Subpar aluminum parts manufactured by Sapa Profiles, Inc. (SPI) led to the failure of two NASA satellite launches in 2009 and 2011, resulting in losses of $700 million, the US space agency stated[pdf] on Tuesday. SPI tried to hide the poor quality of the aluminum parts it supplied to NASA

San Francisco-based robotics startup Anki has closed up shop after a recent round of funding failed and companies that had show interest in acquiring the firm, such as Amazon, Comcast and Microsoft, did not step up. Since it was established in 2010, Anki secured $200 million in funding, allowing it

At a recent US Army War College conference, defense experts discussed how the use of increasingly complex artificial intelligence (AI) technologies for national defense purposes complicates the nature of command. Because AI can think in ways that humans cannot, which is the whole point of developing it, soldiers, military commanders

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is launching a five year program to build robots capable of repairing and upgrading satellites. The research agency will also develop spacecraft for moving the robots through space. The US government and US companies together have over 400 satellites orbiting the earth at

A new report by the UK Airprox Board (UKAB) shows that the number of dangerous incidents that could have led to a collision between aircraft and drones surged from 91 in 2017 to 125 last year, a 34% increase. In late 2018, one drone incident at Gatwick airport caused major

Earlier this week, the European Union published a possible strategy for making ethics a fundamental part of artificial intelligence (AI) research and development. According to European Commissioner Andrus Ansip, “[t]he ethical dimension of AI is not a luxury feature or an add-on.” Instead, he believes that “[i]t is only with

China may eliminate its subsidized cryptomining industry in the near future. Cryptomining involves the use of the processing power of machines in order to solve complex math problems, by which cryptocurrencies are generated. The Chinese regime initially believed that investing in cryptomining could be beneficial to its economy, and therefore

New research[pdf] by the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF) indicates that China is making great strides in its attempt to close the innovation gap with the United States. ITIF president Robert Atkinson says that “[i]n the span of about a decade, the Chinese economy has made dramatic progress in

The European Commission (EC), which is the executive branch of the European Union (EU), is launching a pilot of ethical guidelines for the development of artificial intelligence (AI). The guidelines were developed by a diverse team of AI experts including some from the private sector and the academic sector. The

Amazon wants to put a “constellation” of 3,236 satellites in low Earth orbit as part of Project Kuiper, a project that aims to provide “low-latency, high-speed broadband connectivity” around the globe to “tens of millions of people who lack basic access to broadband internet.” According to the United Nations (UN),