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A funny thing happened the last couple of times I was briefed on a Huawei flagship product: news was breaking about some major roadblock for the company’s U.S. distribution plans. First it was AT&T backing out in the midst of CES and then it was Best Buy’s decision to drop the company just ahead of the big P20 launch (though a rep for the company told me the States were never part of its plans for that handset).

It’s been one thing after another as the Chinese hardware maker has worked to establish a meaningful presence here in the States. In spite of all of this fallout from government pushback, however, the company insists that it’s not going anywhere.

In an email to CNET, the company’s consumer CEO reaffirmed that commitment. “We are committed to the U.S. market and to earning the trust of U.S. consumers by staying focused on delivering world-class products and innovation,” Yu writes. “We would never compromise that trust.”

The sentiment echoes statements Yu made on-stage at CES in the wake of the AT&T deal implosion — albeit much more measured this time around. Most of Yu’s followup reinforced his earlier assertions that, in spite of multiple warning from various US security departments, this whole thing is blow entirely out of proportion.

“The security risk concerns are based on groundless suspicions and are quite frankly unfair,” Yu adds. ”We welcome an open and transparent discussion if it is based on facts.”

Even if the company’s intentions are as stated, Huawei’s got an epic uphill climb if it’s going to make any sort of dent in the world’s third-largest mobile market. The company’s carrier play is non-existent in a country where most phones are purchased through telecoms. And abandonment by the biggest big box store in the States was insult to injury.

And if the company does manage to reverse those trends, it will still be a hard sell for U.S. consumers after several warnings from the country’s defense departments.

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Global ride-hailing rivals Taxify and Uber have launched motorcycle passenger service in East Africa. Customers of both companies in Uganda and Taxify riders in Kenya can now order up two-wheel transit by app.

uberBoda, as its branded, is Uber’s first motorcycle service offering in Africa, and second globally after Asia. For Taxify, it’s the first two-wheel launch in any of the company’s 20 plus international markets.

The moves come as Africa’s moto-taxis — commonly known as boda bodas in the East and okadas in the West –upshift to digital.

Taxify’s “Boda” button

For Taxify, the reasons for entering the market were twofold, according to Kenya Operations Head Chisom Anoke. “We noticed there was a need for this service because boda boda’s haven’t been very well organized or regulated,” he told TechCrunch from Taxify’s Nairobi office.

“The other thing was people had to go search for boda bodas. We want to bring the convenience we brought to regular taxis to the boda bodas,” said Anoke.

The company has upgraded its Kenya and Uganda apps with a “Boda” button to order a two-wheel taxi.

Taxify also aims to bring the average boda boda ETAs in Nairobi to under four minutes, the current norm for its car services.

Boda boda rates for Kenya will be 30 Shillings base then 15 Shillings per kilometer (≈ $.30 and $.15) compared to 85 and 30 for normal car service. Taxify takes a 15 percent cut, according to Anoke.

On safety, the Taxify will only hire boda boda taxi riders licensed by Kenya’s National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA) and who have at least three years of experience.

Taxify will require their boda boda drivers have 2015 or later motorcycles that pass a company inspection “to ensure the quality is on point and our clients are safe,” said Anoke.

Riders using Taxify will navigate via direction voice prompts and headphones (from Google maps and other services). All riders will carry two yellow helmets and reflective jackets. Taxify is also working on a rider training program pilot with Kenya’s NTSA.

uberBoda

The prominence of motorcycle taxis in Uganda prompted Uber to launch uberBoda there, according to Africa GM Alon Lits. “We’re all about localization and boda moves Kampala,” he told TechCrunch on a call from Cape Town. “If we’re going to be a part of the mobility solution in Kampala, we can’t do that without having a boda product.”

Uber’s Uganda app will include an uberBoda request icon. uberBoda drivers must have proper motorcycle vehicle and taxi licenses to work with Uber, according to Lits. “In addition, we’re ensuring all drivers have two helmets and reflective jackets for their riders,” he said.

Uber expects uberBoda passenger costs to average roughly a dollar per fare. Lits estimates “there are nearly 2 million weekly boda trips happening in Kampala.” The uberBoda motorcycle service is starting with around 100 drivers.

As they gather research from early activity, both Taxify and Uber in Africa said they plan to look more deeply into motorcycle financing plans for drivers, expanded rider training, and ways to build more safety into the two-wheel taxi markets.

“By forcing Taxify boda boda riders to follow existing rules, like not riding more than two passengers at a time, it will rub off and have the kind of positive market disruption we want to see on the boda boda industry,” said Taxify’s Anoke.

“As we get more data as to drivers’ track records, that becomes a proxy for credit, which we’ll look to roll out to the boda industry,” said Uber’s Lits. As TechCrunch reported, Uber Africa experiments with many things the company doesn’t always do globally, such as cash payments and recently launching moto-rickshaw service in Tanzania.

Other players

Uber and Taxify aren’t the only companies to enter Africa’s motorcycle ride-hail market. Nigeria has startup Max.ng, which is actually more focused on last-mile delivery service.

And in Rwanda, where taxi-motos are highly used and tightly regulated, startup SafeMotos has been active since 2015. The company offers its app to drivers and passengers to pinpoint pickup spots, meter fares, and facilitate payments. SafeMotos also plans to expand all woman boda boda services and into Kinhasa DRC, co-founder Barrett Nash told TechCrunch recently in Kigali.

Rwanda also has Yego Moto, a Singapore based motorcycle ride-hail company. Yego Moto has 680 drivers and has logged 426,382 trips and 2.1 million kilometers on its Rwanda platform, according to a company spokesperson.

Market expansion

On Taxify’s plans to expand its boda boda service to other Taxify African cities and markets, “definitely, we plan to scale it out,” said company spokesperson Loreen Ajaimbo, though she wouldn’t name any specific countries at the moment.

Uber Africa’s Alon Lits said the company would look to expand uberBoda first in Uganda to Entebbe. He also mentioned Rwanda as a potential new market.

As for earning potential of East Africa’s boda bodas, Taxify’s Chisom Anoke referred to a recent study by the Motorcycle Assemblers Association of Kenya. It pegged that country’s 2017 two-wheel taxi revenues at $2.1 billion, surpassing the income of the Kenya’s largest telco, Safaricom.

Of course, disrupting that market may not be welcomed by everyone. Both Uber and Taxify’s moves into Africa’s four-wheel taxi spaces have brought protests by traditional drivers over the last several years. Time will tell how Kenya and Uganda’s non-digital boda boda pilots respond to their new ride-hail competition.

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Google wants to put its data science chops to the test – in real-time. This weekend, the company is going use data analytics techniques and machine learning during the Final Four in San Antonio to figure out what it thinks will happen next in the live games. And after doing so, it will hand off its predictions about the game’s second half to be aired as a halftime TV ad.

The company detailed its plans in a blog post this morning, explaining how the idea grew out of the existing relationship it had with the NCAA regarding statistical game and competition data analysis using Google’s cloud technology. Google then decided it wanted to challenge itself further to see what else it could do with NCAA data.

A team including data scientists, technicians, and basketball enthusiasts was assembled, and Google built a data processing workflow using Google Cloud Platform and technologies like BigQuery and Cloud Datalab. It was able to uncover all sorts of insights, like who blocked the most shots per minute or whether teams with animal mascots caused more upsets. And then Google decided it wanted to try to predict what happens during a live game.

This weekend, it will analyze the data from the first half of the Final Four games in real-time, and turn that prediction into a television ad in a matter of minutes.

The way this works is that Google Cloud team will be on site during the games, and will feed in the data from the first half into its workflow where it’s analyzed against NCAA historical data. When halftime begins, the team will crunch the data and come up with its predictions. The technical teams regarding its workflow have been shared here, on the Google Cloud Big Data and Machine Learning blog.

Before halftime ends, Google will hand off a newly created TV ad to CBS and Turner that will air right before the second half starts.

“This is likely the first time a company has used its own real-time predictive analytics to create ads during a live televised sporting event,” notes Google.

The experiment is a clever way to advertise Google Cloud and other technology, but it’s not the only tech company doing Final Four predictions.

All the virtual assistants are making their own predictions too, including Google’s own Google Assistant, Alexa, Cortana, and Siri. But their answers are sometimes more like editorialized opinions and not true data science.

You can keep track of Google’s NCAA experiment on the dedicated site, cloud.withgoogle.com/ncaa.

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Uber’s exit from Southeast Asia is under scrutiny from regulators in Singapore who believe that Grab’s purchase of the U.S. firm’s business in the region may violates competition laws.

Singapore-based Grab, Uber’s chief rival in the region, announced the acquisition of Uber’s Southeast Asian business on Monday. In return, Uber is taking 27.5 percent of the Grab business, which is valued at over $6 billion, in a move that appears to be a win for both parties.

Grab plans to shutter the Uber app in less than two weeks and migrate passengers and drivers to its services. It will also integrate Uber Eats into its nascent food delivery service.

The coming together has already concerned consumers, who believe that prices may rise without two companies competeting head-to-head, and now the Competition Commission of Singapore (CCS) has announced that it is looking into the deal.

The organization said it has “reasonable grounds” to suspect that the deal may fall foul of section 54 of Singapore’s Competition Act.

It added:

CCS is generally of the view that competition concerns are unlikely to arise in a merger situation unless:

The merged entity has/will have a market share of 40 percent or more; or
The merged entity has/will have a market share of between 20 percent to 40 percent and the post-merger combined market share of the three largest firms is 70 percent or more.

That might make the deal a little tricky to explain for Grab, which claims over 90 million downloads and more than five million drivers and agents for its transportation and fintech services.

In a first for Singapore, the CCS said it has proposed an Interim Measures Directions (IMD) that requires both Grab and Uber to “maintain pre-transaction independent pricing, pricing policies and product options.” The commission also directed Grab to not take confidential information from Uber nor lock Uber drivers into driving for Grab.

The commision defines the space not as ride-hailing — where Grab would appear to hold a significantly dominant position by acquiring Uber’s business — but instead as “chauffeured personal point-to-point transport passenger and booking services.”

In that respect, taxi companies in Singapore — which allow booking by SMS and phone call, and also offer ride-hailing apps in some cases — may be considered competition which might water down Grab’s marketshare. Likewise, Grab’s case may be helped by Singapore carpooling service Ryde’s plan to add private car services in an effort to fill some of the gap post-Uber.

Lim Kell Jay, head of Grab Singapore, argued in a statement that the deal with Uber allows consumers a choice against “the dominant taxi industry” and that Grab has already committed to freezing its prices. He added that Grab would work with the CCS and other authorities over the deal as required.

Five years ago, consumers were not able to flag or book taxis easily as supply was a problem. Grab innovated to improve the point-to-point transport within the overall transportation industry, particularly the availability and quality of both taxi and car services. Improving services for commuters and drivers will always be our priority, and we urge the government to allow us to freely compete and complement the dominant taxi business. To address consumer concerns, we have voluntarily committed to maintaining our fare structure and will not increase base fares. This is a commitment we are prepared to give the CCS, and to the public. We have and will continue to work with the CCS, LTA and other relevant authorities, and will propose measures to reassure the CCS, our driver-partners and consumers.

Grab has conducted its comprehensive due diligence and legal analysis with its advisers before entering into and concluding the transaction. We had engaged with the CCS prior to signing and continue to do so. Even though not required by the law, we have informed the CCS that we are making a voluntary notification no later than 16 April 2018 to continue to cooperate and engage with the CCS.

The CCS said it has the power to unwound or modify a deal if it sees that its completion will substantially weaken competition, but it is unclear what that might mean for a regional business like Grab.

Grab and Uber operate in eight markets in Southeast Asia, but Singapore — which is where Grab is headquartered and registered as a business — is the first country where a competitive agency is pouring over the deal.

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Extreme and rapid weather swings made it even harder for the Swedish fashion retailer to sell a buildup of unsold garments.

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As fears of a trade war begin to ebb, the tension felt by supply chain leaders appears to be lifting. But given president Trump’s characteristic unpredictability, the fashion industry is not out of the woods yet.

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