plan

China already has an army of 5.8 million engineers. His new plan involves accelerating doctorates

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China has a plan to win the technology race, one that began more than 40 years ago when decided to invest in training millions of engineers. We have seen it in the signings of the Meta superintelligence teamwhere the vast majority are Chinese. Chinese universities have a new plan to further accelerate the attainment of doctorates, one that puts aside theory to focus on practice. What is happening. They tell it in South China Morning Post. China is implementing a new policy that affects STEM students pursuing doctorates. The title PhD or ‘Doctor of Philosophy’ is the highest academic rank that can be obtained and until now required the development of a thesis. With this change, led by Harbin University of Technology, engineers can earn the PhD degree with the development of real products and systems. First case. The first student to achieve the PhD based on practical results was Wei Lianfeng last September. He graduated in 2008 and joined the China Nuclear Institute, where he worked for more than a decade until he decided to return to university to pursue his PhD, which he earned for his results in developing a vacuum laser welding system. To evaluate their work, the court that attended the oral defense included industry experts. Why is it important. The training of technical talent has been a priority for China for decades and more recently they have redoubled their efforts. In 2022, the government launched a program to promote STEM education especially in strategic areas such as semiconductors and quantum computing. Among the key points of the plan was close cooperation between companies and universities for joint training. This measure is the culmination of this strategy and the recognition that theoretical knowledge is not enough to compete in the technological race, especially with US blockades of key technologies. This allows China to solve the bottleneck in graduating higher-ranking engineers; It is not only about training more engineers, but about training them as soon as possible and with solutions that can be applied to the real world, instead of theses that are hundreds of pages long. STEM Power. The push to train engineers and scientists is part of a long-term government plan that began in the post-Mao era. And the plan is going from strength to strength. If we focus only on doctorates, according to data from 2023, China awarded 51,000 doctorates (PhD) in STEM careers, while the US was at 34,000. The projection at that time was that by 2025 the figure would rise to 77,000. In terms of total figures, In 2020, China was already the country that produced the most STEM graduates throughout the world with an abysmal difference: 3.57 million compared to the 2.55 million that India produced or the 822,000 in the United States. At the moment China already has 5.8 million graduates and it is estimated that more than 40% of all graduates choose a STEM career. Image | Joshua Hoehne in Unsplash In Xataka | Silicon Valley has a problem: its engineers are beginning to look to the other side of the Pacific. Specifically towards China

China does not want to give up ground as the world’s factory. Their plan involves deploying a legion of industrial robots with AI

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For years, looking at the label of any device, garment or charger has been almost a formality. The answer used to be the same: “Made in China“. That phrase became silent proof that the Asian giant had managed to establish itself as the factory of the world. From American brand mobile phones to small components of European appliances, much of what we use every day has come from Chinese production lines. But that reality is beginning to change. China’s industrial leadership is no longer sustained solely by abundant labor and low costs, and the model that dominated the last decades needs to be transformed. The shift is not only economic, but also social. Fewer and fewer young Chinese want to work in factoriesa phenomenon that in the United States follows similar patterns: physical jobs, long hours and little professional projection. In both cases, the industry is no longer synonymous with progress for many and is perceived more as a destiny from which one tries to escape. Even so, both China and the United States consider that manufacturing remains strategic, either to maintain global influence or to reduce dependence on foreign countries. Everything indicates that none of them are trying to recover the model of the past, but rather to build a new one based on automation and artificial intelligence. Robots and factories to avoid losing “Made in China” When the Chinese Vice Minister of Industry, Zhang Yunming, said that Adopting artificial intelligence is a necessary and not optional task, I was not speaking only in technological terms. He was referring to protecting one of the country’s great assets: its manufacturing industry, which represents around 25% of the national economy, well above the world average. China remains the world’s largest producer, but it can no longer rely solely on volume or labor. The challenge now is to maintain that leadership by manufacturing with fewer people and more artificial intelligence. In this context, China is responding decisively. The pace at which it is deploying industrial robots is unmatched. Last year alone it installed 295,000 units, almost nine times more than the United States and more than the rest of the world combined. according to the International Federation of Robotics. In some facilities there is already talk of “dark factories”, operations so automated that the plants can operate with minimal human intervention. The Wall Street Journal mentions the Baosteel caseone of the largest steel plants in the country, where workers only intervene every half hour, when before they did so every three minutes. Automation no longer consists only of mechanical arms that repeat movements, but of connected plants, capable of making decisions. The aforementioned newspaper points out how Midea uses an AI system that coordinates robots, sensors and virtual agents to detect failures, assign tasks and adjust processes without human intervention. In the textile industry, Bosideng uses AI models developed with Zhejiang University to conceptualize and design garments, reduce development times and cut costs. This type of solutions not only speeds up production, it also generates a competitive advantage over Western manufacturers that implement changes more slowly. Where China’s industrial ambition is also clearly seen is in the ports. In Tianjin, a fleet of autonomous trucks moves containers without visible human presencewhile artificial intelligence optimizes variables such as ship arrival times and crane capacity. The system, called OptVerse AI Solver, has compressed planning tasks that previously took 24 hours to about ten minutes. PortGPT, a system developed together with Huawei to analyze images and monitor security operations, has also been deployed. The American discourse is based on the idea of ​​sovereignty: manufacturing more within the country to depend less on the outside. The Trump administration has raised that strategy through tariffs on China, Vietnam and other Asian economieswith the aim of attract factories and rebuild supply chains. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick maintains that automation is not incompatible with employmentbut it can generate better-paid technical professions. In an interview he stated that “it is time to train people for the jobs of the future, not for those of the past,” and defended that these factories could support families for several generations. One of the differences between the two models is clearly seen in the ports. While China has deployed autonomous trucks, AI-based planning systems, and tools like PortGPT without significant union opposition, in the United States automation is subject to collective bargaining. The International Longshoremen’s Association and port operators they agreed to veto new automated terminals until the end of 2030, also limiting the use of artificial intelligence in administrative tasks. For unions, automation means losing jobs and bargaining power. For China, it is a national strategy. China wants to continue being the world’s factory, but not exactly the same. It is no longer about cheap labor, but about factories capable of producing more with fewer people and with more artificial intelligence. The United States seeks its own path, with more work conditions and a different rhythmbut with the same objective of not depending on the outside. What is at stake is not just where it is manufactured, but how. And it is possible that, in a few years, the label we find will not only be “Made in China”, but a different form of manufacturing where robots will no longer be accessories, but protagonists. Images | Homa Appliances | Xataka with Gemini 3 In Xataka | Nexperia China has been trying to contact the Dutch headquarters for days. The only response has been absolute silence

Reopening nuclear power plants sounds very spectacular, but Google has a plan B in case it’s not enough: solar energy

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Data centers for are insatiable monsters those who are responsible for them must feed. OpenAI, Meta, Microsoft, xAI, Anthropic and Google are burning money riding colossal data centers for training and management of artificial intelligence. But these installations are not expensive to set up: they are also expensive to maintain. They require a considerable amount of energy to functionand Google has just received a ‘shot’ of renewables. All thanks to a direct connection to the largest system in the United States. Renewables to power AI. Google and TotalEnergies have just signed a agreement of energy purchases for 15 years. The contract stipulates that the energy company will deliver 1.5 TWh of electricity from its Montpelier solar plant, in Ohio, to Google. The plant is still under construction and they estimate that it will have a capacity of 49 MW, but the most important thing is that it will be connected directly to the electricity system. PJM. It is the largest network operator in the United States. It covers 13 states and data centers are representing a relevant portion of the operator’s pie: in its last annual auction, the load of these facilities PJM capacity sale triggered at 7.3 billion dollars, 82% more. Astronomical needs. In the statement from TotalEnergies, the company that this agreement illustrates its ability to meet the growing energy demands of the major technology companies. The problem is that it is not enough. If we focus on Google, the consumption of its data centers was 30.8 million megawatt hours of electricity. The company has been focused on AI for years, but the recent ‘boom’ has made it double what its centers consumed in 2020 (14.4 million MWh). Currently, data centers are estimated to account for 95.8% of Google’s total electricity budget. But it’s not just Google: the International Energy Agency esteem that global data centers consumed 415 TWh last year, representing approximately 1.5% of global electricity consumption. It seems little put in percentage, but Spain consumed in 2024 231,808 GWh, or 231 TWh, in 2024. The data centers of a handful of companies alone consumed twice as much as an entire country. And the estimate is that this data center consumption will double by 2030, reaching 945 TWh. Renewables are not enough. Now, although renewables are a support for the total energy required by data centerssolar and wind power have two limitations: intermittency and variability. Generation depends on weather conditions and time of day, meaning it fluctuates dramatically even throughout the same day. This instability clashes head-on with the high reliability and availability requirements of data centers. These are installations that must operate continuously and cannot assume cuts or Unforeseeable drops in supplysince AI or cloud storage would suffer the consequences. These renewables require backup batteries, but it is complicated and expensive to have such a large number of batteries just to power data centers. Pulling the gas and looking at the nuclear. That’s where other sources come into play. On the one hand, nuclear. In October 2024, Google signed the world’s first corporate agreement to acquire nuclear energy from SMR reactors. The first will come into operation in 230 and it is expected that, together, they will be able to satisfy the technology company with 500 MW of capacity by 2035. On the other hand, natural gas. In October of this year, the Broadwing Energy Center project began, a new natural gas power plant that will have a capacity of 400 MW and is scheduled to come into play at the end of 2029. Decarbonization and pressure. And the big question is… doesn’t the use of gas for AI clash with the technology companies’ objectives of achieving decarbonization percentages for both 2030 and 2050? We have already seen that oil companies have been getting off the renewables bandwagon because they have seen that fossil fuels are still relevant in the technology industry, but in the case of Google, they rely on the fact that projects like the Broadwing Energy Center They will have CCS systems. This means that it will have carbon capture system that will be able to permanently “sequester” 90% of the emissions. It means burying the problem, literally, since the CO₂ will be stored a mile underground. In 2020, before the AI ​​boom, the company established the goal of operating with carbon-free energy 24 hours a day, seven days a week by 2030. It will be interesting to see how they plan to offset these emissions thanks to renewables, but the IAE estimates that the demand for data centers will not stop growing in the short term and that adds another problem: a increased pressure on the electrical grid which is added as another element to manage. Because the big underlying problem is that the demand for energy is growing at a faster rate than the capacity to generate new electricity, and it is something that has an impact on companies’ bills, but also in homes. Images | Unsplash, Google Data Center In Xataka | China does not have a spending problem with AI. What it has is a huge income gap compared to its main rival

The US industrial plan is crumbling because it is being eaten up by a new sector: that of insatiable AI

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Generative AI is stupid. Is Yann LeCun’s opinionone of the godfathers of the artificial intelligencewhich has grown tired of how the AI ​​majors seek AGI and it seems that he is going to set up his startup to achieve it. To make AI more “smart” you have to train it, and for that you have to build data centers. And boy is it being done. To the point that there are already those who calculate that the rise of AI threatens the plan of reindustrialization of the United States. AI walks or doesn’t walk. The United States has a plan: invest whatever it takes to achieve superintelligence before China. China is also investing, but while what it seeks is a cheap and functional AI to monetize nowwhat the US wants is artificial general intelligence, or AGI. That costs money and, above all, investment in huge data centers. One of the Donald Trump’s election promises During his two campaigns he orbited around the commitment to return millions of jobs to Americans. To achieve this, the opening of new factories on national soil through tax incentives and an “America First” policy that we have seen echo in the rest of the world in the form of tariffs. In Xataka SoftBank has always been characterized by very risky investments. And now he just abandoned NVIDIA Capital redistribution. ANDfactories are opening and reopeningbut perhaps not as many expected. In Bloomberg They point to a devastating fact: spending on new data centers has increased by 18% in the last seven months. This is a colossal increase, but it goes hand in hand with another fact: spending on new factories has fallen 2.5% this year. While large technology companies are committed to building data centers, the policies of recent months, immigration restrictions, withdrawal of support for electric vehicles and tariffs are generating uncertainty in the market that slows down investment aimed at opening other types of factories. Not only are factories not opened, but they are laid off. American manufacturing heavyweights are not only facing the biggest corporate tax hike since the 1990s, but are estimated to have lost 38,000 manufacturing jobs this year. Mostly in sectors such as electronics, automobiles or household appliances. In August alone, 12,000 people lost their jobs (and why don’t we include those from the video game industry here…). In Xataka Quietly, the great AI industry has found a gateway to Europe: the United Kingdom brutal difference. Estimates suggest that the monthly spending of manufacturing plants will situates at $18.8 billion, but while the trend is downward, if we look at spending on AI, we see a radically different scenario. Among the big four technology companies (Amazon, Microsoft, Meta and Alphabet) $400 billion will go to AI infrastructure in 2025 alone. This is an increase of 60% compared to last year and it is not a peak: it is something sustained. In fact, the investment in 2026 is expected to be higher. There are other companies with their own plans, such as OpenAI what is the most valuable private company and can afford lose 11.5 billion in just the last 90 days which is making an investment of between 400,000 and 500,000 million dollars between 2025 and 2027. {“videoId”:”x9sjece”,”autoplay”:true,”title”:”CHINA is WINNING the TECH WAR because they planned it that way 10 YEARS AGO”, “tag”:”china”, “duration”:”721″} Help Uncle Sam. This AI boom is driving other directly linked sectors, such as the construction of the data centers themselves (someone has to build them as long as they do not use already manufactured facilities) and that of energy. Because these facilities need ridiculous amounts of energy to runso much so that Google wants to take them to space and China is submerging them in the sea to spend less on dissipation. Thus, reopening nuclear power plants or investing in modernizing gas turbines to supply data centers is on the horizon, but it is still something that does not impact the American worker, they are not new factories that need personnel. And part of the money needed is coming from the state itself. Recently, AMD announced that the United States Department of Energy had allocated 1,000 million public to power the infrastructure. And both OpenAI and NVIDIA have dropped the need for the United States to get involved to sustain this new industry, which is already awakening bubble feelings. In Xataka While the US reopens nuclear plants, China has already resolved the great limitation to the development of AI: energy Echoes of the 2008 blow. When we talk about such astronomical figures, it is very difficult to get an idea. It was already happening with the 70,000 million dollars that Microsoft paid to take over Activisionand if we now go to amounts of 400,000 or 500,000 million, things are going to get worse. What is evident is that, as we say, these investments fly over the fear of the bubble bursting. If in July of this year 37% of fund managers believed that we were facing a bubble, in October the figure increase up to 54%, although from the technology industry itself It seems that there is no one who brings sanity. Because it is spending a lot, a lot, more than during the dotcom era which did not end too well for many, and even figures as interested as Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, have commented that, while it is true that many are oversizing their investments, it is better than being left behind. Only time will tell how everything turns out, obviously, but the article Bloomberg It closes in a quite interesting way. Arno Hill, former mayor of Lordstown, a municipality where there was a large GM plant already closed and which is now part of SoftBank and Foxconn’s plans to create a data center, says that he does not know what will happen with AI, but that people will always need cars. Image | Google Data Centers In Xataka | The world of AI has a problem: there is no energy … Read more

Having China manufacture its cars in Europe seemed like a perfect plan. Until they were filled with Chinese workers

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Manufacture their electric cars in Europe so that they can sell them without tariffs. That was the promise of the European Union to Chinese manufacturers. The objective was to consolidate the electric car industry for Europe in Europe, closing the door to proposals from China at a much more attractive price. And the result is not what was expected. Manufacture in Europe. In October 2024, the European Union confirmed the tariffs to all the companies that bring their electric cars from China. Including European ones. With this measure that applies individually to each company (ensuring that not all have received the same benefits from the Chinese State) it was intended to attract factories to Europe. Why does an electric car have less autonomy than advertised? The strategy has gone well. First, because the Chinese State ordered to stop all investments in Europe that were in the negotiation phase, initially turning off the tap. Secondly, because it is not clear that the installed factories are giving great results in terms of employment. From China for Chinese. “There are currently manufacturers in Europe that assemble Chinese cars with Chinese components and Chinese personnel: this happens in Spain and Hungary. This is not right.” The words are from Stéphane Séjourné Vice President of Prosperity and Industrial Strategy of the European Commission, in an interview for the Italian newspaper La Stampa. In it he pointed out Spain and Hungary as the two hot spots. In this second country, BYD is building its first plant in Europe to produce electric cars. In Spain we have the Chery plant in Barcelona and, under construction, the CATL battery plant in Aragon. In all previous cases, criticism has multiplied because they are not impacting the area as expected. The Hungarian case. Séjourné refers to the plant that BYD has planned in Hungary. There, the Chinese company is building a factory that should produce 150,000 cars a year (with potential for 300,000 units) and employ 10,000 workers. However, the European Union is studying if the Chinese giant is receiving covert subsidies to carry it out, paralyzing its construction. In the early phases of the project, BYD has employed about 1,000 workers Chinese which has raised the suspicions of the European Commission as to whether there is really an intention to produce wealth on European soil. some of them They staged protests last summer by claiming that they had been fired just six months after joining despite receiving promises of large salaries upon arrival in Europe. BYD is at the center of controversy because the European Commission suspects that in the future Chinese workers may be the majority at the plant, since they would aspire to lower salaries. The company, yes, He already promised that he would employ local workers to advance vehicle production. The question is whether this first hiring of Chinese personnel responds to the start-up of the factory or the advancement of a way of acting that extends over time. The Spanish case. In Spain, two factories have concentrated China’s interest. The first to arrive was the one from Chery to Barcelona. There, the Chinese company has found that it already had the necessary machinery to remove cars from it since it responds to the occupation of the old Nissan plant. However, the plans are not meeting the expected deadlines. Chery is assembling kits of cars in Barcelona. That is, the car arrives in large pieces to Spain and is finished being assembled here, so the local impact is reduced. In this case we are not talking about employment but we are talking about the fact that the network of suppliers generated is minimal. The European Commission did not like this and, in fact, the electric Omoda 5 has been delayed in Barcelona because the regulators threaten to impose tariffs on them when they understand that the added value is zero. The other point of friction is that of CATL in Aragón. The Chinese battery producer announced an agreement with Stellantis to produce there the components that the automotive giant will use in its small cars. For now, we know that 2,000 Chinese employees will arrive and, again, the shadow of what impact the new factory will have on the local labor market is looming. According to T&Eit is not guaranteed that the CATL plant will guarantee long-term knowledge transfer. More pressures. In addition to the statements by European regulators, other voices have also raised their voices. France is one of the countries that is most under pressure to create a new category of cars to make electric vehicles cheaper. Their proposal is that they meet certain size requirements… but also that production be entirely European. These days, Josep María Recasens, president of Renault Spain, returned to the charge ensuring that “we cannot allow China to come to Europe to make four plates with wheels without added value.” In his statements he asked that Europe force Chinese companies to associate with European ones so that there is a transfer of knowledge as China itself demanded from Europe when its manufacturers began to produce on Asian soil. Photo | Official Lula on Wikimedia and BYD In Xataka | China is manufacturing many more cars than the world wants to buy. And that is a foretaste of serious problems.

China has a plan to repeat with cars what it already did with cell phones. And that plan has already begun

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It is more than likely that, wherever you look, see chinese technology. Maybe it’s your cell phone, your tablet or your television. You may be surprised that your microwave with a Japanese or American name is actually made by a chinese company. Or your refrigerator, air conditioning, whatever. China has conquered the world of technology and that, at this point, does not surprise anyone. Nor will it be surprising that the Asian giant wants to get involved to the kitchen (literally) and, in the case at hand, even our garage. Because yes, China has been promoting a plan since 2015 to lead several key technological industries (which is what it means to be the largest producer of batteries in the world) and one of those industries is the car. And we are already starting to see it. From the mobile phone to the washing machine and the car China understood very quickly that the future of cars was not in combustion, a market largely led by a well-established European industry. but in electricity. China took a shortcut. The state subsidized every stage of the chain, from mines and loading docks to battery factories and start-ups. We have the clearest example in BYD, which went from manufacturing mobile batteries to being the spearhead of the Chinese electric car. The Chinese market, however, is very saturated. Despite its huge population, there are 150 car brands in the country, so competition is fierce. Thus, China began to look outwards. And it went very well. In 2023, China surpassed Japan as the world’s leading car exporter and the next logical stop was Europe. The Chinese proposal was simple: offer technology, design and autonomy at a much lower price than local and Western proposals. Spain was the gateway with companies such as BYD, OMODA, JAECOO, XPENG and MG filling dealerships, something that translates into a considerable drop in average prices of 12%. In just a few years, the market share of these brands has skyrocketed from 2% to 7%, a figure that rises to 14% if we take plug-in hybrids into account. You still have time to get your tickets for the gala Xataka NordVPN Awards 2025 on November 20 in Madrid! Join us and discover the best technological products of the year in a free event full of gadgets, humor and surprises. Advice offered by the brand And how is that possible? Because China has something that Europe does not have: total control of the production chain. They extract, produce, manufacture and assemble. They can also access affordable financing, free land and subsidiary energy. Companies compete under exceptional conditions with each other, encouraging price cutting and innovation. Not even tariffs can stop China’s advance. China, in fact, has not trembled when it comes to open factories on our continent to manufacture from within and, in the process, sow the seed of a more or less silent conquest. This is just a preview of a much longer report that you can see at the video on these lines. In Xataka | I have ridden a 100% autonomous XPeng Mona in a Chinese city. Tesla and Europe have a problem

Apple has a plan to fix Siri. One that aims to make Google even richer, according to Bloomberg

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Apple Intelligence was introduced in 2024 with great promises. The main one, a Siri completely renewedmuch more capable and versatile. As it turned out, what they showed was a fictitious demo and the new Siri was delayed until 2026. Apple has lost the AI ​​raceat least in the first round, but they already have a plan to recover. One that involves delivering 1 billion a year to Google, all while they continue developing their own model. The agreement. Account Mark Gurman at Bloomberg that Apple is about to close a deal with Google worth $1 billion a year. This will allow them to use Gemini’s AI model to power their Siri assistant, especially in the planning and summary functions, which are what allow the assistant to execute more complex tasks. Apple has been evaluating other competitors such as OpenAI and Anthropic, but has finally settled on Google’s Gemini. The new Siri is expected to arrive in spring of next yearalthough nothing is confirmed. Conditions. The agreement does not involve integrating Gemini as an assistant in iPhones, but rather it will be integrated into Siri and will also do so from Apple’s private servers. This will separate user data from Google’s infrastructure. Furthermore, Gurman says that they are not going to publicize the agreement as they did when Google became Safari’s default search engine; in this case it will be a “behind the scenes” agreement. Temporary solution. Apple does not plan to use Google’s model forever as they are developing their own language model in parallel. We don’t know much about what it will be like, just that it will have 1 billion parameters and they hope to have it ready next year. Apple sources believe that it will have a level of quality similar to that of the Gemini, but for now there is nothing to prove it. Taking into account Apple’s AI stumbles We would not be surprised if the promise of its own model ends up being diluted. Additionally, the company has lost at least three key AI executives because Zuckerberg signed them for his superintelligence team. China. The agreement has a problem and that is that Google services are banned in China, so the new Siri would arrive with modifications to comply with this restriction. It is said that heThe Chinese version could have its own models and a local filter developed by Alibaba. China is a key market for Apple and the latest results do not leave them in a good place. That the new Siri arrives “captured” in China could have more negative consequences. Images | Wikipedia In Xataka | Apple has lost the throne it held for a decade. And the Chinese brands no longer even let it be second

AI data centers consume too much energy. Google’s ‘moonshot’ plan is to take them to space

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Training models like ChatGPT, Gemini or Claude requires more and more electricity and water, to the point that the energy consumption of AI threatens to exceed that of entire countries. Data centers have become real resource sinks. According to estimates by the International Energy Agencythe electrical expenditure of data centers could double before 2030, driven by the explosion of generative AI. Faced with this perspective, technology giants are desperately looking for alternatives. And Google believes it has found something that seems straight out of science fiction: sending its artificial intelligence chips into space. Conquering space. The company Project Suncatcher has been revealedan ambitious experiment that sounds like science fiction: placing its TPUs—the chips that power its artificial intelligence—on satellites powered by solar energy. The chosen orbit, sun-synchronous, guarantees almost constant light. In theory, these panels could work 24 hours a day and be up to eight times more efficient than the ones we have on Earth. Google plans to test its technology with two prototype satellites before 2027, in a joint mission with the Planet company. The objective will be to check if its chips and communication systems can survive the space environment and, above all, if it is feasible to perform AI calculations in orbit. The engineering behind the idea. Although it sounds like science fiction, the project has solid scientific bases. Google proposes to build constellations of small satellites—dozens or even hundreds—that orbit in compact formation at an altitude of about 650 kilometers. Each one would have chips on board Trillium TPU connected to each other by laser optical links. Such light beams would allow satellites to “talk” to each other at speeds of up to tens of terabits per second. It is an essential capability to process AI tasks in a distributed manner, as a terrestrial data center would do. The technical challenge is enormous: at these distances, the optical signal weakens quickly. To compensate, the satellites would have to fly just a few hundred meters apart. According to Google’s own studyKeeping them so close will require precise maneuvering, but calculations suggest that small orbit adjustments would be enough to keep the formation stable. In addition, engineers have already tested the radiation resistance of their chips. In an experiment with a 67 MeV proton beam, Trillium TPUs safely withstood a dose three times higher than they would receive during a five-year mission in low orbit. “They are surprisingly robust for space applications,” the company concludes in its preliminary report. The great challenge: making it profitable. Beyond the technical problems, the economic challenge is what is in focus. According to calculations cited by Guardian and Ars Technicaif the launch price falls below $200 per kilogram by the mid-2030s, an orbital data center could be economically comparable to a terrestrial one. The calculation is made in energy cost per kilowatt per year. “Our analysis shows that space data centers are not limited by physics or insurmountable economic barriers,” says the Google team. In space, solar energy is practically unlimited. A panel can perform up to eight times more than on the Earth’s surface and generate almost continuous electricity. That would eliminate the need for huge batteries or water-based cooling systems, one of the biggest environmental problems in today’s data centers. However, not everything shines in a vacuum. As The Guardian recallseach launch emits hundreds of tons of CO₂, and astronomers warn that the growing number of satellites “is like looking at the universe through a windshield full of insects.” Furthermore, flying such compact constellations increases the risk of collisions and space debris, an already worrying threat in low orbit. A race to conquer the sky. Google’s announcement comes in the midst of a fever for space data centers. It is not the only company looking up. Elon Musk recently assured that SpaceX plans to scale its Starlink satellite network—already with more than 10,000 units—to create its own data centers in orbit. “It will be enough to scale the Starlink V3 satellites, which have high-speed laser links. SpaceX is going to do it,” wrote Musk in X. For his part, Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon and Blue Origin, predicted during the Italian Tech Week that we will see “giant AI training clusters” in space in the next 10 to 20 years. In his vision, these centers would be more efficient and sustainable than terrestrial ones: “We will take advantage of solar energy 24 hours a day, without clouds or night cycles.” Another unexpected actor is Eric Schmidt, former CEO of Google, who bought the rocket company Relativity Space precisely to move in that direction. “Data centers will require tens of additional gigawatts in a few years. Taking them off the Earth may be a necessity, not an option,” Schmidt warned in a hearing before the US Congress. And Nvidia, the AI ​​chip giant, also wants to try his luck: The startup Starcloud, backed by its Inception program, will launch the first H100 GPU into space this month to test a small orbital cluster. Their ultimate goal: a 5-gigawatt data center orbiting the Earth. The new battlefield. The Google project is still in the research phase. There are no prototypes in orbit and no guarantees that there will be any soon. But the mere fact that a company of such caliber has published orbital models, radiation calculations and optical communication tests shows that the concept has already moved from the realm of speculation to that of applied engineering. The project inherits the philosophy of others moonshots of the company —like Waymo’s self-driving cars either quantum computers—: explore impossible ideas until they stop being impossible. The future of computing may not be underground or in huge industrial warehouses, but in swarms of satellites shining in the permanent sun of space. Image | Google Xataka | While Silicon Valley seeks electricity, China subsidizes it: this is how it wants to win the AI ​​war

Iryo arrived in Spain with a very ambitious plan to tighten the screws on Renfe. It has just asked its Italian parent company for a ransom

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Iryo has a problem in Spain: it can’t get clients. Or, we should say, it does not get enough clients to start making its railway project profitable in our country. Its occupancy rate in each and every one of the corridors is better than that of Renfe or Ouigo. In some cases it is certainly worrying. This is leading it to lose tens of millions of euros. And they have already asked Italy for help. 32 million euros. They are the ones that Iryo has lost in 2024. The losses are added to the 79 million euros that the company already lost in 2023 and the occupancy rates of 2025 are not inviting optimism. Although the company defends that They aim to be profitable this yearthe truth is that they had to pick up the phone and dial a number that begins with +39. Help. The call for help has reached Italy. In November 2024Trenitalia has already increased its participation in the company to go from 45% of the capital to 51%. The objective was clear: to provide the Italian parent company with full control of the company and, in this way, have greater room for maneuver to provide it with funds. However, the process to achieve profitability has become complicated. Air Nostrum and Globalia, which are part of the company’s shareholders, committed to putting up 15 million euros more to face possible losses this year. This economic push is just one more within a package that provides aid which has already had contributions of 44.7 million euros in April of last year and almost 35 million euros in the summer of 2024. The occupation. One of the problems that Iryo has encountered is that it cannot fill its trains. If we go to the CNMC datathe Italian company has the worst occupancy data of all Spanish high speed. Madrid-Barcelona: Occupancy of 96.4% (Renfe 112%, Ouigo 99%) Madrid-Seville: Occupancy of 83.2% (Renfe 93.3%, Ouigo 86.4%) Madrid Málaga-Granada: Occupancy of 82.2% (Renfe 93.3%, Ouigo 93.9%) Madrid-Valencia: Occupancy of 70.2% (Renfe 73.3%, Ouigo 88.8%) Madrid Alicante: Occupancy of 66.6% (Renfe 75.9%, Ouigo 87.8%) Added to this is that its power to attract customers by price is much smaller than that of Ouigo since only in Madrid-Alicante does it offer cheaper tickets than those of the French company and for just a few cents. In the rest of the corridors, Iryo is more expensive than the services of Ouigo and AVLO (Renfe). The plans. Yet, Iryo continues defending who aspire for 2025 to become their turning point. They plan to balance their accounts this year and make the jump to profits in 2026 and 2027. To do this, they trust in the arrival of new trains that will expand their capacity and allow them to play on price, first by lowering the price of the ticket and, second, by amortizing Adif fees more easily. In the words of its CEO, the company hopes that Galicia can be another beta where it can make money. However, it must be taken into account that the line moves between the Iberian width and the international width. S106 trains that can “jump” between both tracks are committed to Renfe and the only way to operate would be with a transshipment, which is more costly in time and less attractive to the customer. But it is not the only case. Perhaps the most worrying thing about Iryo’s situation is that, at the moment, Renfe and Ouigo are also losing money with high speed in our country. Since the market opened, the benefits have been exceptional. In 2024, Ouigo received an additional 25 million from SCNF, its French parent company, to cover losses. The initial investment of 200 million had to be expanded given that the company plost more than 40 million euros only in 2024. It is one of the reasons why the Government alleged that from France they were doping the company economically to weaken rivals. Despite everything, Renfe has also suffered heavy losses with high speed. In 2023 they exceeded 120 million euros in losses although in 2024 profitability has already been closelosing in this case about three million euros. Of course, Renfe Viajeros (the part of the company that competes with Ouigo and Iryo) did achieve just over five million euros in profits. Photo | Trenduck In Xataka | Spain wanted to turn the train into the great alternative for traveling in summer. Renfe has never had so many dissatisfied customers

China’s plan to fill the streets with electric and autonomous cars in 15 years is now official

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With the European Union launching into the electric car, with the intention of definitively abandoning the combustion engine and manufacturers trying to stop this possibility, China has presented its new automobile roadmap. The institution in charge has been China Society of Automotive Engineers (CSAE) who have revealed the Energy-Saving and New Energy Vehicle Technology Roadmap 3.0. Or, in other words, its roadmap for the automotive industry between now and 2040. The “new energy” car, that is, electric and plug-in hybrid, will be the cornerstone of a strategy that focuses on a reduction in polluting emissions but also on intensive automation of mobility. In said document, they assure ChinaDaily2,000 experts have been involved and it has taken 18 months to carry it out. “New energy” and autonomous cars The key points of the new Chinese roadmap in relation to its automobile market are summarized in CarNewsChinawho have exhaustively compiled the main pillars of a strategy that has gained in complexity. And this is based on the 1+5+26 concept: 1 roadmap or general strategy to establish global objectives 5 technological groups that group the technologies to be applied 26 specialized research topics to delve deeper into each area Among the key points of the new Chinese strategy, the following stand out: goals: It is expected that in 2028, polluting emissions produced by the automobile industry will reach their maximum. From there, the goal is to reduce them by 60% in 2040. It is expected that by 2040, 85% of cars will be “new energy”, the name China uses to call plug-in hybrids and electric cars. Of those, around 80% are expected to be fully electric. In 2040, it is expected that a third of cars sold will continue to use combustion engines, either as hybrids, plug-in hybrids or extended-range electric vehicles. From 2035 all passenger vehicles will be, at a minimum, hybrids. As a result, new energy vehicles are expected to lead sales from 2030 onwards. Gradual penetration of cars with technology level 4 autonomous driving (current robotaxis) and appearance of level 5 cars (same way of operating but in any type of circumstance, without restrictions due to lighting or weather circumstances). In the presentation Zhang Jinhuapresident of CSAE, has pointed out that one of the big differences between this roadmap and the previous ones (they already presented similar documents in 2016 and 2020) is that this time the program has focused on put more emphasis on production strategies that must be put in place to promote these technologies when. In previous documents, he assures, they would have focused on the technology itself and not so much on the industry. This has its consequences therefore in all areas of the industry. First, because manufacturers must adapt their production models to reduce polluting emissions when manufacturing vehicles, but also because, they say, a more robust connected network integrated into the cloud will be created to servicing autonomous vehiclesimproving their safety and independence when driving on their own. This is essential to achieve the great objective: “zero accidents, zero victims and high efficiency.” Regarding emissions targets, a classification system and methodology will be created to improve efficiency during production. The final goal is not only that in 2040 manufacturing will emit 60% less pollution than in 2028. Manufacturers are expected to save costs by working with data interconnection to analyze the most efficient system, even for the supply of parts or the sale of items. The program also focuses on the solid state batteries. This type of energy accumulators promise to position themselves as the element that allows the electric car to be consolidated at all levels, with promises of ranges of a thousand kilometers and greater safety for the batteries. For make China the leader in the sectorit is wanted that in 2030 the solid state batteries They are already part of the reality of their industry, although on a small scale. The great productive leap is not expected until 2035. So far, CSAE has presented two other roadmaps that have been gaining weight within the Chinese State. To understand how the situation has changed in less than ten years, 500 experts participated in the first program, a quarter of those who made up this latest presentation. In 2016 The program focused on the 1+7 strategy, with an overall roadmap and seven technologies in which China wanted to be a leader: energy-saving vehicles, “new energy” vehicles, hydrogen vehicles, smart connected vehicles, battery technology for electric cars, technologies related to vehicle weight, and automotive manufacturing technology. In 2020the program was expanded with the well-known 1+9. Then, that same roadmap was expanded with two new objectives, the development of combustion engines and the intention to make the Chinese automotive industry cleaner. 1,000 experts already participated in that redesign. Now the new project review some of the previous objectivesremaining as specified at the top of the article. What is certain is that in China they have been meeting the goals they had set. For example, in the 2020 roadmap they anticipated sales of 20% for “new energy” cars in 2025. However, this figure is almost 50% at the end of September 2025. Photo | Xataka In Xataka | Speed ​​has moved to China: BYD and Xioami are breaking all the records that Europe once dreamed of

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