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Amazon postpones Prime Day sale in India amid surge in Covid-19 cases

Amazon’s flagship Prime Day sale, which is scheduled to take place globally in June, has been postponed in India due to a surge in Covid-19 cases across the country in the second wave of the outbreak. The Prime Day sale will not be conducted in India and Canada in June due to the spreading infections, even as Amazon goes ahead with plans to host the event in markets including the United States, UK, Germany, France and Spain. A spokesperson for Amazon India confirmed to ET that the company had decided…

India holds up wireless approvals for China-made devices

India previously allowed companies to self-declare wireless equipment, a move that made imports easier, but new rules in March 2019 mandated firms to seek government approval. India has held up approvals for import of wifi modules from China for months, driving companies such as U.S. computer makers Dell and HP and China’s Xiaomi, Oppo, Vivo and Lenovo to delay product launches in a key growth market, two industry sources said. Imports from China of finished electronic devices – like bluetooth speakers, wireless earphones, smartphones, smartwatches and laptops – containing wifi…

WhatsApp scraps deadline for accepting privacy policy terms

New Delhi, PTI: WhatsApp has scrapped its May 15 deadline for users to accept its controversial privacy policy update and said not accepting the terms will not lead to deletion of accounts. WhatsApp had faced severe backlash over user concerns that data was being shared with parent company Facebook. A WhatsApp spokesperson told PTI that no accounts will be deleted on May 15 for not accepting the policy update. “No accounts will be deleted on May 15 because of this update and no one in India will lose functionality of…

Google CEO Sundar Pichai Joins Global Task Force Steering Committee on Pandemic Response

On last Thursday, three Indian-American CEOs Sundar Pichai from Google, Punit Renjen from Deloitte, and Shantanu Narayen from Adobe have joined the steering committee of the Global Task Force on Pandemic Response, which is overseeing an unprecedented corporate sector initiative to help India successfully fight COVID19. The task force is a newly formed public-private partnership organised by the US Chamber of Commerce and supported by Business Roundtable. It is working with the Chamber’s US-India Business Council and the US-India Strategic Partnership Forum to take immediate actions to help address the…

AICRA ties up with the National Productivity Council for providing training services for Industry 4.0 !!

New Delhi: India had recognized the importance of Industry4.0 quite early. The government had announced that they are working towards the establishment of this scheme. From the highest level, there have been exhortations to move towards Industry 4.0. There have been several schemes to incentivize investment into data technologies. The government is promoting its organizations to help and handhold Industry and academia on this journey to achieve the ATMANIBHAR BHARAT mission. To achieve the mission of Atmanirbhar Bharat-Industry 4.0, National Productivity Council (NPC) and All India Council for Robotics and…

New system uses floor vibrations to detect building occupants !!

Thanks to a new system developed at EPFL, building owners can detect the number of occupants and track their movement using sensors installed on floor slabs. This novel approach could be particularly useful for enhancing safety in retirement homes or managing buildings’ energy is use more efficiently. Many buildings, manufacturing sites, shopping malls and other public spaces are equipped with occupant detection systems. These systems are generally rely on cameras or occupants’ mobile phones. Such technologies are infringe on privacy and may not function in emergencies such as fires. Scientists…

3-D hand pose estimation using a wrist-worn camera !!

Researchers at Tokyo Institute of Technology (Tokyo Tech) working in collaboration with colleagues at Carnegie Mellon University, the University of St Andrews and the University of New South Wales have developed a wrist-worn device for 3-D hand pose estimation. The system consists of all camera that captures  all the images of the back of the hand, and is supported by a neural network called DorsalNet which can accurately recognize dynamic gestures. Being able to track hand gestures is of crucial importance in advancing augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) devices that are…

Robots are Serving Food and Medicines to Covid-19 Patients at Odisha’s Railways Hospital !!

Doctors and health workers have to go through all the  major battle amid the coronavirus pandemic. It’s definitely an exhausting time for them to cover themselves with layers of PEP kit and then ensure social distancing. To protect all the health workers from COVID-19 infection, the East Coast Railways Central Hospital in Odisha is using a Medical Robot called MeD ROBO to provide medicines, food and remote assistance to patients in the coronavirus ward, without any need for physical contact. The MeD ROBO is operated through a unique mobile app…

Startup announces plans to use bike lanes for delivery robots to move cargo !!

Bicycle riders may soon find themselves to a sharing bike lanes with autonomous delivery robots. Robotic delivery startup Refraction to the  AI recently revealed plans for a lightweight delivery robot that can use bicycle lanes. The company, a brainchild of University of Michigan professors Ram Vasudevan and Matthew Johnson-Roberson, is pitching its five-foot-tall REV-1 as a lightweight, low-cost, autonomous delivery robot that can be zip around at up to 15 miles per hour in both bicycle lanes and roadways, making for more efficient last-mile deliveries. “We have created the Goldilocks of autonomous…

Robotics startup Genrobotics raises Rs 2.5 crore in pre-series A round funding !!

New Delhi : Robotics startup Genrobotics on Wednesday said it has raised Rs 2.5 crore in pre-series A round funding from existing investors led by Unicorn India Ventures, along with industrialist Anand Mahindra and SEA Fund. The Kerala-based firm, Genrobotics has been working with the Centre and state governments with a mission to eradicate manual scavenging from the entire country and has deployed its Bandicoot robots across 11 states. “The funds raised will be used for the  further scaling up production of Bandicoot to meet the growing demand in light…