waiting

Buying cheap RAM seemed like a matter of waiting. Lenovo just dismantled that hope

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Buying memory seemed, until not so long ago, a question of patience. If prices rose, many users and companies could wait a while before expanding a computer, renewing storage or closing a large server purchase. The idea was simple: endure the blow, watch the market and hope that the pressure would go down. But that hope begins to collide with a different reality, because memory no longer only powers our computers: it also supports a growing part of the infrastructure that drives AI. The latest news comes to us from ISC 2026in Hamburg, one of those events where the debate on servers and infrastructure allows us to see where the market is moving rather than in domestic consumption. According to ComputerBaseLenovo showed there a slide titled “Five-step survival guide for RAMageddon” and accompanied the idea with a phrase that summarizes the change in tone well: “It will never be like last yearThe aforementioned media clarifies that this “never” should not be read completely literally, but the warning is still relevant: trusting in a quick return to the levels of 2024 and the beginning of 2025 may be too optimistic. ComputerBase may not be a well-known outlet outside of Germany, but its coverage of ISC 2026 has been replicated by specialized publications like Tom’s Hardware and TweakTown. In the latter’s information, Martin Hiegl, a Lenovo executive linked to Enterprise AI & HPC, is identified as the author of the statements. Before the event, Hiegl announced on LinkedIn that he would participate again in the “Vendor Showdown” session with the theme “RAMageddon”. The problem is not just that the RAM is expensive In its presentation, Lenovo is not just talking about a temporary tension, but about a change in the economics of DRAM and NAND. The company maintains that even when new relevant manufacturing capacity begins to be noticed, something that it places from 2028, a good part of that additional production could be absorbed by AI infrastructure. In other words: more memory being manufactured does not necessarily mean that we will return to the low prices of 2024 and early 2025. The industry is also moving in that direction. Tom’s Hardware points to SK hynix’s plans to triple its memory production capacity by 2034 as a background signal: if manufacturers were expecting a quick return to minimal margins and oversupply, they would hardly accelerate investments of that magnitude. Lenovo’s reading is that the incentive has changed. With sustained demand for AI and increased pressure on DRAM, NAND and HBM, expanding factories may ease the market, but not automatically rebuild the cheap scenario that many buyers remember. Now, the Chinese manufacturer is not alone in this diagnosis. As we pointed out days agoMicron recently told its investors that it expects limited supply until at least 2027, with a gradual improvement starting in 2028. SK hynix has also warned that shortages could last until around 2030 whether the AI ​​infrastructure continues to absorb wafer capacity. These are forecasts that should be read with caution, because they come from companies that benefit from high prices, but they also show that the sector is planning as if the pressure is not going to disappear anytime soon. The consumer also remains within the chain. It is no secret that “RAMageddon”, as Lenovo called it, is reaching PCs, mobile phones, consoles and SSDs, precisely the products where we usually notice first if an increase in components reaches the final price. There are the Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5 and 5 Pro and more expensive Nintendo Switch 2. Also mobile phones that come at higher prices and computers like Macs being harder to reach. Does that mean we should take Lenovo’s scenario for granted? Not necessarily. No one can predict with certainty how the market will evolve.. His analysis carries weight because it comes from one of the largest computer manufacturers in the world, but even in a sector like this, forecasts can fall short… or not be met. The most reasonable reading is another: if Lenovo is right, memory is no longer that component that we could postpone almost by inertia until we find a better offer. In a market where AI competes for DRAM, NAND and HBM, waiting is still an option, but no longer a guarantee. Images | Xataka with Nano Banana In Xataka | Memory experts see no relief: “Potential price increases are higher than expected due to shortages”

“Now there is money everywhere and if you have a quality company, you will have a lot of funds waiting”

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Like scouts for football or basketball clubs, investment funds and large companies use a figure with the same purpose. They are the ‘scouts’ or startup scouts. Their mission: to find promising companies when they have not yet been discovered, to be the first or among the first to invest or collaborate with them. In silver, arrive before anyone else. “These ‘scout’ programs become popular during approximately 2021-2022, in the midst of valuation hysteria for technology companies. It is a time of prosperity for the funds, which begin to see that the companies’ income multiples begin to grow very quickly,” says Kintxo Cortés, referring to the fact that the investment enthusiasm resulted in the companies’ income having to be multiplied each time by a higher number (x4, then x6, then x11…) to arrive at your assessment. For reference, the current 5 trillion dollars of capitalization of Nvidia are equivalent to multiplying its annual income by 20. In the case of Alphabet, Google’s parent company, the figure would come from multiplying turnover by 11 and in that of Apple, by 10. “In venture capital what is happening is that money is a commodity. There are very good funds, so it is not only a race to see who finds the company that grows the best but also who enters a promising company the earliest,” explains Cortés, who has been a scout for four years. He currently collaborates with the Accel and Samaipata funds, in addition to working at the connectivity company Gigs. “Now there is money everywhere and if you are an entrepreneur and have a quality company, you will have a lot of funds that will want to put money into you.” In an environment like the one Cortés draws, investment funds can only be differentiated in two ways. One of them is with its team of professionals, capable of adequately supporting the startup. The other is with speed. Whoever gets to the entrepreneur first has an advantage when it comes to investing. So the funds have diversified their search for projects with potential. The objective is to enter capital very soon, even with a small position. And this is where the scouting activity unfolds. They are specialists and know the entrepreneurship ecosystem inside out in certain areas or niches. They allow the funds to gain capillarity that they do not have with their staff alone. This way they have access to a greater number of companies and can glimpse promising teams operating in interesting sectors as soon as possible. Although this scout profile is not the only one that scans the landscape in search of attractive startups. Gema García González, director of Open Innovation and Coporte Venturing at Repsol, is in charge of a team of ten people dedicated to reinforcing the company’s technological development with external resources. “We try to be flexible, we work with other research centers, with other corporations and, of course, with startups. The entrepreneurial ecosystem has many pieces, it has grown a lot in recent years and can contribute a lot to us in developments that we want to accelerate,” he explains. In this case the scouts are on staff. Thus, the company has invested in more than 35 startups and today works with 21 companies, detected by its analyst service. “We do not invest in what any investment fund can invest in, we invest in something that can be strategic for the company, in startups with which we want to collaborate,” says García González. Repsol scouts, working within the framework of its R&D center, Tech Lab, comb the entrepreneurial ecosystem in search of circular economy, energy optimization or renewable hydrogen projects. “My team has to dedicate part of its time to being very connected to the ecosystem. It needs to have a good network of contacts with other corporations, with other investment funds, go to conferences and startup events and see which platforms are the best to launch technological challenges,” explains García González. He clarifies that one of the formulas for finding interesting projects is the launch of contests and challenges that reward the best solutions to a given problem. Don’t let the next ‘PayPal Mafia’ escape The connection with the entrepreneurial world is essential. In the technology sector, a trend that has been seen for a few years has been accentuated. “There are companies that are doing very well in technology and have many employees who begin to set up other companies because they have access to liquidity, either because the company goes public or they can move shares in the secondary market,” says Cortés. “They find themselves with a lot of money and the desire to continue building things.” The phenomenon is not new and is reminiscent of the success of ‘PayPal Mafia’a symbol of that diaspora that sometimes occurs in technology companies. Many talented employees and deep pockets who decide to undertake can emerge from them. From the early days of PayPal came Elon Musk, the founder of LinkedIn Reid Hoffman and the investor Peter Thiel. And other employees started projects such as YouTube, Yelp or the social application Slide, acquired by Google. More recently, the brain drain at OpenAI also illustrates how talent within one startup ends up spawning other startups. That’s where the Amodei brothers came from.which they founded Anthropicformer chief scientist Ilya Sutskever (Safe Superintelligence) or former CTO Mira Murati (Thinking Machines Lab). The great value of Kintxo Cortés for the funds with which he collaborates is his network of contacts with employees and former employees of the companies where he has worked, especially Airbnb, Shopify and Trade Republic. That connection is key for investing entities, which do not have the structure on their own to delve into the ins and outs of the projects formed by former employees of the technology companies. Even fewer are able to discern which employees they should pay attention to, whether because they are the sharpest, most talented, or best positioned. A corporation like Repsol must also be clear about which … Read more

Europe has a robot ready to clean the seabed. Spain has 8,000 kilometers of coast waiting

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Neither the proliferation of jellyfish neither lack of sand On the beaches, the great environmental problem of the oceans is marine litter. So within the European project SEACLEAR 2.0, a research team from the Technical University of Munich has developed an autonomous diving robot capable of detecting and recovering debris from the bottom. A kind of pool cleaning robot that plays in another league: the open sea. But is there really so much shit in the sea? An example: In Dubrovnik they counted more than a thousand pieces of garbage in an area of ​​only 100 square meters. In the Mediterranean, where there is tourism and ports, it is a real problem. The pool cleaning robot. The system is made up of the robot and a series of auxiliary elements necessary to fulfill the mission: an unmanned mother ship, an auxiliary boat, a drone, an explorer robot of about 50 centimeters and the robot in question. How does it work? The boat is what provides energy and data to the robots and is also responsible for mapping the bottom with camera and sonar, which allows objects to be identified even in murky waters. Afterwards, the small, agile scout robot quickly runs through it. With all this information, the pool cleaning robot descends with its eight miniturbines until it reaches that area where there is garbage. There, he picks up the objects and lifts them onto the auxiliary boat, which works as a container, using a winch. Why is it important. Because it reaches where divers cannot or does not allow them to reach: as explains dr. Stefan Sosnowskifrom the Information Technology Control Chair of the TUM, a cost-benefit analysis proves that this autonomous waste collection is profitable from 16 meters deep. That’s where human diving becomes more expensive, time-consuming and dangerous. That is to say, this robot does not replace diving, but rather complements it to offer a global cleaning solution. On the other hand, the system is not limited to extraction: it also constitutes a valuable tool for obtaining data since, thanks to the integrated sensors, it can generate maps of the bottom, identify types of waste and record its location, which can be useful in different fields, such as designing better environmental or port management policies. Context. He SEACLEAR project It is funded by the European Union through the Horizon 2020 program. The consortium is made up of eight European partners: the universities of Munich, Delft, Cluj-Napoca and Dubrovnik on the academic level, plus the Port Authority of Hamburg, the Dubrovnik-Neretva Regional Development Agency and the company Subsea Tech. That the port of Hamburg and a company are part of the group is important: it is not an academic laboratory project, but the idea is to put it into practice, to real use at sea. In detail. The intelligence of the system resides in four components: the identification of objects with camera and sonar, the manual labeling of more than 7,000 images of objects outside the seabed, the generation of 3D models through AI. From here, the system already knows where and how to grab those objects to extract them safely. The key to this extraction is a four-finger clamp capable of applying up to 4,000 N of force, enough to lift objects weighing up to 250 kilograms. However, how much with pressure sensors to regulate that force so as not to break fragile materials such as plastics or glass. If you broke a plastic object into smaller pieces, the cure would be worse than the disease. Yes, but. The first public demonstration of the system occurred in the port of Marseille, where the robot recovered, among other things, a wheel and a car seat. While it is true that it is a test in a real environment, it is a controlled demo under known conditions. The project has not yet made public data essential for its profitability and scalability, such as how many objects were recovered per hour, what is the error rate of the recognition system or the cost of operating the system in a real port for a year. On the other hand, extracting objects from the bottom has its drawback: if they are large and have been deposited there for years, they can suspend contaminated sediments and disturb fauna that has colonized them. That is, paradoxically, cleaning can also have environmental impact. In Xataka | It turns out that China’s new giant buoys are actually miniature data centers. Korea won’t like it In Xataka | Germany is installing giant concrete spheres under the sea. It has a good reason: to store renewable energy Cover | TUM

a colossal work of engineering that has been waiting for 150 years

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The project has lurched back and forth for decades, but Norway has finally kicked off one of its most amazing engineering feats: the Stad Ship Tunnel. It is the first tunnel in the world designed for ships to navigate inside. After many years of debatea budget that did not stop growing and a failed attempt to cancel it by the Government, the project is resurrected with approved financing and works planned to start in early 2027. We will tell you all the details. What you are looking to solve. The Stad Peninsula, on the west coast of Norway, is one of the most dangerous areas for navigation in the entire country. With no nearby islands to act as a natural barrier, the Stadhavet Sea has very rough waters, as for about 100 days a year it has waves that can exceed 30 meters arriving from several directions at the same time. That’s a problem for ships, as both fishing boats and cargo ships are forced to wait days (and sometimes weeks) until the weather eases enough to safely navigate the peninsula. Being late when transporting fish has serious consequences, since perishable products spoil, the railway network collapses as an alternative and companies in the sector lose money. “If we are going to export salmon from Trøndelag to the mainland, we cannot risk it getting stuck in Stad due to bad weather. Because it would arrive on the mainland as rakfisk (Norwegian fermented fish) and not as sushi,” counted Tore O. Sandvik, regional mayor of Trøndelag. The boat tunnel. The answer that has been gaining weight for years has been drilling the mountain. The Stad Ship Tunnel will cross the narrowest point of the peninsula (just 1.7 kilometers) between Moldefjord and Kjødepollen, in the Vanylvsfjord. With its 36 meters wide and 50 meters total height (33 meters free from sea level to the roof), the tunnel will be able to accommodate everything from small fishing boats to ferries and cruise ships, including ships on the Hurtigruten coastal route. The ships would pass through the tunnel in about 10 minutes, at a speed of 8 knots. Century and a half of history. The first sketches of crossing the Stad peninsula They date from 1874although the technology of the time condemned it to be considered a utopia. In the eighties the Norwegian government took up the idea, and in 2013 the tunnel finally managed to enter the National Transportation Plan. In 2021, Parliament gave the project the formal green light and talk began about the imminent start of works. But there was a problem: money. Lots of fights. The tunnel budget has been its biggest enemy. From the initial 267 million dollars it went to estimates of 325 million, then to 690 million in 2023 and finally to about 780 million dollars (around 8.6 billion Norwegian crowns) according to the most recent data. In October 2025 Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre announced the cancellation of the project within the framework of the presentation of the 2026 state budgets. “The cost will be so high that we consider it not responsible to continue with the project,” he declared then. The argument was that the country preferred to prioritize other areas, such as health, defense, or municipal investment, rather than assuming that expense. green light. The Støre Government did not have a majority in Parliament to impose the cancellation, and the pressure between the parliamentary opposition and that of more than 500 companies in the fishing, maritime, tourism and industrial sectors ended up tipping the balance. The center-left parties reached a budget agreement which includes financing to start construction. “We are ready to initiate the necessary processes to facilitate the start of works in early 2027,” counted Einar Vik Arset, director general of the Norwegian Coastal Administration (Kystverket). About 15 million dollars will be allocated for the initial phase, within a total budget estimated at around 888 million dollars (about 8.6 billion Norwegian crowns). How it will be built. “The selected contractor will then be able to begin preparations with the aim of starting works in early 2027,” assured Harald Inge Johnsen, project director. The Norwegian Coastal Administration has already evaluated the offers of three finalist consortiums: AF Gruppen, Eiffage Génie Civil and the consortium formed by Skanska and Vassbakk & Stol. If the schedule is met, the tunnel could be inaugurated around 2032. Of course, the excavation will require removing nearly three million cubic meters of rock and earth. Why it is unique in the world. Just like they point out Since El Confidencial, boat tunnels have existed since 1679, when the Malpas tunnel was opened on the French Canal du Midi. But all of them serve inland waterways (canals and ports) and have never been designed for ocean shipping traffic. The Stad Ship Tunnel will be the first in its category. According to estimates from the Norwegian Government itself, the infrastructure also promises to reduce fuel consumption and emissions by up to 60%, by eliminating long waits and forced detours around the peninsula. In Xataka | Building tunnels is very good, but in China there are regions that are doing other things: cutting mountains in half

The US opened the door to Nvidia’s H200 chip in China. The Chinese army has been waiting for a long time on the other side

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Jensen Huang, the CEO of Nvidia, has been forced to “fight” with the US Department of Commerce for months, but he has achieved what he wanted: your company can now deliver some of its Chinese clients its chip to artificial intelligence (AI) H200. As we explain to you On May 14, Alibaba, Tencent, ByteDance and JD.com are four of the ten Chinese companies that already have access to this powerful GPU. And they have it because the US Department of Commerce, which is the institution that grants or denies export licenses, has authorized at least ten Chinese companies and several distributors, including Lenovo and Foxconn, to acquire the second most powerful AI chip that Nvidia has. This decision has come almost two months after the US Government confirmed which was going to allow the company led by Jensen Huang to deliver its H200 chip to its Chinese customers. However, Nvidia likely won’t have time to savor this victory. Once again, dark clouds are gathering over it that threaten to compromise, once again, its business in China. And, according to Bloombergat least seven Chinese universities linked to the country’s armed forces and defense industry are trying to obtain H200 chips. This disclosure comes from China’s public procurement records, so it is presumably reliable. Remote rental: the avenue that the Department of Commerce still does not know how to close In the US there is a pressure group that opposes the sale of advanced American AI chips in China. Chris McGuire, senior fellow on China and emerging technologies at the Council on Foreign Relations, holds that “any deal that allows Nvidia to sell more chips to China means fewer Nvidia chips for US companies and a smaller US advantage over China in AI.” Besides, McGuire argues that “it is surprising that President Trump continues to allow himself to be convinced to put Nvidia’s interests before those of America.” Chinese entities increasingly resort to renting airtime on servers equipped with restricted Nvidia chips What is happening right now with Chinese universities is the ideal breeding ground to reinforce the theses of this pressure group in the US. Two of the institutions that have expressed interest in H200 chipsBeihang University and Northwest Polytechnic University, are among China’s “Seven Sons of National Defense”, a select group of universities dedicated to supporting the People’s Liberation Army. Both have been included in the blacklist of the US Department of Commerce for their involvement in the advancement of Chinese military capabilities. And public procurement records reveal that the Beihang School of Cyber ​​Science and Technology, which claims to have “national defense characteristics and aerospace advantages,” is attempting to rent the use of Nvidia chips. Northwestern Polytechnic University’s School of Cyberspace Security is also trying to rent access to H200 chips, according to those same records. Chinese entities are increasingly resorting to time of use rental on servers equipped with restricted Nvidia chips as a way to access prohibited hardware without having to import it directly. This is the strategy that the US Government will surely try to dismantle. What is not clear at the moment is how he is going to do it. Image | Nvidia More information | Bloomberg In Xataka | The US remains committed to stopping China. Now it has targeted the second largest Chinese chip manufacturer

The waiting list for a liver transplant can be eternal, so they have created a solution: inject yourself with a miniature one

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The National Transplant Organization of Spain makes it clear: The liver is one of the most requested organs on the transplant list, only behind the kidney. Only in the Spanish state in 2025 there were 310 people waiting and that Spain It is a world power in transplants. There are not enough donated and compatible organs to arrive in time for all those people who need them. This historical gap that no country has managed to close is a double tragedy: for the sick person, who waits without guarantees, and for the health system, which cannot offer them another way out. Liver transplant remains the only cure for certain conditions, and the path to it is full of obstacles: surgical complexity, compatibility problems, the exclusion of patients too fragile for surgery or lifelong immunosuppression. Even when an organ arrives on time, not everyone can receive it. Until now, there was no alternative. That could be about to change. The invention. An MIT research team led by Sangeeta Bhatia has developed “satellite livers”, a type of mini-livers capable of assuming the functions of the diseased liver without having to remove it. One is inside, its cells form a stable structure, connect to the person’s blood vessels and begin to produce proteins that the damaged liver can no longer make. They do not replace the entire organ, but they relieve it of its functions. They are actually small grafts of functional liver tissue that are administered via a syringe guided by ultrasound, that is, without surgery: minimal invasibility. Why is it important. Because it addresses the two big problems for those who need a liver: the shortage of available organs and those who cannot face a transplant operation. If you can have surgery, they act as a bridge until they find a suitable organ. And if you can’t, these mini livers cover the liver functions that your liver can’t do. In this way, satellite livers increase the spectrum of treatable patients. From a more general point of view, this invention is a milestone in liver tissue engineering: science has been trying to replicate the nearly 500 functions performed by the human liver for more than a decade. And if implemented in the different health systems, its impact is direct: according to the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases (AASLD)chronic liver disease is the 12th leading cause of death in the United States and rising. Context. Although the liver is an organ with a remarkable regenerative capacity, it does not work miracles: when it exceeds a certain threshold of damage, regeneration is not enough and only the transplant remains. Since the 90s, medical science has been trying to transplant isolated hepatocytes, but the results were poor. Bhatia is not new to this either: has been there for more than 25 years investigating bioartificial liver models, which has served as a basis for understanding what conditions hepatocytes need to remain functional outside the liver. This MIT work is precisely the practical application of all this knowledge. How it works. The research team developed the idea of ​​turning these cells into an injectable along with hydrogel microspheres and fibroblasts. The spheres are intended to enable this route of administration by ensuring uniformity. Fibroblasts act as a support, helping hepatocytes survive and promoting the growth of new vessels into the tissue. Without blood supply, those cells would have their hours numbered. In the team’s experiments in mice, new vessels formed next to hepatocytes, allowing them to receive nutrients and function normally. In these rodents, the cells remained viable and secreting proteins during the eight weeks of the study. Yes, but. Although the results are tremendously promising, it is a preclinical study done in mice and the leap to humans is enormous. The human liver contains between 100,000 and 130,000 million hepatocytes and replicating a sufficient functional mass with injected cells is a challenge that this study has not yet addressed. Even assuming that we extrapolate this finding as is to humans, immunosuppressants would still need to be used. And it is not a minor problem: the fact that the immune system attacks weakened patients increases the risk of infections, tumors and kidney damage. In Xataka | The “silent” liver epidemic: we have a problem that escapes analysis and that science is already seeking to stop In Xataka | Fatty liver advances silently, but science has found unexpected allies: coffee and green tea Cover | Elen Sher and Magnificent

Between June 9 and 11 we are waiting for you in Malaga at the largest B2B event dedicated to AI and technology

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There are three weeks left until the tenth edition of the Digital Enterprise Show (DES) (June 9-11), one of the most important events in Europe dedicated to digital transformation, AI and exponential technologies. For the fifth year, Málaga hosts this enormous knowledge and technology fair of which Xataka is Media Partner. Like every year, the DES has a B2B profile, aimed at the business, institutional and executive sector. Thousands of managers, workers and experts from all business fields will meet for three days at the Malaga Trade Fair and Congress Center (FYCMA), transforming the city into the epicenter of European technology throughout the week. Thousands of attendees and two large spotlights With an expected attendance of more than 15,000 people, the organization includes the exhibition of 400 firms and the presentation of more than 700 innovations, many of them tied to artificial intelligence. The 2026 edition is special because it marks the first decade of DES’ existence. As a tribute and rupture, the organization has broken with its previous structures and has completely redesigned itself under a new hyper-specialized format called ‘DES Universe’. The idea is simple: transform the fair into an “event of events” divided into seven thematic ecosystems that will address from the Cloud until the Digital Marketing Planet. However, and as could not be otherwise given the current times, DES 2026 will pay special attention to two large thematic areas: the rise of agentic AI and cyber defense, issues that we have discussed at Xataka on a daily basis. The conferences will focus on the integration of AI into everyday life, quantum computingthe work automationthe news in civil and military security and even the rise of drones. Among the speakers are Randi Zuckerberg (creator of Facebook Live and CEO of Zuckerberg Media), Yongdong Wang (Corporate Vice President of Microsoft), Beatriz Navarro (CMO of Renault) and experts such as Carme Artigas (co-president of the UN AI Consultative Body) and Javier Porras Castaño (Chief Artificial Intelligence Officer of Unicaja), among many others. Xataka will also participate at a round table on June 9 at 5:20 p.m. by yours truly. The complete listas well as the agendacan be consulted on the web. How to participate General access and to the exhibition area of ​​the large technology firms is managed through the event’s official website. Tickets vary depending on the professional profile and the content you wish to attend on June 9, 10 and 11. They are the following: Business Pass. The general access entrance. It allows you to visit the DES Universe exhibition area and some of the most important events, such as The Alnomics, Spain Digital Company either CyberXponential World. Its price is 90 euros during the three days. Premium VIP Pass. Ideal if your profile is executive and you pursue business opportunities and meetings with investors. In addition to the general access included in the previous pass, it allows you to unlock the 1 to 1 meeting platform, the VIP Lounge and The Scale Up! World Summit. Its price is 400 euros (one day) or 675 euros (three days). Honor Pass. The honorary pass includes all of the above and also a lunch at the Leadership Summit or in the CIO’s Summit and an invitation to the welcome party. Its price is 1,500 euros for three days. Thanks to our collaboration as Media Partner, all our readers can access a 35% discount in all DES 2026 entries. You just have to click this linkchoose your pass, enter the code that we show you in the following image and complete the registration. We are waiting for you in Malaga between June 9 and 11! Image | DES

That bug has been waiting for its moment in Spain for 60 years. And your time is now

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In 1964, someone decided it was a good idea to release a handful of estrildas in Portugal. Before the end of the decade, this small opportunistic bird from sub-Saharan Africa had already settled in Extremadura and Andalusia. By the 80s, it had already reached the east of the peninsula. For 60 years, estrildas had remained in a discreet background. It had taken root, but they weren’t getting traction. However, that has begun to change: in the last 15 years, Valencian estrilds have multiplied by 10 and in Catalonia the population has tripled. AND, to the surprise of the expertsthe key to the boom has been two other invasive species. What has happened? In recent days, several media have begun to publish reports announcing that the African bird “has already arrived” in Spain. However, the common estrilda has been here for decades. What is new is not that: what is new is that in recent years the proliferation of uncultivated plots (one in five are) is becoming the perfect breeding ground for two other exotic species, the common reed and the Pampa duster. And those species make the perfect habitat for estrildas. Do they eat them? No no. That’s why I say it’s curious: the researchers they have realized that it is not that birds consume these plants. The plants provide shelter, roosting sites and perfect structures for this species. The strilas have been surviving for years in a very hostile territory, now they have found some areas that suit them like a glove. The story, as you can see, is more complex. Above all, because it has an agricultural substrate. Without the profound changes of recent years in the countryside, neither the Pampa duster nor the common sugarcane would have reached where they have. In this sense, what is truly worrying is not the estrilda (a bird that, as far as we know, is not affecting the local fauna either). What has experts worried is the chain of invasions. You just have to think about it a little to understand: the feather duster is South American, the common reed is Asian, and the estrilda is African. Together, they have managed to become strong in southern Europe. Fauna and flora have logics that we are still unable to understand in depth. In the end, the key is always in the same place: that there is a moment when we are going to have to assume that the only way to get out of all the problems we are creating is to start comprehensively managing the field. Image | XRTF In Xataka | England is experiencing an unprecedented invasion. The problem is that they are octopuses, and they are devouring everything they can find.​

If you were waiting for Xiaomi to launch cheap cars, its CEO encourages you to continue waiting seated

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Xiaomi has been in the automobile market for a couple of years (although it is still we are waiting for your arrival in Europe), and in contrast to what the brand offers in other areas such as smartphones, the company wants to position itself rather high in the price table of its cars. Lei Jun, CEO of Xiaomi, confirmed during a live broadcast on April 17 that the brand has no intention of launching electric vehicles below 100,000 yuan (about 12,500 euros) in the coming years. Here, as expected from the figures, he talks about the Chinese market. Communication. Lei Jun made these statements during a live autonomy test in which he drove a new generation SU7 Pro from Beijing to Shanghai (1,265 kilometers) with a single stop to charge. On the way, he took the opportunity to chat with the chat, a calculated communication strategy that has been noticed. Luckily, during the talk, we were able to find very interesting statements from the head of the brand himself and get an idea of ​​his roadmap. No to the cheap car. According to counted Jun during the broadcast, today’s competitive electric cars increasingly depend on intelligent driving systems, and that type of technology has a high cost that does not fit with a sales price below that barrier of 100,000 yuan in China. According to collect the media CarNewsChina, Lei himself recognized that the new generation of the SU7 It accumulates more than 100 improvements compared to the previous model, with an increase in material costs of almost 20,000 yuan, but its selling price only rose by about 4,000 yuan. For Xiaomi, the equation applied to an entry-level car simply does not add up. Where Xiaomi does want to be. The updated SU7 starts at 219,900 yuan (around 27,500 euros), and the brand’s direction points even higher, as the firm is ready to launch its SU7 Ultra which already competes in the high-performance segment, and in the not too distant future models such as the YU7 GT or a premium variant of the SU7 will also appear, according to they count from ChinaEVHome. We will have to see prices when the firm lands in Europe with its SU7, but everything indicates that Xiaomi wants to consolidate itself within the field of the mid/high range of automobiles. The Chinese car is not synonymous with cheap. Xiaomi is not the only one that avoids the price war in the entry segment. He Xiaopeng, president of XPeng, declared during the presentation of MONA M03 that his company also has no plans to go below that 100,000 yuan threshold. Among the reasons it gave were too tight margins, unsustainable investment in smart technology and real risk of a destructive price spiral. What the numbers say. Sales data in China reinforce this reading. And it is that according to figures collected by CarNewsChina, entry-level electric cars, such as the Wuling Hongguang Mini EV or the BYD Seagull (Dolphin Surf here in Spain), registered year-on-year falls of almost 58% in the first months of 2026, partly due to the end of tax exemptions on purchases. The sedan and utility vehicle segment as a whole also fell almost 20% year-on-year in March. The volume is there, but the profitability is not. Promises. All in all, Lei Jun left a door ajar in the long term. Their goal is for Xiaomi to be among the five largest car manufacturers in the world. Reaching that scale would, sooner or later, require greater price coverage. But for this scenario to come true, there still seems to be time. Cover image | Xiaomi In Xataka | Journey to the center of the Chinese motor (part 2): I have seen the future of cars in Beijing and yes, it is electric (and very cool)

Six chapters of ‘The Lord of the Rings’ have been waiting for an adaptation since Jackson’s films. The wait is over

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Warner Bros. has announced that Stephen Colbert, host of ‘The Late Show’ and one of the most recognizable and relevant faces of entertainment in the United States (and also one of the greatest Tolkien experts in the world of entertainment), will co-write ‘The Lord of the Rings: Shadow of the Past’, the second of two new films in development for the franchise. He does it with his son, screenwriter Peter McGee, and veteran Philippa Boyens. The Middle Earth franchise is picking up speed again. A special partner. The announcement was made on March 25, traditionally known among fans as the Tolkien Reading Daywith Peter Jackson looking at the camera from what looked like a home video and promising “a very special partner”. That partner is Stephen Colbert, well-known presenter of the talk show ‘The Daily Show’ (which this year faces its final season). Warner Bros. and New Line Cinema have thus communicated that Colbert will co-write ‘The Lord of the Rings: Shadow of the Past’, the second of two new films in the franchise currently in development. What will count? Colbert identified years ago a hole in Jackson’s trilogy: the third to eighth chapters of ‘The Fellowship of the Ring’, from ‘Three’s Company’ to ‘Fog in the Barrows’, pages that the director never transferred to the screen in 2001. Within those chapters is Tom Bombadil, the Tolkien character whose absence in the original films became one of the fandom’s most persistent complaints. “I found myself reading those six chapters over and over again,” Colbert explained to Jackson in the video“thinking that maybe it could be his own story that fits into the larger one.” The official synopsis places the action fourteen years after Frodo’s death: Sam, Merry and Pippin retrace their steps, reliving the first moments of their adventure. Meanwhile, Sam’s daughter, Elanor, discovers a buried secret that nearly derailed the War of the Ring before it even began. It is a story that unites the past and present of the franchise and that, according to the synopsis, opens the door for actors from the original cast to reprise their roles with a narratively coherent age. More fronts. ‘Shadow of the Past’ will arrive after ‘The Hunt for Gollum‘, the film directed by Andy Serkis (player of Gollum in the original trilogy) and whose premiere is scheduled for December 17, 2027. Serkis returns to the character in a story located between the events of ‘The Hobbit’ and those of ‘The Fellowship of the Ring’, and filming has not yet started. It is not the only adaptation underway: Amazon continues with the third season of ‘The Rings of Power‘, and periodic re-releases are planned to celebrate anniversaries such as the 25 years of ‘The Fellowship of the Ring’. The corporate context. Another layer in the succession of ingredients that season this new adaptation. Paramount is acquiring Warner Bros. Discovery in a merger valued at approximately $111 billion, which is expected to take place before the fourth quarter of 2026. Colbert, ironically, leaves CBS (owned by Paramount) with his ‘The Daily Show’ to work with Warner Bros., the studio that that same corporate group will end up controlling. Colbert’s talent. Colbert’s participation in the script is not an empty promotional nod. The presenter’s relationship with Tolkien dates back decades: when he was a teenager he abandoned sports and schoolwork to read Tolkien systematically: not only ‘The Hobbit’ and ‘The Lord of the Rings’, but all of the author’s work. jackson said of him in 2012 that “I have never met a bigger Tolkienian fan in my life.” One of the many pieces of evidence he treasures: when Colbert visited the set of ‘The Hobbit’, Jackson organized a question and answer contest between him and Philippa Boyens, the screenwriter of the trilogy who will now co-write ‘Shadow of the Past’ with him. Colbert won. In 2013 he had a cameo in ‘The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug’ as a Lake City spy, along with his wife and children (including Peter McGee, co-writer of the new film). The following year he moderated the ‘The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies’ panel at the San Diego Comic-Con. completely disguised as the same character. In 2019 he directed the short film ‘Darrylgorn’, starring Ian McKellen, Viggo Mortensen and Elijah Wood. A stop as a start. The cancellation of ‘The Daily Show’ is what made the project possible. C.B.S. announced in July 2025 the closure of the programin the midst of tensions between Colbert and Paramount after the network’s agreement with Donald Trump to settle a lawsuit by the president with the program ’60 Minutes’, of which the presenter has always been very critical. The last episode is scheduled for May 21, 2026, closing eleven years at the helm of the title. Colbert acknowledged in the ad from the movie that “turns out I’m going to be free starting this summer.” In Xataka | A demographer has spent weeks solving a very important question: how many people lived in Tolkien’s Middle Earth

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