happy

The United States promised to be very happy manufacturing its own chips. Nvidia just spent 150 billion in Taiwan

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Houston, we have a problem. A couple of days ago the CEO of Nvidia stood on the stage at Computex in Taipei and said an inconvenient truth for the United States: “Taiwan is the epicenter of the AI ​​revolution. This is where chips and packaging are made. This is where systems are created. This is where AI supercomputers were created.” The setting was Computex 2026, Asia’s biggest tech event, and it wasn’t a compliment to the host, it’s a real depiction of how the industry works. It may sound paradoxical for an American company and at a time when The United States wants to reindustrialize with chipsbut he needs it. It is a structural issue. The harsh reality of profitability. Nvidia plans spend 150,000 million dollars a year in Taiwan, much more than the 100,000 million they spend now and with an abysmal difference compared to the 10,000 and 15,000 million five years ago. If it sounds silly, it’s because it is, but so is its billing: in the first fiscal quarter of 2026 billed 81.6 billion dollars, 85% more than the previous year in that same period. Also its benefit it’s already going off the charts: 58.3 billion, more than triple compared to the same period last year. That this money goes to Taiwan and not to the United States is due to technical and objective issues: Taiwan produces 90% of the most advanced chips in the world, according to a study by the Stimson Center. Of that Taiwanese production, TSMC controls 70% and is going to invest between 52,000 and 56,000 million this year. Bottom line: If Nvidia wants cutting-edge manufacturing capability, it has to be there. Why is it important. The best way to see it is to put Vera Rubin on the table, who In Huang’s words it is “probably the biggest product launch in Taiwan’s history.” Each system contains about two million parts and is assembled with 150 suppliers, almost all Taiwanese. This mechanism is not assembled by decree or in a legislature: it requires years and putting billions of dollars on the table. There is no factory in Arizona that can do something like this at least until 2030. Constellation will be Nvidia’s new headquarters in Taipei and will come to stay permanently: 4,000 engineering professionals will work in that center that according to Huang It will be operational by 2030. It is no longer that it buys in Taiwan, it is that the most valuable semiconductor company in the world is building the heart of its R&D in that core, an island 10,000 kilometers from the United States. A splash of cold water on Trump’s aspirations. Context. In January 2026, Taiwanese companies they committed to invest $250 billion in semiconductors and AI in the United States, as part of a trade agreement with Washington. Because Taiwan and the US are a symbiosis: each needs the other to maintain its position in the race for AI. The investment of a private company like Nvidia is another expression of this pact. In fact, Nvidia is not the only one: AMD is doing exactly the same: associate with Taiwanese manufacturers such as ASE, SPIL and Wiwynn with their Helios AI platform on the horizon (expected for the second half of 2026). That the two largest AI chip designers in the world strengthen ties with Taiwan is confirmation that the island’s industry is strategically necessary for the entire industry, not a particular bet by one firm. The elephant in the room: China. China’s role in this story is twofold: it is a threat and also a client. According to Reutersin 2026 Chinese companies have placed orders for more than two million units of the H200. Trade restrictions have made the operation difficult, but they have not been able to prevent it. One of the last cases point upon the arrival of a shipment of Nvidia AI chips to China via Japan. Nvidia lives in a contradiction from which it cannot escape: Its supply chain is on an island that China considers its own. China, which is its largest potential market, is blocked. Washington prohibits him from selling to Beijing while asking for independence from Taipei. And judging by his statements, Jensen Huang has bet everything on continuing to walk that wire. Yes, but. The Nvidia CEO forgot one problem in his speech: Taiwan makes the overwhelming majority of the world’s most advanced chips, but TSMC’s diversification into Arizona, Japan and Germany will not be ready before 2028 at best. That is to say, there are almost four years ahead in which Nvidia depends totally on Taiwan, a country that matters 97% of your energy. Furthermore, the atmosphere in the Strait of the same name is increasingly heated. Concentrating the production of its most critical component in a geographically hot spot is dangerous to say the least: if something explodes, there is no plan B. The closure of the Strait of Hormuz has reminded us of this the hard way. In Xataka | Huawei has found a way to counteract US sanctions: overcoming Moore’s Law In Xataka | US companies have always had a hard time making a lot of money in China. One industry is the exception: chips Cover | freepik and Jimmy Liao

The manufacturers promised them happy with “Ultra” phones up to the top of specs. The RAM crisis has other plans for them

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Being an Ultra is not usually the best, unless you are a mobile phone. For years, manufacturers have been throwing darts at each other, launching models designed by and to demonstrate muscle. There was a manufacturer who threw the first stone, and the rest began to follow him. Today, with the component crisis that AI is causing, are in danger. The beginning of everything. The first “Ultra” mobile phone on the market was the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra. The company did a fairly marketing exercise: 108 megapixel camera, 100x zoom… everything in a big way. Was it the best Galaxy to date? Yes. Was it a strategy to set a new industry standard through an even more striking surname? Also. China wakes up. China was quick to react to Samsung’s message. Xiaomi responded with the Xiaomi Mi 10 Ultraa phone that debuted 120W fast charging (absolute nonsense a few years ago), 120x zoom to surpass Samsung, and even a transparent finish to show off its hardware. It was the first Chinese mobile phone to fully enter the war: “we are going to put absolutely everything we can into a mobile phone, whether it is useful or not.” And from then on, the party began. Raised to the absurd. The war to launch increasingly powerful Ultra models is beginning to move away from its original objective. Samsung launched a first model with oversized specs, but with a certain commercial purpose. Manufacturers like Vivo launch phones like the 300Ultra They are sold directly in a kit that makes their price practically unattainable, and some of the direct rivals of Samsung and Apple surpass Western brands in price. Chinese manufacturers do not want to sell them, they want to continue demonstrating technological leadership. in check. As pointed out Ice Universethe flagship Ultra is in danger, and some of the big Chinese brands are considering pausing this product line. The Chinese Ultra is not born to sell in volume, and the Pro models or series number (Xiaomi 17simply) are those who are born to sell, even in China. The increase in costs of components such as internal memory or RAM makes launching Ultra models even more complicated, unless the manufacturer wants to raise the price to the absurd. Yes, but. Despite Ice’s predictions, it seems unlikely that the RAM crisis could completely knock down the Ultra models. Manufacturers have been betting for years on a strategy that allows them to reduce costs and continue advancing in their product line: launching exactly the same mobile year after year, but with some additional touches. This allows you to contain costs, recycle parts and reduce R&D spending, while maintaining memory configurations that cannot be reversed. Be that as it may, it seems inevitable that the RAM crisis will completely affect the mobile market, and that in 2027 we will see progress in dribs and drabs. In Xataka | The best mobile phones (2026), we have tested them and here are their analyzes

BYD promised them very happy by putting very advanced ADAS in very cheap cars. Until the RAM crisis came

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In recent years, BYD had turned its brand new advanced driving system into one of the biggest arguments to confront Tesla. And having this type of technology in affordable cars can be attractive to the consumer, but it has a cost that other companies can hardly absorb. BYD thought so, but the RAM crisis It has stopped him, and the context is now much more complicated. Prices go up. BYD just announced in China a 21% increase in the price of the ‘DiPilot 300’ option (basically its “God’s Eye” in its version with LiDAR), which goes from 9,900 to 12,000 yuan (about 1,560 euros). The company justifies the measure by the “significant increase in global storage hardware costs.” In other words, DRAM memory and storage have become so expensive that they can no longer absorb the cost without passing it on to the customer. Until now, no major manufacturer had so explicitly linked a price increase to the memory market, according to collect South China Morning Post. In detail. The ADAS Modern ones (and especially those that integrate LiDAR like those from BYD) are very demanding on memory. They need high-performance chips to process LiDAR point clouds in real time, run driving models, and store route data. The problem is that this same type of memory is being absorbed en masse by artificial intelligence data centers, which account for most of the global production of DRAM and NAND. The prices of these chips have entered what analysts call a “supercycle,” with increases that according to TrendForce are around 55-60% in conventional DRAM this year, but that in premium automotive segments (which also use DDR5) have reached up to 300% in free market price. A problem of scale. BYD’s colossal deployment makes the problem especially bulging in its case. The company has installed your “God’s Eye” system in more than 2.85 million vehicles as of March 2026, generating approximately 180 million kilometers of driving data per day, according to own data of the signature. At that scale, every extra cent in memory multiplies into millions. On the other hand, BYD closed the first quarter of 2026 with its worst net profit in three years: 4.08 billion yuan, a drop of 55% compared to the same period of the previous year, according to figures published by the company. In this context, maintaining prices without making a move has become unsustainable for the company. They are not alone. Chery, Xiaomi and the Huawei Aito brand prices have also increased on models with similar advanced driving systems in recent months. William Li, founder and CEO of Nio, counted in January that the biggest cost pressure of the year would not come from raw materials, but from memory. What changes for the buyer. The founding promise of “God’s Eye” was that autonomous driving would no longer be an expensive privilege. As we counted almost a year agothe experience of the system on the highway (even in the most economical model, the Dolphin Surf/Seagull, which sells for around 9,000 euros in China at the exchange rate) was genuinely impressive. Lane keeping was impeccable, autonomous lane changes were well executed and traffic management rivaled other premium range systems. BYD even planned to distribute it as standard in all its models, regardless of the price. Although that narrative is not dead, it is beginning to have nuances. At the moment, the version with LiDAR (the most capable) is already a payment option that has just become 21% more expensive. And now what. From Counterpoint Research they point that the blow will be uneven: low-end models simply will not carry this technology, and high-end ones have less price-sensitive buyers. The greatest impact falls on the mid-segment, where BYD’s value proposition was most disruptive. As the markets are, we will have to wait to find out what direction the company finally takes. Cover image | BYD In Xataka | Cuba is experiencing a brutal energy crisis, so a Cuban has used ingenuity to fuel his car: charcoal

Larry Ellison promised them very happy with his new luxury yacht named after a Japanese goddess. Made a rookie mistake

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In the world of technology, there are more or less discreet billionaires and then there is Larry Ellison. He millionaire founder of Oracle has made ostentation his watchword: has a private island (where he wanted to feed the world with a sophisticated 500 million dollar irrigation system), a long list of properties distributed throughout the United States and other countries such as Japan, an exclusive private jetand is also investing in the search for eternal youth. Of course, he also has boats: he currently owns the Musashi, which is his fourth superyacht. Love for ships and Japan. Ellison’s love for the sea dates back to at least the 90s, at which time he even became a sponsor of the BMW Oracle Racingwinner of the 2003 America’s Cup. His current superyacht is 88 meters long, cost him about 160 million dollars in 2011 and its name is clearly of Japanese origin. In fact, it is a tribute to one of the most famous samurai. Its interior also shows Japanese influences. In addition to the Musashi, in its history of boats with Japanese names there is the Sayonara sailboat, with which won several world championships racing, or the 75-meter superyacht Katana. But his first motor superyacht was the Ronin and it cost him some headaches. Ronin It means lordless samurai, but that was not his original name. It was conceived as Izanami. The impressive Izanami. In the late 90s Ellison set his sights on a superb second-hand superyacht called Izanami. Designed by none other than Norman Foster in the early 90s, built at the German Lurssen shipyard and commissioned by a mysterious Japanese businessman, it stands out for its defined geometric lines and its aluminum hull. It combines modernist architecture with great performance: at 59 meters in length, it was capable of reaching an impressive maximum speed of 34 knots. Inside, five cabins to accommodate up to 10 guests and 14 crew members in total. The mistake that no one saw coming. The name chosen by its original owner, Izanami, comes from Japanese Shinto mythology: the goddess of creation and death, consort of Izanagi. On paper, it fits like a glove: it is cultured, it is evocative… it fits for such a superb yacht. Larry Ellison paid 25 million dollars for it and was preparing to enjoy it when, docked in San Francisco Bay, in Sausalito, his name made a splash. If you read the name “Izanami” backwards you find a tasteless surprise: “I am a Nazi”, especially considering the German manufacturing and Ellison’s Jewish origins. Change of name and owner. The tycoon tells it in his authorized biography “Softwar: An Intimate Portrait of Larry Ellison and Oracle” from 2003: “When local newspapers started pointing out that Izanami was ‘I’m a Nazi’ spelled backwards, I had to choose between explaining Shintoism to reporters at the San Francisco Chronicle or renaming the ship.” He did the latter: Izanami became Ronin. Ellison enjoyed the Ronin until 2013, at which time He sold it to the Venezuelan banker Víctor Vargas and this one would later be sold to the Italian businessman Alessandro Del Bonothe CEO of the pharmaceutical company Mediolanum Farmaceutici. Today is for sale for 28.5 million euros. In Xataka | In 1988, Larry Ellison rented a Concorde and filled it with journalists just to say that Oracle 6 was going at supersonic speed. In Xataka | Larry Ellison has overtaken Mark Zuckerberg as the second richest man in the world. Their secret: building a home for AI Cover | Flickr and Lidija Jakovljevic

OpenAI promised them they would be happy selling hype and memes. Until reality hits

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The news of the weekend is Sora’s closure. What was once the platform of the hype Regarding video creation, he says goodbye, leaving agreements behind millionaires with giants like DisneyOpenAI’s promise to be one of the big players in text to video, and doubts about the company’s strategy. The bet on hype. For some time now, OpenAI’s strategy has been to create hype, be the protagonist in the conversation, and wait for the user to assimilate its proposal. The problem? It is a strategy that worked in its initial phases, when OpenAI played practically alone. We saw it with Sora: the launch was the most talked about on networks, television and practically all media. Months after its launch, there was no way to use the app without VPN outside the United States (and in a very controlled way through its app in countries such as Canada, Japan, Korea or Vietnam) and was still in the experimental phase. The closure. Sora hasn’t lasted even two years. It was born in February 2024 and says goodbye in March 2026. What was born as the reference model for video creation remained a half-baked experiment, while Chinese giants or Google itself with their models I see They advanced and landed their models on the plane that really matters: the one that allows the average user to access it. The competition tightens. OpenAI promised them happiness two years ago, when ChatGPT had hardly any rivals and companies like Anthropic were in their early product stages. But photography has changed in just a few months: Claude is becoming, with almost daily iterations, the most complete chatbot (it is already much more than that). Gemini has been starting to eat his toast for a year. China is absolutely unleashed launching spectacular video models like Seedance 2.0. AI solutions are no longer promises and hype: they are rapid and controlled launches, integrated into platforms that any average user can access. If you don’t integrate, you don’t win. Seedance 2.0 has not even been running for three months and already It is beginning to be integrated into editing programs such as CapCut. AIs like KlingAI have been integrated into gigantic platforms like HighsfieldAI for months. Releases that materialize a few days after seeing the light, and that lay tangible foundations for the state of AI in text to video. OpenAI assumed that a minority of professionals would be willing to pay for the more expensive versions of GPT to access Sora. The reality: the competition is managing to create much superior mass-use tools, and OpenAI cannot afford tools like Sora. The money is on the other side. Sam Altman need to redefine the strategy. For the moment, he wants double the company’s workforcecenter everything in one superapp that reduces catalog and he has his eyes on Spud. This is the name given internally to the next great AI model they are preparing, one aimed at making OpenAI finally a profitable company. After years without a fixed direction, and with its rivals eating its toast, OpenAI faces its most complex stage: one in which selling hype is not enough. In Xataka | Sora’s closure is a sign: OpenAI takes a step back in the AI ​​race to completely recalibrate

Apple promised they would be happy by sweeping the iPhone in China. Until Huawei made things clear

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For years, the iPhone was the best-selling mobile phone in China despite the efforts of Asian manufacturers. Xiaomi, Huawei, OPPO and Vivo were fighting to create a product at their level (or even superior in some key aspects, such as the camera), achieving privileged positions in a ranking in which Apple used to dominate. It’s not like that anymore. Again, king. Huawei has been in first place in shipments within its country for more than two years. This past 2025, despite having lost 1.9% in annual growth, it is still slightly above the iPhone company. Specifically, 16.4% market share compared to Apple’s 16.2%. Apple grows 4% year-on-year, an increase motivated by the great commercial reception of the new family iPhone 17. In fact, Apple has already surpassed Samsung and has become the first manufacturer worldwide, despite being the second in China. Yes, but. Although Huawei is reigning with an iron fistthe data is not enough to assert that this will continue to be the case next 2026. There has never been such a fierce fight between the main Chinese manufacturers. Huawei: 16.4% market share. Apple: 16.2% market share. Vivo: 16.2% market share. Xiaomi: 15.4% market share. OPPO: 15.2% market share. Minimal differences in quota that will translate into a constant dance of positions during 2026. There is a clear message here: Huawei has not been able to be stopped in its native country. The Huawei case. Vivo, Xiaomi and OPPO maintain a close relationship with Qualcomm, the giant in charge of providing the best high-end Android devices with the most powerful chips on the market. Meanwhile, Huawei has had to adapt to playing with more restrictions than the rest: has had to develop together with SMIC their own processors He had to create a software ecosystem completely independent of Android Almost completely redesign your supply chain Make an even more ambitious bet on your domestic market, where life without Google is the norm The surprise. For years, we have seen Chinese mobile phones as great high-end proposals, but with some important disadvantages compared to Western rivals (fewer years of support, mediocre video recording, “crazy” specs without any sense of assembly…). This has been changing for a while now.. Today (saving the subjectivity of which software we like more or less), Chinese mobile phones are the most ambitious hardware proposal overall. They have the best batteries on the market, by far. On a photographic level, they are beginning to move dangerously far from Apple, Google and Samsung. The hardware set usually far exceeds what we see in the rest of its rivals. Chinese brands are very focused on their expansion throughout Europe, and it shows. not so fast. The Asian market is a great mirror in which to see how the fight between large technology companies progresses, but its particularities are still there. On a global level, at least currently, Apple and Samsung seem practically unreachable. Only Xiaomi, with a 13% share worldwide (compared to Apple’s 20% and Samsung’s 19%), plays in the double-digit league. Vivo and OPPO, with a share of 8%, have not moved their position since 2023. By 2026, consultancies like Counterpoint expect a year of moderation and a poor growth forecast. The global price crisis in DRAM/NAND memories will force an imminent price increase. Whoever manages to contain the dam will win this year. Image | Xataka In Xataka | Chinese mobile phones conquered the market by dividing into a thousand different brands. Now they are doing just the opposite.

McDonald’s Happy Meals

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At the end of the eighties, batman It was not that perfectly oiled machine of franchises, shared universes and meticulous marketing, but rather a risky bet. Warner Bros decided to blow up the image camp inherited by Adam West and entrust the character to a guy like Tim Burtona director with a dark, gothic and deeply authorial imagery. The result was a success almost as famous as his fall into hell. When Batman stopped being sellable. As we said, the result of Burton’s hiring It was Batman (1989), a huge success that not only devastated the box office, but also legitimized superhero movies as more than just children’s entertainment. Burton not only redefined the character, he also laid the aesthetic and emotional foundations for everything. what would come next. Gotham became an architectural nightmare, Bruce Wayne a lonely and disturbed millionaire, and the genre took an irreversible leap toward maturity. Creative freedom and unbridled sequel. That success placed Burton in a unique position: almost total creative control for Batman Returns (1992). The director took advantage of the margin to go even further, delivering a film less interested in the hero than in his villains, more sexual if you will, but also more grotesque and uncomfortable. Danny DeVito’s Penguin was not a stylish eccentric, but an abandoned monster at birth, violent, repulsive and tragic. Catwoman, a broken and vengeful figure, and Gotham City a warped reflection of corruption, power and alienation. Batman Returns it wasn’t a children’s movie, and possibly I didn’t mean to be. Burton never conceived it as such, and in fact fought with censors and studios to avoid an even more restrictive rating. The clash with merchandising. The problem was not the movie itself, but everything that was built around. Warner Bros. activated a massive marketing campaign, supported by sponsors who had not seen either the script or the final cut. McDonald’s was the star partner. Gotham-themed restaurants, collectible glasses, toys and, above all, Happy Meals aimed at children between five and ten years old. The contradiction was total: a dark, disturbing film not recommended for children under 13 years of age sold as a familiar, colorful and sweetened product. The Penguin case was the breaking point. While Burton showed a villain on screen who bit noses and spit black bile, McDonald’s distributed a watered down version and almost endearing character in their children’s menus. The perfect storm: parents. The reaction it didn’t take long to arrive. Outraged parents, letters to newspapers like Los Angeles Timesreligious organizations and civic groups accusing McDonald’s and Warner of irresponsibility and deception. The question was always the same: how on earth was it possible for a movie full of nightmares to be actively marketed to young children? McDonald’s tried to defend himself claiming that the toys did not promote movie attendance, and Warner claimed that it had avoided using real elements from the film, something that was not entirely true. The damage, after all, had already been done. Batman Returns became a public relations problemnot because it failed at the box office, but because it didn’t fit the mold that marketing needed. Find a culprit. Fearing that the franchise would burn out in the long term, Warner Bros. opted to a radical turn. The solution was not to change the relationship between cinema and merchandising, but to change the tone and sacrifice the director. Tim Burton was removed from the saga on the grounds that his vision was “too strange” and unfamiliar. Michael Keaton, who did not want to continue without Burton, he also left. The message was clear: Batman had to be bright, accessible and, above all, sellable again. Joel Schumacher took over and the result was Batman Forevera film designed for please sponsors and fast food chains (and that today would embrace the algorithm), with bright colors, exaggerated humor and a tone that made any trace of Burton’s introspective and gothic Batman impossible. The Happy Meal as a symptom. Years later, Burton I would sum it up with irony and bitterness: he had upset McDonald’s. The famous phrase about “that black thing that comes out of the Penguin’s mouth” condensed the real problem. It was not just a fast food chain behind it, but the definitive clash between an artistic vision and an industry that was beginning to understand franchising. as merchandising platforms rather than as cinematographic works. In that sense, Batman Returns didn’t fail creatively, it failed as a children’s product, and that was inexcusable. The legacy. Burton’s departure marked a before and after. The saga entered into a drift that would culminate with the infamous Batman & Robin and their outfits with nipplesa cartoon that buried the character for years. Paradoxically, time has been generous with Batman Returns, today considered one of the films more personal and brave of the genre, and possibly one of Burton’s best works. Its “failure” was, in reality, the early demonstration of a conflict that would define Hollywood for decades: when superhero cinema stopped belonging to directors and began to respond, above all, to toys that had to fit in a Happy Meal box. Image | Warner In Xataka | In 1975 a party ended on the beach. What happened next was so chilling that people were afraid to swim in the sea In Xataka | The best advertisement within a movie is this science fiction classic: it was so good that it made us doubt the Nazis

Europe was happy with the changes in the App Store, but not with those in Google Play. There is a historic fine at stake

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Google is in the crosshairs of the European Commission. A few days ago they announced a new investigation into monopolistic practices with AI summaries, but it is not the only front they have open. The company has already paid historical fines and you face a new one if you don’t make changes to Google Play, your app store. what has happened. They tell it in Reuters. The European Commission is not satisfied with the changes that Google has made to its app store to comply with the Digital Markets Act or DMA. Regulators consider that there are two points that do not comply with the standards: There are technical restrictions that make it difficult for developers to direct users to external channels with better prices. Google continues to charge a commission to the developer even if the user buys the app from its website, with the excuse that they have “facilitated” the purchase. Why is it important. If Google does not make the necessary changes to comply with the DMA, it faces a fine that could amount to 10% of its total revenue. In 2024 they will invoice 350,000 million dollarsso the maximum fine would amount to 35,000 million, the highest to date. Google can still offer to apply changes to avoid paying the fine. The Apple case. The one the Commission is satisfied with is Apple. In fact, they are using your case as an example of what needs to be done. It was not a bed of roses and Apple was fined 500 million euros for not complying with the DMA. Apple had to remove restrictions that prevented redirection to alternative offers. The Epic trial. The European Commission is not the only one that has Google Play in its sights. In the United States, the judge of the Epic vs Google case made a historic decision: Google would have to allow rival stores within the Play Store. Recently Google and Epic reached an agreement through which Google undertakes not to charge commissions of more than 20% on purchases’in-game’ and 9% for the rest. In addition, developers will be able to showcase other payment systems through Play Billing. The agreement must still be approved by the judge, but it seems that Google will have no options but to comply with what both the judge and the EU ask of it. What Google says. The company announced changes in Google Play last August to avoid the fine, is what the Commission now considers insufficient. Google competition lawyer Clare Kelly said the company was “concerned that these could expose Android users to harmful content.” This is the usual position of American companies that are under the scrutiny of the European Commission. Mark Zuckerberg called the DMA “censorship” and there has also been harsh criticism and tariff threats since the Trump administration. Recently, a national security strategy document He claimed that European laws could mean an “erasure of American civilization.” The fruits of the DMA. He overregulation of the European Union is subject to criticism, but It also has a good side. Thanks to the DMA has made USB-C mandatory for all manufacturers, forcing Apple to abandon its proprietary connector. It has also brought us the Universal AirDrop and the changes in the app stores so that we have more freedom when it comes to where to download our apps. Image | Xataka, Pexels In Xataka | Europe wants to protect itself against Huawei, but the energy sector knows something uncomfortable: it cannot move forward without it

A beach bar in Malaga had the happy idea of ​​taking its ‘Sardinator’ robot for a walk. Until the police found out

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An establishment in La Malagueta decided to innovate when it came to attracting new customers with an advertising robot that wandered along the seafront, advertising mojitos, caipirinhas and espetos for four euros. Although the idea was striking and made heads turn among the local residents, the Malaga City Council has stopped the initiative. ‘Sardinator’ does not comply with municipal regulations and the Local Police have already reported the beach bar. The beach bar play. The robot, named Sardinator, walked along the La Malagueta promenade inviting people around to follow its voice to the beach bar. It wasn’t a waiter robot of those that serve inside the premises, but an autonomous device designed to advertise in the middle of a public street. It advertised drinks and food as it moved, although according to MálagaHoyhis ability to avoid obstacles left a lot to be desired: “he avoids trash cans, but he is not so skilled with people”, even tripping over a pedestrian. Why did the police intervene? Just like has shared The medium, Elisa Pérez de Siles, Councilor for Public Roads of the Malaga City Council, assured that this type of robots “are not authorizable” in the city. The use of the device on the promenade violates the municipal ordinance, which is why the Local Police were ordered to draw up a report and report the establishment. Although in other cities they are quite popular devices, in Malaga “there is an ordinance that must be complied with,” said the councilor. The political reaction. The municipal group Con Málaga has also focused on the issue. Its councilor, Toni Morillas, submitted a letter to the mayor asking about the robot after receiving complaints from neighbors who observed the advertising device “with astonishment.” Morillas even described the situation as “Málaga, the lawless city” on his social networks, according to inform MálagaHoy, highlighting the concern over the lack of control over this type of initiatives on public roads. The legal loophole of advertising robots. The case of Sardinator is something very specific and Spanish legislation does not yet specifically contemplate autonomous advertising robots on a public road. Municipal ordinances regulate outdoor advertising through urban planning licenses, but these regulations are designed for static elements such as fences, signs or posters. Many ordinances expressly prohibit the distribution or delivery of brochures and advertising on public roads, and even advertising in circulating or parked vehicles except for very specific exceptions. The boom of robots in hospitality. Sardinator does not seem to have had the same luck as other robots that have had growing popularity, such as those who work inside serving at the tables. In Spain, waiter robots are being introduced mainly in fast food restaurants, chains and some fine dining restaurants. Cities such as Madrid, Barcelona, ​​Valencia or Seville have already seen the introduction of these robots in several establishments. The fundamental difference here is that these robots move in controlled private spaces, not on public roads, which avoids conflicts of this type. Without going any further, in Malaga, there are several establishments that have incorporated this type of robots, although never outside the premises, as is the case of Sardinator. How they work. Waiter robots are designed to take orders from the kitchen to the customer’s table, following already marked routes and avoiding obstacles. The manufacturers are mostly of Chinese origin, including PUDU Robotics with its Bellabot and Kettybot models, Orion Star with Lucky, and Keenon, although there are also Spanish companies such as DAX Robotics with its Delibot and Slimbot model. The prices of waiter robots range between 6,000 and 15,000 euros, and they can support up to 60 kilos of load. They are equipped with LIDAR laser sensors and 3D cameras to move autonomously and safely. Robots as an alternative to labor shortages. The labor shortage in the Spanish hospitality industry, which affects more than 60% of businessesaccording to the Bank of Spain, means that this type of device could end up being an effective alternative. This is not about replacing staff, but about easing the burden due to the difficulty in finding waiters and qualified staff, which is why many establishments are turning to service robots as support. Although they are not yet a complete substitute for human interaction nor are they profitable for all establishments, these robots may end up representing a pragmatic response to a structural problem. And now what. The La Malagueta beach bar will have to return to traditional advertising methods or look for alternatives that respect the regulations. Meanwhile, ‘Sardinator’ has stopped touring the promenade and his catchy “mojito, caipirinha, daikiri” promotion is no longer heard in the area. Let’s give a minute of silence for our friendly friend. Cover image | Javier Albiñana In Xataka | The crazy story of the Galician woman who registered El Sol before a notary, sold plots online and then took eBay to court

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