engine

Mercadona has gotten rid of its search engine and replaced it with its own. They did it in a month with Claude Code and saved 90%

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Mercadona’s online store processes 4.4 million searches a week. Until recently, that volume was managed Algoliaa well-established search service used by companies like Sephora or LVMH. They had been with him for eight years. Now They have replaced it with their own search enginebuilt largely by José Ramón Pérez Agüera, CTO of Mercadona Tech. He has done it largely by himself, from his home, over a long weekend. This is how he told it in a successful LinkedIn post which now extends us in a video call with Xataka. “I’m going to be very honest and I know that this is going to look tacky, but it’s the truth,” says Pérez Agüera. “70% of the work (implementing the search engine, improving search quality and laying the foundation) took three days. One weekend plus an extended Monday.” The result: an 85% improvement in the quality of the ranking, the complete elimination of searches without results (previously 4% of the total) and a reduction in the monthly cost of between 9,000 and 15,000 dollars with Algolia to less than 900. That is, a saving of between 90% and 94% depending on the month. A decision that had been on hold for years The idea of ​​abandoning Algolia is not new at Mercadona Tech, it had been ruminating for a long time. The reasons are not surprising either: the search engine directly moves between 30 and 35% of the products that end up in the cart, which makes it a critical piece of business. And Algolia, like most SaaS services, has a pricing model that scales with use: as the company grows, the cost grows, with no way to stabilize it. “In the end you end up in a vendor lock-in of very critical software that is then difficult to get rid of,” explains Pérez Agüera. But Every time the team considered building something of their own, the work estimate was pushed back.. “The most optimistic vision we had, and with a much more basic version than the one we are going to release now, was five months. And it already seemed fast to me.” Then came the era of AI agents in software development. Pérez Agüera used Claude Code as the main tool and began to experiment on his own, without a formal project or assigned team. More out of curiosity than anything else. For playing. What AI did and what it didn’t The technical process combines hybrid search (by keywords and semantics) with a machine learning system that optimizes the ranking of results. AI made it possible to iterate on dozens of experiments in hours, analyze 479 MB of catalog and analytics data in days, and explore different ranking configurations by chatting with the agent instead of manually implementing them one by one. “I easily did 40 or 50 experiments in a weekend. That would have traditionally taken me weeks,” he explains. But the speed has a precise limit: the 29 technical decisions that AI did not make. Documentation generated during the experimentation process with Claude Code: the 14 parameters that Mercadona’s search engine evaluates to order results (from the popularity of a product to how well it fits semantically with what the user is looking for), its relative weight in the final ranking (popularity and semantic similarity account for two thirds of the decision) and the configuration of the machine learning model used to train it, based on click and purchase data from the last four weeks. Each of those parameters was discussed and validated with the AI ​​agent, but the final selection was made by the human team. Image provided by Mercadona Tech. The most representative was the choice of the indexing engine. Most systems, and probably any AI agent consulted, would have recommended Elasticsearch, the most widespread solution. Pérez Agüera chose Tantivy, a much smaller library written in Rust that integrates as an embedded component, without the need for a separate Java virtual machine. An impossible decision without knowledge of the Mercadona ecosystem. “The AI ​​always recommends the most generic option,” he says. “I made that decision because I have the context and the knowledge to make it.” The transfer to the team When the core of the search engine was ready, the project passed to the engineering team. What they found was not bad code, but it was ccode that did not follow Mercadona Tech’s internal standards. The architecture was hexagonal, as is the company’s style, but it used a different approach than usual. The tests existed (Pérez Agüera applied TDD during development) but some did not make sense or were missing cases. The agent had written thousands of lines of code in a few hours and reviewing them all was unfeasible. “The team’s Tech Lead took two or three days to adapt the project to our good practices,” he summarizes. “Not because the code was wrong, but because it didn’t meet our standards as a company.” In total, adding the initial phase and the launch into production, which includes load testing, infrastructure adjustment and integration into the Mercadona Online architecture; The project has taken approximately a month of work. And “two and a half people” have been in charge of it: Pérez Agüera, the Tech Lead of the Shop team and a part-time Staff Engineer for infrastructure. The original five-month estimate required five or six people. “FWe have easily done a x5 to the speed of the projectand what we have now is much more advanced than what we would have had in five months,” he says. What changes for the teams For Pérez Agüera, the search engine is one more experiment within a larger transformation that Mercadona Tech continues to process internally. The question on the table is not whether to use AI in development, but how to redesign the entire development process based on it. His diagnosis of the profiles is forceful: “AI is going to mean that fewer developers are needed and more engineers are needed. Coding loses value per se; the … Read more

A gasoline engine that uses 3L per 100km is a dream come true. And only Spain could manufacture it.

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With gasoline and absolutely shot dieselsreduce a few tenths (or liters) to 100 It is the wish of practically every Spaniard. Although the efficiency of current engines is increasing, and gasoline consumption is not as high as it was two decades ago, giants like Repsol are struggling to develop ultra-efficient engines that run on renewable fuel. And they have achieved it. They are not alone. Repsol has the fuel, but needs a partner to develop the engines. That partner is horse powertrain, a Joint Venture between Renault and the Chinese group Geely. This is dedicated to designing, manufacturing and selling thermal and hybrid propulsion systems, something that allows both Renault and Geely to continue exploring the combustion vehicle of the future without abandoning their electrification plans. Horse H12 Concept. This is an engine that promises less than 3.3 liters per 100km in the WLTP cycle, with a reduction in consumption according to the company of 40% compared to the average of new gasoline vehicles registered in the last two years. The best of all? The engine has been developed in Spain, and runs on 100% renewable Repsol gasoline. Horse has its operational headquarters in Madrid, engine factories in Valladolid and gearbox factories in Seville. Why is it important. The Horse H12 Concept is not a shot in the dark. It is an evolution of an already existing engine: the HR12. It is a 1.2-liter three-cylinder produced in Romania, and used in models such as the Dacia Duster. What makes this Concept version special is its exhaust gas recirculation system, a specially optimized ignition system and a hybrid gearbox. This Concept version, in alliance with Repsol, shows how far these engines can go with the help of synthetic fuel. It is not an experiment with an engine designed from scratch, it is the refinement of something that already exists. The other 50%. Repsol is now capable of producing gasoline of 100% renewable origin on an industrial scale at its Tarragona plant. According to what it indicates, it is compatible with all current gasoline vehicles, without requiring any type of modification. It’s your Nexa fuelcurrently available at 30 of Repsol’s stations. The same happens with its diesel, which promises to reduce net CO₂ emissions by up to 90%. And if you’re wondering how much the joke costs, approximately 10 euro cents more per liter compared to conventional fuels. Combustion is not dead. The comings and goings of Europe with combustion cars in 2035 They make it clear that the future will involve electrification. But the plans of giants like Geely and Repsol to try to keep more environmentally responsible combustion solutions alive are a clear indication that gasoline and diesel still have life ahead of them. In Xataka | The question is no longer whether diesel will continue to rise: it is whether it will become an expensive fuel forever.

an engine for all speeds

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For decades, engine development has set a pretty clear limit on what a plane or missile can do in the air. Achieving hypersonic speeds does not depend only on materials or aerodynamic design, but on solving a much more complex problem: how to maintain a stable propulsion system from takeoff to beyond Mach 6. China has been working in this direction since the mid-nineties, and now claims to have completed a prototype that seeks to cover that entire range without resorting to switching between propulsion systems in mid-flight. That objective takes shape in what researchers describe as a “contra-rotary ramjet engine“, an air-breathing engine designed to operate continuously from startup to speeds above Mach 6. The team, linked to the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and led by Xu Jianzhong, maintains that the prototype has already been completed and verified experimentally after more than three decades of work. Even so, the development is in a preliminary phase: the next steps involve adapting it to different platforms and subjecting it to real flight tests that allow its behavior to be validated outside the laboratory. The engine that can mark a before and after in defense The traditional solution to hypersonic and high-speed flight usually combines two propulsion systems: a turbine engine for speeds up to around Mach 3 and a ramjet for higher speeds. On the one hand, turbine engines cover takeoff and the first phases of flight, while ramjets can only operate when the device is already moves at high speed. This division of labor solves part of the problem, but it introduces other complications. As the researchers explainthe system drags unnecessary mass when one of the engines is inactive and adds technical complexity when changing regimes, a process that can become unstable in demanding phases of flight. The Chinese team’s proposal introduces changes on several fronts, but the core is in its compressor. Unlike conventional designs, it uses two sets of blades that rotate in opposite directions, one for high pressure and the other for low pressure, this configuration reduces centrifugal forces on the components. It would also improve rotation efficiency. Added to this is an unusual approach: instead of minimizing shock waves, the design takes advantage of them to compress the air flow, which would reduce its size and weight. The road to this prototype has not been quick. According to SCMPXu Jianzhong began focusing on hypersonic propulsion in the mid-1990s and by 2000 had outlined the concept of the counter-rotating compressor. For years, the project progressed until andn 2009 obtained institutional supportwhich made it possible to build experimental platforms from scratch. From there, the team spent nearly a decade resolving technical bottlenecks, especially in blade cascade design, before reaching the experimental verification now announced. If this architecture were to be transferred to operational systems, its implications would be direct in the design of hypersonic aircraft and missiles. Reduce the weight of the motor in this type of weapons open the door to increase the amount of fuel, payload or range, in addition to improving maneuverability. For reusable aircraft, a single propulsion system would simplify integration and reduce the risks associated with mid-flight mode changes. Even so, these advantages are presented for now in potential terms, awaiting validation in real conditions. Despite the scope of the announcement, development is still in an early phase when viewed from an operational point of view. The tests carried out so far have been limited to experimental settings. The next challenge, according to the researchers, will be precisely that, adapting the engine to real aircraft or missiles and checking its behavior outside the laboratory. Images | Xataka with Nano Banana | CAS In Xataka | Japan has dozens of “forgotten” islands off the coast of China: it is now preparing for the worst scenario

The legendary Renault plant in Valladolid is “reinvented” with an old acquaintance: the combustion engine

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The historical map of car factories in Spain is blurring with the evolution of the industry and the transition towards electrification, which has brought an unequal destiny for all of them: uncertain future of Ford in Almussafes to the Cupra bastion in Martorell. In the middle of the peninsula and emulating the village of Asterix and Obelix, an irreducible combustion engine factory that still resists: the Renault of Valladolid. But staying with the combustion engine does not mean staying stuck in the past: the historic Valladolid plant, which has such iconic models behind it as the Renault 4 CVpromises to continue writing history with Tilting Gravity Die Casting, the technique that changes how the heart of hybrid engines is manufactured. And Valladolid is the first factory in Spain to use it. New technology and more production. Horse Powertrain has invested 45 million euros at the Valladolid plant to install a head gasket manufacturing line using the Tilting Gravity Die Casting process, the first with this technology in the state. The new facility, which will occupy 3,500 square meters, will increase cylinder head manufacturing by 20% (from 300,000 to 360,000 units) and will require 150 new permanent jobs. Context. We are talking about the old Renault from Valladolid, but it has little of that 1953 Renault: today it is powered by Horse Powertrain, a joint venture formed by Renault 45%, Geely 45% and Aramco 10%. The formation is not coincidental: Geely provides the Chinese technological muscle, Renault its experience in the sector and the Saudi oil company is more than just financial muscle: it is interested in the combustion engine having the longest possible run. In Valladolid, Horse does not manufacture cars: it manufactures the hybrid E-Tech engines of the Captur, Symbioz, Clio, Austral and Rafale, the “heart” of a good part of the Renault range in Europe. And not only from Renault, but also from the group’s brands, which makes it strategic in that a single engine can end up in several different models. Why is it important. The bet is not minor: Valladolid is one of Horse Powertrain’s most strategic plants, which confirms that this is not a local experiment but a first-class industrial decision. The new technology allows engines to be manufactured with a more precise design and greater durability, something essential for hybrids, whose constant start-stop cycle subjects the components to greater thermal stress than a conventional engine. And the context justifies it: although almost one in five cars sold in Europe is already electric96% of those circulating they still have a non-plug-in motor. An inertia of more than 250 million vehicles that will not disappear in a decade. At a business level, the support is unquestionable. Its CEO highlighted that this investment “further demonstrates Valladolid’s leadership as a world-class automotive plant.” On the other hand, it is the first plant of this type in Spain and has been considered as a Priority Industrial Project by the Government of Castilla y León. What is Tilting Gravity Die Casting. Head gaskets are traditionally made of aluminum through a molding process, which leads to the possibility of air bubbles forming inside. And if there are bubbles, there will be microporosities and the structure will therefore be weaker. The TGDC solves this in a seemingly simple way: the aluminum no longer falls into the mold, but rather the mold is tilted so that it flows slowly and uniformly, thus minimizing turbulence and the risk of air. Bridging the distances, like when you pour beer into a glass. The result is a more homogeneous and structurally more integral piece that better withstands use and deterioration. In addition, this method requires less machinery and shortens production cycles. The push of Spain in the European industry. At the 2024 Paris motor show, then-Renault CEO recognized that the French unions were demanding the hybrid vehicle projects in Valladolid and Palencia due to the lack of demand for their electric models in the Douai and Maubege factories, however this latest movement is a complete “non, merci”: Spain not only does not give up production but also expands and modernizes it. Spain is the second state that manufactures the most vehicles in the old continent and this operation reinforces that position in the segment that endures the most: the hybrid. The question that remains in the air is whether De Meo’s successor will maintain the same commitment to Spanish plants in the face of French union pressure. Renault’s roadmap, which the brand plans to update soon, will give clues. In Xataka | Renault is a firm defender of the hybrid car and has its key factory in Valladolid. We have been there to know your future In Xataka | Given the tariffs on China, the CEO of Renault is clear who the European electric car should imitate: China Cover | Xataka

The emptied rural Spain has been revealed as the great energy engine of the State

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Spain is a State full of contrasts. At a demographic level, the population density is concentrated in Madrid and coastal cities, that is, 30% of the territory concentrates 90% of the people. It is “tight Spain.” The rest, approximately five million people, occupy 70% of the territory, in the interior of the peninsula. More people consume more resources, which puts two realities on the table: Madrid consumes more and generates less energy than anyone else and that emptied Spain is the energy engine of the State, as the report summarizes “The energy transition in the Spanish rural environment” prepared by Monitor Deloitte. The most striking fact: 84% of renewable energy generation comes from rural environments. Context. In the collective imagination we associate energy production with large nuclear or fossil fuel installations, but nothing is further from current reality. Spain is carrying out an energy transition collected in the National Integrated Energy and Climate Plan with the objective of reaching 81% electricity generation from renewables. And it’s on the right track: the report of the Spanish Electrical System of Red Eléctrica for 2023 It showed that it had already exceeded the 50% quota. At specific moments, has reached 100% supply. Listing renewable sources by their importance, we find wind energy prominently, followed by photovoltaic and hydraulic energy. Where. In rural territory, in that sparsely populated place where natural resources and space abound. The report highlights regions such as Castilla-La Mancha, Castilla y León and Aragón as hubs precisely because of their availability of soil and climatic resources (radiation and wind). Why is it important. Because the State needs that emptied Spain and its resources to successfully carry out its energy transition. Without that territory or its available resources, there is no decarbonization or energy sovereignty. Obviously a paradox occurs: that the most populated places are those that produce the least energy and vice versa, which generates a territorial imbalance. However, this deployment of infrastructure can become an opportunity to promote local employment and thus establish the population. Finally, agrivoltaics is revealed as a way to modernize the agricultural sector, making it possible to make cultivation for food compatible with energy supply, all on the same soil. In figures. In addition to this substantial share of 84% of renewable energy from rural areas, the report reveals other interesting figures: There are 15 provinces with critical population density (

50 years ago, an inventor introduced the first water engine. He was Spanish, a visionary and a complete fraud

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“Of my patent, the license for Spain is transferred free of charge to the State for the benefit of all Spaniards.” Loud and clear, this is what Arturo Estévez Varela, the inventor of the water engine and, without a doubt, a great Spaniard. At least that’s what they must have thought. NODE viewerswhich in the early years of the 1970s included the words of this man from Extremadura. “That died with my father and we haven’t bothered to move it either,” said Arturo Estévez Jr. in a report for RTVE in 2009. Perhaps due to lack of knowledge or, probably, due to having too much knowledge. Knowledge that the invention, in reality, was completely unrealizable and that the patents shown to the journalist from the public entity have no value. But who was that man in a suit who drank from a jug before filling the tank of a motorcycle with water and made it work? Behind the name of Arturo Estévez Varela there was an inventor, an enormous visionary and, why not say it, also a scammer. Before his water engine, this Extremadura native born in Valle de la Serena (a small town of just over 1,000 inhabitants in the province of Badajoz) had already devised a chicken roaster with infrared and the “wing plane”, a device that allowed rockets to be recovered. Space X in Franco’s Spain. Arturo Estévez Varela in a demonstration of his invention With four liters of water, 900 kilometers of autonomy But if Arturo, who perhaps at this point we should start calling Don Arturo, became famous for something, it was for his water engine. An invention that, according to what he said, allowed you to travel by car 900 kilometers with just four liters of water. Statements included in the press of the time. It was October 1970 and, evidently, it seemed like magic. How did good old Don Arturo get a motorcycle he was taking around Spain running? Yes, with water, but also with hydrogen. Water was only one of the pillars of his invention. The third was hydrogen. And the second, a mystery. Town to town and city to city, Don Arturo traveled throughout Spain, generating a stir as he went, capturing the attention of the press and, as we have seen, also of the NODO. What this Extremaduran inventor did not reveal was what was hidden in that substance that, together with water, allowed the combustion engine of his motorcycle to work. In theory, the water reacted with a mineral that Arturo did not want to reveal. This reaction produced hydrogen which, when burned in the combustion engine, made the motorcycle work. That is, the procedure was similar to that have tried in Toyota. It is not a motor fuel cellis a combustion engine that burns hydrogen, a much more inefficient process. If we consult different sources on the Internet, many agree that the Francoism came to order a technical report to check if what that unknown inventor said was true. Obviously, everything was left in water, yes, but borage. missing These same sources end their story at the same point. Don Arturo was tireless in making himself heard, in convincing people and strangers that his invention worked and that it was the solution to many of Spain’s problems. However, it disappears. Nothing else was heard of him and the fables begin. Since the Franco regime tried to hide the invention until the oil companies decided to silence it. It seems that the secret, however, was not so secret. In this blog They recover a large part of press clippings from the time. Shortly after making himself known and without being listened to by the Government, Don Arturo managed to get someone to trust him. That someone was José Carrera Rey, a businessman who bought half of the rights to the invention at a price of six million pesetas. It is at that moment that Don Arturo loses track of him. José Carrera Rey then discovers that he has in his hands an invention that is useless. What it doesn’t have are six million pesetas and he doesn’t have a partner either. In desperation he denounces Don Arturo but nothing is heard from Don Arturo again. Only an indictment, in 1974, for an alleged crime of fraud, managed to get Don Arturo to appear in court. However, in December 1977 the magistrates were clear: Justice matters were already going very slowly in Spain and Don Arturo had not committed any crime of fraud because he believed in his invention, so there was no type of deception. Due to the dates on which the Spanish Television report was recorded and what his son says, Don Arturo died on the border of the 80s and 90s and took his secret to the grave. A secret which, according to the scientists who have studied the case, was boron. He boron It is a chemical element that, in reaction with water, produces hydrogen that, even, can become inflamed due to the enormous heat released. Hence, Don Arturo always warned that his “secret mineral” and water had to be mixed in controlled quantities. As collected The Vanguard last summer, the water engine, therefore, is perfectly functionalbut very little useful. To obtain 5 kg of hydrogen, with which a fuel cell Toyota Mirai (more efficient than burning hydrogen) travels about 600 kilometers, 45 liters of water and 19 kg of boron are needed. The problem is, basically, the 68,000 euros that 19 kg of boron would cost, according to what was reported in the Catalan newspaper. Was it functional? Of course, but, at its side, the first liter of synthetic and emissions-neutral fuel at 2,800 euros It no longer seems so expensive to us. Image | Commons In Xataka | The 194 kilometers that changed the history of the automobile have a first and last name: Bertha Benz In Xataka | The history of the first traffic light in Spain, installed in 1926: six lights … Read more

The Earth turned on its great geological engine billions of years earlier than we estimate. We know it from a microscopic crystal

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For a long time, textbooks They have painted the primitive Earth like a ball of infernal and static magma, being a “lid” of inert rock where life or complex geological movement was impossible. Specifically, it was thought that the plate tectonicsthe engine that shapes the continents and recycles our planet’s nutrients, had taken much longer to start. However, we were wrong. How he did it. Science, in a recent article, has just put on the table the definitive evidence that indicates that the Earth began to move much earlier than we believed: at least 3.3 billion years ago, and most likely, more than 4 billion ago. And the key is not in the gigantic mountains under our feet, but in small fragments of glass smaller than a grain of sand. And if we want to travel in geological time, you have to go to jack hillsin Western Australia, where the oldest known fragments of terrestrial rock are found. The protagonists of this story are zircon crystals, extremely resistant minerals that act as authentic geological hard drives. The interesting thing is that, when they form, they trap isotopes and tiny amounts of other elements inside that tell us exactly what the environment was like at the time of their crystallization. The results. According to detailed analysis that collects Natureand supported by key works such as those published in the prestigious magazine PNASthese S-type zircons hide unmistakable geochemical signatures. Specifically, they reveal that, instead of a static and dead Earth’s crust, subduction processes already existed. That is, the oceanic crust was already colliding and sinking under other plates, melting back into the Earth’s mantle. A double life. But researchers have not limited themselves to looking at a specific era, but have traced the proportions of trace elements such as uranium, niobium or scandium in different zircons from Australia, Greenland and South Africa. Here they observed that during the Eoarchean, the Earth did not have a single geological behavior. Instead, it had two tectonic regimes. The first of these, known as a ‘stagnant lid’ with areas of crust dominated by plumes of oceanic magma that simply pushed upwards. On the other hand, it also had the ‘moving lid’ zone, which were active zones where volcanic arcs were already forming and there was subduction, very similar to modern plate tectonics, recycling the Earth’s crust. But there is more. As if that were not enough, other published studies in Science and Geology have contributed even more pieces to the puzzle, such as the transform faults in the Pilbara Craton of Australia that show horizontal movements 3,000 million years ago, and even inclusions of fresh water in zircons from more than 4,000 million years ago, which suggests that there were already emerging continents interacting with the atmosphere and the water cycle. It changes everything. Knowing that plate tectonics started so early is not a mere geological whim, since tectonics is the Earth’s thermostat: it regulates the carbon cycle, releases fundamental gases into the atmosphere and creates the necessary environments for the chemical breeding ground. In this way, if more than 4,000 million years ago our planet was already recycling its crust, having primitive continents and fresh water, it means that the conditions for life to emerge occurred much earlier than what science books dictated. Once again, the Earth shows us that, from its most remote beginnings, it has always been a living world. Images | Javier Miranda In Xataka | There are scientists deliberately causing earthquakes in the Alps and they have a good reason for it

It has taken years of development to give them a V6 engine

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“The Quadrifoglio is the most authentic expression of sportiness at Alfa Romeo and our cars are designed by true driving enthusiasts, we always put the focus on the driver” The words are from Santo Ficili, CEO of Alfa Romeo, who confirmed With them the Italian company once again put on sale the most special versions of the Alfa Romeo Giulia and Stelvio. And the company has resurrected the Quadrifoglio version, the one with a four-leaf clover on the side, four exhaust pipes at the rear and a brute V6 under the hood. The movement is the consequence of another mistake at the time. Stellantis has decided to put the sportiest and most special versions of its brand’s flagships back on the streets. The problem is that this movement is only the visible part of the iceberg. The one that is submerged is a real problem. A problem. The trees that don’t let you see the forest Yes, Alfa Romeo will bring the Quadrifoglio versions of its Giulia and Tonale to its European configurators. The sedan and the SUV will once again have specific sports versions, with all the aesthetic features but, above all, with an engine 2.9 liter V6 520 HP and 600 Nm. We are the first to celebrate it. But although the company has emphasized that the focus is once again placed on the most passionate about the brand and those seeking pure driving sensations, the truth is that the movement is simply a concatenation of errors. Just a year ago, Alfa Romeo confirmed that stopped selling the more performance versions and the 280 HP gasoline engine of its Giulia and Stelvio. A stage was closing. A few months before, Carlos Tavares had resigned (or had been resigned) from Stellantis. Another stage was closing. The Portuguese had become a kind of Carlos Ghosn in tiny A new “cost killer” had taken the reins at Stellantisthe largest automotive group in the world by number of brands in its portfolio. Brands that, since the company was born, have had to demonstrate their profitability. And Alfa Romeo was one of those that had the most complicated role. Tavares made decisions that, over time, are considered more than controversial. The first was to keep the brand portfolio intact. Of course, forcing companies to demonstrate how far they were capable of going and confirm for themselves that they were profitable. His inflexible hand ended up sending cars to the United States for which there was no outlet despite the fact that from the other side of the pond they already told him that there was no way to sell, for example, an electric Fiat 500. Solution? Little less than giving them away. The second was to bring the entire group into line. Same platform for what was to come, with a clear focus on electrification. The immediate result was a brutal cost reduction. The consecutive was a total loss of identity. Believing that the same plan could be equally successful for Citroën, RAM, Alfa Romeo or Maserati did not bode well. And so it has happened. The company has seen how billions were thrown away of euros in development. And how its sales have suffered until assume an impact on the accounts of 22,000 million of euros. The European Union has left a loophole open to combustion, has made medium-term objectives more flexible, The United States has lifted any environmental restrictions. Along the way, many of its brands have lost their identity. Maserati has run into a problem: the rich don’t want electric sports cars. And they have had to cancel a project in which They had invested more than 3,000 million euros. In the United States They had retired their well-known HEMI V8 engine and they have also had to back down because the path to complete electrification of brands like RAM was up in the air. Now, the same has happened with Alfa Romeo. Stellantis opted to completely electrify it and he made the same mistake as with Maserati or RAM, he lost identity. Alfa Romeo has generally had worse finishes than its premium rivals but was supported better or worse by a loyal public that accepted risky and different designs, a distinctive driving feel and engines like the V6 Busso which was, among other incentives, the company’s assets. Strip Alfa Romeo of any identityfrom any minimally aspirational halo to shoehorn it onto the same platform that all Stellantis’ small or medium-sized cars mount and make a Opel Frontera with the Italian brand’s bodywork it didn’t seem like the best idea. Especially if the ultimate intention is to sell cars. The results are being calamitous for Alfa Romeo. Junior doesn’t sell much and Tonale He is almost missing in action. The Alfa Romeo Giulia and Stelvio are cars with a decade behind them, which makes them anticompetitive in the market. Giving them back their V6 engine is a small marketing exercise to boost sales of two cars that seem to have left the collective imagination when looking for a new car. The company, at least, once again has those halo cars that can attract the public and, at least temporarily, put the brand on the market. But if they are with us it is because Stellantis has thrown away the development of the future fully electric models that were going to replace them. These Quadrifoglio versions are also born with an expiration date. In a few months they will have to comply with Euro 7 and nothing confirms that with pure combustion they can be sold without making any adjustments. In 2027, if the plans end up being fulfilled, a completely renewed Stelvio should arrive with a new generation. Considering that they should ride the same platform, the same should happen with the Giulia. Yes, we welcome that both cars can be available. But it’s just a band-aid to stem the bleeding from a much deeper wound. Photo | Alfa Romeo In Xataka | Europe has been filled with Stellantis … Read more

The change of Google’s search engine with AI was a mystery about its monetization. Finally it will be another subscription

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For months, the technology industry has been closely watching how Google resolves its particular dilemma: how to integrate artificial intelligence into its search engine without destroying the advertising business that supports its empire. The doubts are being cleared up little by little, and everything indicates that the company has already solved it: through AI Plusa subscription with a cost of 7.99 euros per month. Dilemma. The results of traditional search with blue links They generate billions in advertising, being one of the company’s most lucrative businesses and also one of the reasons why it is where it is. On the other side we have his foray into the AI ​​careera business in which they are burning money on infrastructure in the hope that it will be profitable in the long term. This last business also clashes with the traditional advertising system, with which Google also takes great advantage. Embracing the new potentially means burying what feeds you. The company is looking for a solution to this dilemma with Google AI Plus. What does the 8 euro subscription include? AI Plus has recently reached 35 new countriesamong them Spain. For €7.99 per month, users get enhanced access to Gemini 3 Prothe image generator Nano Banana Prothe research tool Deep Research200 GB of cloud storage and the possibility of using Gemini directly in Gmail, Docs, and other Google apps. Also includes 200 monthly credits for flow and Whiskthe company’s AI video creation platforms. Duel with OpenAI. The price is tight and even lower than the offer. ChatGPT Gowhich is found in Spain at a price of 9.99 euros per month. Both companies are fighting to attract users who want more than the free version, an opportunity to obtain more financing for their AI operations and, over time, attract even more customers who want to immerse themselves in more complete and higher-cost plans. Limitations to justify the price. The version of Gemini 3 Pro included in AI Plus has significant restrictions compared to the AI ​​Pro subscription of 22 euros per month. For example, the context window is drastically reduced from 1 million tokens to 128,000, which means that the model will “forget” information much sooner in long conversations or when analyzing long documents. Monthly credits for creation tools are also five times lower: 200 versus 1,000 in the Pro version. Google gives away AI to its storage customers. The company is adding all AI Plus features automatically to existing subscribers of Google One Premium (2 TB for 9.99 euros per month) at no additional cost. This avoids the absurd situation where paying more would result in having fewer features, but it also shows Google’s commitment to getting its users who pay for storage familiar with Gemini without them having to think twice. A change for the media. Google is building a monetization strategy around AI, and that affects the media. In this way, the media goes from being the user’s final destination to becoming data providers to train and feed AI responses. When Gemini responds directly instead of displaying blue links, traffic to the original sites evaporates, along with the advertising revenue they generated. The issue is somewhat tricky and it is still unknown how all the parties involved are going to agree. Subscriptions. Google is betting on a freemium model that allows it to make its investment in AI profitable without completely abandoning its traditional advertising business. The question is whether users will be willing to pay for something that until now they considered free. Unlike Netflix or Spotify, AI subscriptions They are still a relatively new concept to the general public. We will have to wait to find out if this tightrope walk balancing exercise by Google ends up convincing in the long term. In Xataka | The number of new apps coming to the App Store has skyrocketed. We have a culprit: “vibe coding”

less than fixing the gasoline engine

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What if your car’s engine breaks after 10 years? What are you doing with the car? With how expensive it has to be to change an entire engine… do you throw the car into the scrapyard? And if you don’t, do you invest thousands of euros in it? It is very likely that when you have told a friend, a cousin or a co-worker that you are thinking of buying a gasoline car, they have never asked you these questions. What if it were electric? Would they ask you what happens if your battery breaks when the car is 10 years old? In that case, the questions are not so strange anymore. Now, the answer will be less uncomfortable if you are one of the latter, one of those who are thinking about jumping into the electric car. At least not so much if you compare it with a combustion car. As expensive… as a combustion one How much does a serious gearbox breakdown cost? How much does a serious breakdown caused by the timing belt cost? How much does a serious engine cylinder head breakdown cost? These questions, and many others, are answered by RACE. Whether due to the amount of time that has to be invested, either because the replaced parts are expensive or due to a combination of both, the three aforementioned breakdowns can easily cost over 5,000 euros. An electric car, most commonly, does not have a gearbox. It will also not have a timing belt or an engine with cylinder heads, connecting rods or injectors. In fact, its maintenance is so simple that there are those who were wondering If electric cars have oil and if it is necessary to change it. However, there is a large public that continues to worry about the health of the battery and how much the bill may increase in the event of a forced change. This question was already answered by Recurrent study supported by Goldman Sachs. In it it was stated that in 2030 Changing an electric car battery will be as expensive as facing a serious breakdown of a combustion engine. According to his calculations, collected by Hybrids and ElectricsIn less than five years, changing batteries will cost between 3,200 and 4,800 euros for larger batteries. For lower battery cars, the forecast is for it to be below 3,000 euros. The bulk of the calculation to make these estimates is based on the price of its minerals and their impact on battery cells and packs. According to the data of Bloomberg NEFthe total cost of the battery in 2025 stood at $108/kWh. That is, a car battery with an 80 kWh accumulator (for which a highway range of between 350 and 450 kilometers is usually expected) would cost $8,640 right now, just over 7,200 euros. The number, however, has plummeted in a decade. In 2015 they calculated that the cost was $475/kWh and in 2013 it was $827/kWh. The evolution is promising. That Recurrent report already anticipated a price of $65/kWh cost for a complete battery replacement in 2030. That is, a car with the aforementioned 80 kWh battery would cost about $5,200 (about 4,380 euros). The study mentions the chemistry used (NMC are predictably more expensive than LFP) but it does not indicate whether there would be any additional cost between the cars that use CTC or CTB batteries. The first are batteries that are installed on the chassis of the vehicle but in the second the chassis itself is used as the vehicle’s casing and the cells are attached to it. In this way, energy density is increased and, therefore, there is a greater amount of electrical energy available in the same space. What is certain is that the price of changing batteries should fall over the years. The economy of scale itself will lower what remains the main cost of an electric vehicle. To this we must add that firms like Toyota They are already offering guarantees of ten years or one million kilometers if maintenance is carried out in their official workshops. To the above we must also add that some studies suggest thatOnly 2.5% of electric cars replace the battery due to breakdowns. Of course, it must be taken into account that the figure may have been distorted by the high cost that, until now, this operation has had. Photo | seat In Xataka | Toyota’s weapon to dominate the electric car is 1,200 kilometer batteries. And he has already set a date for them

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