Gree Group ushered in a new leader, and netizens urgently called Dong Mingzhu
NEWS
Today's news
Lei Jun: Xiaomi's Beijing Changping Smart Factory was officially completed and put into operation, Huang Jenxun said that the era of learning computers has passed, Gree Group ushered in a new leader, Gaohe Automobile announced a six-month shutdown, and Starbucks China responded to the launch of "Braised Pork Latte". OPPO responds to the suspension of the folding screen project, BMW confirms a data breach, Wuliangye invests 10 billion yuan to set up a private equity fund, HSBC Holdings completes a $3 billion share repurchase plan, and Meta will mark AI-generated images on its social platforms......
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Lei Jun: Xiaomi's Beijing Changping Smart Factory was officially completed and put into operation
On February 18th, Lei Jun posted that Xiaomi's Beijing Changping Smart Factory was officially completed and put into operation today, with a flagship mobile phone manufacturing capacity of more than 10 million units, which is the first large-scale factory in Xiaomi's history, and it is also another key milestone in Xiaomi's intelligent manufacturing.
It is understood that the completed Xiaomi smart factory belongs to Xiaomi Changping Park, and the entire park includes Xiaomi smart factory, Xiaomi innovation and research center, Xiaomi future industrial park and supporting office buildings. It covers a total area of 287 acres with a total investment of 12.1 billion yuan.
Son plans to raise $100 billion to set up an AI chip company
Masayoshi Son plans to raise $100 billion to build an AI (artificial intelligence) chip giant belonging to SoftBank to challenge industry leader Nvidia. People familiar with the matter said that Son hopes that the company and its chip company Arm will form a complementary relationship and jointly build an AI chip giant. According to people familiar with the matter, one funding package currently under consideration is that SoftBank will contribute $30 billion, with another $70 billion likely coming from institutions in the Middle East. However, details on the specific source of funding for the project and the future use of the funds have not yet been determined. (The Paper)
Huang said the days of computer science are over
Recently, at the 2024 World Government Summit, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said when asked "what should people learn if they are at the forefront of technology", the era of learning computers has passed, and life science is the future.
Large companies
Gree Group ushered in a new leader
Zhuhai Gree Group recently ushered in a new leader. According to the latest information on the official website of Gree Group, Kang Hong has been appointed Secretary of the Party Committee and Chairman of Gree Group. According to public information, Kang Hong was the deputy secretary-general of the Zhuhai Municipal Government, and was appointed as a temporary cadre selected by the Organization Department of the CPC Central Committee as the deputy general manager of China Xiongan Group Urban Development and Investment Co., Ltd.
As of the end of 2023, Gree Group's total assets exceeded 113.2 billion yuan and total owner's equity exceeded 48.3 billion yuan.
Interestingly, some netizens confused Gree Group with Gree Electric (000651), of which Dong Mingzhu is the chairman.
At the end of the third quarter of 2023, Gree Group held 3.44% of the equity of Gree Electric Appliances, making it its fourth largest shareholder, with a reference market value of 6.6 billion yuan at the end of the period. As of February 8, 2024, the total market value of Gree Electric is 203.6 billion yuan.
Gaohe Automobile announced that it would suspend production for six months
According to Jiemian News, on February 18, the first day of the resumption of work during the Spring Festival in the Year of the Dragon, Gaohe Automobile held an internal meeting and announced that it would suspend work and production for 6 months from now on. According to insiders told Jiemian News, Gaohe Automobile said that the wages of employees before February 18 will be paid as usual, and the employees who remain in Gaohe Automobile before March 15 will only be paid basic salary, and after March 15, employees will only be paid basic salary in Shanghai. It is reported that Gaohe Automobile pays wages on the 15th of each month.
Previously, Gaohe Automobile held an all-staff meeting to announce the postponement of the payment of January wages, the cancellation of year-end bonuses and salary cuts for all employees. Among them, the January salary will be paid back at the end of February.
Meizu has fully entered the field of AI technology
On February 18, Meizu announced that it would make strategic adjustments, and at the same time as All in AI, it will stop the development of new projects of traditional smartphones, and existing smartphones will still enjoy software and hardware maintenance services normally, and fully invest in the "tomorrow's devices" AI For New Generations, and enter a new wave of promising AI technology.
It is understood that Meizu currently has the ability to fully transform into the field of AI, Meizu has a complete hardware team such as R&D and supply chain, and also has a systematic development, design, and interactive software team, which will provide solid technical support and service guarantee for Meizu All in AI.
Starbucks China responds to launch "braised pork latte"
According to Jiupai News, recently, the topic of "Is Starbucks' braised pork latte serious" on social platforms has sparked heated discussions. This is a new product launched by Starbucks - "Nianfeng Salty Latte". The product detail page shows that it is composed of "Dongpo braised pork flavor sauce and espresso fusion, added to steamed milk, decorated with Dongpo braised pork flavor sauce and pork jerky", priced at 68 yuan.
On February 18, the reporter learned from Starbucks China that "Nianfeng Salty Latte" is a limited new product in the Year of the Dragon, which belongs to the Special Coffee Series of Reserve New Year, and its sales scope is 25 Starbucks Reserve stores across the country.
OPPO responded to the suspension of the folding screen project
According to Jiemian News, in response to the rumors that one of the top 5 mobile phone manufacturers in China has suspended the development of the folding screen project, OPPO responded: The folding series products are advancing as planned. Previously, the latest report released by well-known analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said that the two brands, OPPO and vivo, have shelved their plans to release a new vertical folding screen in 2024.
BMW confirms a data breach
According to reports, a misconfiguration incident occurred at the cloud storage servers of the automotive giant BMW, resulting in the exposure of sensitive information such as private keys and internal data. Researcher Can Yoleri said that during a routine scan, it found that the Microsoft Azure managed storage servers, also known as "buckets," in BMW's development environment were configured as public rather than private.
According to TechCrunch, the exposed data includes BMW's cloud service private keys in China, Europe and the United States, as well as login credentials for BMW's production and development databases, although it is unclear exactly how much data was exposed.
A BMW spokesperson has confirmed that the data breach affected Microsoft Azure buckets, a storage-based development environment, and said that no customer or personal data was affected as a result. "The BMW Group has fixed this issue in early 2024 and we will continue to monitor the situation with our partners," the spokesperson added. BMW would not say how long the cloud storage server exposure had lasted or whether the exposed data had been maliciously accessed. According to researcher Yoleri, BMW has yet to revoke or change the set of passwords and credentials found in the exposed cloud storage servers. (Phoenix Finance)
Faraday Future responds to being sued for rent arrears
Recently, Faraday Future's headquarters in Los Angeles, Wrexford Industries, filed a lawsuit against Faraday Future in Los Angeles Superior Court, accusing it of arrears of rent and related maintenance fees and taxes for January and February. Faraday Future owed a total of $91,000 (about 660,000 yuan) in rent.
In addition, the landlord also demanded the repossession of the building in the lawsuit. Faraday Future said today that it is actively working with the landlords of the San Jose office and the Gardina headquarters, and is engaged in friendly negotiations on the current situation to resolve it as soon as possible. (CBN)
Investment and financing
Wuliangye invested 10 billion yuan to establish a private equity fund
According to the Aiqicha App, recently, Sichuan Push Industrial Development Fund Partnership (Limited Partnership) was established, with a capital contribution of 10.01 billion yuan, and the executive partner is Yibin Wuliangye Fund Management Co., Ltd., whose business scope includes equity investment, investment management, asset management and other activities with private equity funds. The equity penetration chart shows that the company is jointly held by Sichuan Yibin Wuliangye Group Co., Ltd. and Yibin Wuliangye Fund Management Co., Ltd.
HSBC Holdings completes US$3 billion share repurchase programme
On February 19, HSBC Holdings announced on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange that since the start of the repurchase, the company has repurchased 208,107,953 ordinary shares from the UK location at a volume-weighted average price of 6.1158 pounds per ordinary share, and repurchased 179,962,000 ordinary shares from the Hong Kong Stock Exchange at a volume-weighted average price of HK$60.4624 per ordinary share for cancellation, with a total consideration of about US$3 billion.
Beijing Qingyun Energy completed nearly 200 million yuan in Series B financing
Beijing Qingyun Energy Group Co., Ltd. completed nearly 200 million yuan in Series B financing, led by Zhongxing Capital. Qingyun Energy has experienced two rounds of financing since its establishment, the first round is the A round of financing in 2021, the investor is Shanghai Qifeng, the amount is not disclosed, and the second round is the B round of financing.
New technologies/products/services
OpenAI Sora can generate multicam videos in one go
On Saturday (February 17), local time, OpenAI scientist Bill Peebles (Bill Peebles) posted on X that Sora can generate multiple videos side by side at the same time. Based on the GIF he showed in his tweet, Sora generated five videos of people strolling and playing in the snow on a snowy day.
"This is a sample of the video that Sora generated all at once, not that we stitched together five videos. Sora decided to have five different perspectives at the same time!" Peebles said in a tweet.
At the moment, OpenAI has not opened Sora to the public. OpenAI said the model is being tested and shared only with a select group of researchers and academics. They will look at Sora to look for the risk of the model being misused. (Phoenix.com Technology)
Meta will annotate AI-generated images on its social platforms
Meta Platforms' top policy executive said on the 6th that the company will begin in the coming months to use a set of invisible markers built into documents to detect and label images generated by other companies' AI services. Nick Clegg, president of global affairs at Meta, wrote in a blog post that the company will apply these tags to any tagged content posted on Facebook, Instagram, and Threads services to show users that the images, in many cases, resemble real photos and are actually digital creations. (Zhitong Finance)
*The title image was purchased from Visual China