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Visitors check out Alibaba Cloud's data synthesis and Embodied engine at the 2024 Apsara Conference in Hangzhou, China, on September 19, 2024.
Hard Numbers: Alibaba’s models, Palantir’s contract, Newsom’s deadline, Vietnam’s fab plan
100: Alibaba, the Chinese tech giant, launched more than 100 new open-source AI models, collectively known as Qwen 2.5. Many of the models have specific design purposes, such as for automobiles or science research. Alibaba’s models are free to use, but the company sells its cloud services and support to fellow businesses.
100 million: Palantir has won a $100 million US defense contract to give military personnel advanced visualizations of battlefields in real time across different computers. The company will use intelligence data and computer vision technology to make digital replicas of battlefields for real-time decision making.
6: California Gov. Gavin Newsom has six days left to sign SB 1047, the California AI safety bill. He hasn’t signaled whether he’s going to sign it yet, but he recently signed a pair of bills into law that protect performers from artificial intelligence recreations being made without their permission. However, he has said that he’s concerned about the “chilling effect” the bill could have on the state’s tech industry.
1: Vietnam said it’s aiming to build one semiconductor fabrication plant and 10 packaging plants in the country by 2030. To help, it’ll launch a fund to help foreign investors with taxes on the projects. The country is seeking to evolve from a manufacturing economy to include more high-tech industries such as chip making.
What is a technopolar world?
Who runs the world? In a series of videos about artificial intelligence, Ian Bremmer, founder and president of GZERO Media and Eurasia Group introduces the concept of a technopolar world––one where technology companies wield unprecedented influence on the global stage, where sovereignty and influence is determined not by physical territory or military might, but control over data, servers, and, crucially, algorithms.
We aren’t yet in a fully technopolar world, but we do exist in a digital order where major tech companies hold sway over standards, operations, interactions, security and economics in the virtual realm. And Bremmer says this is just the beginning. He highlights two key advantages that technology companies have: their dominance over the digital space, which profoundly impacts the lives of billions of people every day, as well as their role in providing critical digital infrastructure required to run a modern economy and society.
As artificial intelligence and other transformative technologies advance, and more and more of our daily life shifts online, Bremmer predicts a shift in power dynamics, where tech companies extend their reach beyond the digital sphere into economics, politics, and even national security. This will almost certainly challenge traditional ideas about global power, which may be determined as much by competition between nation states and tech companies as it is, say, between the US and China. Incorporating tech firms into governance models may be necessary to effectively navigate the complexity of a technopolar world, Bremmer argues. Ultimately, how these companies choose to wield power and their interactions with governments will shape the trajectory of our economic, social, and political futures.
See more of GZERO Media's coverage on artificial intelligence and geopolitics,
China’s tech crackdown & the Jack Ma problem
Is the Communist Party losing support in China?
On GZERO World with Ian Bremmer, Shaun Rein, founder and managing director of the China Market Research Group, explains why wealthy Chinese citizens fear that the country is moving towards socialism and is no longer pro-business as it was in the past.
“People have trusted the Chinese government to do the right thing. It was almost like they were invincible,” Rein explains, “But zero-COVID wasn’t done well, so they’re starting to lose some support, especially among the wealthy.”
Along with zero-COVID sapping domestic consumption and production, Rein also points to the example of Jack Ma. Ma was a hero to many young Chinese, rising from a peasant to become the billionaire owner of one of China’s biggest tech companies, Alibaba. But Communist Party's crackdown on the private sector forced Alibaba to split into six separate companies and forced Ma to give up his control.
Rein says he agrees with the decision because companies like Alibaba were becoming too powerful, controlling too many industries and stifling fair market competition. But the Beijing's crackdown has rattled the business community and some worry that China’s ethos of “socialism with Chinese characteristics” is starting to look a lot more like traditional socialism, full stop.
Watch the GZERO World episode: China’s economy in trouble
And watch GZERO World with Ian Bremmer every week on gzeromedia.com/gzeroworld and on US public television. Check local listings.
- US-China tech “Cold War” is on ›
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- 2022 showed Xi Jinping is not invincible; 2023 will be "rocky year" for him ›
- What We’re Watching: El Salvador’s lingering state of emergency, Northern Ireland on alert, Alibaba’s breakup, Greek election matters ›
- Jack Ma dethroned as China's richest with 'Lone Wolf' moving up ›
- What We're Watching: Qatar-Saudi embrace, Jack Ma's whereabouts, Egyptian incompetence ›
Gang members wait to be taken to their cell after 2000 gang members were transferred to the Terrorism Confinement Center, in Tecoluca, El Salvador. Handout distributed March 15, 2023.
What We’re Watching: El Salvador’s lingering state of emergency, Northern Ireland on alert, Alibaba’s breakup, Greek election matters
El Salvador’s state of emergency one year later
This week marks one year since El Salvador’s bullish millennial president, Nayib Bukele, introduced a state of emergency, enabling his government to deal with the scourge of gang violence that has long made his country one of the world’s most dangerous.
Quick recap: To crack down on the country’s 70,000 gang members, Bukele’s government denied alleged criminals the right to know why they were detained and access to legal counsel. The arrest blitz has seen nearly 2% of the adult population locked up.
Despite these draconian measures and Bukele’s efforts to circumvent a one-term limit, he enjoys a staggering 91% approval rating.
Bukele has also sought to distinguish himself as an anti-corruption warrior, which resonates with an electorate disillusioned by years of corrupt politicians (Bukele’s three predecessors have all been charged with corruption. One is in prison; two are on the run.)
Externally, relations with the Biden administration have been icy under Bukele, with San Salvador refusing to back a US-sponsored UN resolution condemning Russia’s war in Ukraine.
What matters most to Salvadorans is the dropping crime rate, which is why Bukele will likely cruise to reelection next year.
Fears of domestic terror attack in Northern Ireland
Britain's MI5 intelligence agency has raised the domestic terror threat in Northern Ireland from “substantial” to “severe” amid fears of an imminent attack in the British-run region. This follows a series of attacks by Irish nationalist groups, mainly against police, in Northern Ireland in recent months.
The New Irish Republican Army, a paramilitary group with roots in the original militant group of the same name, has taken responsibility for a series of crimes against law enforcement and journalists.
For context, the IRA dominant in the 20th century disbanded with the signing of the Good Friday Agreement in 1998 that put an end to decades of violence between pro-British unionists wanting to stay part of the UK, and Irish nationalists calling for the unification of Northern Ireland with Ireland.
This warning comes as US President Joe Biden is preparing to travel to Belfast next month to mark the 25th anniversary of the peace deal, which put an end to the conflict, known as the Troubles.
Indeed, tensions have risen since Brexit, which revived age-old questions about the status of Northern Ireland’s borders. The threat level in Britain, meanwhile, remains “substantial,” meaning that an attack is still a strong possibility, according to authorities.
Alibaba breaks up … itself
Now we know the real reason Alibaba founder Jack Ma resurfaced in China this week. On Tuesday, the Chinese e-commerce giant announced it would spin off its different businesses into six units with separate CEOs under a single holding company. Each unit will be allowed to seek outside capital or go public independently.
Alibaba claims that the Chinese government did not order the restructuring, but it's an open secret that Xi Jinping thought the company had become too rich and powerful. The restructuring plan was unveiled the day after Ma made his first public appearance in the country since late 2020 to boost confidence in the tech company and within the broader sector. (His public criticism of regulators set off a broader crackdown against China's tech sector that hit Alibaba hard.)
Politics aside, Alibaba is just following in the footsteps of its main rivals, Tencent and JD.com, which showed earlier they got the memo from Xi: Break yourself up before you become too big to fail, or it'll be worse if we have to do it for you. The question is, would this ever happen in the US to curb the power of Big Tech?
Greek PM calls spring election
PM Kyriakos Mitsotakis, whose popularity has dipped in the wake of a train disaster last month that killed 57, has called for a general election on May 21. The train crash sparked national protests and strikes as angry Greeks pointed blame at the government for poor transport-sector investment and regulation.
In this election, Greece is transitioning to a proportional representation system, making it harder for any party to enjoy an outright win.
Mitsotakis, whose term was set to end in July, has been dogged by protests and allegations of wiretapping of political opponents by security forces. His reputational dent mixed with his New Democracy Party’s declining numbers – though they remain slightly ahead of the opposition Syriza Party – raise the likelihood of Greece soon being ruled by a coalition.
Syriza, meanwhile, says that even if it wins an outright majority, it will form a "government of cooperation." But the left-wingers have ruled out the possibility of working in a coalition with Mitsotakis’s conservatives.
A poster by street artist Harry Greb depicting Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny in Rome.
Hard Numbers: Navalny sentenced (again), oily oceans, Alibaba stock buyback, Ukrainian fundraising star
9: Imprisoned Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny was sentenced on Tuesday to nine more years in jail after being convicted of fraud and contempt of court. In his closing statement, the top Kremlin critic blasted Vladimir Putin and Russia’s war in Ukraine, urging Russians to protest.
52.8 million: That’s the amount of toxic oily water being dumped annually into the world’s oceans, according to an investigation by Deutsche Welle. The figure is roughly five times the equivalent of the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska, one of the worst maritime environmental disasters ever.
25 billion: Alibaba wants to buy back more than $25 billion worth of stock. The Chinese e-commerce giant aims to reassure investors about the company's future despite being targeted by Xi Jinping’s tech crackdown.
380,000: A seven-year-old Ukrainian girl who went viral for singing the Frozen theme song from a bomb shelter in Kyiv performed her country’s national anthem during a concert in Poland. The event, attended by thousands, raised some $380,000 for Ukrainian refugees like her.Why is China trying to game the gamers?
This week, the market value of Tencent, China's biggest video game company, nosedived after a state media outlet suggested that online gaming was as addictive and destructive as opium. Tencent immediately pledged to cap the number of hours people can play, and to keep minors off its platforms.
It's the latest example of a months-long crackdown on major Chinese technology firms that until recently were viewed as some of the world's most powerful and successful companies, as well as a source of national pride. Beijing's about-face on its own tech titans could have big implications for China, and beyond.
Who's being targeted? First they came for billionaire Jack Ma, who was fined a whopping $2.8 billion for alleged antitrust violations and stopped from launching Ant Group, part of his Alibaba empire, as the world's biggest IPO. The value of its stock has plummeted since.
Then Beijing imposed sweeping restrictions on cryptocurrency trading, perceived as being too volatile... right as China (wink-wink) is pushing its own digital yuan as a reliable alternative.
After that, it was the turn of ride-hailing app Didi, which — on the eve of its American IPO — had its offices raided by state security agents for collecting more data on passengers than Beijing was comfortable leaving in the hands of a private firm. Next, for-profit tutoring giants were taken offline for skewing college admission odds towards the kids of rich families who can afford the help.
Now, it's the gamers' turn.
Why all the fuss? Beijing has all these companies in its crosshairs because they do at least one of three things Xi Jinping doesn't seem to like: they've become too big too fast, have gathered too much data, or are making too much money at the expense of social stability.
At a time of rising inequality in China, being rich is no longer, in Deng Xiaoping's own words, "glorious."
Here are two ways to understand what's going on.
One prevailing narrative — especially in the West — is that Xi is bullying large, rich companies because he is simply an authoritarian party boss who wants to stop any tech mogul or company from becoming too influential for the ruling Communist Party. Some argue that Xi would rather put the likes of Alibaba, Didi, or Tencent in their place — and perhaps out of business altogether — than let them become rival power centers. That's especially true if US stock market listings open up sources of financing and influence for these companies from Beijing's number one rival.
But another reading is that he is using his terrible powers for an understandable purpose. After decades of breakneck growth and corporate enrichment, China is reining in companies in the interest of social harmony over infinite growth. From this perspective, Xi is astutely flexing the one-party state's (considerable) muscle to nip social ills like inequality, monopoly, or gaming-induced apathy in the bud before they become horrific political problems like in the West.
In fact, at a time when many countries want to regulate tech firms but can't do so expediently as democracies, Beijing is — as far as this argument goes — ahead of the curve. In other words, by cracking down on tech behemoths Xi's acting less like Joseph Stalin than like trust-buster Teddy Roosevelt.
Xi has found an unexpected ally in Chinese youth, who are otherwise tired of their parents and the government ganging up on them over playing video games. There's a #MeToo angle — Tencent is one of several tech firms linked to Kris Wu, a famous singer accused of sexually assaulting multiple women. In cancelling him, young Chinese and the CCP have found common ground: the youth hate Wu for being a sexual predator, while the party generally despises the celebrity obsession culture tech companies rake in billions from.
What do you think? Is Xi using his power for good or bad reasons? Let us know here.
- Can China limit kids’ video game time? Risks with facial recognition - GZERO Media ›
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- NBA player sparks backlash from China; Bolsonaro's COVID negligence - GZERO Media ›
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What We're Watching: Qatar-Saudi embrace, Jack Ma's whereabouts, Egyptian incompetence
Qatar blockade lifted: A bitter dispute between Gulf rivals Saudi Arabia and Qatar has begun to ease after Qatar's Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani flew to Saudi Arabia for the Gulf Cooperation Council summit and was warmly embraced by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, known as MBS. The immediate cause of the détente was Riyadh's decision to lift a years-long land and air blockade that significantly disrupted Qatar's economic activity and led to a bitter standoff in the Gulf. (The Saudis, along with Egypt, Bahrain, and the UAE launched a joint blockade against Qatar in 2017, citing its support for the Muslim Brotherhood, and regional foes Iran and Turkey.) It's unclear what concessions Qatar made in exchange for beginning the normalization process, though President Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, a close friend of MBS, has been lobbying for the move for some time. Qatar has long denied claims that it supports Islamic extremist groups and rebuffed demands like terminating Turkey's military presence within its borders. As for the timing for the rapprochement, it could reflect a feeling that increased GCC cooperation is needed as the incoming Biden administration in the US is expected to promptly re-engage in talks with Iran.
Where is Jack Ma? After two months where he seemed to have disappeared altogether, Chinese billionaire and Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma is now "laying low," according to media reports, after a fallout with the Chinese government. Ma has not been seen in public nor heard of since late October, when he openly criticized China's banks and financial regulators. Just days later, Beijing blocked Ma from listing his fintech company Ant on the Hong Kong and Shanghai stock exchanges, in a deal that would have made Ant the world's largest initial public offering. When Ma tried to save the IPO by offering the government a stake in Ant, Beijing doubled down by opening an antitrust probe into Alibaba, the world's top e-commerce firm. Indeed, Ma's fall from grace has sent a strong message to other Chinese tycoons: don't question the regime's wisdom — or else. It also plays into wider public resentment about rising income inequality in China, which the ruling Communist Party is very worried about. Either way, we're watching to see if Ma will find a way to make amends with the government, or whether his low profile is a preamble for Beijing to take over Ant and other parts of the Alibaba empire.
Incompetence and horror in Egypt: Over the past several days, shocking video footage has made the rounds online of an oxygen leak that suddenly killed every patient in the intensive care unit of an Egyptian hospital. Egypt's government first denied the story, accused the Muslim Brotherhood of making it up, and pressured hospital employees to keep quiet. Public outrage is growing, however, and Egypt's health minister has now admitted that hospitals face oxygen shortages as a new wave of COVID takes hold across the country. This combination of horrific event, personal tragedy, state incompetence, and public fury recalls the massive warehouse explosion in Beirut that killed more than 200 people, left 300,000 homeless, and destabilized Lebanon's government in August 2020. Egypt is far more politically stable than Lebanon, but we can expect more of these kinds of stories from other cash-strapped, poorly governed countries in 2021, particularly because they will be the last to receive the vaccinations that allow human, economic, and political recovery to begin.Jack Ma's public absence fuels speculation
BEIJING • Alibaba founder Jack Ma's absence from public view in the past two months, including missing the final episode of a TV show on which he was to appear as a judge, has fuelled social media speculation over his whereabouts amid a Chinese regulatory clampdown on his sprawling business empire.