U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo speaks at an event held by the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations and the U.S.-China Business Council on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in San Francisco in November.
BUSINESS / Tech
Apr 22, 2024
Raimondo says Huawei’s chip breakthrough is years behind U.S. tech
Raimondo said the technology gap shows the Biden administration’s success in imposing export controls on China.
Tesla Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk gets in a Tesla car as he leaves a hotel in Beijing in May last year.
BUSINESS / Tech / ANALYSIS
Apr 22, 2024
Elon Musk’s robotaxi dreams plunge Tesla into chaos
The idea of creating an autonomous taxi service has been kicking around Tesla for at least eight years.
Japanese businesses traditionally all hire graduates at the same time each year, but about one in 10 recruits fresh from college quit their jobs within a year, government data shows.
BUSINESS / Tech
Apr 20, 2024
Japanese AI tool predicts when recruits will quit
The tool crunches data on employees at a company, from their attendance record to personal information such as age and gender.
U.S. President Joe Biden speaks as he announces a preliminary agreement with Intel for a major CHIPS and Science Act award, during a visit to the Intel Ocotillo Campus in Chandler, Arizona, on March 20.
BUSINESS / Tech / ANALYSIS
Apr 19, 2024
Latest Biden chip deal highlights U.S. semiconductor successes
Samsung is the latest beneficiary of Washington’s efforts to shore up precarious supply chains and protect its national security interests.
Arthur Mensch, the chief executive and one of the founders of Mistral, a French artificial-intelligence startup, at the company’s offices in Paris in late March.
BUSINESS / Tech
Apr 14, 2024
Europe’s AI ‘champion’ sets sights on tech giants in U.S.
As Europe vies for AI leadership, Mistral, under Arthur Mensch, is emerging as a formidable contender against U.S. and Chinese giants.
An AA patrol for electric vehicles in Birmingham, England. Fewer than 10% of the U.K.’s 236,000 auto mechanics are qualified to work directly on EV batteries or their cases, according to the Institute of the Motor Industry.
BUSINESS / Tech
Apr 13, 2024
EVs head for junkyard as mechanic shortage inflates repair costs
High costs are prompting underwriters to total cars with relatively benign damage — prematurely consigning electric models to the junk heap.
The assembly line at the Volkswagen factory in Zwickau, Germany, on March 14. The factory stopped producing gasoline-powered Golfs and switched to electric vehicles, illuminating the risks and opportunities for factory towns and cities.
BUSINESS / Tech
Apr 11, 2024
What happened when a German car factory went all electric?
The city of Zwickau, where more than 10,000 people work for Volkswagen and tens of thousands more for suppliers, seems to have avoided dire consequences.

Longform

Later this month, author Shogo Imamura will open Honmaru, a bookstore that allows other businesses to rent its shelves. It's part of a wave of ideas Japanese booksellers are trying to compete with online spaces.
The story isn't over for Japan's bookstores