The semiconductor industry last year suffered its worst annual slump in almost two decades, hurt by a trade war between the largest chip producer, the U.S., and the largest consumer, China. Bloomberg reports: Revenue fell 12% to $412 billion in 2019, the Semiconductor Industry Association said Monday in a statement. That's the biggest drop since 2001, when industry sales slumped 32% as the dot-com bubble burst. The rate of decline last year abated with sales growing slightly in the fourth quarter from the preceding three-month period, the industry association said. For that to continue, China and the U.S. need to build on the phase one trade agreement announced last month.

Memory chips were the hardest hit. Prices of those commodity chips fell as production outran demand. Memory revenue dropped 33% from 2018 led by declines in computer memory. All regions experienced a decline in demand. Sales in China, whose consumers and factories that supply finished products to the rest of the world account for more than one-third of global consumption of the electronic components, fell 8.7%, according to the SIA. Sales in the Americas dropped the most of any region at 24%.

fahrbot-bot shares a report from Phys.Org: The University of Rochester research lab that recently used lasers to create unsinkable metallic structures has now demonstrated how the same technology could be used to create highly efficient solar power generators. In a paper published in Light: Science & Applications, the lab of Chunlei Guo, professor of optics also affiliated with Physics and the Material Sciences Program, describes using powerful femto-second laser pulses to etch metal surfaces with nanoscale structures that selectively absorb light only at the solar wavelengths, but not elsewhere.

A regular metal surface is shiny and highly reflective. Years ago, the Guo lab developed a black metal technology that turned shiny metals pitch black. "But to make a perfect solar absorber," Guo says, "We need more than a black metal and the result is this selective absorber." This surface not only enhances the energy absorption from sunlight, but also reduces heat dissipation at other wavelengths, in effect, "making a perfect metallic solar absorber for the first time," Guo says. "We also demonstrate solar energy harnessing with a thermal electric generator device." "This will be useful for any thermal solar energy absorber or harvesting device," particularly in places with abundant sunlight, he adds.

Japan's first robot bartender has begun serving up drinks in a Tokyo pub in a test that could usher in a wave of automation in restaurants and shops struggling to hire staff in an aging society. From a report: The repurposed industrial robot serves drinks in is own corner of a Japanese pub operated by restaurant chain Yoronotaki. An attached tablet computer face smiles as it chats about the weather while preparing orders. The robot, made by the company QBIT Robotics, can pour a beer in 40 seconds and mix a cocktail in a minute. It uses four cameras to monitors customers to analyze their expressions with artificial intelligence (AI) software. "I like it because dealing with people can be a hassle. With this you can just come and get drunk," Satoshi Harada, a restaurant worker said after ordering a drink. "If they could make it a little quicker it would be even better." Finding workers, especially in Japan's service sector, is set to get even more difficult.

MojoKid writes: When AMD unveiled its forthcoming Ryzen Threadripper 3990X 64-core processor at CES 2020 this year, the company made no bones about comparing its performance to a many-core competitive platform from Intel. Under the hood of the yet formally released high-end workstation AMD chip are 64 physical cores capable of processing 128 threads in SMT, with a 2.9GHz base clock, 4.3GHz boost clock, and 256MB of L3 cache. All that horsepower resides in a single TRX40 socket with a 280 Watt TDP for a suggested retail price of $3990. Conversely, a dual socket Intel Xeon Scalable Platinum 8280 setup will sport 56 cores across two sockets with over a 400 Watt TDP that costs around $20,000. At CES, AMD showed its new 64-core Threadripper beating the dual Xeon Platinum setup in a 3D rendering application called VRAY, and today additional benchmark numbers have surfaced in SiSoft SANDRA, showing Threadripper 3990X out-scoring the Intel setup by around 18 percent. No doubt, AMD's Threadripper 3900X isn't a CPU for the average mainstream desktop user, but when the chips arrive to market in the near future, workstation and content creation professionals will likely be all over AMD's new 64-core beast chip.

There's a North American tradition that says there'll be six more weeks of winter if a groundhog can see his shadow (due to clear skies) on February 2nd.

And while it's been honored every year with a ceremony in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania since 1887, PETA is now suggesting that the event's organizers should stop using a live groundhog -- and replace him with a robot. The Morning Caller reports:
The People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals said in a news release Tuesday it sent a letter calling for the current incarnation of Punxsutawney Phil to be sent to a "reputable sanctuary" to live out the remainder of his life. Phil, arguably the world's most famous groundhog, takes part in a ceremony every Feb. 2 at Gobbler's Knob in Punxsutawney. His handlers, also known as the Inner Circle, host festivities that culminate at 7:20 a.m., when they pull Punxsutawney Phil from a decorative stump so he can predict an early spring or six more weeks of winter.

"Gentle, vulnerable groundhogs are not barometers," PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman said in the release. "PETA is offering the club a win-win situation: Breathe life into a tired tradition and finally do right by a long-suffering animal... An AI Phil would renew interest in Punxsutawney, generating a great deal of buzz, much like Sony's robot dog 'aibo,' which walks, plays, misbehaves, and responds to commands...

"By creating an AI Phil, you could keep Punxsutawney at the center of Groundhog Day but in a much more progressive way."
One LiveScience article points out that "you'll be better off flipping a coin than going by the groundhog's predictions."

Or, as one PETA blog post explains, "To predict the weather you need a robot, not a terrified groundhog."

An anonymous reader quotes a report from CNBC: General Motors is resurrecting the Hummer, best known as a gas-guzzling, military-style SUV, as an all-electric "super truck" with massive horsepower, acceleration and torque. The Detroit automaker confirmed the plans Thursday and released three online teaser videos for the "GMC Hummer EV" pickup ahead of a 30-second Super Bowl ad for the vehicle featuring NBA star LeBron James. The spot is scheduled to air during the second quarter of Sunday's game.

The Hummer EV pickup, according to GM, will feature 1,000 horsepower; 0 to 60 mph acceleration of three seconds; and 11,500 pound feet of torque. It didn't announce a price. The Hummer EV pickup is expected to go into production in the fall of 2021 at a plant in Detroit, followed by sales starting toward the end of the year. The teaser videos detail the specifications and preview the front of the pickup, which features a new iteration of Hummer's well-known slotted grille with "HUMMER" backlit across the front of the truck.

Rolls-Royce has announced that it plans to build, install, and operate up to 15 mini nuclear reactors in Britain, with the first set to go online in nine years. New Atlas reports: In a BBC Radio 4 interview with business journalist Katie Prescott on January 24, 2020's Today program, Paul Stein, chief technology officer for Rolls-Royce, said that the company is leading a consortium to produce factory-built modular nuclear reactors that can be delivered for assembly by ordinary lorries. Rolls-Royce believes that its consortium has got its sums right and can restart Britain's nuclear industry by building up to 15 Small Modular Reactors (SMR) with an expected value to the UK economy of $68 billion, another $327 billion in exports, and 40,000 new jobs by 2050.

Each power station is projected to have a service life of 60 years and generate 440 MW of electricity, or enough to power a city the size of Leeds. The estimated cost of the electricity generated is $78 per MWh. According to a previous press release from Rolls-Royce, the British government has already promised 18 million British pounds in matching funds, or about half the present costs of the endeavor, with the consortium partners providing the rest. Prescott says that the advantage of the Rolls-Royce plan is that it doesn't involve building a whole new reactor, as other companies have tried to do, but rather to adapt a present design. In addition, the reactors will be built along manufacturing lines rather than civil construction, which the company claims will drive down costs rather than inflating them.

UPDATE (10/15/20230: The court's order did not stand, and by 2023 Caltech had agreed to drop their lawsuit.

Below is Slashdot's original report from 2020:

The California Institute of Technology (CalTech) said it won a $1.1 billion jury verdict in a patent case against Apple and Broadcom. Reuters reports: In a case filed in federal court in Los Angeles in 2016, the Pasadena, California-based research university alleged that Broadcom wi-fi chips used in hundreds of millions of Apple iPhones infringed patents relating to data transmission technology. "While we thank the members of the jury for their service, we disagree with the factual and legal bases for the verdict and intend to appeal," Broadcom said in a statement. Apple said it plans to appeal the verdict, but declined further comment. The company had said in court filings that it believed all of the university's claims against it resulted from it using Broadcom's chips in its devices, calling itself "merely an indirect downstream party." The verdict awarded CalTech $837.8 million from Apple and $270.2 million from Broadcom. "We are pleased the jury found that Apple and Broadcom infringed Caltech patents," CalTech said in a statement. "As a non-profit institution of higher education, Caltech is committed to protecting its intellectual property in furtherance of its mission to expand human knowledge and benefit society through research integrated with education."

Delivery giant UPS has ordered 10,000 electrical trucks from Arrival, a technology company based in the UK. The two companies hope to deploy the trucks across Europe and North America over the next four years. Engadget reports: If everything goes well, UPS has the option to buy another 10,000 vehicles. For now, the trucks are still in a prototype phase. The current iteration is 2.7 meters tall and designed for "walk-in and walk-out" use, according to Patrick Bion, Arrival's chief of product. The final version should have a battery pack "around about 75KWh," he explained, and offer roughly 250 kilometers (155 miles) on a single charge. The vehicle will use CCS, a popular charging standard that cleverly combines the slower Type 2 port with two large DC pins for rapid charging. Arrival has also previously confirmed that its trucks will use BlackBerry QNX, an enterprise-focused operating system designed for cars, robots and medical equipment.

The trucks will utilize a "skateboard" underbelly that Arrival hopes will translate across to all of its future vehicles. According to Bion, this covers "everything below the floor," including the suspension, brakes and steering. The design is flexible enough, however, that changes can be made for different customers and vehicle types. "We have the ability to change the wheelbase," Bion explained, "to add front-wheel drive, rear-wheel drive and all-wheel drive. We can also change the battery pack capacity so that the customer, if they only need 150 kilometers (90 miles) per day, doesn't have to pay for a bigger battery that could theoretically do more." Arrival's first UPS trucks will be built in Banbury, Oxfordshire, where it currently runs a research and development facility. The majority of the 10,000 order will be built "local to where it's needed," though, according to Bion. UPS also announced a pilot project with Waymo, the Alphabet subsidiary and leading operator of self-driving vehicles. "UPS will use some of Waymo's self-driving Chrysler Pacifica minivans to shuttle packages between some of its stores in the Metro Phoenix area and its hub in Tempe, Arizona," reports The Verge. "The minivans won't be fully driverless; Waymo says it will keep trained safety drivers in the front seat to monitor operations."

sciencehabit shares a report from Science Magazine: Using a robot dropped through a 700-meter hole in the ice, scientists stationed on Antarctica's Thwaites Glacier have captured the first video of the glacier's grounding line, the mysterious boundary where ice meets land and where warm ocean water could be slowly melting the glacier's base -- putting it at risk of collapse (above). Battling 2 months of stormy conditions and temperatures lower than -30C in one of Antarctica's most inaccessible locations, the researchers drilled a hole and lowered the torpedo-shaped Icefin robot into the frigid ocean waters below. Icefin then swam more than 1 kilometer along a downward-sloping basin to the grounding line, a rocky ridge below sea level that supports the glacier's huge floating ice shelf. The researchers used cameras, sonar, chemical probes, and other sensors on Icefin to study the rapidly retreating Thwaites and its supporting sediment. Scientists are still sifting through the data. But they fear warm ocean water intruding underneath the glacier could eventually cause it to retreat from the ridge, leading to its ultimate collapse.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Engadget: For the third time in less than a year, Intel has disclosed a new set of vulnerabilities related to the speculative functionality of its processors. On Monday, the company said it will issue a software update "in the coming weeks" that will fix two more microarchitectural data sampling (MDS) or Zombieload flaws. This latest update comes after the company released two separate patches in May and November of last year.

Compared to the MDS flaws Intel addressed in those two previous patches, these latest ones have a couple of limitations. To start, one of the vulnerabilities, L1DES, doesn't work on Intel's more recent chips. Moreover, a hacker can't execute the attack using a web browser. Intel also says it's "not aware" of anyone taking advantage of the flaws outside of the lab. In response to complaints of the company's piecemeal approach, Intel said that it has taken significant steps to reduce the danger the flaws represent to its processors.

"Since May 2019, starting with Microarchitectural Data Sampling (MDS), and then in November with TAA, we and our system software partners have released mitigations that have cumulatively and substantially reduced the overall attack surface for these types of issues," a spokesperson for the company said. "We continue to conduct research in this area -- internally, and in conjunction with the external research community."

Apple applied for a patent for an ambitious design for a new all-in-one computer which integrates both its keyboard and screen into a single curved sheet of glass. The Verge reports: The patent application, which was first spotted by Patently Apple, and which was filed in May last year, describes how the iMac-like computer's "input area" and "display area" could be built into a single continuous surface, while a support structure behind the display could then contain the computer's processing unit, as well as providing space for all the machine's ports.

It's a pretty striking design for a couple of reasons. For one thing, the amount of curved glass involved is far more than Apple has ever used in one of its products before. It's also interesting to see that the company is thinking about taking the iMac's all-in-one design even further, by integrating not just the computer and display together, but also a keyboard and touchpad as well (although the application also describes how the keyboard could be detached during use). The patent also describes how one could dock a MacBook into the device and output the screen to the iMac's display, while its keyboard would pass through a hole in the middle of the machine to let you use it as normal.

Additionally, "the application suggests that its single sheet of glass could fold down its middle to allow you to pack it away when not in use," reports The Verge.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from NBC News: General Motors confirmed Monday it will invest $2.2 billion to convert an aging Detroit assembly plant into the manufacturing heart of its "all-electric future." The Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly Plant was one of five North American factories GM said it would close in November 2018 but the automaker reversed course as part of an aggressive plan to launch more than 20 battery-electric vehicles, or BEVs, by 2023. The first to roll out of what is known locally as the "Poletown Plant" will be an all-electric pickup that will reportedly be the subject of an upcoming Super Bowl ad. It is widely expected to bring back the name, "Hummer," used for a brand GM abandoned in 2010 after emerging from bankruptcy.

The plant will be capable of using an extremely flexible vehicle "architecture," said GM President Lloyd Reuss, industry-speak for its underlying platform. It will allow the automaker to produce multiple products "for multiple brands, with multiple variants, with multiple customers (offering) different ranges of performance at different price points to meet customers wherever they are." After a news conference at the plant, Reuss told NBC News there will be multiple pickup truck models. The Poletown plant also will have the capacity to produce SUVs and crossovers, he said. What is expected to be called the Hummer pickup will go into production in late 2021. It will be followed in early 2022 by a version of the Cruise Origin, the fully driverless ride-sharing vehicle announced last week by Cruise, GM's autonomous vehicle subsidiary. The $2.2 billion that GM will spend on the plant "is part of a broader investment of $3 billion authorized as part of the contract it negotiated last autumn with the United Auto Workers Union," adds NBC News. That includes a number of other projects, including a plan to set up a factory in Lordstown, Ohio to build batteries.

"Cut back on email if you want to fight global warming," read the headline on a recent article at Bloomberg:
[A]ll those messages require energy to preserve them. And despite the tech industry's focus on renewables, the advents of streaming and artificial intelligence are only accelerating the amount of fossil fuels burned to keep data servers up. Right now, data centers consume about 2 percent of the world's electricity, but that is expected to reach 8 percent by 2030. Moreover, only about 6 percent of all data ever created is in active use today, according to research from Hewlett Packard Enterprise. That means 94 percent is sitting in a vast "landfill" with a massive carbon footprint.

"It's costing us the equivalent of maintaining the airline industry for data we don't even use," said Andrew Choi, a senior research analyst at Parnassus Investments, a $27 billion environmental, social and governance firm in San Francisco. Kirk Bresniker, chief architect of Hewlett Packard Labs, said these server farms use energy both to retain your data and when you use it... And when you empty the email trash, you probably aren't actually erasing the data. Multiple copies of even decade-old emails are stored on servers around the world, still using energy...

Bresniker says the tech industry is "flying blind" when it comes to the true cost of storing data. The picture is clouded by a constant stream of efficiency and memory upgrades, increased renewable power and AI aimed at data-center efficiency. "We don't really understand what the footprint is," he said... The sum of all the world's data in 2018 was 33 zettabytes — 33 trillion gigabytes — but by 2025 it could increase fivefold, to 175 zettabytes, according to International Data Corp. Every day, the world produces about 2.5 quintillion bytes of data... Computing workloads are likely to more than double as more AI comes online, more devices are connected and people do more work in the cloud...

Choi says the problem is getting too big, too fast... Training an AI model emits about as much carbon as the lifetime emissions associated with running five cars.

Long-time Slashdot reader gabebear writes: The FCC hasn't officially cleared 6 GHz for WiFi, but chipsets that support 6 GHz are starting to be released. 6 GHz opens up a several times more bandwidth than what is currently available with WiFi, although it doesn't penetrate walls as well as 2.4 GHz.

Celeno has their press release and Broadcom has their press release. Still no news from Intel or Qualcomm on chipsets that support 6 GHz.

Electronic component distributor Digi-Key will be producing a small manufacturing run of the "open hardware" ereader from the Open Book Project, reports Gizmodo: The raw hardware isn't as sleek or pretty as devices like the Kindle, but at the same time there's a certain appeal to the exposed circuit board which features brief descriptions of various components, ports, and connections etched right onto the board itself for those looking to tinker or upgrade the hardware. Users are encouraged to design their own enclosures for the Open Book if they prefer, either through 3D-printed cases made of plastic, or rustic wooden enclosures created using laser cutting machines. With a resolution of just 400x300 pixels on its monochromatic E Ink display, text on the Open Book won't look as pretty as it does on the Amazon Kindle Oasis which boasts a resolution of 1,680x1,264 pixels, but it should barely sip power from its built-in lithium-polymer rechargeable battery -- a key benefit of using electronic paper.

The open source ereader -- powered by an ARM Cortex M4 processor -- will also include a headphone jack for listening to audio books, a dedicated flash chip for storing language files with specific character sets, and even a microphone that leverages a TensorFlow-trained AI model to intelligently process voice commands so you can quietly mutter "next!" to turn the page instead of reaching for one of the ereader's physical buttons like a neanderthal. It can also be upgraded with additional functionality such as Bluetooth or wifi using Adafruit Feather expansion boards, but the most important feature is simply a microSD card slot allowing users to load whatever electronic text and ebook files they want. They won't have to be limited by what a giant corporation approves for its online book store, or be subject to price-fixing schemes which, for some reason, have still resulted in electronic files costing more than printed books.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from CNN: The first person diagnosed with the Wuhan coronavirus in the United States is being treated by a few medical workers and a robot. The robot, equipped with a stethoscope, is helping doctors take the man's vitals and communicate with him through a large screen, said Dr. George Diaz, chief of the infectious disease division at the Providence Regional Medical Center in Everett, Washington. "The nursing staff in the room move the robot around so we can see the patient in the screen, talk to him," Diaz said, adding the use of the robot minimizes exposure of medical staff to the infected man. It's unclear when the patient will be released because the CDC, which is set to provide the discharge details, has recommended additional testing. "They're looking for ongoing presence of the virus," Diaz told CNN on Thursday. "They're looking to see when the patient is no longer contagious."

An anonymous reader quotes a report from MacRumors: On January 24, 1984, former Apple CEO Steve Jobs introduced the first Macintosh at Apple's annual shareholder's meeting in Cupertino, California, debuting the new computer equipped with a 9-inch black and white display, an 8MHz Motorola 68000 processor, 128KB of RAM, a 3.5-inch floppy drive, and a price tag of $2,495. The now iconic machine weighed in at a whopping 17 pounds and was advertised as offering a word processing program, a graphics package, and a mouse. At the time it was introduced, the Macintosh was seen as Apple's last chance to overcome IBM's domination of the personal computer market and remain a major player in the personal computer industry. Despite the high price at the time, which was equivalent to around $6,000 today, the Macintosh sold well, with Apple hitting 70,000 units sold by May 1984. The now iconic "1984" Super Bowl ad that Apple invested in and debuted days before the Macintosh was unveiled may have helped bolster sales.

Boston Dynamics' creation is starting to sniff out its role in the workforce: as a helpful canine that still sometimes needs you to hold its paw. From a report: This autumn, after years of dropping view-amassing videos of Spot the robot dog fending off stick-wielding humans and opening doors for its pals, Boston Dynamics finally announced that the machine was hitting the market -- for a select few early adopters, at least. BD's people would be the first to tell you that they don't fully know what the hypnotically agile robot will be best at. Things like patrolling job sites, sure. But Spot is so different than robots that have come before it that company execs are, in part, relying on customers to demonstrate how the machine might actually be useful.

After a few months on the job, Spot is beginning to show how it'll fit in the workforce. BD's researchers have kept close tabs on the 75 or so Spots now working at places like construction companies and mining outfits. (Oh, and one's with MythBuster Adam Savage for the next year.) They're seeing hints of a new kind of cooperation between humans and machines, and even machines and other machines. Starting today, you can even customize Spot to your liking -- the software development kit is now publicly available on GitHub. The robot is not included, though.

couchslug writes: Potential hardware damage alert. As reported by Notebookcheck and later posted to a Lenovo support page, the USB-C firmware issue affects more than a dozen ThinkPad models including the ThinkPad X1 Carbon (5th Gen to 7th Gen), X1 Yoga (2nd Gen to 4th Gen), and P-series ThinkPads. It turns out that a firmware update issued in August 2019 corrupted the software controlling the port. " couchslug adds: Anyone with more information on this expensive problem please post. It's already taken out many system boards. The problem affects enough models that class action suit may be appropriate because failures due to the defect have occurred outside the warranty window. Users on Reddit suggest the situation is even worse. The "critical firmware update" is only a mitigation for the hardware failure -- keeping the machine going until the warranty expires." CNET adds: If your laptop is one of the models affected, Lenovo recommends to immediately update your system with new driver and firmware packages that are designed to resolve any USB-C problem. If the updates don't work out, Lenovo urges ThinkPad owners to reach out to Technical Support.