Qualcomm on Tuesday said it was teaming up with Alphabet’s Google to offer a combination of chips and software that will let automakers develop their own AI voice assistants using technology from the two firms.
Qualcomm’s chips have long powered mobile phones with Google’s Android operating system and the company has expanded into the automotive business, with chips that can power both a car’s dashboard and automated driving systems that are used by General Motors and others. On Tuesday, Qualcomm said it is working with Google to create a version of the company’s Android Automotive OS that will run smoothly on Qualcomm chips.
While many consumers are familiar with Google’s Android Auto and Apple CarPlay that display apps from a phone when plugged into a vehicle, Google’s Android Automotive OS is an offering that automakers use behind the scenes to power a vehicle computing systems. Qualcomm and Google said automakers will be able to use the joint offering and Google’s AI technology to create voice assistants that are unique to an automaker and can work without relying on a driver’s phone.
“Typically, we have operated together, but independently — we plan a lot of things together, but we go to customers separately,” Nakul Duggal, group manager for automotive at Qualcomm, said of the Qualcomm-Google relationship. “We decided we should think about this differently because it will reduce a lot of friction and confusion.”
Qualcomm on Tuesday also rolled out two new chips, one called Snapdragon Cockpit Elite to power dashboards and another called Snapdragon Ride Elite for self-driving features. The company said Mercedes-Benz Group plans to use the Snapdragon Elite Cockpit chip in future vehicles, though the two companies did not specify when or in which vehicles the chip will appear.
Qualcomm, Alphabet team up for automotive AI; Mercedes inks chip deal
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Qualcomm, Alphabet team up for automotive AI; Mercedes inks chip deal
- Qualcomm on Tuesday also rolled out two new chips
Arts festival’s decision to exclude Palestinian author spurs boycott
- A Macquarie University academic who researches Islamophobia and Palestine, Abdel-Fattah responded saying it was “a blatant and shameless act of anti-Palestinian racism and censorship,” with her lawyers issuing a letter to the festival
SYDENY: A top Australian arts festival has seen the withdrawal of dozens of writers in a backlash against its decision to bar an Australian Palestinian author after the Bondi Beach mass shooting, as moves to curb antisemitism spur free speech concerns.
The shooting which killed 15 people at a Jewish Hanukkah celebration at Sydney’s Bondi Beach on Dec. 14 sparked nationwide calls to tackle antisemitism. Police say the alleged gunmen were inspired by Daesh.
The Adelaide Festival board said last Thursday it would disinvite Randa Abdel-Fattah from February’s Writers Week in the state of South Australia because “it would not be culturally sensitive to continue to program her at this unprecedented time so soon after Bondi.”
FASTFACTS
• Abdel-Fattah responded, saying it was ‘a blatant and shameless act of anti-Palestinian racism and censorship.’
• Around 50 authors have since withdrawn from the festival in protest, leaving it in doubt, local media reported.
A Macquarie University academic who researches Islamophobia and Palestine, Abdel-Fattah responded saying it was “a blatant and shameless act of anti-Palestinian racism and censorship,” with her lawyers issuing a letter to the festival.
Around 50 authors have since withdrawn from the festival in protest, leaving it in doubt, local media reported.
Among the boycotting authors, Kathy Lette wrote on social media the decision to bar Abdel-Fattah “sends a divisive and plainly discriminatory message that platforming Australian Palestinians is ‘culturally insensitive.'”
The Adelaide Festival said in a statement on Monday that three board members and the chairperson had resigned. The festival’s executive director, Julian Hobba, said the arts body was “navigating a complex moment.”
a complex and unprecedented moment” after the “significant community response” to the board decision.
In the days after the Bondi Beach attack, Jewish community groups and the Israeli government criticized Prime Minister Anthony Albanese for failing to act on a rise in antisemitic attacks and criticized protest marches against Israel’s war in Gaza held since 2023.
Albanese said last week a Royal Commission will consider the events of the shooting as well as antisemitism and social cohesion in Australia. Albanese said on Monday he would recall parliament next week to pass tougher hate speech laws.
On Monday, New South Wales state premier Chris Minns announced new rules that would allow local councils to cut off power and water to illegally operating prayer halls.
Minns said the new rules were prompted by the difficulty in closing a prayer hall in Sydney linked to a cleric found by a court to have made statements intimidating Jewish Australians.
The mayor of the western Sydney suburb of Fairfield said the rules were ill-considered and councils should not be responsible for determining hate speech.
“Freedom of speech is something that should always be allowed, as long as it is done in a peaceful way,” Mayor Frank Carbone told Reuters.
