sinking

Samsung earns 19 times more than a year ago. Investors have reacted by sinking the stock 7%

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Samsung has announced that its operating profit soared to 89.4 trillion won (58.4 billion dollars) in the second quarter of 2026. That represents 1,810% more than what it achieved last year, that is, it multiplied by 19 the figure it achieved in the same period of 2025. The curious thing is that this achievement has not been of much use in the short term, because its shares have plummeted 6.9% according to indicate on Nikkei Asia. What has happened? A magical quarter. The operating profit for the second quarter of 2025 was just 4.7 trillion won, a very modest figure that can be explained simply: although it may seem incredible now, at that time the memory industry was going through a major crisis that would soon be completely revolutionized with the rise of AI and AI data centers. What was achieved in this second quarter of 2026 nevertheless remains colossal, and in fact Samsung has exceeded the operating profit of its last three years in a single quarter. Blessed damn memories. While users suffer one of the worst crises in history to purchase or upgrade our devicessemiconductor companies They are living a golden age. According to Citi Research, average selling prices for DRAM and NAND are up 44% and 53% respectively… this quarter alone. The demand for AI is no longer limited only to HBM modules, but also to conventional memory used in mobile phones, computers or business servers. But stocks plummet. Despite these results, the actions they fell around 7% on the South Korean stock market in the last 24 hours. Analysts in Nikkei indicated that this was a classic “sell on the news.” Investors had been anticipating these results for months, and in fact Samsung shares had already multiplied their value by five in the last year. Fall and then rise again? What has happened when this maximum was confirmed is that many of these investors have preferred to take profits before the demand for AI is not sustainable and there is an excess of supply in the memory sector. That does not seem likely in the short term, and the manufacturers themselves have already made it clear that demand It will be much higher than the supply at least until 2028. It therefore does not seem likely that Samsung shares will fall for a prolonged period, and if everything goes as it seems, it is reasonable to think that they will in fact continue to rise. Beware: this is not financial advice, it is simply what the market predicts. Market correction. Other companies in the sector also suffered significant falls. In the same session SK Hynix, its great rival, fell 6.1% after collapsing 11.2%. The KOSPI index – something like South Korea’s IBEX 35 – fell 4.9% and the impact was also felt in Japan. There Koxia fell more than 12% and SoftBank more than 4%. Backdrop. The crash comes just as SpaceX enter on the prestigious Nasdaq 100 and when the IPO of SK Hynix in the US is also imminent (scheduled for July 10). Not only that: just a week ago South Korean President Lee Jae Myung presented a public-private investment plan with Samsung and SK Hynix to expand chip manufacturing capacity in the country. Said project will theoretically have a billion dollars of funds (in Nikkei they talk about 800,000 million, the figures they dance) and can further boost the leading role of its two great bastions in the world of semiconductors. In Xataka | Samsung had been the absolute king of technology in South Korea for decades: SK Hynix has just surpassed it

Mobile phone sales are sinking. Apple thinks it knows how to save them: with foldables

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Apple seems to be preparing one of the most striking release schedules in its recent history. There is talk of no less than five new models between the second half of 2026 and the first half of 2027, and among all of them, one is especially protagonist: the (long rumored) foldable iPhone. The curious thing is not that Apple is launching it at this point, but that it is quite optimistic about said model. More foldable than expected. According to indicate in Nikkei Asia Sources close to Apple’s plans, Apple has asked its suppliers to prepare to manufacture about 10 million foldable iPhones this year. This is a figure clearly higher than the 7-8 million that were estimated recently, and this “doubled” commitment to the format is certainly surprising. risky bet. Firstly, because folding devices have never managed to achieve massive success in the mobile phone market. They are a very striking niche, but one in which manufacturers have not achieved the success they probably expected. And second and most important, because there is no oven (from the mobile industry) for buns. The memory crisis It is having a brutal impact in many areas, and the smartphone market is no exception: is preparing for the worst year in its entire history, in fact. Muscle is muscle. The company has already reserved components for 80 million smartphones for the second half of 2026 alone, and its total production for the year will exceed 220 million units, according to that newspaper. It is a spectacular figure, especially considering that its competitors in China, with brands such as Xiaomi, Oppo or Vivo, have had to cut its production by at least 100 million units due to the shortage of memory and other components. But of course, Apple is a lot of Apple, and its negotiating power with suppliers is spectacular. Staggered releases. For months it has been rumored that Apple will follow a very special launch route. Theoretically, it has decided to postpone the launch of the standard iPhone until the first half of 2027 to focus all the autumn prominence on the premium models: iPhone 18 Pro (if it is finally called that), Pro Max and of course that first foldable iPhone. It has even asked its suppliers to reserve components already used in the iPhone 17 for the future iPhone 18: It is another way to protect yourself from the shortage that is strangling the rest of the industry. In spring 2027, two more models. And as we said, while this fall we will see how the super high-end iPhone catalog is renewed, in the first half of 2027 We will foreseeably see the standard iPhone 18 and, attention, a new iPhone Air. There are apparently plans to renew its more affordable models, although at the moment there are no details on how it will be done. Be that as it may, the 2026-2027 academic year seems like it will become one of the most ambitious for Apple just at a terrible time for the industry. The hinge is no longer a problem. The great challenge with folding devices has always been the hinge: the screen ended up showing signs of the fold in that central area of ​​the screen when unfolded, and no manufacturer had solved the problem until now. That threatened the launch of the Apple device, but it seems that the company has managed to overcome this challengewhich would make your device one of the most striking in that niche. Prices, the great threat. a week ago Apple announced price increases of 20% on average throughout its catalog. It was a splash of cold water for consumers, and that highlighted that not even the Cupertino company could avoid the memory crisis. The question, of course, is how those new policies will affect future iPhone prices. Is this increase a preview of another that will arrive in the fall? Or has Apple preferred to give bad news now to maintain prices later? The unknown is there, and it can mark the purchasing decision of millions of consumers. In Xataka | I thought that in 2026 I could buy a cheap cell phone without worrying about anything. big mistake

BYD sales are sinking in China, so its plans now go through two countries: Mexico and Argentina

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BYD has its eye on America. At the moment, its entry into the United States is almost impossible but its expansion plan not only targets the country that has tried to build a wall against Chinese car manufacturers. The Chinese company has set its sights on Canada. But also further south, in Mexico. And much further south, in Argentina, with a project that crosses the entire continent. 100,000 cars. According to Stella Li, vice president of BYD worldwide, the volume of cars that Mexico and Argentina have claimed that the Brazilian factory exports to them. According to Chinese media, this volume of orders is distributed equally, with 50,000 cars for each country. The export order for the Brazilian factory demonstrates the growing interest in both countries for BYD plug-in vehicles. He’s not the only one. In Brazil alone, BYD sold 113,000 cars last year, making the country the country that bought the most cars from the company outside of China. A factory is key. Since last summer, BYD is producing cars in Brazil with a clear focus for South America. There it produces the BYD Dolphin Mini (what we know in Europe as BYD Dolphin Surf) and will share facilities with the BYD Song Pro and BYD King, plug-in hybrid options. The plant, which started with controversy after working conditions close to slavery will be reported During its construction, it has the current objective of producing 150,000 cars each year but is capable of expanding the volume to 600,000 cars per year. The investment, therefore, is strong. At the moment, production has begun in the SKD version, with kits that arrive partially assembled, as is happening in Barcelona with the Chery Group, but according to BYD The goal is for production to be completely local over the years. From Mexico to Argentina. In Bloomberg They explain that the plant will be the central industrial hub of the entire continent for BYD. The company started with a production of 150,000 cars per year and planned to expand its capacity with a second phase to 300,000 cars. However, last October they announced that they plan to double this figure and reach 600,000 cars manufactured per year. Expansive plans in America are key for BYD. The company is seeing its sales slow down in the local market. In China, the State has withdrawn aid to the purchase of “new energy” vehicles (plug-in hybrids and electric), which directly impacts a company like BYD that has no other alternative in its range. Added to this is that the State has been trying for years to mobilize local consumption, which declines without this aid. The news coming from outside China indicates in Blomberghave been good news for the company whose shares have begun to rebound after a sustained fall. The Mexico case. Looking ahead to its expansion, BYD has set its sights on Mexico. In fact, Chinese manufacturers have been gaining great popularity in the country. enough so that the Government, in a clear nod to the United States, has raised some 50% tariffs on these cars. A strategy that, for the moment, has been unsuccessful in its first stages because These companies had already exported cars in very high volumes. However, BYD has the best tool in Brazil to continue selling in Mexico. Both countries have a special treaty that allows them to take cars from one country to another without paying tariffs along the way. The company planned to build a factory in Mexico which, in addition, he wanted to use as a back door for shipping cars to the United States. With the closure of this border and the tariffs already imposed on Chinese cars (and those to come)BYD ended by throw away your plans. The Argentina case. As we said, Mexico and Brazil are not the only two attractive markets for BYD. Argentina has become another vein that, supposedly, has demanded the importation of 50,000 Chinese cars. In Infobae They point out that this figure is equivalent to 10% of Argentina’s annual vehicle production. Until now, the Argentine market has been highly regulated in its imports but it has opened up. This has increased imports by 97%, making it more important than ever for companies to export outside their borders. (90% of them already do it). However, they are seeing how the reception capacity in countries like Peru or Ecuador is lower because Chinese vehicles are also beginning to enter these markets. At the moment, tariff-free imports to Argentina are based on quotas. Quotas that, of course, They are 50,000 units which are exactly the ones that BYD plans to send to the country from Brazil. An eye on Europe. But, in addition, the Chinese company says it is not only interested in America. In presenting all these figures, BYD also assured that it had one eye on Europe. And with him progressive link between Mercosur and Europeit will be easier to import cars to Europe economically. It remains to be seen, however, if BYD is compensated for the efforts it has to make in terms of homologation to bring cars from Brazil. And tariffs are one thing and security obligations are quite another. Despite this, the company may have an opportunity if it manufactures pick-up for America, widely purchased in the region but with very low performance in Europe, so it can compensate for its exports so as not to have to dedicate specific assembly lines in our soil for a marginal type of vehicle. Photo | Jimmy WooBYD and Nicolas Flor In Xataka | Spain has a new brand of Chinese cars and it arrives with an ambitious plan: “Five million units by 2030”

Global sperm count has been sinking for years

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There was a time when the movie ‘children of men‘ It seemed like a fairly distant dystopia, but today science forces us to look at it with different eyes due to the great drop in birth rate that we are seeing. Although in principle it could be attributed to social issues such as difficult access to housing or one could even look at women as responsible for this. But it is becoming increasingly clear that human sperm quality is declining. The quality is going down. In this way, it is not that we have fewer children just because we decide to have them later (which too), but that biologically our ability to father them is plummeting. The scientific evidence tells us shows in this case that between 1973 and 2018 total sperm count has fallen by 62.3%. And logically, if men have fewer sperm in general, this leads to a reduced chance of conceiving. Although it does not stop at this data. Studies that have followed men for several years also show that the average sperm concentration has gone from 101 million per ml in the 1970s to just 49 million per ml of ejaculate today. In a generalized way. This is not a phenomenon that is only occurring in Europe or North America, but has also been confirmed by recent studies in Latin America, Asia and Africa that are suffering the same decline. Although the most alarming thing is not the accumulated decline that we are experiencing, but the speed. Specifically, we see that since 2000 the rate of decline has accelerated, exceeding 2.6% annually without any signs of stabilization over time. It’s not just the culture. It is easy to blame the social changes we have experienced to justify the drop in birth rates, such as the delay in couple formation or the economic stress we are experiencing. And it is true that everything influences the birth rate, but it does not explain why semen quality is increasingly worse in our environment. To put it in context, a 30-year-old man today has, on average, half the sperm concentration than the one his grandfather had at the same age. Because. To understand what is happening, there are different scientific reviews that point to lifestyle like an enemy. The obesitysmoking, sedentary lifestyle or diets that have a significant presence of ultra-processed foods They destroy sperm quality. A study published in PMC in 2024 also directly links obesity to oxidative stress and hormonal imbalance to the destruction of sperm quality. But not everything focuses on what we eat, but on what we breathe and touch in our environment. The exposure to microplasticspesticides and endocrine disruptors It is altering male hormonal production that leads to this serious problem. New biological factors. The investigations carried out in 2025 point out two new fronts here to attack in this case. The first is paternal age, since after 35 years of age not only does sperm movement decrease but sperm DNA fragmentation increases, making it of poorer quality. Besides, imbalance in bacteria of semen is behind many cases of infertility that we previously considered “of unknown cause.” If it is true that knowing that the pathogen called Ureaplasma is one of those responsiblecan give rise to personalized treatments. Imminent collapse? The short answer is that we are not facing an apocalyptic scenario where humanity becomes sterile overnight, but the trend is worrying. In the event that sperm concentration continues with this downward trend, a large part of the male population could fall below the threshold of natural fertility, making assisted reproduction cease to be an option and become a structural necessity to perpetuate the species. However, there is a species for the nuance, since a 2025 study in the US suggests that the decline may not be as pronounced in men whose fertility is already confirmed, indicating that the problem could be concentrated in specific subpopulations or closely linked to those environmental factors that we can control. What can we do? The good news is that, unlike other genetic problems, many of these factors are modifiable. The science in this case suggests that adopting the Mediterranean diet, exercising and controlling obesity is a good way to mitigate this decline. Images | freestocks Mohamed Hassan In Xataka | There are couples who couldn’t have children. Now AI has managed to give them hope

Duolingo was the fun, brave company we loved that taught us languages. Today it is sinking in the stock market

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Most people never manage to turn their ideas into business successes. Luis von Ahn (Guatemala City, 1978) has achieved it twice. The first, when he created reCAPTCHA and sold it to Google in 2009 for a small fortune. The second, years later, started from a much simpler concept. Learning languages ​​was a painso von Ahn wanted to turn that into just the opposite: something fun. This is how it was born Duolingoa company that taught how to speak languages ​​with a strong component of gamification. You already had to go to an academy or spend long periods of time in online courses: you could learn words, phrases and pronunciation through small tests when you were on the bus or waiting in a queue. Duolingo achieved the most difficult thing: making us like each other (and fall in love) Learning with Duolingo was fun and comforting. The small rewards worked and turned it almost into a video game that little by little more people became fond of. The snowball got bigger and bigger and Duolingo became one of those companies that already seemed likeable at first. It seemed that everything it did was done well, and little by little the company took important steps to become the giant it is today. The certifications arrived who wanted to rival the famous TOEFL exams, their platform for schools, and more and more languages. Some, like japanesewere a challenge. Others, like the Klingon or the high valyriumwere above all a diversion that consolidated the fun and cool image of the company. Then things started to get interesting because Duolingo wanted to not only teach us languages ​​to speak, but also programming languages. He was encouraged to want to serve as a tool so that the little ones They learned to read and write. And for the young and not so young, Duolingo wanted to become private mathematics teacherof music or even chess. All of this ensured that over the years Duolingo managed to solidify that company image that Not only did he solve real problems, but he did it in a friendly, friendly and fun way.. In 2021 the company decided go public and after a couple of relatively calm years, the shares began to rise in value significantly. Everything seemed to be going great for the company. And then everything went wrong. AI has mortally wounded Duolingo, but not because of what we think When OpenAI presented GPT-4o in June 2024, many of us saw the future. One in which you no longer typed on your computer or on your mobile screen: it was enough to talk to him. That promised to transform many segments and kill some others, and among those threatened were companies like Duolingo. At the time it wasn’t so obvious, but when we saw that kid solving a math problem With the help of AI, it was not difficult to imagine that education, as we had known it, could have an expiration date. Curiously, that didn’t seem to affect Duolingo too much. The company continued to grow, but then two things happened. First and foremost, a major blunder. Luis von Ahn advertisement in April an “AI First” vision in which I would bet on artificial intelligence as a new great tool for your growth. The message sounded like “let’s do without the human being,” and although von Ahn tried to clarify things, the damage was done. After that, the debacle. Duolingo shares began to plummet. But the thing didn’t end there. The second of those turning point events occurred in August, when GPT-5 demonstrated that one could build a custom Duolingo for, for example, learn french in a fun way. People stopped being in love with Duolingo and they began to criticize her precisely because of what had made her succeed. There was too much gamification and, as i said a user on Reddit, “for me the reward for learning a language is learning the language.” Source: Cinco Días. Stocks continued to fall almost steadily. These days Duolingo presented financial results, and the curious thing is that although they were good, they were not good enough for Wall Street. The firm reached 135 million active monthly users (50 million use it daily), 20% more than in the same period of the previous year. It also rose 34% in paying users. Although one would think those numbers were fantastic, they also warned that the forecasts for the fourth quarter were not so optimistic. Result: new stock market debacle. So much so that the shares have plummeted 64% since reaching their highs on May 1, just after the “AI First” announcement. Since then, Duolingo’s drift has been worrying, and the coming months will undoubtedly mark its future even more. The company is in a difficult moment, and the rise of AI may end up causing those experimenting with their chatbot to realize that starting to learn languages ​​​​is as easy as telling ChatGPT “I want to practice my English with you a little. Correct me when I say something else and suggest small exercises” out loud. That is the great challenge for Duolingo going forward. In Xataka | How to practice languages ​​using artificial intelligence

In reality, the workslop is sinking her

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One of the mantras most repeated by the apostles of AI automation is that AI-assisted work was going to boost productivity in companies that apply it, but the data shows that the reality is very different and depends on How is that productivity measured?. For example, the study data ‘Forrester Consulting’s Total Economic Impact 2023′ from IBM, highlight an increase in productivity based on a 30% reduction in the time it takes to manage an incident, but it does not measure the quality of that management. It is at that point where AI, more than boosting productivity, is sinking her. The effect “Workslop“. As and how do they count in Harvard Business Reviewin many companies, the mass adoption of AI tools translates into enthusiasm and apparent advances, but behind these figures lies an increasingly evident problem: the proliferation of mediocre content generated by AI, known as “workslop” or work garbage. The phenomenon occurs mainly when AI is used to produce documents, reports and materials that are very apparent at first glance, but are superficial at their core and end up generating more work in reviewing and correcting them than it would have taken a person to do it from the beginning. A recent study conducted by BetterUp Labs together with Stanford Social Media Lab reveals that 40% of US employees reported having received content “workslop” in the last month. Data indicates that 15.4% of all the content they received at work falls into this “Workslop” category. BetterUp Labs estimates put the cost of reviewing AI-generated work at $186 per employee, or about $9 million per year for a large corporation with 10,000 employees. It is useful to get rid of “paperwork”. AI is proving useful in routine tasks, such as email automation, simple summaries or basic content generation, allowing the employee release cognitive load. That is, freeing your brain from work that, although necessary, does not really represent progress in tasks or projects. The report GenAI Divide (MIT, 2025) confirms that 70% of employees prefer to use AI to compose quick communications and perform simple analyses, noting that “AI has already won the battle of easy work.” However, for complex projects and jobs that require memory, continuous adaptation and deeper analysis, 90% still prefer to turn to human professionals. The investigations from Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) and Duke University point out that AI can serve as a starting point for developing an idea, but it fails in 70% of the cases in which tasks are asked to complete unattended. The invisible “tax” of AI. Every time an employee receives AI-generated workslop content, the process requires an additional investment of time and resources to unravel and correct any errors or inaccuracies that come with it. The aforementioned BetterUp Labs study estimates that each employee wastes an average of one hour and 56 minutes analyzing or reviewing this “junk” content. So much so that it has even given rise to the birth of a new professional niche in which professionals who previously carried out that work now charge for analyzing it and fix your mistakes. The biases of AI. The study also analyzes the social and labor impact of this type of content. His conclusion: it is as harmful as the economic impact. 53% of employees say they feel upset after receiving these texts and 38% say they are confused. According to published Forbes, approximately half of those surveyed consider their colleagues who submit workslop work to be less creative, less capable. Furthermore, 42% say they see them as less trustworthy, generating a deterioration in reputation and collaboration within the team. This social impact does not have its origin in the fact of using AI to generate documents, code or graphics, but in the fact of not having taken the trouble to check if the content generated by AI is correct before sending or using it in his work. Use AI with common sense. Researchers at MIT and BetterUp Labs agree that using AI indiscriminately, only following the mandate to adopt the technology, like some big technologies they want to do at all costsis not a good idea to increase productivity. According what was published by CIOdespite the fact that the CEO of Google beats his chest assuring that 25% of your code It is already generated with AI, that work is not free nor does it result in notable improvements in productivity of its engineers. Before they were dedicated to generating code, and now they use that time to review it or repair the errors produced by the new integrated code. Therefore, using AI on complex tasks that must then be supervised by engineers does not improve productivity, but rather displaces it at best and even can reduce it depending on the use case. In Xataka | We believed that AI was going to take our jobs. At the moment he has started whispering to your boss who he should fire Image | Unsplash (Sigmund)

It was built on an artificial island and has been sinking for years

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At the end of the 1960s, commercial aviation was booming. The first civil aircraft with Turbofán engines, such as the Douglas DC-8 and Boeing 707they were redefining the rules of the passenger air transport game. As a result of this scenario, many countries in the world began to boost changes for a future where flights would multiply. Then In Japan they believed than the Osaka International Airportwhich operated for the Kansai region, would not be able to deal with the growing air market. Expanding its facilities, however, was not a plausible option. Due to a series of residents demands, the government had established strict operating standards to this airport. An airport on an artificial island To avoid limits as a limited operating schedule and the impossibility of carrying out an ambitious work to expand the existing airport, it set out to build “A second Kansai airport” The project was advancing, little by little, during the following years. In order to avoid the noise pollution of the planes of that time it was concluded that the new airport should be at least three kilometers from the coast. Under this premise, The works began in 1987 five kilometers inside Osaka Bay. Kansai International Airport To shape the artificial island they were made multiple excavations in adjacent mountainous areas in order to obtain sufficient material to fill the site. Every day, from 4 in the morning until the afternoon, the members of the land project used machinery to throw thousands of cubic meters of rock on the seabed. Osaka Bay Marine bed The oceanic relief of this area is made up of a surface layer of 20 meters thick called Holocene layer. Then comes a layer of hard clay and gravel of many meters thick, which can be divided into upper and lower level parts. These layers usually yield when they are under pressure, And the builders knew it perfectly. Kansai International Airport with its first phase (left); With its two phases (right) The first phase of the project was designed by the Italian architect Renzo Piano and began with the construction of a landing floor and a passenger terminal in 1991. To compensate for the sinking of the same, special columns were installed with base metal plates to support the weight of the structure. Opened its doors to the public in September 1994. Four months later, The one that was considered one of the most expensive and complex civil works in history He received his fire test. On January 17, 1995, the Asian country was beaten by the Kobe earthquakewhose epicenter stood several kilometers from the airport. The structure resisted with slight damage thanks to its advanced antisismic design. In 1996, the construction of another track and passenger terminal was given green, second phase that demanded a good amount of years to complete. In 2007 it was partially inauguratedwhich allowed a limited service and, in turn, decongest the other parts of the airport. Since then, the airport has starred in several improvements and maintenance works. Boeing 747 at Kansai International Airport The ability of those responsible for the project to carry out a work of such magnitude has received praise throughout the world. In 2001 he was awarded the prize “Millennium Civil Engineering Monument“From the American Society of Civil Engineers. But it has also received an avalanche of criticism, mainly at its cost of realization. In 2008, Kansai International Airport had consumed more than 20,000 million dollars. Many of the expenses derived from the necessary tasks to mitigate the sinking of the artificial island. In 1994, the sinking rate was around 50 centimeters per year, although it is currently by below 10 centimeters. Engineers have resorted to a system of sand drainage to address the problem of sinking. The same consists of placing sand piles in the clay area that allow the water to escape and clay to harden. Since the beginning of the project, 900,000 piles have been installed that, in the light of the data, seem to be fulfilling their function. Images | Wikimedia (1, 2) | The Kansai International Airport | Google Maps | Ken h (CC By-SA 2.0) In Xataka | It is assumed that the US is already developing the successor of the legendary SR-71. It is supposed because everything is super secret *An earlier version of this article was published in August 2024

Energy and space. China has solved them by sinking them into the sea

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China has opened in Shanghai The first commercial submarine database fed entirely by marine wind energy. It is an important evolutionary leap after two years of experience with its pilot installation in Hainan. Why is it important. The digital infrastructure is facing Two crisis worldwide: The excessive energy consumption of data centers. The shortage of urban land to expand them. This underwater installation solves both problems of a stroke, because it reduces energy expenditure to 40% while releasing space on the mainland. The context. China already tested the commercial viability of Submarine centers in Hainan Since December 2022, where an installation operates 30 meters deep without registering a single server breakdown in these two and a half years. Microsoft experienced with PROJECT NATICK In Scotland in 2015, but it was Hainan who marked the first real commercial deployment of the world. Shanghai now represents the “version 2.0” of this technology. In figures: Investment reaches 1.6 billion yuan (222.7 million dollars) to create an underwater cluster of 24 megawatts. The natural water cooling system reduces cooling consumption of 40-50% to less than 10% of total consumption. More than 90% of energy will come from marine wind farms. What has happened. Yesterday, Tuesday, June 10, The tripartite agreement was signed Among the authorities of Shanghai and the company Hicloud Technology. The first phase, 2.3 MW, will begin operating in September as a national model project. The second phase will scale up to 24 MW with an energy efficiency (PU) of less than 1.15. And now what. The installation anchors an industrial ecosystem that will support AI, 5G, Internet of industrial things and electronic commerce platforms outside China. The country thus consolidates its leadership in submarine digital infrastructure while other countries remain focused on expanding land centers to use. Outstanding image | Hicloud In Xataka | Saudi Arabia wants to become a new power in data centers. Nothing is clear that I can do it

North Korea was going to throw his greatest war boat and ended up sinking it into the sea. Everything points to a culprit: Kim Jong-un

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Making a fool of it is something that It is not anyone’s pleasure. Surely you have ever stumbled down the street and looked around to see if someone had seen you. Now, imagine that what stumbles is a Military ship of 5,000 tons and several million dollars and sinks at the time of its premiere. That is what happened last week when Kim Jong-un He witnessed how His brand new war ship sank before the impotence of all those present and under the watchful eye of the rest of the planet. And everything indicates that the error was because, as the Spanish proverb points, the hurry are not good. Short. Days before the event, satellite images They showed both the vessel and a scenario in which what seemed to be an observation zone. Probably, the place from which Kim Jong-un was going to witness that historic moment. And the truth is that it was historic, but not for the reasons he would have wanted. On May 23, during the launch ceremony of the new North Korean destroyer (the second of its most advanced class), all attendees in the front row and the world was witnesses of a Technical failure that ended in disaster: the ship overturned. That symbol of power, with 143 meters in length and 74 vertical missile launch cells, ended up ridiculous. How do we float it? Satellite images later Analyzed by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, or CSIS, they showed the ship partially sunken with tarps that covered the disaster. And, although at first the rush was blamed, we now have more clues about everything that could go wrong. Obviously, there is no official information from North Korea, but in The New York Timeswe can see that there are analysts who are quite clear what the problem was. Or the sum of them. Image | CSIS/BEYOND PARALLEL/MAXAR When a ship is finished, there is Several ways to ‘throw it’ into the water. We have the sliding launch in which the ship slides on a ramp into the water. The dry dock in which the ship is built in a dry dock and, once finished, the water dike is filled (That is done with cruises). Also the mechanical launch by cranes, the launch with airbags that are placed under the ship and allow it to slide to the water. And the side launch that drops the side ship into the water. Normally, a single technique is used, but in the North Korean destroyer disaster it seems that sliding and side techniques were used. And not because that’s how it was planned. Perfect storm. As noted The New York TimesIt was the first time that analysts watched North Korea use the side launch to throw a war ship. This technique is sure if it is done well, but in Large ships It is more likely that a problem appears, with dire consequences if it happens. The reading of the analysts is that, using that technique for a 5,000-ton ship points to a lack of experience added to the political pressures by Kim Jong-un to achieve rapid results. The destroyer was manufactured in the port city of Chongjin that has experience assembling ships of such magnitude, but not something as huge as this ship. This puts on the table that a possible trigger was that inexperience When throwing such large ships. In the absence of a dry dike of the appropriate size, it is estimated that the engineers tried the lateral launch to throw it into the water, but the angle was not correct and, when trying to slide it, the ship was unbalanced and ended up lying on the right side. When it goes well, as happened with this fighting ship of 3,500 tons in 2013, it is worth seeing: And it can also go wrong: The hurry are not good. Interestingly, this destroyer is from Choe Hyun classwhose first model was inaugurated successfully Last month. It was going to be the second great frigate of North Korea and the new example of that naval remodeling that Kim Jong-un is promoting. And the precedents were good: the first It was built In the city of Nampo and, because it is a larger shipyard, they could put it afloat through the technique of dry dock. There were no major problems and, at the inauguration, the ruler saw how test missiles were thrown successfully. However, there are hurry in the government dome to follow demonstrating to the world its military potentialwhich has led the president to visit the shipyards who are building new ships to accelerate delivery deadlines. In addition, there are information They point out that, although the ship could have thrown out correctly, the ocean exit street is narrow and has a questionable depth. I made a. pic.twitter.com/urflog6leo – Dr. Jeffrey Lewis (@armsControlwonk) May 22, 2025 Firm hand. And who will pay for this? At the moment, the ridiculous has resulted in several arrests of members of the responsible shipyard itself. The Central News Agency of Korea reported that the chief engineer, a senior armament official and another member of the installation had been arrested, and Kim himself described The accident as a “criminal act”, demanding An urgent restoration of the ship before June. Country engineers estimate that, pumping seawater, they can straighten the ship and repair damage. And it will take about ten days to do it, but it seems complicated because, after a week, Keep as it was. Sentinel-2 images of May 23 and 28. Despite the clouds, we can see that the destroyer continues exactly at the same point And sarcasm. From South Korea, which always have an eye and a half placed in what their neighbors doThey think something else. Yang UK is an expert in North Korean military affairs of the Asan Institute for Policy Studies in Seoul and, as Tnyt comments, the incident may not be only an accident, but something caused by a structural imbalance on the ship itself. … Read more

Venice is an inverted forest that is sinking. There is a radical plan to save it: raise it 30 centimeters

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Venice is, in essence, a prodigy of Inverted engineering: It stands on millions of stuck piles On the contrary in the Lagunar mud, creating what has been described as a submerged forest down. These trunks, made with trees, have supported for centuries the burden of stone palaces and imposing bells without resorting to steel or concrete. The physical principle that supports this system is not based on the brute force of the materials, but on the friction of compressed humid soil that, together with wood and water, constitutes a resistant tripartite structure. However, that skeleton It has a serious problem. The abyss. The mythical city lives a cruel paradox: it is not only a city that floats, but one that It sinks. In the last century, the Venetian floor has descended about 25 centimeterswhile the sea level has risen about 30. In other words: it is a lethal combination that has triggered increasingly frequent and severe floods. While its decay adds some tourist magnetism (visiting it before it disappears), for Venetians it is a persistent threat that compromises your future. The city sinks two millimeters a year due to natural subsidence, while the waters increase some Five millimeters annually due to climate change. An unpublished plan. Before this existential threat, the engineer Pietro TeatiniAssociate Professor of Hydrology and Hydraulic Engineering at the University of Padua, proposes a solution as bold as controversial: physically raise the city Injecting water into aquifers deep between 600 and 1,000 meters under the lagoon. The idea is born from the observation of gas reservoirs in the Valle del Powhere when filling during the summer, the terrain rises, and goes down when they are emptied in winter. According to Teatini, through this technique, Venice It could rise 30 centimeters In a stable and homogeneous way, enough to grant a break of about five decades, in which the authorities could plan a definitive solution. Drill and drill. The project would consist of pour a dozen wells Distributed in a circle of 10 kilometers around the city, all located inside the lagoon. Water to be injected would be saline, taking advantage of the abundant local resource and without risk of contaminating fresh water aquifers. To ensure stability, it would be injected at low pressure and slowlyavoiding fractures in the underground rock. The choice of a wide circumference guarantees a uniform elevation that would not damage historical structures. Chioggiaat the southern end of the lagoon, it would be outside the radius of action. The system that was not enough. The search for solutions also exposes a failure. Currently, Venice’s main defense against high tides is The Mose system (Sperimentale Electromeccanico Module), a series of mobile gates that rise from the seabed to isolate the Adriatic Sea lagoon. Although it began to plan in the 80s and was tested for the first time in 2020, its cost has exceeded seven billion of euros and is not yet officially operational. Originally conceived to activate five times a year, since 2020 it has already been used about 100 timesreflex of the problem. Every time it is activated, interrupts maritime traffiche harms the port (the second most active in Italy) and alters the ecological balance of the lagoon by preventing the natural flow of water. Mosetherefore, it does not solve the problem, and Teatini proposes its project as a temporary complement by extending the combined functionality of both systems during those 50 yearsmargin that could be used to develop a definitive structural solution. Venice towards the end of the seventeenth century Underground technology Theatini’s plan It is not frackingnor is it based on extreme pressures. It is rather a controlled process that has been used in oil engineering to stabilize platforms. The idea is that water gradually penetrates the deep sandy substrate, expanding and pushing the ground up without causing fissures. A maximum elevation of 30 centimeters is the technical limit that can be achieved without compromise stability. The pumping rhythm would gradually reduce to avoid overloading aquifers, and the incorporation of additives that maintain the expansion achieved even if the pumping is interrupted is studied. To prove the viability, a pilot project is proposed in another part of the lagoon, less critical, with an estimated cost of Between 30 and 40 million euros. The complete implementation would be three times cheaper than the Mose. Plus: The approach is more realistic than other ideas raised in the past, such as shallow cement injections that were used limited to islands such as Poveglia in the 70s. Race against time. No doubt, some experts are skeptical. David Dobson, professor of materials at University College London, acknowledges that the idea generates “skeptical optimism”. It warns that the aquifers already collapsed (as happened in Marghera when water was extracted in the 60s) may not recover its original volume. In addition, injecting water is more difficult than gas, as it flows more slowly and requires greater pressure. However, he argues that, if a successful essay is carried out and the process control is demonstrated, the proposal It could be truthful. In any case, he points out that the root of the problem remains Global warmingand as long as it is not addressed, any solution will necessarily be temporary. Symbol and priority. Teatini has been studying the phenomenon of the Subsidy in Venice. His Thesis with doctorate He already addressed this problem, and was his former professor, Giuseppe Gambolati, who first proposed those deep injections as a solution. Today, in the face of institutional inertia, he insists that his proposal is the only technically developed that can begin to be tested immediately. In addition, with the creation in March 2025 of the New authority per the lagoona state entity that will be in charge of evaluating interventions in the lagoon and planning the future, a window of opportunity opens. Although every plan will have high costs, Teatini argues that it is a Reasonable investment and even possible with citizen financing. The big doubt. In addition, there is the … Read more

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