underscores The Post's commitment to growing its software arm as a significant revenue stream to support its journalism. 

The Post currently makes most of its money from ads and subscriptions, but software sales are increasingly becoming a third major business line for the company.

Catch up quick: The Washington Post launched Arc Publishing in 2015 as an in-house tech division that built and licensed publishing software to other media companies. 

Today, it serves a slew of businesses in addition to media and entertainment publishers, including sports teams, cryptocurrency companies, and financial services firms. 

Many of the clients it serves are increasingly focused on transactions between businesses and consumers. This year Arc XP added added e-commerce and video hosting capabilities.

Earlier this year, Arc Publishing rebranded to Arc XP to reflect its broader focus.  Arc XP's products are cloud-based and rely heavily on Amazon Web Services (AWS). 

Details: King, who starts officially on Nov. 29, says her goal in the next year is to accelerate the growth of Arc XP's sales team and to grow the business globally.

Arc XP currently serves customers across 28 countries and most U.S. states. King says Arc XP is looking to expand more into Latin America and Western Europe, as well as Africa. It currently serves clients in Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, Korea and the UAE, in addition to hundreds of local news sites and businesses in America.

Much of King's experience at Genius, which was recently acquired by Santa Monica-based MediaLab, was working with enterprise clients. That focus will translate to her new role at The Post. 

"The goal for Arc XP is to really to help brands optimize their digital presence," King said. She noted that developing products that support everything from cryptocurrency to sports betting is going to be inevitable. 

"We're in the very early stages on betting and gaming," she said. "It's a space that there could be an opportunity for us, but conversations have been preliminary to-date."

King will report to both publisher and CEO Fred Ryan and chief information officer Shailesh Prakash. Scot Gillespie will remain CTO and GM of Arc XP.

By the numbers: Currently, Arc XP's technology is licensed to over 1,900 sites, up from about 1,500 in April, per The Post. 

King says she expects Arc XP to bring in $100 million in revenue "in the next 3-5 years."

There are around 250 people that work for Arc XP alone, per King. For context, The Post has roughly 1,000 journalists. 

"The Post has really doubled down on expanding corporate functions dedicated to Arc XP, including in human resources, legal, finance and analysis roles," she said.

The Washington Post's owner Jeff Bezos has thrown his weight behind both Arc XP and The Post's ad tech division, Zeus Technology. 

"As we moved from news publishers to enterprise, that was very much of interest and supported by Jeff Bezos," King said. "He has been very much involved in every large strategic decision related to Arc XP."

Washington Post chief revenue officer Joy Robins told Axios in September that Zeus Technology work will hit nine figures in revenue "easily" next year.

The big picture: Several media companies, including Vox Media and Minute Media, have launched tech businesses as a way to fund journalism in recent years. 

But King says those firms are not The Post's biggest competitors. "I often do think our greatest competition is the trend of organizations that to want to go at it alone," she said.

She said Arc XP also sees opportunities in providing strategic insight and advisory services to companies building their own software.

What to watch: While it's long been rumored that one day The Post might spin out Arc XP, King says that's not in the cards for now. 

"As of today, my role is not one tied to an exit strategy," she said. "The conversation with our leadership team has really been one about how can we  accelerate growth."

"Arc is well on track to be a $100 million company, I don't think that's a path to a spin-off, but we'll see how things unfold."

Washington Post taps its former CMO to lead tech division

Miki King will head Arc XP,  the Post company's publishing software subsidiary.

Photo credit: Jackie Hicks, Photo courtesy of The Washington Post

Washington Post

Media

Axios Generate

General Motors' expanding electric vehicles' business left dry land Monday when the auto giant announced it's acquiring a 25% stake in the electric boating company Pure Watercraft.

Why it matters: "The investment in Pure Watercraft represents the first time GM will commercialize all-electric marine products and applications," Mark Lubin, a GM spokesman, tells Axios.

He notes GM has previously invested in "exploratory all-electric proof-of-concept marine propulsion projects," and that work will inform their collaboration with Pure Watercraft, he said.

Details: The deal is worth $150 million, Pure Watercraft CEO Andy Rebele tells CNBC, which includes cash and other commitments. "The company is not disclosing the split between cash and payment-in-kind," it reports.

GM plunges into electric marine transport

General Motors announced it's acquiring a 25% stake in the electric boating company Pure Watercraft.

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