The UNICEF Innovation Fund is investing $100,000 in six companies for developing blockchain projects, according to an announcement published Dec. 10. The UNICEF Innovation Fund was launched specifically to finance early stage and open-source technology that can benefit children. The fund identifies solutions in tech areas like blockchain, machine learning, quantum computing, artificial intelligence (AI), and others. Today’s announcement reads that the Fund will invest up to $100,000 in Argentinian software development firm Atix Labs, Mexican tech companies Onesmart and Prescrypto, Indian startup Statwig, Tunisian apps development startup Utopixar, and web apps development firm W3 Engineers from Bangladesh. The companies …

Chinese crypto mining giant Bitmain is closing its development center in Israel and firing local employees, Israeli business news outlet Globes has learned Monday, Dec. 10. Bitmaintech Israel — founded in 2016 to explore the use of blockchain technology, work on the Connect BTC mining pool, and develop the infrastructure behind Bitmain’s artificial intelligence (AI) project Sophon — will close this week. All 23 employees will be fired, the Globes reports. Gadi Glikberg, head of the Israeli branch as well as Bitmain vice president of international sales and marketing, is also leaving. Globes reports that Glikberg linked the closure to …

Thailand’s Revenue Department is testing blockchain to track value-added tax (VAT) payments, English-language media outlet Bangkok Post (BP) reports Dec. 3. Ekniti Nitithanprapas, director general of the Thai Revenue Department, said that the department “wants to use blockchain technology to prevent VAT refund fraud.” According to the BP, the nation is “on the path to becoming the first country to use the distributed ledger for tax probes if the technology is adopted.” The article cited Nitithanprapas explaining that “blockchain is expected to help verify VAT invoices” and “root out fake invoices for VAT claims,” defining “adoption of new technologies” as …

The Second United Arab Emirates (UAE) Government Annual Meetings concluded with the introduction of two initiatives pertaining to blockchain and artificial intelligence (AI), the Emirates News Agency reported Nov. 28. At the meeting hosted by the governmental AI and Blockchain Joint Working Group, participants addressed strategies to attract foreign investment and create necessary technological infrastructure, as well as potential challenges related to blockchain and AI adoption. The meeting announced the launch of the AI and Blockchain Guide Initiative, which aims to develop a standardized definition of the technologies on the federal level, as well as introduce the concepts of AI …

Artificial intelligence has come a long way in recent years, but there is still one milestone which is yet to be achieved: passing the Turing test. The premise is simple: an interrogator asks questions to a machine and to a human while sitting in a separate location, and receive the answers written down. If they can’t tell the difference between man and machine after a period of time, the AI has passed. For the past 12 years, a $100,000 prize has been offered to the developers of the first program to pull this off. Alas, there have been no winners …

Does your mopping robot or your food processor have names? Do you ascribe a character to them? Unless you’re a robot yourself, you probably do. The entire history of engineering has been about making the most human-like machines possible. We humans are hardwired to process social interactions, so we subconsciously expect machines to be at least somewhat human. We can adapt to dashboards, handles and buttons, but what we really want is an obedient servant. Japanese startup Connectome have come up with the “world’s first” Virtual Human Agent (VHA) on the blockchain. Robotic incarnations Any user interface, however great, is …

A startup says the tokenization of assets represents the next big milestone for blockchain technology – and is creating a platform that’s going to enable individuals and businesses to digitize real-world items. According to IDA, its infrastructure helps to solve a dilemma facing the world today: an effective link between physical and digital economies. The company says digitizing assets can help strengthen rights of ownership, allow everyone to track resources and prevent waste, and create a tamperproof record of transactions. In its white paper, the company has set out why this evolution matters. IDA claims that digitized assets are going …

Singapore’s state investment firm Temasek Holdings Pte has invested in enterprise blockchain software firm and global banking consortium R3, according to a Bloomberg report Nov. 22. Temasek is a Singapore government-owned investment company, which has reported its Asia-focused portfolio to be worth around S$308 billion ($235 billion) as of spring 2018. Bloomberg today cites an “internal memo,” whose contents have reportedly been confirmed by a Temasek spokesperson, which illuminates the company’s broad investment strategy as of October 2018. It indicates that Temasek is responding to a shifting global investment landscape by focusing in on bleeding-edge technologies such as blockchain and …

Ping An Bank, a subsidiary of China’s Ping An Insurance Group, will launch a boutique bank using blockchain, cloud services, and the Internet of Things (IoT). Ping An Insurance Group is one of the world's leading financial and insurance corporations, and their subsidiary’s announcement was reported on Nov. 20 by People’s Daily, China’s official state run press service. A boutique bank is defined as a non-full service investment bank that supports more individualized services than larger firms. The new boutique bank will rely on Ping An Group's scientific and technological skills and comprehensive financial capabilities to provide integrated financial services …

China’s Ping An Insurance Group, one of the world's largest insurance corporations, and the Sanya municipal government signed a strategic cooperation agreement for “Smart City” construction. The new project will be backed with blockchain tech, artificial intelligence (AI), big data, and cloud computing, the official state run press People’s Daily reported Nov. 14. Ping An Group signed a strategic agreement with the Sanya Municipal People's Government to carry out comprehensive cooperation on financial investment and “Smart City” construction as a part of a major strategic urban development in China. The article states that one of the “core segments” of the …

The Thai branch of U.S. global IT company IBM will promote blockchain and artificial intelligence (AI) in order to turn the country into a major sales hub in the surrounding region, English-language daily news outlet The Bangkok Post reports Wednesday, Nov. 14. According to the article, IBM is going to promote blockchain in collaboration with the country’s central bank, Bank of Thailand. A recent survey by IDC-IBM shows that global spending on blockchain will reach $9.7 billion by 2021. Moreover, IBM is also discussing the possibility of blockchain education in local schools and universities, aiming to provide enough member of …

The government of Austria is supporting a U.K. cancer research company using blockchain to detect the disease. The government’s support comes as part of its drive to promote the technology, a press release shared with Cointelegraph confirms Nov. 10. Lancor Scientific, which has developed a device to detect multiple cancer types and record screening results with smart contracts on blockchain, plans to open a research laboratory in the city of Graz. Like Google’s Lymph Node Assistant, the cancer screening tool released in October using artificial intelligence (AI), Lancor Scientific’s offering aims for 90 percent accuracy. Lancor will additionally work with …