Samsung and Huawei, the world’s largest manufacturers of Android smartphones, are now joining an interesting initiative along with Qualcomm. The three companies have agreed to support and play a key role in promoting the MPEG-5 EVC (Essential Video Coding) codec. This standard will find application in devices supporting 4K and 8K resolution, but it is also optimised for virtual and augmented reality (AR).

The Bulgarian company Allterco Robotics has released its latest smart product on the market – a smart camera with the capability of remotely taking body temperature with an accuracy level of within 0.3℃ of the real number. As the company notes, the MyKi Tcam is a pandemic control solution with features like body temperature screening and a smart warning system.

Beaches deserted, city squares devoid of people: Many tourist attractions are currently unrecognisable. People are stuck at home because of coronavirus lockdowns, wondering when they can travel once again. But that gives them plenty of time to plan and make the next trip really count. In the meantime, they can digitally explore the world from their sofa.

Competition for Tesla is hotting up with the news that Chinese carmaker Build Your Dreams (BYD) has chosen Europe to launch its new mid-sized Han electric saloon. The sharp-looking, 5-metre-long Han limousine will make its Chinese debut in June 2020 before heading for Europe.

Google says it will no longer build custom artificial intelligence tools for speeding up oil and gas extraction, separating itself from cloud computing rivals Microsoft and Amazon.

 Alibaba Group Holding Ltd will invest 10bn yuan ($1.41bn) into an AI (Artificial Intelligence) and IoT (Internet of Things) system centered around its Tmall Genie smart speaker, the company announced on Wednesday. The announcement comes as the e-commerce giant continues its push into new technologies and business sectors beyond online shopping.

Researchers have taken inspiration from a mosquito's ability to fly and land in the dark to develop a new collision-avoidance sensory system that has been tested on a quadcopter. The international team of scientists, led by Professor Richard Bomphrey at the Royal Veterinary College (RVC) in London, looked at the sensory mechanism in the male Culex quinquefasciatus mosquito and found a way to mimic the insect's ability to use airflow to detect obstacles.

Various European supercomputers were shut down to give way to investigations after they were infected by cryptocurrency mining malware last week. A ZDNet report said the malware aims to mine Monero virtual currency (XMR).

China’s foreign ministry said on Saturday the United States needed to stop the “unreasonable suppression” of Chinese companies like Huawei.

OpenAI, an independent research organisation aimed at developing “friendly AI,” has been cranking out a lot of impressive work over the past few months. The organisation, for example, recently provided the source code for the language generating tool, Talk to Transformer. Now, OpenAI is adding to its repertoire of AI tools, Jukebox: An AI that generates raw audio of genre-specific songs.