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Germany does not want to depend on Elon Musk for war. So the largest weapons factory in Europe wants a “military Starlink”

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For decades, European security has rested on critical infrastructure controlled from the United States. But with the war back on the continent and space communications becoming a decisive military assetGermany is beginning to assume that it cannot afford depend on Elon Musk nor from Washington for something as basic as talking and fighting in case of conflict. A “military Starlink”. Rheinmetall and OHB are in preliminary talks to present a joint offer to create a satellite communications network in low orbit for the Bundeswehr, a system that in Berlin already is openly described as a “Starlink for the German army”. The initiative aims to capture part of the ambitious German plan for invest 35,000 million euros in military space technology, with the aim of providing a secure, sovereign infrastructure specifically designed for military use, reducing dependence on US services such as Starlink, owned by SpaceX. Technological sovereignty. The background of the project will be one of the great themes of this 2026, and it is both strategic and political, since the war in Ukraine has shown to what extent satellite communications in low orbit can be decisive when terrestrial networks are destroyed or degraded. Although Starlink (and its military version Starshield) became in a key asset for kyiv, many European countries distrust to base critical capabilities on a foreign private provider, which has accelerated plans to build national or European networks under state control. The weight of Germany. With this program, Germany aims to become the third largest investor world in space technology, only behind the United States and China, according to the consulting firm Novaspace. German military authorities have already defined the technical specifications and are preparing the tender, prioritizing coverage of NATO’s eastern flank, where Berlin deploys a permanent brigade of 5,000 soldiers in Lithuania as part of its defensive reinforcement. From armored to space. Traditionally associated with tanks, artillery and ammunitionRheinmetall is rapidly expanding its presence into new domains in the heat of German rearmament. At the end of last year it obtained its first major space contract, up to 2,000 million eurosto develop together with Iceye a constellation of radar satellites capable of operating at night and in bad weatherwhich puts it in a solid position to now aspire to a military communications system in low orbit. HBO and opportunity. For HBOthird largest European satellite manufacturer and navigation system supplier Galileothe project represents a key opportunity to strengthen its military business. The company faces the possible creation of a European space giant as a result of the merger of the divisions from Airbus, Thales and Leonardoan operation that its CEO considers potentially anti-competitive and that could leave OHB at a disadvantage if it does not expand its scale and capabilities. Boiling market. The simple announcement of the talks has OHB price skyrocketedreflecting the extent to which the sector perceives German military space spending as a catalyst for opportunity. That said, the project is still in an early phase, with no official comments from the companies or the Ministry of Defense, and is part of a growing competition for multi-million dollar contracts that will define who controls future critical military communications infrastructure in Europe. Image | Support Forces of Ukraine Command In Xataka | Germany is experiencing a new “industrial miracle” that it already experienced 90 years ago: that of weapons In Xataka | Europe’s largest arms factory faces an unexpected problem: earning an indecent amount of money

Japan has attempted to power up the world’s largest nuclear power plant. It only lasted a few hours

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The nuclear debate, which Japan thought closed, returns to the scene. The recent authorization to reactivate Kashiwazaki-Kariwa, the largest atomic plant in the world, has set off alarms: citizen distrust, the shadow of Fukushima and doubts have surfaced about whether TEPCO (Tokyo Electric Power Company) is the right company to lead the country’s new energy stage. Fifteen years of waiting for a reboot that didn’t even last a day. In Niigata, reactor number 6 went from complete silence to emergency shutdown in less than 24 hours. The failure, located in critical safety systems, has turned the great revival energetic of Japan in a lesson in technical fragility. A slow giant. Kashiwazaki-Kariwa had not produced a single kilowatt since 2012. That closure was not an isolated event, but the shock wave of Fukushima in 2011, which put all reactors of similar design in the spotlight. But for TEPCO, this complex of seven units and more than 8,000 MW is much more than energy: it is its financial lifeline. According to Japan Forward estimatesthe electricity company needs these reactors to inject some 100,000 million yen annually into its coffers, essential oxygen to pay the endless bill for the dismantling of Fukushima Daiichi. The Japanese Government, under the command of Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, has positioned this reopening as a strategic pillar. The objective is ambitious, in saying that nuclear energy represent 20% of the energy mix by 2040. This energy is needed to power new AI data centers and semiconductor factories, thus reducing dependence on imported fossil fuels, made more expensive by the fall of the yen and current geopolitics. Chronicle of a fleeting reboot. The reactivation process of reactor No. 6 was marked by setbacks even before it began. The restart, initially scheduled for Tuesday, January 20, had to be postponed one day after it was detected that an alarm designed to warn of the accidental removal of control rods did not work during the tests, as reported by The Japan Times. After correcting this error, operations formally began on Wednesday at 7:02 pm. At 8:28 pm, the reactor reached the “critical state” (sustained nuclear fission). However, the celebration in TEPCO’s control rooms – where staff tensely monitored screens – was short-lived. At 12:28 a.m. Thursday, just 16 hours after the start, an alarm sounded again. This time it indicated a failure in the engine control panel that operates one of the reactor control rods (the devices that regulate or stop the nuclear reaction). TEPCO attempted to replace electrical components and inverters, but the anomaly persisted. Given the uncertainty, the company announced a “planned temporary shutdown” to reinsert the control rods and stop the fission, a process that concluded Friday morning. “We do not assume that the investigation will be resolved in one or two days; at this time we cannot say how many days it will take,” admitted Takeyuki Inagaki, director of the plant, at a press conference. Security under suspicion. Although TEPCO maintains that the reactor remains under control and without leaks to the outside, the incident has served to poke into a wound that was never closed. It is not just the present that is worrying, but a tarnished record: just five years ago, the Financial Times I already put the focus on the plant after a security scandal where an employee circumvented access controls using a foreign identification, revealing the fragility of its surveillance systems. However, distrust does not only fall on TEPCO. The Japanese nuclear sector is experiencing a systemic credibility crisis. Earlier this month, Chubu Electric admitted to manipulating seismic data to minimize the impact of potential earthquakes at its Hamaoka plant, leading the Nuclear Regulatory Authority (NRA) to describe the act as “scandalous” and to suspend its security review after a decade of paperwork. A divided society in Niigata. Outside the plant and at TEPCO headquarters, protesters like Yumiko Abe, 73, express their indignation: “Electricity is for Tokyo, but we in Kashiwazaki run the risk. It doesn’t make sense.” The figures support this discomfort. According to surveys cited by South China Morning Postabout 60% of Niigata residents oppose the restart. Furthermore, 70% of citizens fear that TEPCO will not be able to manage an emergency based on its history. On the other hand, prominent seismologists warn in the Financial Times that the plant is located near an area of ​​very high seismic risk where a large earthquake could cause billions of dollars in damage. The future of the atom in Japan. The path to full operation of Kashiwazaki-Kariwa is once again up in the air. While TEPCO makes cost cuts of 3.1 trillion yen To fund the decommissioning of Fukushima, the NRA has promised strict on-site inspections to verify corrective actions following this latest failure. Experts like Dr. Florentine Koppenborg suggest that this “nuclear renaissance” It could be just a “drop in the ocean” as security costs have skyrocketed and public trust remains at rock bottom. Japan is at an energy crossroads: the urgency to decarbonize and feed its technology industry collides head-on with the memory of a disaster that, 15 years later, is still very present. The Kashiwazaki-Kariwa giant has shown that, in nuclear energy, the distance between strategic success and technical failure is measured in the sound of a single alarm. Image | IAEA Imagebank Xataka | Here is news that will surely reassure you: Europe’s largest nuclear power plant is running on diesel generators

They are the largest product experiment in the world

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Tu Le, founder of Sino Auto Insightshe explained in the podcast High Capacity How what Toyota took 36 months or more to develop (from design to production), companies like BYD or XPeng complete in 12 or 16 months. Modular platforms, digital simulations, OTA updates… all of this has replaced classic industrial processes. And they test features that almost no Western manufacturer would dare to include. Why is it important. What Toyota took three years to develop (design, prototype, validate, produce…), companies like BYD or XPeng execute in just over a year. And without reducing quality. What they do is change the process: They use modular platforms that stretch without redesigning everything. Digital simulations instead of physical prototypes. And software updates that improve the car after purchasing it, as Tesla already marked the rest of the industry. It’s a real-time product experiment. If a feature is unused or buggy, they send an OTA update after a few days. If a model is not selling well, they update it in 12 months. It is the logic of consumer electronics applied to the car. In detail. Chinese cars incorporate features that in the West might seem absurd or reckless. BYD, for example, sells models with drones on the roof that can fly out following us. NIO installs chips whose performance is disabled for months until an update activates them, which serves to increase the value of the car over time instead of simply depreciating it. They are proposals that reflect that they understand a consumer much younger than the average Mercedes buyer in Europe, hyper-digitized and accustomed to everything responding instantly. BYD’s ultra-fast charging promises times “as fast as refueling gasoline”. XPeng and NIO assisted driving systems They already operate on long-distance trips with minimal driver intervention. The aforementioned Tu Le and his colleague Lei Xing drove from Beijing to Shenzhen using the XPeng system for 90% of the trip. They then repeated the route on a NIO using only battery swapping. Both experiences worked. Between the lines. The founders of these companies do not come from the automotive world. Li Xiang (Li Auto), Li Bin (NIO) and He Xiaopeng (XPeng) come from the world of the Internet and apps. When they decided to make cars, they didn’t start thinking about factories or supply chains. They thought about user experience, interface and functionality. Then they learned to manufacture from that. This change in the process explains a lot: a traditional manufacturer begins to optimize thinking about industrial efficiency, one born in technology optimizes for the user and then decides how to take that to production. The context. China sold 25 million vehicles in 2025. One in every two was electric or hybrid: more than 12 million units. In that mass market, any product experiment has instant and scale feedback. If something works, it is replicated within weeks. If it fails, it is corrected just as quickly. BYD went from 700,000 units six years ago to 4.6 million in 2025manufacturing its own chips and batteries. Vertical control that allows you to iterate faster than any competitor dependent on external suppliers. And now what? Volkswagen invested in XPeng and will launch vehicles based on its platform this year. Stellantis bought 19% of Leapmotor in 2023. Ford licensed battery technology from CATL in 2022. They are implicit recognitions that the Chinese experiment works and the West needs to learn from it. Renault directly went there Learn how to build a cheap electric car in a short time. The question is not whether Chinese cars are better, but whether the rest of the industry can adopt this model of accelerated development without breaking everything built over a century. In Xataka | The year of Chinese consolidation in Spain: MG, Omoda and BYD close a spectacular 2025 and are among the best sellers Featured image | XPeng

China bets on liquid air to stabilize its largest solar sea on the roof of the world

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In the vastness of Qinghai province, where the Tibetan plateau merges with the Gobi desert, dust and rock they have given up their domain to a mega-project of 610 square kilometers. This “sea of ​​silicon”—the size of the city of Madrid—is home to seven million photovoltaic panels that have transformed the ecosystem: the shade of the plates retains humidity and allows thousands of “photovoltaic sheep” graze today where before there was only sand. However, this massive deployment encountered a physical barrier. As researcher Wang Junjie explainssolar and wind energy are “random and intermittent”; When the sun sets in the Gobi, the power grid shakes. To stabilize this giant, China has gone beyond conventional lithium, betting on liquid air storage. White giants in the desert. On the outskirts of the city of Golmud, a row of white tanks stands sentinel against the horizon. It is the world’s largest liquid air energy storage (LAES) project, dubbed by Chinese media as the “Super Air Power Bank.” According to the Xinhua agencythis facility of the state-owned company China Green Development Investment Group (CGDG) has entered its final commissioning phase. It is not just any battery: its capacity is 60,000 kilowatts (60 MW) and it can release up to 600,000 kWh per cycle, a discharge capable of sustaining the daily consumption of tens of thousands of homes. Physics against lithium. Why has China opted for this technology instead of its popular lithium ion batteries? The answer lies in scale and geography. While lithium is ideal for mobile devices or cars, on an industrial scale it faces cost and degradation problems. Air has an advantage that is difficult to match: it is there and it costs nothing. AND, as CleanTechnica remindswhen it becomes liquid air its density skyrockets, up to 750 times more than that of normal air, which allows energy to be stored in large quantities without dams or geographical conditions. The alchemy of cold: From gas to liquid at -194°C. The operation of the system is a feat of cryogenic engineering. As detailed by Xinhuathe process is divided into three critical phases: Load (Compression): During the day, surplus solar from a nearby 250 MW plant powers giant compressors. The air is purified and cooled to -194 degrees Celsius (-317°F). At that extreme temperature, the air becomes liquid. Heat recovery: The heat generated during compression is stored in high-pressure spherical tanks to be reused. Discharge (Expansion): When electrical demand rises or the sun disappears, the liquid air heats up. When vaporized, its volume expands explosively (750 times), driving a turbine that generates electricity again for the grid. This cycle, according to researcher Wang Junjieachieves over 95% cold storage efficiency and 55% “round trip” efficiency, harnessing what would otherwise be waste heat and eliminating the need for rare materials. A global laboratory on the “roof of the world.” China is not the only nation in this race. The United Kingdom waits to complete a similar plant in Manchester by 2026, and South Korea too has made progress in this technology. However, the Chinese scale is, again, incomparable. However, the success of these projects in Qinghai is due to centralized planning which combines three sources: solar, wind and hydroelectric. At 3,000 meters above sea level, the cold, pure air improves the efficiency of the panels, and the electricity generated is already 40% cheaper than that of coal. This energy not only illuminates homes; It powers the data centers that power China’s Artificial Intelligence, using the plateau’s frigid air to cool the servers. From the factory to the engine of the world. As Professor Ningrong Liu reflectsChina no longer wants to be just the “factory of the world”, but the “engine” of that factory, exporting its engineering and its green network model. Golmud’s project It is the symbol of a paradox: the country that emits the most CO2 is also the one that builds the fastest carbon exit. In the silence of the Gobi, between cryogenic tanks and sheep herders, China is demonstrating that the air we breathe can literally be the fuel that sustains the 21st century. Image | freepik and Bureau of Land Management Xataka | On the roof of the world, China is building the largest solar park on the planet

This is the largest battery-powered locomotive in the world

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There are places where scale determines everything, and Port Hedland is one of them. At this point in the northwest of Australia, a locomotive has appeared that seeks to make its way into a territory dominated for decades by diesel. Progress Rail presents her as the locomotive battery-powered electric largest in the world, and the relevant thing is that it is not enough for a photo, but to fit into a real mining operation. It’s the kind of move that, if it works, could have practical implications in a sector little given to change. From an industrial point of view, the key is not only that the locomotive exists, but that it is already in the place where it is expected to work. Fortescue says that These electric locomotives are intended to operate on its mining network with the stated goal of reducing the use of fossil fuels and improving the energy efficiency of the railway system. The interest of the announcement lies in this direct application, in an infrastructure designed for constant and demanding loads. From now on, it will be the actual operation that will determine whether this bet can be scaled beyond the first units. From diesel to batteries at the heart of Australian mining The locomotive that has arrived in Western Australia It is an EMD SD70J-BBone of Progress Rail’s developments in railway electrification using batteries. On a technical level, it combines an eight-axis architecture with a high-capacity battery, which in the Joule series can reach 14.5 MWh. Regarding weight, Progress Rail speaks of 265 tons in a recent communication, while its technical sheet for the model places it at 245 tons, a difference that the documentation itself does not clarify and that may depend on the configuration. The route followed by the locomotive helps to understand where this initiative is. Shipped from Sete Lagoas, in Brazil, the unit was transported by sea bordering Africa, passing through South Africa, before arriving in Australia. This type of logistics is common when dealing with individual teams and not entire fleets, and fits with the idea of ​​​​a gradual introduction. The move alone suggests that the project is still in an early phase of operational deployment. Fortescue defines these units as Battery Electric Locomotives, or BEL, a concept that transfers principles already known in other electrical fields to heavy rail. In this case, the locomotive runs on energy stored in batteries and recovers part of that energy during brakingan especially relevant aspect on loaded and sloped routes. The company has pointed out that This system makes it possible to recover between 40% and 60% of the energy used, although this figure depends on the profile of the line and the type of operation. Fortescue’s environmental speech accompanies this deployment with ambitious figures. The company ensures that your Electric locomotives could collectively eliminate about a million liters of diesel each year, provided they operate according to planned scenarios. It has also highlighted that the energy used comes from its own renewable infrastructure in the Pilbara, a key element for the reduction of emissions to be effective. Progress Rail set the noise level of this locomotive below 70 dB during operation, a low record by heavy rail standards. In comparative terms, a conventional diesel locomotive is usually above this threshold, especially during acceleration and low-speed work. This difference is not only a matter of comfort, but also influences working conditions in industrial environments where machines operate for long shifts. The acoustic reduction thus adds to other operational changes derived from electrification, beyond energy consumption. From a technical point of view, the most direct comparison is with heavy-duty diesel locomotives that dominate railway mining today. These machines stand out for their autonomy and known logistics, while the electric alternative introduces new variables, such as the management of stored energy and recharge times. Compared to hybrid proposals, which combine thermal engines and batteries, the SD70J-BB is committed to a completely electric scheme, with fewer elements associated with combustion and with the potential to simplify part of the maintenance. In return, dependence on energy infrastructure and stricter planning increases. The arrival of these locomotives cannot be understood without the role of the companies involved. Progress Rail, acquired by Caterpillar in 2006offers diesel locomotives and also alternatives such as batteries, hybrids or hydrogen, and is now seeking to place these solutions in high-demand environments. Fortescuefor its part, is trying to reduce the energy footprint of one of the most intensive logistics chains in mining, and fits these units into its public narrative of decarbonization. From now on, the focus shifts to the operation. It remains to be seen how this locomotive will behave in continuous service, what its real availability will be and what demands it will add in maintenance and energy infrastructure. It will also be key to observe whether the estimates on fuel savings and efficiency are confirmed with data accumulated under real load conditions. Images | Progress Rail In Xataka | Traveling by train is no longer about reaching a destination: the La Robla Express is the “slow luxury” getaway for 1,300 euros per person

Spotify has suffered the largest music theft in history. One that confirms that most of their catalog is never heard

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Anna’s Archive was already known by literature lovers, who turned to this repository to be able to access books of all kinds without having to pay for them. Now they want to achieve the same thing with music, and they have taken a colossal and disturbing step: stealing practically the entire Spotify catalog. What is Anna’s Archive. Anna’s Archive project appeared on the scene in late 2022, shortly after legal pressure managed to knock down the Z-Library platformone of the largest websites for downloading free books. The platform works as a metasearch engine that allows you to find books and then download them. Anna’s Archive does not host these files—which, according to the project, exempts it from legal responsibility—and links to different anonymous download providers, which is where users can obtain them. Until now the platform focused on books, but that has changed. The biggest music theft in history. In a post published on his blog official this weekend, those responsible for Anna’s Archive indicated that they have made “a backup copy” of Spotify that includes both metadata and music files. Not only that: it is indicated that they are distributing all this information through torrent files, and the total download takes up 300 TB of data “grouped by popularity.” 86 million songs. They call it the first music “preservation archive” in history and it has 86 million music files. Although that figure is only 37% of the songs in Spotify’s entire catalog, according to Anna’s Archive they account for 99.6% of listening on Spotify. And here there are two important things: on the one hand, music as such. And on the other hand, the metadata that surrounds that music, and that offers very interesting information about Spotify’s music catalog. The top 10,000 popularity. Thus, at Anna’s Archive they wanted to organize that archive based on “popularity”, a metric that they use in Spotify to order the songs that are listened to the most and how recent those plays are. Those responsible for Anna’s Archive have compiled a gigantic list with the 10,000 most popular songs according to this metric. Lady Gaga, Bad Bunny and Billie Eilish occupy the top three positions, for example. This graph reveals how song popularity demonstrates the long tail phenomenon. Only 62 songs exceed 90 points. Three out of four songs are not heard. By grouping songs by popularity, the metadata reveals and confirms the traditional long tail phenomenon. More than 70% of the songs in the Spotify catalog are barely listened to (less than 1,000 plays), and there are so many that are popular or that they had to cut the gigantic file (it would have been 700 TB) to end that representation of 99.6% of songs that have minimal popularity on Spotify. That does not mean that they are better or worse, be careful: it just means that they have been heard more or less on the platform. We all hear (more or less) the same thing. Most listens come to songs with popularity between 50 and 80, and here comes an expected figure: of the 86 million songs, only 210,000 exceed 50 popularity (0.1%). Or what is the same: almost everyone basically listens to a very small set of songs compared to the size of the catalog. How much is each song listened to? Those responsible for Anna’s Archive claim that it is possible to estimate the total number of views per song thanks to popularity. They gave the example of the first three: ‘Die with a smile’ (Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars), 3,075 million views ‘Birds of a feather’ (Billie Eilish): 3,137 million views ‘DtMF’ (Bad Bunny): 1,124 million views Between the three of them they accumulate as many listens as the songs that are between number 20 and number 100 million have. Once again, the long tail in action. Analysis everywhere. These metadata are very useful, and Anna’s Archive has produced a unique report in which they reveal conclusions based on the data collected. Thus, you can confirm how the most common length of songs is around 3:30 minutes, how there are numerous duplicates per song (licenses, versions, etc.), which ones are the most popular genres between artists or how most of the songs on Spotify are singles, and not part of an album. These metadata are a true treasure for market researchers. Downloading (for now) only in large torrents. At Anna’s Archive they have not published almost any of the torrents so far, but they have already indicated how they will offer those 300 TB. First, the metadata in a 200 GB file, which is already being shared by about 200 people. Then the music in various batches organized by popularity. Finally, some additional metadata and content like album art designs. Time will tell if those 86 million songs end up being available on some type of platform that links them to download individually. At Anna’s Archive that does not seem to be the intention, at least for now, and at the moment the metasearch engine focuses strictly on books. What Spotify says. As they point out in TorrentFreakthose responsible for Spotify have launched an investigation, and as a result have “identified and deactivated the accounts of malicious users who were participating in illegal scraping activities.” They have also implemented new measures to prevent these types of attacks and “are monitoring suspicious behavior.” Image | Sumeet B In Xataka | The chaos of streaming is causing a phenomenon that we thought was in recession: downloads are increasing

Dreame seeks to become the third largest in China along with Xiaomi and Huawei. Far away from wanting to be the new Dyson

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Dreame is a Chinese manufacturer that has crept into the European conversation based on muscle. Muscle for the home, specifically. Founded in 2015, it soon emerged as a serious rival of Dyson thanks to its numerous vacuum cleaners of all kinds and beauty devices. Now it has been filtered the Dreame E1, the company’s first mobile with which they seek to replicate the strategy of the “Apple from China”. They no longer want to be Dyson, they want to be Xiaomi. The Dreame E1. In September, Dreame dropped the bomb: robot vacuum cleaners They were going to move into the smartphone segment and electric cars. Since then, Dreame’s phone had kept a low profile, but it recently appeared in the European database EPREL with the name ‘W5110’. We have to wait for the official announcement, but it seems that it will have a AMOLED screen 6.67 inches, a 108 megapixel main camera, a 4,850 mAh battery and only 33 W charging, as well as seven years of system updates. This would aim to satisfy European regulators. Divide the world. Its features are not revolutionary and the sketches look like those of a Samsung Galaxy S25but it is a first step. No price or key details such as the processor or something so on everyone’s lips like the RAM memorybut in an internal communication, the CEO of Dreame pointed out high: they want to be one of the three tigers of consumer technology. The other two would be Huawei and Xiaomi, companies that have been shaping an ecosystem in which a multitude of home devices are controlled by a single brain: the mobile phone. In a scenario in which we can have our house full of Dreameit is a vision with all the sense in the world. 1+8+N from Huawei. Many devices, a single brain Xiaomi, the birthplace of Dreame. To understand this strategy, it is essential to understand the model that Xiaomi has been developing for more than a decade. The company began by selling its own products, but also making investment strategies in promising startups, like Dreame. These companies developed a product and gained access to Xiaomi’s distribution network, but also to its name. A rice cooker from an unknown company does not attract attention. One from that same company, but under the name Xiaomicalls much more. This way, the risks are also lower. And, precisely, Dreame manufactured vacuum cleaners that they formed part of the Xiaomi ecosystem while simultaneously operating its own catalog. It is something that explains the rapid growth of many Chinese brands, something impossible, or very difficult, if they had operated independently from the beginning. Roborock too was in that Xiaomi ecosystem. Meteoric. The rise they have achieved since their independent birth has been brutal. According to some analyses, Dreame is the third manufacturer of robot vacuum cleaners with a share of 11.3%. They only have Ecovacs ahead with 13.6% and Roborock with 19.3%. In Europe they are very well positioned, reporting great growth in revenue during the first half of this year, and the consequence is what we saw during the presentation at the IFA a few months ago. The mobile phone will be the control center, that N+1 that we have seen in companies like the aforementioned Xiaomi or Huawei, and at the German fair they announced that, along with the consolidation of their personal care range, robot vacuum cleaners, vacuum cleaners, lawnmower robots and pool cleaner, will launch in Spain in the coming months televisions, air conditioners, dishwashers and kitchen appliances. They are already at itwith small appliances, accessories and even smart lighting. In this photo the ecosystem is that of Xiaomi. It could easily be Dreame’s future. Image | Xataka Ford already said it. It is, as we said, a carbon copy of the strategy that has worked so well for Xiaomi. They entered with competitive technology at a good price to gain market share and customer loyalty, and now they want to expand the ecosystem with all types of connected devices. It is a strategy within the reach of not all companies, but it is drawing the attention even of people like Jim Farley. Farley is the CEO of Ford and, in his quest to understand why chinese cars are winning toast to Westerners, he has been driving the Xiaomi SU7. Apart from other characteristics, what impresses him most is the ecosystem: With your cell phone you control the car, and from the car you control the house. Ambition. Given this, the fact that a robot vacuum cleaner manufacturer launches a mobile phone is not a surprise and responds to a strategy in which manufacturers want us to have a house full of their devices, controlling everything from a single app. And, if possible, from your mobile. And it is not surprising if we look at the investment figures in research and development. Dreame has 5,000 employees and 60% of its staff is dedicated to R&D. They invest 7% of their annual income in this segment and it is evident that Dreame wants to stop being the Chinese Dyson. It wants to be the new Xiaomi. Images | HuaweiXataka, Dreame In Xataka | A Chinese company you don’t know makes 35% of all microwaves in the world. Probably yours too

Telefónica leaves Wall Street through the back door. Goodbye to almost four decades in the largest market in the world

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Telefónica has started the procedures to delist your shares from the New York Stock Exchangewhere it has been listed since 1987. The securities will stop trading on Wall Street in a matter of days once the documentation is filed with the SEC. The telecom will only maintain its listing in Madrid, in the Spanish continuous market. Why is it important. The movement closes a symbolic chapter that began when Telefónica became the first Spanish company to be listed on the largest market in the world. But the symbolism was left behind: today maintaining that presence involves high administrative costs and regulatory demands that no longer compensate. The trading volume in New York is residual and investor interest is practically non-existent. The context. Telefónica’s stock has fallen more than 90% in the last fifteen years. Its current valuation is on the floor, very far from that giant that in the nineties became the most valuable company in Spain. The dividend, which for years was the main attraction for conservative investors, has been successively cut, the last time this quarter. Buying in Madrid is more direct, cheaper and with the same liquidity as in New York, where securities are hardly traded. Between the lines. This decision fits into the strategic plan presented in November by Marc Murtra, focused on aggressively reducing costs. Telefónica has been lowering its blinds on all fronts: Sold subsidiaries throughout Latin America except Brazil. Reduced the dividend. Presented an ERE which is ending its negotiation phase. And now it is abandoning stock markets where being present no longer adds value. Also will stop trading in Lima. The figure. 4,554 departures are contemplated by the ERE that was agreed this Wednesday with the unions, 26% of the workforce in Spain. Cost savings are the obsession of the new management: 3 billion annually until 2030. Yes, but. Investors who have ADR certificates (American Depositary Receipts) will be able to exchange them for common shares in Spain or hold and trade them in US over-the-counter markets. Telefónica will provide both options, although it is evident that it prefers the first. The background. The exit from Wall Street is not an isolated or recent decision: The telecommunications sector has lost interest from investors, especially in Europe. It is a mature business, highly regulated, with tight margins and little ability to surprise. Telefónica today is a very different company from the one that debuted on Wall Street: smaller, more regional, more European. Its new strategy focuses on four markets (Spain, Germany, the United Kingdom and Brazil) and on consolidating itself as a reference operator with profitable scale, in addition to increasing its focus on technological solutions. Marking agenda. Wednesday’s day at the Distrito Telefónica offices north of Madrid was hectic. The contrast. When Telefónica went public in New York in 1987, it placed certificates worth $375 million, the largest influx of European capital on Wall Street up to that time. The telecom was then majority owned by the State and its debut was seen as a milestone of internationalization. Today it leaves unnoticed, recognizing that the regulatory burden and administrative costs of the SEC outweigh any benefits. Go deeper. The obligation to report detailed information to the SEC was useful at the time: thanks to it, data such as the price that STC or SEPI paid to enter the capital were known, information that the Spanish CNMV would never have required to reveal. But that level of transparency also has a cost, and Telefónica has decided that it is no longer worth paying for. In Xataka | The Government has had an idea so that the next blackout does not leave us without mobile data: let the operators pay Featured image | Telefónica, Lo Lo

The bridge with the largest steel span has completed its most difficult challenge. And it’s in China, of course.

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There is not a month that does not release one mega constructionand in that area, China leads with an iron fist. Both due to the magnitude of his works, the technique used or the land they save with the structurethe Asian giant has become an example of perseverance when it comes to creating, above all, infrastructure that connects all its regions. After the highest bridge in the world, in the province of Chongqing, they are involved with another record-breaking bridge. One with the largest steel span in the world. Fenglai Daxi River Grand Bridge. As is often the case with these works, something that stands out as much as its magnitude is the construction time. In just three years, they have up a bridge in an extremely complex area. It clears two cliffs and the causeway will be 310 meters above the water surface. But more than because of the terrain, if it is news for something, it is because of the opening, that space between two columns. The total length of the bridge will be 1,136 meters when it is finished and the span is almost half of it: 580 meters that are suspended leaning on an arch-shaped structure made of steel. The height The arch in its central part is 116 meters and both the photos and videos show the complex lattice-type structure. Precision. More than a whim, it is necessary if you want to bridge that distance while looking for a bridge that can withstand both the weight and the possible tremors that are frequent in the region. To build the structure, engineers turned to BIM methodology (either Building Information Modeling) that simulates by computer all the processes of both the construction of the structure and its future maintenance. This is common, but essential in this lattice structure where many embedded components require an accuracy of less than a millimeter of deviation. On November 28, the team complete the union of each of the pieces weighing more than 300 tons that form that great puzzle of the lattice span, and now it remains to create the road that will consolidate the union between regions. Necessary. Because the Fenglai Daxi River Grand Bridge is not simply a feat of engineering: it is a catalyst for something China is aggressively pursuing. The country wants to carry out an economic and social transformation of the most challenging regions of its geography, and the Chongqing region falls into those plans as it has a large number of mountain ranges that have traditionally challenged communication with large centers. When completed, the bridge will be part of the Wu-Liang Expressway that will link the urban center of Chongqing with the Wulong district in approximately one hour, when with the current detour it takes approximately three hours, having to do a mountain route. And it is just one piece of a much more ambitious plan, which includes 52 construction projects, more than 1,200 kilometers of highways and a total investment of 155 billion yuan, about 19 billion euros. Megathings = tourism. Thus, the bridge will seek to become an element that will facilitate the flow of goods between the regions, but also of people with the objective of promoting tourism. Currently, in Wulong About 350,000 people live there and it has traditionally been a poor area due to the soil not being the best for farming and its natural isolation. However, since 1994, tourism has transformed it, especially since the Karst Geology National Park out including on the UNESCO World Heritage list in 2007. Now, Wulong aspire to become a global tourist destination, and this improvement in infrastructure seems key to achieving that goal. Furthermore, it is no longer just that China’s megaconstructions facilitate mobility: The buildings themselves are designed with the aspiration that they become points of interest. An example is Huajiang Grand Canyon Bridgean immense construction 625 meters above the level of the river that is used to cross from one side to the other, but It has a cafeteria and some adventure activities. Another is the Three Gorges Damwhich can not only move the axis of rotation of the Earthbut it also has a museum that documents the construction, an example of how the dam itself works and multiple observation points. Images | Xinhua Sci-Tech In Xataka | Young tourists from China have begun to visit random places en masse. There is an explanation: Xiaohongshu

The largest glacier in Spain is in its final death throes, and this marks a before and after in the Pyrenees

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Although it may be a bit unknown, in Spain we have a glacier: the Aneto glacier, which is located in the Pyrenees. but there is bad news regarding its continuitysince although we knew that it was doomed to disappear, the reality is that the speed at which it is doing so is faster than we expected. And the latest data that has been known is clear: it has been definitively fragmented. It’s a reality. Although it may be an appreciation of veteran mountaineers who are already tired of seeing it, the reality is very different. The conclusion has been drawn after decades of LiDAR data, photogrammetry with drones and analysis of satellite images from 1981 to 2022 which confirm that the Pyrenean colossus has entered a phase of irreversible collapse. In this way, what was once a continuous mass of ice that flowed down the mountain is today an archipelago of fossil ice fractures that is doomed to disappear. Catastrophic data. Thanks to all the technological means that have been used to monitor this glacier, it has been possible to make a chronology of everything that has happened. And in a single year, the ice masses of the Pyrenees They have lost an average thickness of more than one meter. In specific points, the loss of ice reached four meters, which is equivalent to one and a half floors of a building. But the important thing is that this large amount of ice has disappeared in months. The most worrying thing is that this has occurred in a year that was not especially bad in terms of levels nor did it have the extreme heat waves of 2022. It is simply that the system could no longer take it. An evolution. If we look back, in 2022 the Aneto glacier lost a large lower area. But now the body has split in two so the Aneto is three disconnected masses of ice. And this has consequences even in the name, since the smallest part, under the Collado de Coronas, now stops being a glacier and becomes a glacier. If we continue looking back, there are figures that justify this thaw, since since the final of the little Ice Age in the mid-19th century and until 2017 the temperature of the area increased 1.14ºC. However, the turning point is clearly detected in the 1980s, with a dramatic acceleration of the decline starting in 2000. The technology behind. What differentiates this monitoring from observations made in the last century is its precision. The Cryopyr team It is not limited to driving stakes into the snow and seeing its level. It has been decided to use LiDAR technology and programmed drone flights to create digital models of the terrain. These studies, supported by publications in The Cryosphere and Naturehave made it possible to map not only the surface, but also the basal topography. Thanks to this, we know what is under the ice before it melts. And the most shocking thing is that the ice no longer flows. This is very important because a glacier is defined by its movement; When the thickness decreases so much, gravity stops pushing it down the slope. It stagnates. It turns into fossil ice obscured by dust, which absorbs more solar radiation (lower albedo) and melts even faster. And this is what has already ended up condemning it to its disappearance without anything being able to be done to reverse it. The case of Ossoue. If the Aneto is the symbol, the Ossoue glacier which is located on the border of Spain and France, is undoubtedly the sign that anticipated what was going to happen. This is because it has been the most affected of the season with average losses of 3.5 meters thick. And here history gives us a striking visual reference. In 1882, Earl Henry Russell ordered caves to be excavated on the rock at ice level to celebrate parties. Today, these caves are inaccessible holes hanging tens of meters high above the current ice. The future. What will be left when the ice is gone? This is the mandatory question after seeing this piece of ice melt in the coming years. The answer is that we will see lakes that will appear in the high mountains. And we already have a preview of what we will see what the Innominatea lake with turquoise waters that was formed in 2015 at 3,150 meters above sea level and is considered the highest in the Pyrenees. Despite being beautiful, we must not forget that it is the liquid “corpse” of what was once an ice giant. When will it arrive? There is no exact date on which this disappearance will end. What is known from the most recent reports is that if temperature and precipitation trends continue along the same path, all the Pyrenean glaciers will disappear within 10 years. Images | Pablo J Danis Joan Brebo In Xataka | The Arctic was one of the few corners safe from invasive species thanks to the cold. Until climate change came

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