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NVIDIA is going to spend $4 billion on photonics companies. He is preparing for what is coming

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NVIDIA does not provide stitches without thread. At the end of August 2025, the company led by Jensen Huang announced that in 2026 their platforms artificial intelligence next generation (AI) will use photonic interconnections to achieve higher transfer speeds between GPU clusters. This announcement came during the conference specializing in semiconductor engineering and high-performance computing ‘Hot Chips’, which was held in Palo Alto (California), and was just the prelude to what was to come. And this same week NVIDIA has revealed that is going to invest 2,000 million dollars in Lumentum, and the same amount in Coherent. These two companies have something very important in common: they are specialized in developing photonic technologies. Shortly after NVIDIA confirmed its interest in them, the shares of these two companies rose 5 and 9% respectively. And the company led by Jensen Huang has committed to purchasing products from Lumentum and Coherent for several billion dollars, and also to use their advanced laser solutions and optical networking technologies. Photonics is the support that cutting-edge semiconductors need Most IC designers and manufacturers are working on the development of silicon photonics. Douglas Yu, a TSMC executive with responsibility for systems integration, explained in September 2023 very clearly what disruptive capacity this technology has: “If we manage to implement a good integration system for silicon photonics, we will unleash a new paradigm. We will probably place ourselves at the beginning of a new era.” Silicon photonics is a discipline that in the field in question seeks to develop the technology of this chemical element to optimize the transformation of electrical signals into light pulses. The most obvious field of application of this innovation is implementing high performance links which, on paper, can be used both to resolve communications between several chips and to optimize the transfer of information between several machines. In AI clusters, thousands of GPUs must work in unison, so it is essential to connect them using high-performance links The advanced packaging technologies used by leading semiconductor manufacturers, such as TSMC, Intel or Samsung, can greatly benefit from a very high-performance inter-chip communication mechanism. And large data centers where it is necessary to connect a large number of machines, too. However, there is one discipline in particular that has an overwhelming future projection and that would benefit greatly from building on the advantages offered by silicon photonics: AI. This is precisely NVIDIA’s bet. In AI clusters, thousands of GPUs must work in unison, so it is essential to connect them using high-performance links. It is possible to solve this challenge using traditional copper cables or optical modules, but both of these solutions introduce into the infrastructure very important inefficiencies. The most problematic are energy loss and bottlenecks. Data transfer can consume up to 30 watts per port, which increases energy dissipation as heat and increases the likelihood of failure. Additionally, latency limits the scalability of clusters as the number of GPUs in data centers increases. To resolve these inefficiencies, NVIDIA will integrate the optical components required for photonic interconnections into the same switching chip package. This technology is known as CPO (Co-Packaged Optics) and manages to reduce power consumption to only 9 watts per port. Additionally, it minimizes signal loss and improves data integrity. Looks really good. NVIDIA has confirmed that it will integrate CPO technology into its Quantum-X InfiniBand and Spectrum-X Ethernet interconnect platforms during 2026. However, there is something important that is worth not overlooking: CPO is not going to be an extra. When it arrives, it will be established as a structural requirement of the next generation of AI data centers in a clear attempt to increase the competitiveness of NVIDIA’s AI hardware platforms. Image | Generated by Xataka with Gemini More information | Reuters In Xataka | Intel and TSMC lead the photonic chip revolution. Their problem is that China has just gotten fully involved in this war

Stellantis has lost 22 billion euros with the electric car. Their hope to solve it is called Zaragoza

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Stellantis embarked on a path of rapid and aggressive transition to the electric car. Along the way, it merged models on the same platform, wanted to convert brands to zero emissions and lost the identity of some of them. The result is 20 billion euros of real and expected losses. Now, part of his future is at stake in Zaragoza with a Chinese car. Saragossa. The news was almost a not news because Stellantis, through the mouth of its CEO Automotive Newshad already confirmed that it would manufacture Leapmotor’s Chinese cars in Spain. By then, with a CATL factory in the middle of construction and already manufacturing Stellantis small electric cars, Zaragoza seemed the best placed city, ahead of Madrid and Vigo. Last week, Filosa himself reconfirmed what was already known but expanded the information with some nuances as stated in The Aragon Newspaper. The car will be manufactured in Zaragoza and will not be alone. And the company has awarded Spain the production of up to four completely electric Chinese models. It will, therefore, be the reconversion of Figueruelas. The Stellantis situation. Although the investments were already confirmed, the last presentation of results could have raised some doubts. Then Stellantis confirmed that the electric car would have a negative impact of 22,000 million euros in your accounts. This does not mean, exactly, that it loses that money, but it is the readjustment that amounts to the cancellation of two new factories, the compensatory payment to suppliers, the money invested in new developments and the money that will no longer enter the company’s coffers. All of this is a consequence of a project led by Carlos Tavares, former CEO of the company, which has failed. The Portuguese wanted to accompany the conversion to all-electric too quickly and with a very aggressive cost adjustment. The result has been too much product at dealerships that very few have bought and models little differentiated from each other with a total loss of identity between companies. Good news (1). Firstly, because the arrival of Leapmotor in Zaragoza represents support for the electric transition in Figueruelas. The factory will be in charge of producing one of the first purely Chinese electric cars to arrive in Europe, a key step to be able to sell them without tariffs. But this also guarantees two things. The first is the opening of a new assembly line because they cannot use exactly the same one as for the Opel Corsa, Peugeot 208 and Lancia Ypsilon electric that Figueruelas produces at the moment. The second is that it increases pressure on the production of batteries that CATL will set up nearby, giving greater support to the project. It remains to be seen if the other three Stellantis models will also roll out of their doors.. Good news (2). The second part of the announcement is interesting in that the Leapmotor B10, the first car to be assembled in Zaragoza, is different from the three mentioned above and that in itself is a reason for joy for Zaragoza. And it is that the Stellantis urban electric cars have not been working well in the market. Everything indicates that, in the future, these electric vehicles will have to receive the embrace of the European customer but at the moment it is not being like thatwhich raised questions about long-term production with a plant that could operate at half gas. The Lepmotor B10 is a car that Stellantis has hopes for because it is different. It has much more striking interiors, adjusted to the huge screens that the industry has demanded in recent years. And it has purely Chinese software and development, so Stellantis can play with the price because its investments have been minimal. The company has the power to distribute the car outside of China but the development, investments and sales within China have been left to Leapmotor itself. Strengths and weaknesses. Stellantis’ decision to produce in Spain reminds us the strength that our country has gained in Europe as a productive alternative to advance electric cars. Either because labor is cheaper than in countries like Germany or France, or because energy is also cheaper, Chery or Stellantis, with Leapmotor, have decided that they will manufacture on our soil. Spain has the advantage of a well-established industry that needs reconversion. The problem is that, for the moment, it has focused on the assembly of small cars (as also happens in Martorell) which are the ones that are having the most problems to sell them or, if necessary, for the brand to make a profit from them. It would be interesting for our country to expand its presence in the development of vehicles and not only focus its industry on their production. Therefore, it is good news that Chery also bets on our country for its new R&D&i space. Photo | In Xataka | Volkswagen’s cheap electric car is manufactured in Spain: this is the new megaconstruction that makes it possible

China spent 10 billion on oil it did not need. With Hormuz blocked, the puzzle finally makes sense

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As the West panics over the possibility of the barrel break the $100 barrieran eerie calm reigns in Beijing. The Asian giant observes the crisis with the coldness of someone who has already done his homework. During the last few months, the world has been debating the excess oil supply, but the real winner of this war crisis is not firing missiles, but has been filling its storage tanks for years in the most absolute silence. World geopolitics has been blown up a few weeks before the expected summit between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping. As reported Nikkei Asiathe coordinated airstrikes of the United States and Israel (dubbed “Operation Epic Fury“) have culminated in the assassination of the Iranian supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Tehran’s response has been a rain of missiles and drones on American allies in the region. The immediate impact has been felt in the water. The Strait of Hormuz, through which 20 million barrels a day flow (20% of the world’s oil supply), is blocked de facto. As detailed Bloomberg, Rates to hire a supertanker on the route from the Middle East to China have skyrocketed by 600%, reaching $200,000 a day (or 525 Worldscale points for a Suezmax). Besides, France 24 points out that insurers They have increased war risk premiums between 25% and 50%. As reported cnnBrent crude oil jumped 6.5% in the early stages, touching $82, driven by fear of prolonged logistical disruptions. Bob McNally, president of Rapidan Energy Group, warned the US chain that closing Hormuz would cause an immediate global energy crisis. China’s exposed vulnerability On paper, the Donald Trump administration’s offensive should be an absolute nightmare for Xi Jinping. As explained The TelegraphAmerican military adventurism is exposing the gigantic energy vulnerability of China, the largest oil importer in the world, which buys three-quarters of the crude oil it consumes abroad. Washington’s strategy seems clear: suffocate the “rebellious” suppliers that supply the Chinese industrial machinery at bargain prices. Earlier this year, the military capture of Nicolás Maduro has established what some analysts They already call the “Donroe Doctrine”. Trump has been explicit in his goal to control oil. If the United States manages to add Venezuelan production to that of Guyana and its own, it would de facto control 30% of the world’s reserves, according to JP Morgan. This movement cuts supply to China in the bud, evaporating imports that represented around 4% of its maritime purchases. according to data from Kpler collected by The Financial Review. However, Washington’s optimism collides with geology: the infrastructure is so in ruins that loading a supertanker today takes five days and the crude oil arrives so “dirty” that the Chinese and Indian refineries themselves have canceled orders, according to a Reuters investigation. Refloating this industry will cost 10 billion dollars annually for a decade, as Francisco Monaldi calculatesdirector of energy policy at Rice University. For its part, the current blow to Iran. From Chosun Daily details that China bought 80% of Iranian maritime exports last year (about 1.38 million barrels per day), which represents 13.4% of Beijing’s total maritime crude oil imports. As he points out Institute for Energy Research (IER) United States, cited by the same mediumChina has used the heavily sanctioned and cheap oil from these countries to cement its manufacturing competitiveness. Losing Iran and Venezuela would force Chinese refiners — especially the independent ones in Shandong, known as “teapots” — to look for much more expensive substitutes on the open market, threatening to import inflation and slow their economic growth. The master plan in execution If Western analysts expected to see China cornered, they were wrong. Beijing foresaw this scenario of isolation and has been executing a four-pronged master plan for years that today allows it to cushion the blow of Hormuz. While in 2025 the world feared a global oversupply, China dedicated itself to massive purchasing. Last year, China spent $10 billion buying an extra 150 million barrels that it didn’t immediately need, absorbing more than 90% of crude oil storage measurable globally. Supported by a new Energy Law that obliges the public and private sector to maintain reserves, Beijing today has strategic reserves equivalent to at least 96 days of imports, according to The Telegraph. Under the banner of national security, China is investing $80 billion annually in its state oil fields. In March 2025 they reached a production peak of 4.6 million barrels per day and they completed the drilling of the deepest oil well in Asia (10,910 meters). Its goal is not financial profitability, but pure autonomy. With Iran and Venezuela under fire, China has simply turned its head toward Russia and Saudi Arabia. According to oil price, Chinese refineries are absorbing record amounts of Russian crude oil (more than 2 million barrels per day in February 2026), taking advantage of the fact that India has given in to pressure from the US to stop buying from Moscow. Simultaneously, Saudi Arabia has cut the official price of its crude oil Arab Light to five-year lows to gain market share in Asia, which has led China to order between 56 and 57 million Saudi barrels by March. China’s definitive move is to abandon the oil board. As analyzed by Professor Hussein Dia in The ConversationChina’s massive commitment to electric vehicles (50% of new car sales last year) and renewable energy is a national security policy. How they collect in The Telegraph, The new five-year plan (2026-2030) seeks to peak oil consumption by accelerating the installation of solar and wind parks (430 gigawatts added last year alone). Unlike the ships in Hormuz, sunlight cannot be blocked by the US Fifth Fleet. The diplomacy of silence and the illusion of OPEC+ In the face of Khamenei’s assassination, the response of the Chinese Foreign Ministry has been one of calculated coldness. They condemned the act as “unacceptable” and a “violation of sovereignty,” but, as pointed out Chosun Dailythey carefully avoided directly mentioning Donald Trump. From Nikkei Asia explains this pragmatism: … Read more

Amazon increases its investment in Spain to 33.7 billion euros. All, of course, for data centers

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amazon has announced that will expand your investment in data centers in Spain, and this amount will now reach 33.7 billion euros in total. Today’s announcement adds 18 billion euros to the 15.7 billion euros of investment announced by 2024. Amazon is going more in Spain. The company has taken advantage of the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona for an announcement that significantly reinforces its strategy in our country. The announcement highlights that there are plans to build facilities for manufacturing, storage and something interesting: server recycling in Spain. The promise of employment. Amazon’s forecast is that this Amazon Web Services (AWS) region, which reinforces its location in Aragónwill contribute 31.7 billion euros to Spain’s total GDP until 2035. They estimate that it will contribute “the equivalent of 29,900 full time jobs on average annually in local companies.” Of that figure, there will be 6,700 full-time jobs derived from Amazon’s direct investment in various areas such as data center operationsemployees of AWS providers, or workers who build the facilities. Supply chain. This investment includes an important part of the business consisting of facilities dedicated to the supply chain. These facilities, according to Amazon, will theoretically generate 1,800 jobs in Aragon. Thus, there will be a factory dedicated to the assembly and final testing of the servers, a logistics warehouse and a facility for the manufacturing and repair of AI servers. Let’s talk about energy… Amazon has not given too many details about what the energy and water needs that these data centers will have. However, it does indicate that they have committed to achieving net zero carbon emissions by 2040. To do this they are investing in 100 solar and wind projects across Spain, including seven new solar farms. According to their data, AWS data centers in Aragon have offset their electricity consumption with 100% renewable energy since opening in 2022. It remains to be seen if that is enough to prevent the Spanish electrical infrastructure, already saturated, from bursting. …and water. There is also talk about how AWS is going to face the water consumption of these centers: “AWS is also committed to returning more water to communities than it uses in its direct operations by 2030. By 2024, AWS had reached 53% of that goal. In Aragon, AWS supports five water projects with an investment of 17.2 million euros.” A pinch of capex. That investment is certainly part of the planned capex that Amazon has estimated for 2026. The total figure is 200,000 million dollarsa notable increase from the 131.8 billion dollars of capex in 2025. Thus, those 18 billion euros ($21.11 billion) at the current exchange rate represent just over 10% of that capex. AWS is doing (very well). Amazon may not be standing out for having its own AI model, but it certainly has value in its cloud infrastructure. In it fourth quarter of 2025 AWS’s revenue was $35.6 billion, achieving the most notable year-over-year growth (24%) in the last three years. It is evident that investment in infrastructure at a global level is working right now, and Spain has benefited from that momentum. In Xataka | Amazon is negotiating to invest 50 billion in OpenAI. The money would go in through the door and out through the window.

Russia set up a secret network to sell 90 billion in oil. It has fallen due to using the same mail server

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In the geopolitical chess of international sanctions, where Western governments design complex legislation to suffocate Vladimir Putin’s war machine, sometimes checkmate comes not from a brilliant diplomatic maneuver, but from corporate stinginess. An entire global smuggling network, designed to the millimeter to be invisible to the eyes of Washington and Brussels, has fallen like a house of cards for not wanting to pay separate email bills. A simple saving in computer infrastructure has exposed a monumental flow of black money. a colossal IT blunder (a huge computer error) has brought to light a smuggling network that has moved at least $90 billion worth of Russian oil. As revealed by extensive research of the Finance Timesthis plot is mainly responsible for financing the Kremlin in its war against Ukraine. The British media has identified a network of 48 companies which, on paper, operated completely independently from different physical addresses. However, in practice, they acted in unison to disguise the origin of the crude oil, especially that of Rosneft, the Russian state-controlled oil company. The need to hide these exports became life or death for the Kremlin in October 2025, when the United States imposed direct sanctions to Rosneft and Lukoil. From that moment on, a previously unknown company called Redwood Global Supply was suddenly crowned as the largest exporter of Russian crude oil in the world. This firm, along with the rest of the network, is linked to a group of businessmen of Azerbaijani origin with privileged access to the leadership of Rosneft, led by figures such as Tahir Garayev and Etibar Eyyub. The independent Russian media The Moscow Times has been echoed of this discovery, highlighting a devastating fact: in November 2024, more than 80% of Rosneft’s maritime exports They moved through this network. Sergey Vakulenko, former head of strategy at Gazprom Neft and current researcher at the Carnegie Center, explained to this medium that using fifty shell companies is “an old trick from the 90s” to evade taxes, but he confesses his surprise at the fact that a single network has become so immensely crucial for a giant like Rosneft. The triumph of shadow intermediaries The existence of this network means, quite simply, that the Western sanctions system is full of holes and that Russia has managed to industrialize evasion. According to the investigationthe success of this $90 billion network was based on strict separation of roles to erase the money trail. The network used a group of shell companies exclusively to buy crude oil shipments in Russia, and another group of companies, totally different on paper, to sell them in key markets such as India or China. In this way, the initial buyer and the final seller almost never coincided in customs documents. Furthermore, in most cases, the crude oil was labeled under generic names such as “export mix”, which destroyed any possibility of tracing its origin or checking whether the price cap imposed by the G7 was being respected. As we already explained at the time in Xatakathis modus operandi It is not new and it relies on an architecture of evasion that has been brewing for years in places like the United Arab Emirates. Something very similar happened with the case of Christopher Eppinger, a young trader German that perfectly illustrates how this underworld works. As we detailed in our report, while Europe boasted of energy sovereignty, an army of new intermediaries moved to Dubai—a jurisdiction that does not apply sanctions to Moscow—to make gold. The network now discovered by the British media uses exactly the same tools that we already analyzed: the express creation of opaque companies, the use of the “ghost fleet” (aging ships that turn off their transponders when approaching to load Russian crude oil) and transfers of oil on the high seas to mix it and falsify its origin. The only difference is that the Rosneft network uncovered by the FT was operating on an unprecedented industrial scale… Until they made a rookie mistake on the internet. The rookie mistake This entire sophisticated international network collapsed due to an absurd detail that borders on comedy. He Finance Times discovered that these 48 multi-billion dollar companies shared a single private server for their emails: mx.phoenixtrading.ltd By pulling this digital thread, the journalists of the FT they managed to identify 442 web domains who shared administrative functions of back office on that same server. The next step was pure data mining: they compared the names of those domains with the customs records of Russia and India. Thus, they discovered that the domain foxton-fzco.com It corresponded to Foxton FZCO (based in Dubai), buyer of $5.6 billion in oil; and? advanalliance.ltd It was Advan Alliance, which sold 1.5 billion to India. The desire to create and destroy companies quickly to mislead sanctioners—according to The Moscow Timesthe average lifespan of these signatures is only six months—led the network to centralize your IT infrastructure to reduce costs. A saving that has cost them their anonymity. The show must go on In the short term, the strategy of those involved is denial and adaptation. How to collect Finance Timesboth Tahir Garayev and Etibar Eyyub have categorically denied their involvement in sanctions evasion, calling the accusations “baseless” (curiously, Eyyub sent his denial from an email address hosted on the compromised server). The original company that founded the network, Coral Energy (now 2Rivers), has also disengaged from operations. However, behind the scenes, the machinery is already looking for new avenues. A senior Russian energy executive, speaking on condition of anonymity, summed up the situation in the investigation starkly: “It creates additional costs and inconveniences. But at the end of the day, the show must go on.” The United Kingdom has already reacted to the investigation of the British media, sanctioning nearly 300 entities linked to this “dark web”, blocking Russian ships and banks. The fall of this immense $90 billion network shows that, in the 21st century, bank secrecy and flags of convenience are useless if the system administrator decides … Read more

Mercadona suppliers have invested 1.7 billion euros. That gives you an idea of ​​what a huge business it has become.

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when you want present your model Mercadona’s business strategy usually cites five pillars: “the boss” (the word used to refer to customers), its staff, society and capital. The fifth is his wide network of suppliers. That the Valencian chain includes them on that list is no coincidence. If it has managed to lead the sector until it has gained a business share that is already close to 30%, it is thanks largely to its bet on white labela wide catalog of articles impossible to articulate without a “industrial cluster” with 2,100 suppliers. As Mercadona grows they do it too, but that link is not free. In order not to lose step, they are forced to invest millions. One figure: 1.7 billion. The data has revealed it Expansion. Last year, Mercadona suppliers made investments in Spain and Portugal worth 1.7 billion euros. The figure is not only interesting for its volume, it is also interesting when put into perspective: it represents 31% more than the previous year, when the sum of investments amounted to 1,300 million. If compared to 2023, when ‘only’ 500 million euros were mobilized, the increase in investment is much greater, close to 240%. Of course, not all suppliers have spent the same nor do all the projects in which they have invested have to be 100% focused on Mercadona, although it is true that the chain is the main client of some of its suppliers. Who has invested the most? Mercadona has not yet presented its 2025 report, but we do have that of the previous yearwhich details the suppliers that mobilized the most investment and generated the most employment. At the head was Casa Tarradellas, which supplies Mercadona with ready-made pizzas and fuets for the Hacendado brand. In 2024 the Catalan company invested 104 million to build two new factories, dryers and production lines. The published data by Expansion show that in 2025 it once again led investment in the Mercadona supplier ecosystem, with the mobilization of 117.6 million. At the beginning of last year the firm presented a new mill for wheat flour in Gurb (Barcelona) that required 25 million of euros and throughout the year it also promoted a storage center of species. In 2024 Casa Tarradellas achieved increase 12% its profits to reach 38.4 million euros, consolidating the positive trend already registered in 2023. The result was largely possible due to the increase in income. An investment cluster. The list The greatest investment effort is completed by companies such as Vall Companys (70 million euros), Incarlopsa, Avinatur, Essity and Cañigueral, all four with investments close to 60 million, Covap (42.5 million) and Entrepinares (27 million). Names such as Familia Martínez, Huevos Guillén (50) and Elaborados Naturales (40) also stand out. Not all of that money has had to be allocated to projects focused on supplying Mercadona, but a review of the reports deposited in the Commercial Registry reveals that the supermarket chain has become the main client of its suppliers. In some cases the company founded by Roig actually represents more than 50% of all his income. “Joint planning”. The data is interesting because it does not only tell us about the resources that Mercadona suppliers have dedicated to strengthening their infrastructure and productivity. It also suggests that these companies are forced to make this effort to keep up with the Valencian chain, which in 2024 increased its turnover by 9%, to exceed the 38.8 billion euros. Looking ahead to 2025, it expected to continue growing and reach 40.1 billion. Although Mercadona has not yet presented its report for the past year, we do have studies that show that it has achieved increase your quota of business, moving away from rivals such as Carrefour or Lidl. As its sales grow and its catalog of private labels and ready-to-eat foods triumphs, the Valencian firm needs to rely on its “industrial cluster” of suppliers. Hence the urgency for them to strengthen their production capacity. “These investments are possible thanks to trust and joint planning,” they explain from Mercadona when remembering the 1.7 billion mobilized. Investment… and something more. That these companies are willing to dedicate millions and millions of euros to modernize their facilities, gain production capacity or expand is explained by a very simple reason: keeping up with the Valencian chain has become quite a lucrative business. Recently Five Days he wondered how the companies that supply it with products are doing and, after investigating the Commercial Registry, it found out that in 2024 the 20 main suppliers of the chain increased their sales figures by 18% to exceed 12,000 million euros. In total, aggregate profits grew by 5%, exceeding 360 million. Curiously (or not) at the top in billing volume were Casa Tarradellas, Incarlopsa, J García Carrión and Covap, with sales increases ranging from 12 to 29% between 2022 and 2024. Images | Mercadona and Wikipedia In Xataka | Mercadona and the rest of the supermarkets have realized something worrying: they spend a million dollars on printing paper

The scientist who made the AI ​​we know today possible has just raised 1 billion. His new goal is to teach him to see space

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Fei-Fei Li, known as the godmother of AIjust closed a $1 billion round for World Labs, his startup dedicated to teaching machines to understand the world in three dimensions. Behind this bet are large companies such as NVIDIA, AMD, Autodesk or the Andreessen Horowitz fund, among others. Li, like other important figures in the field of AI, believes that world models are the way to go, instead of the AGI. Who you are and why what you do matters. Li is one of the people who made it possible for the Generative AI as we know it today existed. He was part of the team that developed ImageNet, a database of millions of images that allowed computers to learn to recognize objects in photos. That academic work was the trigger for the leap towards deep learning that gave rise to everything that came after: from voice assistants to generative models of text and images. Now, from Stanford University, where he directs the Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence, and from World Labs, the startup he founded in 2024, Li points to what he considers the next big unsolved problem in AI: that machines understand the physical world, not just text or flat images. The problem you want to solve. The great language models like GPT either Claude They are extraordinarily good at processing text. But the real world is not text, or at least it is not only text: it is three-dimensional, it has physics, it has geometry, it has objects that move and relate to each other. “If AI is to be truly useful, it must understand worlds, not just words,” counted Li in his statement. That is what so-called spatial intelligence, the central focus of World Labs, pursues. Unlike working with two-dimensional data, the models the startup works on are designed to perceive, generate and interact with three-dimensional environments. The idea is that an AI with spatial intelligence can reason about how things work in space, where an object is, how it moves, what will happen if it is pushed, how it fits into a larger environment, etc. What already exists and what is coming. In November of last year released Marbleits first commercial product. It is a model that generates editable and downloadable 3D environments from text, images, videos or panoramas. The user can create a virtual world, modify it, expand it and export it in different formats. The startup positions it mainly for video games, visual effects and virtual reality, or sectors with a huge demand for 3D content in which there are few tools to put them into operation. With this new round of financing, the focus also expands to robotics. And in this field, spatial intelligence is especially critical, since a robot that understands the space around it can plan actions before executing them, process different ways of completing a task or adapt to changing environments without needing to be reprogrammed for each situation. Autodesk has put 200 million at your table. It really makes perfect sense. It is the company that makes the design software used by architects, engineers, animation studios and manufacturers around the world. Your business is, by definition, thinking in three dimensions. And if Li’s models can generate and reason about 3D environments, Autodesk tools can also benefit from what the startup aims to offer. Daron Green, chief scientist at Autodesk, explained to TechCrunch that the collaboration between both companies will initially focus on entertainment and audiovisual production. The idea is that design workflows can be combined with AI-generated worlds. In this way, a user designs an object in Autodesk and places it in an environment created by World Labs, or the other way around. “You might anticipate that we will consume their models or that they will consume ours in different contexts,” Green said. You are not alone in this race. World Labs is not the only commitment to world models. Google DeepMind works on your family of Genie modelscapable of generating and simulating 3D environments. Yann LeCun, who was chief AI scientist at Meta, just founded AMI Labs with the same approach. Startups like Decart and Odyssey They also move in this spacealthough with products still in the demo or research phase. However, there are differences in their respective approaches. LeCun, for example, defends that to build true world models a completely new AI architecture will be needednot generative. Li, from World Labs, is committed to advancing with current generative models and improving from there. Cover image | World Labs and Andria Lo In Xataka | We’d love to tell you that ‘Her’ hasn’t come true and there aren’t people dating an AI, but we can’t.

9.5 billion trips in 40 days

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China is preparing for the largest migration of people in the world. And behind it there is no famine, war or racial persecution. In fact, there is not even a crossing of borders. China, the world’s second most populous country with more than 1.4 billion people, faces a new test. And today, February 17, the Lunar New Year. This time we are facing the Year of the Fire Horse, a good year for those who embrace this element because they are cold (born in autumn/winter) and for the industries that depend on it. On the contrary, complications are expected for relations that are already tense and with prospects of greater probability of suffering natural disasters related to heat and fire, points out Thierry Chow, Feng Shui consultant to cnn. Those first tense relationships have already been seen in the movements of these days, says Lucas de la Cal in an interesting chronicle in The World. He explains that the most coveted thing these days are train tickets that are packed. No wonder, there are those who have trips of more than 30 hours ahead of them, with the aim of covering the more than 2,000 kilometers that separate them from their hometown. And the Lunar New Year is a celebration in which there is a massive migration from the city to the countryside, to the origins. Traditionally, the Chinese employee has returned home for this Spring Festival, a period that lasts for 15 days. However, the massive movement of people means that trips accumulate in a total of 40 days in which, this year, around 9.5 billion trips are expected to occur. A tradition that, explained in CNAis undergoing some changes since, although anecdotal at the moment, it is beginning to be common to see parents traveling to the city where their child works. The train as the axis on which everything rotates They point out the Cal in The Worldthat your trip starts from Shanghai and is destined for Longkou. Normally, he says, they would have taken a plane but this means of transportation has tripled in price. The solution, like that of millions of Chinese travelers, is on the train tracks. Shanghai represents well the investment effort what the State has done in this means of transportation. The city’s southern station It is the first in the world with an entirely circular design and 15 million people are expected to pass through it every year. Nothing compared to the city’s main station, where it is estimated that 60 million people pass through each year, with access to the busiest metro service in the world. Nor to Guangzhou South Station. This space was, until 2024, the busiest in the country. By the station, Chinese media reports170 million people passed through it every year and an average of 600 trains passed through it every day. On average, it is estimated that almost half a million people pass through the station. It was until this year, the most renowned station in China. However, a few months ago it opened in Chongqing the largest train station in the world. Is five times larger than Grand Central Station from New York and has been moving 16,000 passengers an hour. Its potential is yet to be discovered because, as happens with metro stops in the countrywas born in an open field where buildings have begun to grow around it. These are just some data that speak of the consolidation of the train as the means of transportation capable of transporting the greatest number of people in the shortest possible time in a gigantic country. In the early 2000s, high-speed rail was completely unknown in China. Today they have, by far, the most extensive network in the world. And not only that. On their trains Robots travel that act as hostessesthe wagons have become space preferred over the plane because in them you can work with an enviable data connection and they have, in length, the fastest trains in the world while They keep breaking speed records in new tests to continue putting bites on the stopwatch. The country is experiencing an effervescence in the sector that has turned it into the true reference. Óscar Puente, Minister of Transport in Spain, I used Chinese trains as an example. as the technological vanguard and the key to being able to operate a Madrid-Barcelona at 350 km/h. For now, they have reached a position unattainable by any other country in the world. Not even Japanwho was the absolute king of the bullet train, can now at least come close. Photo | Kuruman and Tim Wu In Xataka | China urgently needed a train station, so it was built in nine hours with 1,500 workers and 23 excavators.

There was a day when Spain was a reference on the roads of Europe. 13.4 billion need to be invested to recover its splendor

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Floods, landslides, fractures, potholes or, directly, sinkholes. What is happening with Spanish roads? Are we facing a real maintenance problem or are we simply facing an avalanche of information or viral videos fueled by railway accidents and doubts about their maintenance? These are the answers we have. The controversy. The roads are bad. Very badly. At least that is the popular sentiment on social networks and in much of the media. The potholes (or directly sinkholes) They are the main ones accused of an alleged lack of investment in the maintenance of Spanish roads. Since the Adamuz train accident (Córdoba) in which 46 people died on January 18, the state of infrastructure in Spain is in the spotlight. The Adamuz railway accident was followed by new accident in Rodalies (Catalonia) in which a trainee train driver died and 37 people were injured just 48 hours later. The focus was then placed on the condition of the roads and their maintenance But, as the weeks have passed, the controversy has moved to the roads. And in recent days there have been videos in which cars are counted that have suffered blowouts due to going over a large pothole and statements on social networks. Is there data?. According to the Association of Infrastructure Conservation and Exploitation Companies (ACEX)Spain has a deficit of 5 billion euros of investment in its roads, distributed as follows: Highways under the responsibility of the State: 2,000 million euros. Highways of the Autonomous Communities: 2,000 million euros. Provincial roads: 1,000 million euros. According to ACEX, Spain invested half that of neighboring countries between 2009 and 2017, with a clear impact of the economic crisis of 2008. Since 2022, the deficit with Germany, France, Italy and the United Kingdom has been reduced to 30% with the arrival of European funds. It must be noted, however, that ACEX is made up of large construction companies. Source: AEC Officials? More or less. It must be taken into account that the budget items for road maintenance are not only presented in the General State Budgets, they must then be executed by the corresponding administrations. However, the DGT validates the data provided by the Spanish Road Association (AEC). And they say that half of the road surface in Spain is in poor condition. The data is even long before the last rains and a winter that is especially punishing the pavement. In fact, although the report was presented in 2025, the information was collected in 2024 so there is no data after the first months of last year either. which were also especially rainy. The AEC is an association created in 1949 and is non-profit. In 1998, it was also declared a Public Utility Entity and has international recognition. According to their evaluations, Spanish roads are “at the worst moment in its history” and that 13,491 million euros are needed to repair all the roads that need some type of intervention and they are distributed as follows: 4,721 million euros in 26,000 km managed by the State. 8,770 million euros in 75,300 km managed by the regional and provincial governments. A creeping problem. The problem of investments in road maintenance in Spain is not new. According to data from the Independent Authority for Fiscal Responsibility (AIReF) in a 2019 studyroads had absorbed the majority of infrastructure investments between 1985 and 2018, surpassed only by train investments between 2008 and 2012. Those days, from Europe it was supported that the quality of Spanish roads was much higher than average and among the best in Europe. However, investments had been declining for years and although they exceeded 1% of GDP in the 1990s, in 2018 they were below 0.5% of GDP. Of the total money invested, the AIReF report indicates, 35.98% corresponded to the State, 19.96% to the Autonomous Communities and 8.41% to local entities. Money received, for example, with European funds, is not taken into account. European entities, however, attributed this decline in investments to an infrastructure that was already established and in good condition. The OECD pointed out that Spanish roads were above average in quality and connectivity and were only behind in density. Are there solutions? European aid is what once again boosts investments in roads. From the Ministry of Transport, Mobility and Urban Agency they collected that between 2022 and 2024 2,460 million euros would be mobilized, placing special emphasis on the maintenance of the roads but announcing that they foresee a study to analyze the financing channels, which once again gives rise to the constant background noise about the implementation of tolls. Furthermore, with the impetus of Europe, a project has been created to adapt Spanish infrastructures to the new climate reality, analyzing the interventions that must be carried out to readapt them to more extreme climates where aggressive weather episodes occur more frequently. Photo | Feranza In Xataka | Spain has dozens of unique abandoned roads. Now he wants to save them by turning them into “historic roads”

Researchers have discovered “lost continents” from 4 billion years ago

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The idea we have of the early Earth involves a huge ball of incandescent magma and conditions incompatible with life. The problem? That there are no rocks from 4.3 billion years ago to confirm this consolidated theory. What we do have are some microscopic crystals called zircons. And zircons are telling a different story, according to this study by a research team at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. published in Nature. What zircon says. Regarding the behavior of the Earth’s surface, geology valued two ideas for that period known as Hadean: that there was a plate tectonics where one plate sinks under another or that the Earth had a kind of stagnant lid, a rigid and hot surface where heat only escaped through large columns of magma. Well, neither one nor the other, both: zircons leave evidence of an Earth that already had oceans, liquid water and a crust that alternated both systems. John Valley, the University of Wisconsin-Madison geoscientist who leads the study explains that “There were about 800 million years of Earth’s history in which the surface was already habitable, although we have no fossil evidence and we do not know when life first emerged.” Why it is important. Because they determine that the Earth did not choose a single model, but rather that both processes took place at the same time in different places. Of course, it was not a stable plate tectonics like the one that exists today, but rather it had violent and short episodes of sliding of the edges of one plate under another (subduction) that coexisted with large jets of magma that rose from the interior of the Earth. This discovery is key to understanding how the Earth’s surface moved, the formation of continents and life. On the one hand, without tectonics, the felsic continental crust that floats on the mantle and makes up the lands on which we live would not exist. On the other hand, plate tectonics regulates the climate and recycles nutrients, so knowing when it started working helps understand when the Earth became a place compatible with life. How they analyzed it. The John Valley team analyzed the popular zircons from Jack Hills (Western Australia). These sand-sized minerals are a kind of time capsule, housing the only direct record of Earth’s first 500 million years. They were looking for chemical “fingerprints” that would reveal where and how they were formed, for which they used technology WiscSIMS high resolution. They then compared the results of the analysis with other zirconiums from the Hadic Eon found in Barberton (South Africa). Each one told a different story. Surprises in the “DNA” of the mineral. 47% of oceanic zircons had high levels of Uranium compared to Niobium, indicating that they formed in subduction zones where ocean water sinks into the mantle. On the other hand, the South African zircons show that they were born from virgin rock from the planet’s interior, confirming the classic ‘stagnant lid’ theory by which the Earth’s first solid surface was rigid and immobile. Or what is the same: while in Australia the crust sank and created protocontinents, in what is now South Africa the Earth behaved differently, with a rigid and stagnant crust. That is, the early Earth was a mosaic of tectonic styles. The Earth did not go from being hell to what it is today overnight, but rather it was a hybrid process and generated the necessary conditions for life sooner than we thought. In Xataka | We know it as “the red planet”, but 3.37 billion years ago Mars was almost as blue as Earth In Xataka | 4.5 billion years of Earth’s history, summarized in a spectacular video map Cover | Tomáš Malík and Javier Miranda

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