Dtac Accelerate has annually groomed 10 to 12 start-ups, said Lars Norling, chief executive officer, Total Access Communication PLC or DTAC. The programme graduates are now able to create digital innovations to help enhance customers’ day-to-day lives and contribute to Thai society.

“DTAC is one of the pioneers in the start-up ecosystem,” said Norling.

Since its beginning, dtac Accelerate has been committed to creating the first start-up unicorn in Thailand and to help start-ups expand into international markets.

And while the unicorn so far remains elusive, dtac Accelerate batches 1 to 5 have helped nurture Thai start-ups to a combined value of over US$100 million (Bt3.13 billion), with graduates collectively securing $5 million (Bt31.31 million) in investment and 70 per cent follow-on funding, the highest in Southeast Asia.

For 2018, dtac Accelerate features a training program from the Google LaunchPad Accelerator and mentoring from world-class start-up gurus. The gurus include Jacob Greenspan, an expert in user experience and user interface (UI/UX) for product development, Jake Knapp, an expert in the “design sprint” process used to develop new ideas, and many other mentors from around the world.

Moreover, DTAC is also collaborating with Line Thailand to offer Thai start-ups an opportunity to reach 42 million users on that platform.

Andrew Kvalseth, DTAC’s chief marketing officer, said that 2017 saw increased investments and steady growth in the Thai start-up industry, a reflection of the country’s expanding start-up ecosystem. Dtac Accelerate has played a key role in building this ecosystem.

In 2017 alone, dtac Accelerate alumni raised investment totalling $9.5 million, including three series A investments and eight seed investments.

Its start-ups got 70 per cent follow-on funding compared to a 20 per cent regional average.

Exclusive Google partner

Google is clearly impressed.

“Google has selected dtac Accelerate as their exclusive partner for Google Launchpad,” said Kvalseth. “We have access to their full curriculum. We are the ones screening start-ups for their launchpad. And they’re sending us some of their top people, like Jacob Greenspan.

“We’re also the first, and currently only, accelerator to work with Line. Line will support our start-ups with user acquisition, thanks to their 42 million-strong customer base in Thailand.

Line not only has an API platform for start-ups to plug into but is also launching its own venture capital fund, said Kvalseth.

The partnership with Google Launchpad Accelerator will allow selected start-ups from batch 6 to take part in the Google Launchpad Accelerator in San Francisco, USA.

As well, the partnership with Line Scale-up will offer start-ups a co-marketing opportunity with access to more than 42 million Line users, an investment opportunity from Line, and participation in Line Dev Day at Line Corporation headquarters in Tokyo in September.

“We also have partnerships with Thailand’s leading corporations such as Muang Thai Life Assurance, Siri Ventures and PTT’s Express Solutions,” said Sompoat Chansomboon, managing director of dtac Accelerate.

The dtac Accelerate batch 6 provides support in three areas: a technical pack by Clouds partners AWS, Google Clouds, IBM, and Tencent; a marketing pack by DTAC, FB, Line@, PTT, San Siri, MTL, Thairath, and Fastwork; and a talent pack by Getlink, Scoutout, Google Ignite, Skooldio, Disrupt University, Globish, Senseino and Google Developer Group Thailand.

Application submissions are open for dtac Accelerate batch 6 until April 11, with participants announced on May 4, then Pitch Day on May 11, 2018, Boot Camp from May to August, and Demo Day on the last week of August.

New Zealand regulators late Tuesday approved plans for Zephyr Airworks, a subsidiary of Page’s company Kitty Hawk, to develop and test the futuristic air taxis.

Known as Cora, the electric aircraft has a dozen small lift rotors on its wings, making it capable of vertical take-off and landing like a helicopter.

But developers say it is much quieter, meaning it could transport passengers in urban areas using rooftops and car parks as landing pads.

“We are offering a pollution free, emission free vehicle that flies dependably, we think this is the logical next step in the evolution of transportation,” Zephyr chief executive Fred Reid said.

The Cora prototype being tested in New Zealand’s South Island uses three on-board computers to calculate its flight path and is capable of carrying two passengers.

The computers operate independently as a safety measure and the aircraft can deploy a parachute if anything goes wrong.

The aircraft, previously known as Zee.Aero, has a range of 100 kilometres (62 miles), reaching speeds of 150 kmh and an altitude of up to 900 metres (3,000 feet).

The Cora project envisages the air taxis becoming so common that “air travel will be woven into our daily lives”.

‘Like science fiction’

Zephyr said using them would be a simple experience for passengers.

“You wouldn’t have to know anything about flying a plane. Cora could fly for you,” it said in a promotional video. “And it would be all-electric, helping to build a sustainable world.”

Page’s company is also developing a prototype personal aircraft called the Kitty Hawk Flyer and unveiled an early model in the United States last year.

However, it looked more like a recreational plaything than a flying car, suitable only for flying above water and seating the pilot in an open top cabin exposed to the elements.

Cora appears far more robust, with a design more like a traditional aircraft featuring wings, a tail and a closed canopy for passengers.

The aircraft will not be offered for sale, instead the public must book trips like they would with an airline or taxi service.

Zephyr said Cora took eight years to design but then developers needed a suitable environment to safely test the new technology.

They settled on New Zealand because of its uncongested airspace and rigorous regulatory environment, with Reid saying local officials had embraced the idea.

“We had no idea what to expect,” he said. “They could have laughed us out of the room. We were pitching something that sounded like science fiction.”

Cora has been given an experimental airworthiness certificate from the New Zealand Civil Aviation Authority.

Trialling the flying taxi service will reportedly take six years, with operations based around the city of Christchurch.

“This aircraft represents the evolution of the transport eco system to one that responds to a global challenge around traffic and congestion, and is kinder to the planet,” Christchurch mayor Lianne Dalziel said.

The company said it used its own funds to reimburse about 46.6 billion yen ($440 million) to all 260,000 customers who lost their holdings of NEM, a leading cryptocurrency.

“Procedures have been completed with the accounts of all 260,000 customers,” company spokesman Yosuke Imai told AFP.

Thieves syphoned away 523 million units of the cryptocurrency from Coincheck — then valued at $547 million — during the January 26 hack, which exceeded the $480 million in bitcoin stolen in 2014 from another Japanese exchange, MtGox.

The 2014 hack prompted Japan to issue new regulations, requiring exchanges to obtain a government licence, but Coincheck was allowed to continue operating while the Financial Services Agency was reviewing its application.

Authorities raided Coincheck’s office last month and have slapped the company with sanctions.

Coincheck chief operating officer Yusuke Otsuka said last week that the company’s system was breached after several staff members opened emails containing malware.

The firm had failed to upgrade its systems to keep up with the rapid expansion of the cryptocurrency market, he said.

In February, seven plaintiffs — two companies and five individuals — filed a lawsuit against Coincheck seeking the reimbursement of 19.53 million yen in lost virtual currency and further compensation for interest lost due to the hack.

As many as 10,000 businesses in Japan are thought to accept bitcoin, and bitFlyer — the country’s main bitcoin exchange — saw its user base grow beyond one million in November.

Facebook’s two billion users will soon be able to post in more creative ways with the catalog of Warner, whose artist roster includes Ed Sheeran, Coldplay and the late Prince.

“Our partnership with Facebook will help expand the universe of music streaming and create supplementary revenue for artists,” said Ole Obermann, chief digital officer of the Warner Music Group.

“Fan-created video is one of the most personal, social and often viral ways that music is enjoyed, but its commercial potential is largely untapped,” he said in a statement.

Warner said it had been holding out for “the best possible deal” after its two rivals, Universal Music and Sony Music, signed deals with Facebook in recent months.

Facebook has said that it is looking at more personalized ways in which users can post music, including through Messenger and Instagram, the picture-driven social media platform owned by Facebook.

Mark Zuckerberg’s company has largely taken a back seat on music streaming as other mega-companies such as Apple and Google invest heavily in the growing sector.

While music postings are omnipresent on Facebook, the company has sought to take down embedded content that is copyrighted without licensing.

Fans, when not uploading their own homemade videos, link to other sites such as YouTube and Spotify.

In line with the Ministry of Primary Resources and Tourism’s (MPRT) Strategic Goals and Key Areas of the Main Resources of the ministry such as Productivity Improvement for Modern Technology and Modernisation in broadening activities in all farming, fishing, and animal husbandry activities.

This was highlighted by the Minister of Primary Resources and Tourism YB Dato Seri Setia Awang Haji Ali bin Haji Apong at the 14th Legislative Council session on Thursday, responding to a query by YB Iswandy bin Ahmad on integrating technology physically, digitally and biologically, and on policies to adapt such changes to stir economic growth in the near future.

In adapting these changes, the country encourages the needs for technological applications towards expanding key resource sectors and the tourism sector.

The appropriate technology adaptation approaches include the application of LED, vertical farming, green house, fertigation and hydroponics, and agricultural industries in farming.

The minister said others include closed house system and multi-level houses in broiler industry as well as multi-storey tanks for the maintenance of fish and shrimps. For financial transaction management, the adaptation of the e-payment system is an initiative already implemented under the Brunei Darussalam National Single Window (BDNSW) system and similar to other systems that facilitate the users.

“There’s a whole bunch of interesting and difficult philosophical questions… that we’re going to have to answer about how to control these systems, what values we want in them, how do we want to deploy them, what do we want to use them for,” he said.

Hassabis was speaking at a screening of a documentary about AlphaGo, the AI system developed by DeepMind that stunned the world in 2016 by beating an elite human player in the complex Chinese strategy game “Go”.

In a question and answer session at University College London, he said AI is an “incredible tool to accelerate scientific discovery”, adding: “We believe that it will be one of the most beneficial technologies of mankind ever.”

However, like other powerful technologies, “there are risks”, he said, adding: “It depends on how we as a society decide to deploy it that will resolve in good or bad outcomes.”

He said ethical questions were at the “forefront of our mind” at DeepMind, which he founded in 2010 and is now part of Google.

Users of smart speakers with Alexa assistant software have comically expressed their fears in recent weeks on Twitter, even posting video snippets of speakers infused with the software laughing menacingly for no apparent reason.

“If Alexa is laughing at you to your face, just imagine what it says about you behind your back,” read a quip posted at Twitter by @mattblaze.

Darker posts wondered playfully whether fears about artificial intelligence turning on humans were coming real.

“Every time Alexa laughs, an angel dies,” entrepreneur and innovator Elon Musk joked in a Twitter exchange on the development.

Tesla co-founder Musk is among high profile figures who have called for vigilance to ensure artificial intelligence doesn’t turn on humans.

Amazon told AFP it looked into what was going on and found that sometimes Alexa mistakenly registers the phrase “Alexa laugh” and obeys.

“We are changing that phrase to be ‘Alexa, can you laugh?’ which is less likely to have false positives,” an Amazon spokesperson told AFP.

And, Alexa is being modified to say “Sure, I can laugh,” before cackling.

Streaming television titan Netflix took the opportunity to spotlight a Black Mirror dystopian series known for twisted, unanticipated consequences of new technologies.

“Just brainstorming some @blackmirror titles while Alexa laughs maniacally in the distance,” read an @netflix tweet.

The tweet included a picture of a multi-story, modern book shop overlaid with “The Bookstore That Enslaved Humanity.”

Amazon began as an online book seller.

One video of a cackling Alexa posted at Twitter on February 23 had logged more than a million views.

“I unplugged Alexa and she’s still laughing,” one Twitter user quipped.

Launched in 2014 by Amazon, the Alexa digital assistant has spread from the company’s Echo voice-commanded speakers to millions of devices, even cars.

Alexa competes in the digital assistant market with offerings from tech titans including Apple, Google, and Microsoft.

BlackBerry is claiming infringement on patents it holds for message encryption and notifications, and is seeking an injunction as well as damages for lost profits, although no figure was given.

Facebook and its wholly-owned services Instagram and WhatsApp are named as defendants in the lawsuit. The company said it intends to fight the lawsuit.

“We have a lot of respect for Facebook and the value they’ve placed on messaging capabilities, some of which were invented by BlackBerry,” BlackBerry spokeswoman Sarah McKinney said in a statement.

She said BlackBerry would like to partner with Facebook “in our drive toward a securely connected future, and we continue to hold this door open to them.”

“However, we have a strong claim that Facebook has infringed on our intellectual property, and after several years of dialogue, we also have an obligation to our shareholders to pursue appropriate legal remedies,” McKinney added.

Facebook shot back by disparaging BlackBerry, saying the lawsuit “sadly reflects the current state of its messaging business.”

“Having abandoned its efforts to innovate, Blackberry is now looking to tax the innovation of others. We intend to fight,” Facebook deputy general counsel Paul Grewal said.

BlackBerry, after abandoning the manufacture of its once-popular smartphones, which it also pioneered, has refocused its core business on cybersecurity software and services.

The all-in-one app is a daily necessity for most Chinese, bringing together messaging, social media, mobile payment, games, news and other services.

“WeChat’s worldwide monthly active users have surpassed the critical one billion mark,” CEO Pony Ma said Monday on the sidelines of China’s parliamentary session underway in Beijing.

“In the future we hope to use technological innovation to push forward the next developmental step of reform and opening,” Ma said.

He was referring to China’s economic liberalisation policy that has fuelled four decades of breakneck economic growth.

Although Ma said WeChat’s monthly active users had crossed the one billion threshold, a company spokesman told AFP he was referring to its total number of accounts.

Still, the one billion figure indicates the huge user base which Tencent has built up both inside and outside China for its all-in-one app.

It compares with 2.1 billion monthly active users on Facebook and 1.5 billion on its messaging app WhatsApp.

The popularity of WeChat — and profits from its addictive mobile games — have pushed Tencent’s earnings and share price sharply upwards.

The company surpassed Facebook in market value last year and the 47-year-old Ma has rocketed to near the apex of China’s rich list.

He is the wealthiest delegate to the parliamentary session, according to Shanghai-based luxury magazine publisher Hurun Report, which estimated his fortune at $47 billion.