china

China no longer plays in its favor

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Apple has closed its fiscal fourth quarter of 2025 with $102.5 billion in revenue, surpassing the psychological barrier of $100 billion in a quarter for the first time. Earnings per share have reached $1.85, 13% more than a year ago. Wall Street expected less, so the stock is up 4% outside market hours It is the best quarter in Apple’s history. It is also the one that best exposes its dependence on China. Why is it important. Apple is already worth more than $4 trillion, the third company to reach that valuation after NVIDIA and Microsoft. Its results affect hundreds of suppliers in its production chain. But the growth of the iPhone, which still accounts for half of its revenue, has slowed. China is both a threat and an opportunity: If you regain traction there, the rally continue. If not, services will have to compensate more and more. And they are not infinite. Yes, but. ‘Greater China’ (a region that includes mainland China, Macau, Taiwan and Hong Kong) is the only region that has fallen compared to the previous year. Revenues in that market have been $14.5 billion, 4% less year-on-year and well below the $16.4 billion expected by analysts. Tim Cook has tried to soften the blow by promising that they will grow again in the first fiscal quarter thanks to the iPhone 17but the numbers sing: Apple is losing ground where it hurts most. Besides, Chinese brands are winning the battle of prestige on their own territory. Manufacturers like Huawei, Xiaomi or Vivo are no longer cheap alternatives and have started to position themselves as premium options, with special emphasis on the former. Apple is no longer the only status symbol in a market that manufactures many of its products. The money trail. The Services division has reached $28.75 billion this quarter, 15% more than last year. It is a historical maximum and the figure that really sustains Apple’s growth. In the full fiscal year, Services have exceeded $109 billion, another record. iPhone: 49 billion (+6%). Services: 28,750 million (+15%). Mac: 8,726 million (+13%). iPad: 6,952 million (practically flat). Home, wearables and accessories: 9,013 million (-0.3%). In this last division are Apple Watch, AirPods, HomePod, Apple TV… Services already represent 28% of total revenues but their very high margin compared to hardware means that they generate close to 50% of operating profit. Services, after all, do not require complex supply chains or rely on product cycles. In detail. The tariffs have cost $1.1 billion in the quarter and are expected to reach $1.4 billion in the next. Kevan Parekh, the chief financial officer who has replaced Luca Maestri, has projected revenue growth of 10% to 12% for the December quarter — the first of Apple’s fiscal year — with iPhone sales growing by double digits. Analysts expected only 6%. Cook has highlighted the “very strong demand” for the iPhone 17, launched in September alongside the iPhone Air. They have also mentioned supply constraints, suggesting that they could have sold more if they had been able to make more. The backdrop. Apple depends on China in two directions: As a consumer market. And as a production center. This double dependence is a geopolitical vulnerability that has become more evident with the trade war. The company has tried to diversify its manufacturing towards India and Vietnambut China remains irreplaceable in the short term. Meanwhile, in China, Apple is no longer perceived as the only aspirational brand. Local manufacturers have improved a lot in design, cameras and software, which leads to an improvement in perceived value. And they’ve done it while Apple navigated years of incremental iPhone updates. Featured image | apple, Li Yang In Xataka | Ode to rounded corners, the visual element that has proven Steve Jobs right once again

First it was the automotive industry, now Europe is going to lose another of its star industries to China

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The lights at the LyondellBasell plant in the port of Rotterdam went out for the last time on a September afternoon. The factory, which produced propylene oxide — an essential raw material for foams, mattresses and auto parts — had just been dismantled. A silent symbol of a fading era. The plant, barely 22 years old, became another victim of a storm that is hitting the European industrial heart: expensive energy, Asian competition and disinvestment. Europe, once a world chemical power, has lost its industrial pulse to China. The perfect storm. The sequence began with the war in Ukraine. The Russian gas cutoff energy prices skyrocketed in Europe and exposed a fatal dependence. “Gas costs in the Netherlands were between 15% and 66% higher than in other European countries,” economist Edse Dantuma explained to NRC. However, the decisive blow came from further east. From that same period, an avalanche of Chinese chemicals began to flood the European market. “During the pandemic, China completed all stages of its chemical value chain without us realizing it,” Manon Bloemer explained.director of the Dutch association VNCI. “Later, with domestic demand stagnant, they began to export their surpluses,” he added. Europe was paying the most expensive energy in the world and, at the same time, facing the lowest prices in history. In the UK, Ineos—Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s petrochemical giant— was forced to lay off staff due to “very cheap” imports from China, made with coal and with CO₂ emissions up to eight times higher. The same symptoms are repeated in Germany. According to ICISGerman chemical production (excluding pharmaceuticals) will fall by at least 2% this year. Economist Christiane Kellermann, from the VCI, warned that “Capacity utilization remains low, even with plants closed. More production shutdowns are coming.” The end of a European era. For decades, Europe was the world’s laboratory. The petrochemical complexes of Rotterdam, Ludwigshafen and Antwerp symbolized the industrial modernity of the continent. But now, warns the joint study by Cefic and Advancythe European sector “faces a historic turning point: structurally higher costs, regulatory overload and investment flight threaten its survival.” According to this report, Europe has lost 30% of its chemical production in the last decade and new investments have been reduced to historic lows. In Germany, Strategy&PwC estimates that chemical investments They have fallen by 90% since seven years ago and profits have been reduced by 12%. Incoming orders are at their lowest level in ten years. “Deindustrialization is no longer a risk, it is a reality,” this research warns. “Neither Europe nor Germany benefit from global growth anymore. Investment decisions are made on other continents.” China, the new epicenter. Meanwhile, the Asian giant is investing on an unprecedented scale. According to Global Datathe country will account for more than 60% of the world’s new petrochemical projects until 2030, with more than 500 plants underway. Analyst Bhargavi Gandham explains that this boom responds to “a deliberate policy of self-sufficiency, supported by cheap financing, state planning and domestic demand.” From Roland Berger point out in a recent report: “China not only produces more; it has become the global price setter in multiple value chains.” The consulting firm identifies unprecedented levels of overcapacity: with such a surplus, China could supply the entire Western market and still retain idle capacity. China’s dominance in petrochemicals reinforces its strategic influence over critical industries—from batteries to fertilizers—a lever of industrial power that Europe no longer controls. Beijing is aware of the problem. According to Bloombergthe Ministry of Industry plans to convert or close obsolete plants more than 20 years old and promote the transition towards advanced chemicals, used in semiconductors, batteries or biomedicine. AND, as detailed by Reutersthe Chinese Government itself called this October to the main producers of plastics and fibers to stop internal “destructive competition” in products such as PTA or PET. But the result, for now, is that the Chinese excess puts pressure on global prices. And Europe, caught between its energy costs and its climate goals, cannot compete. The old continent without defenses. “The system is like a Jenga tower,” Ronald van Klaveren told NRC. “Take away one piece and it holds. Take away three and it collapses.” Every closure in Europe endangers an entire ecosystem of factories connected by pipelines of steam, heat and raw materials. In Rotterdam, Chemelot or the Ruhr, the closure of a plant affects dozens of suppliers. In the industrial regions of the Rhine or Limburg, each blackout translates into hundreds of lost jobs and entire communities in decline, evoking the reconversions of the 1980s. Meanwhile, the political framework moves slowly. In the summer the European Commission presented its “Chemical Industry Action Plan“, that, according to Dutch industrialists“has good intentions but few concrete measures.” The industry is asking for three things: affordable energy, equivalent rules for imports and a competitive tax framework. In Germany, the Helaba bank warns of a “Chinese shock 2.0”: After China joined the WTO in 2001, its exports focused on toys and textiles; Today it competes in machinery, automotive and high-tech chemistry. “The result is enormous pressure on prices,” said economist Adrian Keppler. And in the UK, Ineos Acetyls director David Brooks was more direct for The Guardian: “The UK and Europe are sleepwalking towards deindustrialisation. If governments do not act now on energy, carbon and trade, we will continue to lose factories, talent and jobs.” What’s coming now? Europe wants to reinvent its chemistry, but it does not have the conditions to do so. The Cefic and Advancy report warns that 40% of European plants could close before 2040 if the transition to low-carbon materials and high-value products is not accelerated. To comply with the Green Deal, more than 2 trillion euros in investment would be needed until 2050, according to Consultancy. The problem is that no one wants to invest where energy costs more, the rules change every year and permits take months or even years. Some experts, as Alexander Baumgartner by Roland Bergerbelieve that the way out is to “abandon … Read more

An experiment has put four chatbots from the US and two from China to invest $10,000 in cryptocurrencies. The Chinese are sweeping

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What would happen if you gave GPT-5 $10,000 to invest in cryptocurrencies? What if you gave them to other models at the same time and they competed with each other? That’s just the idea they had in Nof1…and the result is fascinating. Six models investing in cryptos. Those responsible for Nof1 have created Alpha Arena, a new type of benchmark that according to them “gets more difficult the smarter the AI ​​is.” The idea is relatively simple: measure the performance of six cutting-edge models to see how they perform when given $10,000 (real) and invested in cryptocurrencies in real markets. The contenders are the following: GPT-5 Gemini 2.5 Pro Claude Sonnet 4.5 Grok 4 DeepSeek Chat v3.1 Qwen 3 Max DeepSeek has turned his $10,000 into almost $20,000, and Qwen into $15,000, fantastic. GPT-5 and Gemini 2.5 Pro have lost 65% of their value and are both at $3,500. Total disaster. DeepSeek and Qwen triumph, GPT-5 and Gemini sink. The result of these 11 days since this “race” began is fascinating. The two Chinese models, DeepSeek and Qwen, have obtained enormous benefits: in DeepSeek the return is 97% at the moment (it was as high as 123%), while Qwen is not doing badly at 53%. Claude (0.84%) and Grok (-8.2%) are maintaining or losing slightly, but pay attention, because GPT-5 (-65.7%) and Gemini 2.5 Pro (66%) are currently losing two thirds of what they invested. The summary of winners and losers not only shows that positive or negative return, but also something curious: the number of operations. GPT-5 (75 moves) and especially Gemini 2.5 Pro (193!) are extremely restless. Although it does not have to be this way always, those who operate the least are the ones who are earning the most. Crypto fortunes that come and go. For this experiment, the models can invest in six of the most relevant cryptocurrencies on the market: bitcoin, ethereum, dogecoin, ripple, solana and BNB. The models decide whether to take positions in one or several, as well as the amounts and level of leverage. Positions are normally held for a few hours, although in some cases they may be held for days. Learning little by little. All of them have been competing since last October 18 in the “first season” of an experiment that will last until November 3. As explain its creatorsthis first iteration will allow us to obtain the first conclusions about how these models perform in the financial field. Here we come to earn money. The goal is simple: maximize profits and minimize losses (PnL). This first season is just that, because from then on we will apply what we have learned after each season to polish the prompts and add new features to the experiment and thus create models that in theory will perform better and better when investing in financial markets. Algorithmic trading at its best. What these models are doing would be crazy for human investors, especially since all of them not only expose themselves to the volatility of the crypto market, but also multiply it because they make use of the leverage (leverage). With this mechanism one can achieve huge profits much faster, but the risk is also extreme. The models in fact use absolutely extraordinary leverages of 20x or 25x, and can take either short positions (short, you “bet” that the price of an asset will go down) or long (long, you “bet” that the price of the asset will go up). The operation of the benchmark experiment is relatively simple, but it will become more complicated in future seasons. Machines don’t panic. To try to control these risks, the models have clear rules in their prompts regarding risk limits (establishing clear stop loss signals, for example) or confidence in their criteria. And furthermore, they follow them, which allows the models to maintain their position unless these signals occur. Here, by the way, we are talking about medium or low frequency trading: decisions are made in minutes or even hours, not in microseconds. That, the creators say, allows us to answer the question of whether a model can make good decisions if it has enough time and information. Don’t even think about doing it at home.. This experiment is just that, an experiment, and in fact financially speaking it is leaking everywhere. To begin with, because the trial period of this first season is extremely short and does not allow long-term behavior to be evaluated. And finally (among many other things), because the information to which the models have access is very limited. They do not take into account news related to this area and only have numerical data that correspond to average prices and current and historical volumes, and some technical indicators. That information. On the right side DeepSeek v3.1 confesses how it maintains its position because no condition that invalidates it is met, and by clicking on it you can see what it takes into account (value of BTC or ETH, for example) to modify or not modify that criterion. The models tell everything. One of the sections of the interface shows the “Model Chat” where it is possible to see how each model “reflects” on its position. If we click on that reflection we can see all the current and historical data with which he has worked to reach that decision (I maintain my position, I change it) and thus we can find out at all times his reasons for making a move. Just because they win now doesn’t mean they are the best.. Those responsible for Nof1 explain that this is not about declaring the best trading model of the six, because this is just an experiment. As they say, “we are deeply aware of the flaws of this first season, including, but not limited to: response bias, limited sample sizes/lack of statistical rigor, and brevity of the evaluation period.” This experiment will be repeated over different seasons and with new features that will be added to the decision … Read more

China arrives earlier and better

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Just a few days ago, Porsche presented its quarterly results. In the month of Halloween, the numbers were truly terrifying. Hundreds of millions lost, a resounding drop in margins per unit sold and, above all, the feeling that the company is in the middle of a clamp between Europe and China where, in the latter, its toast is being eaten at a devilish rate. The numbers. Loud, if I had to give it a quick qualifier. Let’s review hand in hand with your own numbers: Losses in the last quarter of 967 million euros. Last year it reported 974 million euros in the same quarter. In the first nine months of the year it reported 40 million euros in profit. Last year it reported 4,000 million euros of profit in the same period. The operating margin has completely disappeared. Expected losses at the end of the year of 1.8 billion euros. a clamp. The problem for Porsche is that it has found itself in the middle of a perfect storm. not long ago it seemed like she was ready for that storm. Now everything indicates that is falling on him and he has been caught with a flimsy umbrella and a raincoat that leaks water. Encouraged by its sales in China and a European regulation that has clearly pressed for jumping into the electric car, Porsche put on the table a plan to electrify at a good pace. He porsche taycan was received with a good reception, the Electric Porsche Macan It was to be its first large “mass” electric car and the Porsche Cayenne would delve into the leap to electric. However, the electric Macan has arrived late. At that time, The United States has imposed very high tariffs that have caused a hole in their accounts. The European institutions want to jump to the electric car but customers seem not to want to do it at the pace proposed by politicians and The rich already seem satisfied with the electric cars they bought. The Chinese public has completely changed their focus and now, for them, Luxury is represented by the cars made in China itself.. Looking at the internal market. The paradigm shift in the Chinese market has completely disrupted Porsche’s prospects. Not only in terms of sales, but also in terms of putting a huge brand crisis on the table. For the Chinese, Porsche is no longer synonymous with luxury and the latest technologyit’s just another brand. The company, like many other European brands and the entire Volkswagen Grouphas not known how to adapt to the new reality. The result is that sales in the Asian country have plummeted. Despite the launch of the electric Porsche Macan, in the first nine months of the year, Porsche has sold 26% less than in the same period of 2024. The 32,195 cars sold in China in Q3 of 2025 are very far from the 64,237 cars sold in Q3 2019record year for the company. In the last five years, the drop in sales has been a constant but it has worsened especially in the last two years. China has experienced an explosion of electric vehicles that They are faster and more modern. But, in addition, they put supposed innovations on the market that arrive earlier and better than those presented by the German company. Better and faster. The best example of how China is arriving better and faster is the case of the electric Porsche Macan and Cayenne. The first, as we have said, was delayed for years and that was disastrous in an industry that is advancing at a devilish pace and that, specifically in China, makes cars obsolete in just a few months. To convince the skeptics and eliminate friction with its more classic customers, the Porsche Cayenne has been presented with a wireless charging system and a very digital environment. The problem is that this type of cargo is already offered in China in cars like the Hongqi E-HS9 for years and it hasn’t caught on. On the other hand, ubiquitous screens are no longer surprising, what the public in China is demanding is differential software, extensive integration with services such as the mobile phone and a variety of services that European companies do not seem to understand. The other great incentive is its ultra-fast 400 kW recharge. It must be taken into account that, indeed, in Europe it will be one of the most powerful cars on the market but Porsche is interested in looking at China and there BYD is offering cars with 1,000 kW of power for a fraction of the price. The Zeekr 7X, which is one of Geely’s (owner of Volvo) big bets it will go to 800 kW of power. We already know this. This example of the Zeekr 7X and its 800 kW of ultra-fast charging is just the (pen)latest example. BMW suffered something similar with its Panoramic iDrive. The company announced it in 2023 but will not have mounted it on a street car until the first units of the BMW iX3 hit the streets in the early stages of 2026. When it was first announced, Xiaomi did not have a single car on the street. Today, Your Xiaomi YU7 already has a system very similar to BMW’s big bet. The ability of Chinese firms to adapt to new markets or launch technologies in record time is one of their great assets when it comes to staying ahead of the competition. In fact, we know that from Volkswagen to Toyota have looked for solutions to speed up production times and put their products on the market more quickly and thus be able to compete with an industry that advances at a dizzying pace. We have noticed the consequences of this crazy race to bring more and better cars to the market even in our country. a few months ago we explain in Xataka how companies adapted their cars in record time to European tastes, adapting pre-series units … Read more

China had been testing a mysterious satellite in orbit for years. A counterespionage company has finally revealed what it was

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On October 16, the starry skies of the Canary Islands were illuminated by a spectacular fireball that crossed the sky from south to north. It was not a meteorite, it was a Chinese satellite that until a few days ago had been a complete mystery. A mystery called XJY-7. Since its launch in December 2020, as part of the maiden flight of the Long March 8 rocket, the Xinjishu Yanzheng-7 had been an unknown. China officially described it as a “new technology verification satellite.” Aside from a blurry render, the world knew almost nothing about its configuration, purpose, or capabilities. And although its re-entry was news in itself, the real news is that, just before it disintegrated, an Australian company managed to photograph it in orbit, finally solving the mystery of what it was and what it was doing up there. Counterespionage in orbit. Using its network of satellites to photograph other objects in orbit, the Australian company HEO achieved what ground-based radars could not: take photos of the XJY-7 up close. The images and the 3D model that HEO built from them revealed features that China had neglected to mention. According to the company has declared to SpaceNewsthe satellite was not a simple test platform; It was equipped with “a large radar antenna” and, most tellingly, a Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) antenna. It was a spy satellite. SAR is an advanced remote sensing technology that allows high-resolution images of the Earth’s surface to be obtained in any weather conditions, day or night. The “mysterious” test satellite was, in reality, an advanced surveillance and remote sensing satellite. The HEO observations also revealed a fascinating detail about its design: the satellite had fixed solar panels. This forced it to “rotate its entire body” to maintain power generation, a behavior that the Australian company was able to verify through multiple simultaneous observations from different angles. Satellites that monitor satellites. Traditional monitoring methods (ground-based radars and telescopes) are no longer sufficient to monitor the activity of other nations in orbit. HEO uses a network of more than 40 sensors in flight to take satellite-to-satellite images for your clients. When one of its associated satellites passes near a target, it takes a photo of it. It is a “non-invasive flyby method” that offers real photographs where you can see antennas, panels, thrusters and payloads. With this technique, HEO has managed to identify more than 80 space objects before they appeared in any public catalogue. In an environment where satellite constellations are deployed by the dozens, knowing whether an object is an operational satellite, a piece of space junk, or what type of antenna it carries is crucial for intelligence and defense. Mysterious until his re-entry. Ironically, the mystery that surrounded XJY-7 in its useful life also accompanied it in its death, as the United States Space Command never issued a reentry alert. This is “strange” for an object of this size, says expert Marco Langbroek. It is estimated that XJY-7 had a mass of between 3,000 and 5,000 kg. That an object weighing more than three tons bypassed re-entry warning systems highlights the gaps in conventional space tracking. Even worse when it comes to a satellite with secret capabilities. Image | H.E.O.

The countries with the most kilometers of high-speed train, displayed in a graph with a brutal dominator: China

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The train is the backbone of many countries. For centuries it has been key to mobility in Europe, in Japan it is essential, China has experienced a railway revolution and even the United States or Latin America begin to bet on passenger mobility by train. However, it is one thing to have a railway and quite another to have a rich high-speed network. And this graph shows the countries with the most kilometers of high-speed trains and their plans for the future. China, undisputed queen. The Olympics They are an event in which countries “sell” themselves to the worldbut in the case of China, it involved a profound renovation of its infrastructure. It was in 2008 when China launched its high-speed railway line: barely 120 kilometers between Beijing and Taijin, and 17 years later, it is the country with the most kilometers of high-speed lines in operation. According to the data of World Population Review and as we can see in the graph prepared by Visual CapitalistChina has more than 40,000 kilometers of tracks on which its trains go at 250 km/h or more. They have another 12,800 kilometers under construction and more than 11,000 planned. In total, some 64,000 kilometers of high-speed rail. In addition, they are moving forward to make their network the highest speed thanks to the maglev advancesmagnetic trains, with tracks that already link cities like Beijing and Shanghai to speeds of more than 430 kilometers per hour. And it is this network that is putting the airlines in check. Spain and Japan. The train is vital in a country as huge as China and the numbers speak for themselves, but there are two other countries that, without being the ones with the most kilometers in total (operational, under construction and planned), complete the podium of those with the most high-speed kilometers currently operating. There are no surprises here. Spain has a total of 5,632 kilometers of high speed, of which more than 3,700 are already operational, followed by China the country with the most kilometers of high speed currently holds. There are another 1,040 kilometers under construction and another 862 kilometers planned. For its part, Japan, another example when we talk about fast trainshas a total of 3,700 kilometers divided into 3,050 operational kilometers, 402 under construction and 193 planned. Promises, promises. At a time when the train is emerging as the alternative to international flights, especially to low cost and among short-distance points, it is striking that, in reality, there are no more countries with high-speed lines. In Europe, apart from Spain, France, Germany, Sweden, Finland or Italy, they have hundreds of operational kilometers, but outside of the ‘Old Continent’ and cases like South Korea, things are very different. For example, India. It is the second country in the graph, but of the 8,000 total kilometers, only 508 eare under construction and the remaining 7,400 are planned. They do not have high speed, and the same thing happens in Egypt (with 3,400 kilometers planned), Australia (1,700 planned) and European countries such as Latvia, Estonia, Norway or the Czech Republic: all with plans to create high-speed lines, but not one operational kilometer. America. And if in China the train is essential due to its dimensionson the American continent we should think that things are the same. And no, not at all. The United States, a gigantic country, has only 735 kilometers of high speed, 273 under construction and almost 5,000 planned, but nothing more. Spain tried to bring the AVE to the North American country and there are demands for high-speed trains to expand, but their internal mobility continues to have the plane as the protagonist. Canada has 1,500 kilometers planned and not one kilometer built, Mexico is in the same situation with 210 kilometers on the table, Brazil the same with 510 kilometers planned and Argentina does not even appear on the graph. But, although high speed is complicated on the continent, the truth is that there are many plans to expand the railway network, even creating international trains that go from one ocean to another, like the one planned between Brazil and Peru. And who is behind many of these projects? Well, who has gained experience at a forced pace in recent years ‘pulling’ thousands of kilometers of tracks: China. In Xataka | China wanted to be the queen of high-speed trains. So he built all the longest bridges in the world

In China they have created a material for their fighters that opens a new technological direction: it aims directly at radars

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From the early days of World War II to the stealth fighters of the 21st century, the goal of remaining unnoticed by the enemy has been a constant obsession in military aviation. Aerial “invisibility”, more than a myth, It is a technological challenge that has marked decades of innovation in materials and design. A team from Chinese universities describes a flexible and ultra-thin coating capable of absorbing radar waves without losing thermal resistance, collects SCMP. If its effectiveness is confirmed in flight, it could change the conversation about modern aerial stealth. The development was detailed on October 14 in Advanced Materials. The study, signed by Cui Guang, Liu ZhongfanHuihui Wang and Maoyuan Li, among others, presents a graphene-on-silica-fabric (G@SF) metasurface that combines flexibility, low weight and thermal resistance of up to 1,000 degrees Celsius. According to its authors, the direct integration of the material into the insulating layer of an aircraft would allow the reflected radar signal to be reduced to −42 dB, without compromising the structure or weight of the aircraft. A surface that wants to defy the radar The material is based on a silica textile base on which the researchers deposited graphene using a chemical vapor deposition process. On that layer they applied a laser “erasing” technique, which allowed them to create a precise pattern on the surface and adjust your electrical impedance. In this way, they claim, they managed to make the coating effectively absorb electromagnetic waves without needing to increase its thickness or weight. The result is a flexible, ultralight metasurface with an adjustable sheet resistance between 50 and 5,000 ohms per square. {“videoId”:”x9ri2iu”,”autoplay”:false,”title”:”How China, the biggest polluter on the planet, has also become the complete opposite”, “tag”:”webedia-prod”, “duration”:”740″} Laboratory tests showed that the material maintains stable performance even under extreme conditions. After five minutes of exposure to 600 degrees Celsius in air, it retained its absorption capacity, and also withstood prolonged heating to 1,000 degrees in a vacuum without degrading. In tests with air currents of up to 200 meters per second, its loss of efficiency was less than 1%, and neither the surface pattern nor the resistance of the sheet were altered. These properties make it an ideal candidate for high-speed aircraft exposed to intense heat and friction. Withstood prolonged heating to 1,000 degrees in vacuum without degrading The material described in the study poses a possible alternative to conventional coatings, although it has yet to be demonstrated whether its advantages are sustainable outside the laboratory. US stealth fighters, such as the F-22 and F-35they use absorbent compounds They offer good initial performance, but require constant and expensive maintenance. In China, the J-20 has been seen with a coating apparently more stable, although those impressions come from displays and not verifiable technical data. The difference, for now, is in the discourse rather than the evidence. The new coating is still far from becoming a technology in real use, but it illustrates the direction of Chinese research in stealth materials. The challenge is not only to achieve high performance in the laboratory, but to keep it in flight and under extreme conditions. Chinese scientists aim to solve one of the most persistent limitations of modern fighters: the fragility of absorbent coatings. If the material achieves this stability, it could open a different stage in aircraft protection. In Xataka We believed that the F-16s were Ukraine’s great achievement: it has just taken the first step to receive up to 150 European Gripen fighters Beijing has set 2035 as the horizon to complete the modernization of its armed forces. In this context, the development of new compounds, sensors and materials responds to a broader policy aimed at strengthening its technological and military industry. Each advance in the field of stealth materials is interpreted not only as a technical improvement, but also as a step towards greater strategic independence. Images | Wikimedia Commons | Arthur Wang In Xataka | The Chinese ambition to lead each and every area of ​​the planet has found its next adversary: ​​Jaén (function() { window._JS_MODULES = window._JS_MODULES || {}; var headElement = document.getElementsByTagName(‘head’)(0); if (_JS_MODULES.instagram) { var instagramScript = document.createElement(‘script’); instagramScript.src=”https://platform.instagram.com/en_US/embeds.js”; instagramScript.async = true; instagramScript.defer = true; headElement.appendChild(instagramScript); } })(); – The news In China they have created a material for their fighters that opens a new technological direction: it aims directly at radars was originally published in Xataka by Javier Marquez .

China continues to draw up five-year plans in the old communist way. Objective: tech self-sufficiency

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Let’s talk about five-year plans. Alexei Grigorievich Stakhanov She had no idea, but her exaggerated productivity ended up messing her up. In 1927 he began working in the Tsentrálnaya-Írmino mine and realized that he was good at it. In fact, he was much better at it than the others. In August 1935 smashed the record of mine productivity and extracted 102 tons of coal (14 times its quota) in five hours and 45 minutes. Days later he crushed it again and extracted 227 tons. He became a hero to socialist workers—in addition to appearing on the cover of Time magazine—and from that was derived the stakhanovismwhich advocated the increase in labor productivity based on the workers’ own initiative. That didn’t matter to Stalin: the Soviet Union was already completely immersed in its second five-year plan with a clear objective: the frenetic industrialization of the country based, of course, on trying to convert all workers into new Stakhanovs. And from those five-year plans we ended up moving on to others. China signs up for the five-year period That idea of ​​five-year plans ended up being used by China, which began to apply them in 1953 – with the help of the former Soviet Union – and has maintained them until now. In fact, the Asian giant has debated these days what will be your 15th Five Year Plan and the focus is clear: technological self-sufficiency. The Central Committee of the Communist Party of China published on Thursday a statement in which he made it clear. Its objective was to “greatly increase” the self-dependence capacityand in that plan there are clear fronts for the medium-term future of the Asian giant: Promote R&D in critical technologies such as semiconductors, robotics, high-performance computing and, of course, artificial intelligence. Build a “modern industrial system“that allows reduce dependency of foreign components, equipment and knowledge. Promote the domestic market as a pillar of growth and reduce exposure to possible impacts of the export model Integrate technological development with national security: self-sufficiency not only makes economic sense, but also geopolitical sense. This five-year plan is clearly a consequence of the times we live in: the trade war with the US that it started years ago has marked the apparent end (at least partial) of globalizationand now both are looking for the same thing: not depend on others. China’s new five-year plan goes precisely in that direction, and has a clear impact both for that country and for the rest of the world. On the one hand, greater state investment in strategic sectors and greater interventionism are proposed (Hello Mr. Trump). On the other hand, this move may reduce Chinese demand for foreign technology, exacerbating technological rivalry with the US but perhaps opening new opportunities for collaboration with other countries. If successful, China’s five-year plan can stabilize growth in the face of potential external threats, but if self-reliance is prioritized too much, international openness and competition could be neglected, which could slow innovation or lead to less efficient companies. Source: Bloomberg And there is another problem: as they point out on BloombergChina is the great world exporterprecisely because their internal consumption is insufficient: they produce much more than they need. The contribution of exports to the country’s GDP is getting biggerbut consumption has stagnated or falls. All the details of the final five-year plan will be published in March, and will intensify the focus on everything related to the technological field. This effort, which began after that first veto of the Trump administration on Huaweiseems to be bearing promising fruits for China, which is becoming in an overwhelming machine of technological innovation. That pace will not slow down. Alexei Grigorievich Stakhanov would probably be proud. Image | Chinese Communist Party In Xataka | Spain has an antidote to mental and emotional exhaustion: the nap

either they create giants, or China wins

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Orange has confirmed that it can simultaneously undertake the purchase of 50% of Masorange and its proportional share of Altice’s assets in France without affecting the dividend. Or so he claims. Laurent Martínez, financial director, has said it unequivocally: both operations are viable while maintaining “profitability for the shareholder as an absolute priority.” Why it is important. Five years ago, any European operator that had announced two large acquisitions in parallel would have suffered an immediate stock market punishment. Now the market digests it. It is the first major sign that the consolidation of the sector has ceased to be a regulatory taboo and has become an accepted strategic necessity. There are even signs that Europe begins to give way after decades of anti-concentration dogma. Between the lines: Orange is looking for customers and spectrum in France, not duplicate infrastructure. In Spain, the Masorange shareholder agreement blocks any movement until April 2026. But CEO Christel Heydemann has been clear: “There is no rush.” They can wait because they have financial muscle. That capacity for patience is, in itself, a competitive advantage. The context. Europe has 34 main operators for 450 million inhabitants. The United States has three for 335 million. China, four for 1.4 billion. Proportionally, Europe has eight times more operators than the United States and 27 times more than China. The result: compressed margins, insufficient investment and a 41% drop in the sector’s market capitalization between 2015 and 2023. Unexpected twist. Teresa Ribera, new European Commissioner for Competition, said in spring that the rules will “evolve” to allow for greater scale. It’s a radical departure from her predecessor, Margrethe Vestager, who systematically blocked mergers for a decade. The Draghi Report has explicitly called for facilitating consolidation. Something is moving in the bureaucracy. Marking agenda. Marc Murtra, president of Telefónica, has led a manifesto signed by twenty European telecommunications companies calling for drastic changes in merger regulations. It’s not rhetoric: Telefónica has liquidated its businesses in Latin America to concentrate on Europe with the addition of Brazil. Murtra has declared that the teleco “will be active in a future scenario of European mergers.” They want to be much more than the large Spanish telecom. It’s been rumored for months its interest in taking over Vodafone Spain and with the German 1&1. Digi has even sounded. Yes, but. Not two of the three large Spanish operators can finance a state-of-the-art fiber network without external help. PremiumFiber, presented by Masorange and Vodafone A few days ago, it needed the Singapore sovereign fund with 25% of the capital. That is the real picture: without consolidation, European telecommunications companies will increasingly depend on Asian capital to maintain competitive infrastructures. The big question. Will Europe allow its operators to consolidate now, while they still have muscle, or will it wait for American and Chinese giants to absorb the European market piecemeal? Orange has shown that it can play on two boards at once. It remains to be seen whether regulators are going to let the game continue. In Xataka | Telefónica wants to lead Europe. But he resists turning Spain into his letter of introduction Featured image | Xataka, operators

Europe has done the only thing it could do to compete with SpaceX and China in space: merge its largest companies

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Europe has grown tired of watching from the sidelines how SpaceX and, increasingly, Chinaredefine the rules of the game in space. The continent’s response was inevitable: a historic fusion. The three European aerospace giants, Airbus, Leonardo and Thales, have signed a memorandum of understanding to combine its spatial divisions into a single, colossal enterprise. Merge or die. This is not news that we break every day. It is the most ambitious move in the European aerospace industry since the creation of the MBDA missile consortium in 2001. And at the same time, it is not an offensive move, but a strategic survival maneuver. Given the agility of reusable rockets and Elon Musk’s megaconstellations, the fragmentation of Europe had become an unsustainable burden. Now, the plan is to create a European champion with the critical mass necessary to at least be able to compete. A colossus about to be born. The agreement, which It’s been brewing for months. under the code name “Project Bromo”, it will give rise to a new company that, if approved by regulators, could be operational in 2027. The figures used give an idea of ​​the scale of the operation: a combined annual turnover of 6.5 billion euros, and nearly 25,000 employees spread throughout Europe. Airbus will have the majority stake with 35%, while the Italian Leonardo and the French Thales will share the rest almost equally, with 32.5% each. Despite the majority of Airbus, the government of the new colossus will be “balanced” and under joint control, as reported by the companies. What does each one contribute? Each partner will contribute his crown jewels in the space sector. Airbus will contribute with its Space Systems and Digital Space businesses. Leonardo will bring its Space Division to the table, including its valuable stakes in Telespazio and Thales Alenia Space. Thales will mainly contribute its shares in those same joint ventures (Thales Alenia Space and Telespazio) and Thales SESO. Why it was inevitable. The harsh reality is that Europe was falling behind, and very quickly. SpaceX’s disruption has been brutal, especially on two fronts: launch and satellites. While Europe continues recovering lost ground With the development of its Ariane rockets, Elon Musk’s company has not only radically lowered the cost of putting something into orbit, but has flooded the sky with its Starlink constellation and its military version, Starshield. Beating SpaceX is no longer possible. On October 19, the company surpassed a staggering number of 10,000 Starlink satellites launched in just over 300 launches of the Falcon 9 rocket. This network of small satellites has cannibalized the traditional market for large and expensive geostationary satellites, the pillar on which the business of European companies was based. The only thing Europe can do, and what this new giant is destined to do, is recover its technological sovereignty in space and, with it, its security. Image | Airbus In Xataka | “We are the company that has developed an orbital rocket the fastest”: PLD Space, one step away from making history from Spain

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