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AMOpportunities gets $1.1m to support overseas medical students
 Thank you for supporting our journalism. This article is available exclusively for our subscribers, who help fund our work at the Chicago Tribune.

Health care startup AMOpportunities, which won the University of Chicago's New Venture Challenge in June, has raised $1.1 million in funding. (Robert Holly / Blue Sky)

AMOpportunities, a Chicago-based startup that helps connect international medical students to short-term training programs in the United States, has raised $1.1 million in seed funding, the company announced Thursday.

The startup, which won the University of Chicago’s New Venture Challenge in June, was founded in 2013 from a dorm room at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The company aims to help alleviate a shortage of doctors across the United States by helping international medical students join the U.S. health care system, co-founder Benjamin Bradley said.

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“The United States has a huge shortage in specialties like internal medicine and primary care, primarily in rural and underserved areas,” Bradley said. “These students see that and know that they can come here and get a job and fill that opportunity.”

However, the American Medical Association says international students are strongly encouraged to complete short-term training, in the form of clinical rotations, before applying for residencies in the United States.

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AMOpportunities’ “one-stop-shop” site offers students information and applications for almost 400 host clinics. If a student applies through the site, AMOpportunities vets their identity and then helps package their application, secure housing and request the necessary travel documents. They also have advisers on staff part-time to guide the students through their application.

The company says it charges between $1,100 and $4,000 per four-week training program, depending on the number of hours the student works and the popularity of the site. About $500 to $1,000 of that fee is given to the participating clinic.

Foreign-educated physicians usually set up their rotations by contacting American physicians directly, AMOpportunities CEO Kyle Swinsky said.

Although this option is typically free of charge, students generally do not receive help finding housing or obtaining visas.

“It’s more of one physician or one practice that sets up a website,” said Swinsky, who co-founded AMOpportunities with Bradley. “Nobody really does it on the scale we do it.”

Hopefuls can also receive the training through U.S. medical schools. But less than half of the country’s schools accept international students, according to the Association of American Medical Schools.

AMOpportunities says it has earned $2.5 million helping 1,600 international students travel to the United States for training in the past three years. An additional 38,000 students have registered on the site, but have not completed an application. The users have come from more than 65 countries, primarily in South America, South Asia and the Middle East, Bradley said.

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The company says it rarely faces challenges when helping students apply for the nonimmigrant visas. Swinsky added that the travel bans enacted by President Donald Trump haven’t impacted their business because it hasn’t had any applicants from the restricted countries since the ban was ordered. However, he said he’s not sure if the company will be affected in the future.

The startup moved its staff of seven from health-tech incubator Matter to its own office in River North this week. They plan to use the funding to hire five more employees by the end of the year. They also intend to increase marketing at international medical schools and expand their network of advisers.

Chicago-based OCA Ventures and Madison, Wisconsin-based HealthX Ventures led the funding round. Other participants include M25 Group, Wildcat Capital, China Innovation Venture Partners, and Techra Investments, according to AMOpportunities. Also included in the round is $100,000 the startup received as the winners of the New Venture Challenge, Swinsky said.

maclevine@chicagotribune.com

Output: Chicago-based start-up AMOpportunities has secured $1.1m in seed funding, in a round led by HealthX Ventures and OCA Ventures. AMOpportunities, which won this year's University of Chicago’s New Venture Challenge, has developed an online platform connecting medical students around the world with information about job vacancies and links to host clinics in the US. The company said it has helped 1,600 students in the past three years. The funds will be used to expand the company's staff, hire more advisers and increase marketing at international medical schools.


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San Francisco pledges to build fibre-optic network
 Last week, San Francisco became the first major city in America to pledge to connect all of its homes and businesses to a fiber optic network.

I urge you to read that sentence again. It’s a ray of light. In an era of short-term, deeply partisan do-nothing-ism, the city's straightforward, deeply practical determination shines. Americans, it turns out, are capable of great things—even if only at the city level these days.

[#image: /photos/5947e0146c638b3847cde2a7]|||||| Susan Crawford is a columnist for Backchannel and a professor at Harvard Law School. She is also the author of The Responsive City and Captive Audience. --------- Sign up to get Backchannel's weekly newsletter, and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

You might think: Big deal, San Francisco is our tech capital, the last place that needs this. But for years, San Francisco has had a major problem. True, it’s the tech capital of the country and a progressive leader among US cities, but before last week it had no plan to ensure that it had world-class data connectivity for its residents at a reasonable price. Techies frequently bemoan this fact, showing one another screenshots of spinning wheels. San Francisco’s dilemma is a compact form of the crisis in communications facing the rest of the country: Although fiber is the necessary infrastructure for every policy goal we have—advanced healthcare, the emergence of new forms of industries, a chance for every child to get an education, managed use of energy, and on and on—the private sector, left to its own devices, has no particular incentive to ensure a widespread upgrade to fiber optic connections.

Comcast dominates access in the city, but has no plans to replace its cable lines—great at downloads, not so great at uploads, no opportunity to scale to the capacity of fiber thanks to the laws of physics, and expensive to subscribe to—with fiber. And its planned enhancements to its cable lines have, in other cities, resulted in a product costing $150 per month. AT&T will say it’s upgrading to fiber in San Francisco, but so far its work in many other US cities has been incremental, confined to areas where it has existing business customers to serve or where it already has fiber in place. Other, smaller providers similarly have no plans to do a city-wide upgrade, leaving San Francisco with a deeply uneven patchwork of connectivity.

Just as in the rest of the country, poorer and less-well-educated San Franciscans tend not to subscribe to a wire at home, but instead rely wholly on smartphone data plans—no substitutes, given their expense and throttled capacity, for what’s possible using a wired connection.

It’s taken San Francisco a number of tries to get to the point of suggesting a city-controlled utility fiber network that private-sector retail operators can use as a neutral platform. Like Bill Murray's Phil Connors in Groundhog Day, the city has been steadily learning. 10 years ago, the failure of a much-hyped city partnership with Google and Earthlink for a city-wide wifi network was caused by inexperience on all sides: No one was up to the job of accounting for the number of hotspots and the amount of backhaul that would be necessary for a wifi network to serve San Francisco’s data-hungry citizens in their homes and businesses. Eight years ago, a city-commissioned report recommended a fiber network, but plans didn’t proceed because of lack of leadership and the absence of a concrete plan.

The city has finally gathered both sufficient expertise and the political will to move ahead. Last week, Mayor Ed Lee and Supervisor Mark Farrell released a substantial report from expert consultant CTC Technology & Energy that essentially provides a detailed, thorough blueprint for a fiber network connecting every home and business in the city. (Disclosure: I’m the co-chair, with Supervisor Farrell, of the unpaid advisory committee he convened to look at the issue. I have no clients or consulting arrangements, and receive no income or other compensation, direct or indirect, from any telecom-related company.)

Output: San Francisco's patchy data connectivity could become a thing of the past after mayor Ed Lee and supervisor Mark Farrell released a report containing a blueprint to bring fibre connectivity to every home and business in the city. The study by consultants CTC Technology & Energy details how fibre planning needed to be split into "dark" (the infrastructure) and "lit" (internet services) fibre. San Francisco's authorities would tender in a private firm to set up the publicly controlled dark fibre network extending to every home and business, while third-party outfits would win leases to provide the lit fibre: connecting users.


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Ebay offers visual search tools for mobile users
 Following the announcement of its visual search tools back in July, eBay has finally launched them, enabling mobile shoppers to use their camera to search for products on the auction site.

The image-recognition features, which are called ‘Find It On eBay’ and ‘Image Search’, are available on eBay’s mobile apps.

With Find It On eBay, consumers are able to able to search for a product from any social platform, blog, or website by sharing an image from the platform with eBay. The eCommerce giant’s app then provides similar listings to the product featured in the picture.

Through Image Search, users click on the in-app camera button and take a photo, or use an existing photo from the phone’s gallery. Once again, eBay surfaces visually similar listed products for the shopper to consider purchasing.

“Moments of shopping inspiration can come at any time, whether you’re walking down the street or browsing your social media feed,” said Mohan Patt, VP of buyer experience at eBay, in July. “At eBay, we’re focused on creating new complementary technology that helps our millions of shoppers easily find the things they love at the best value. eBay Image Search and Find It On eBay make it possible for people to shop eBay using any image or photo that inspires them.”

Find It On eBay is only available on Android, while Image Search is available on both Android and iOS.

Join us at the 2017 Effective Mobile Marketing Awards Ceremony, taking place in London on Thursday 16 November, to mix with the industry's best and brightest, and raise a glass to the year's best campaigns and solutions. To find out more, and to book your place, click here.

Output: Mobile shoppers can scour auction site eBay for purchases using images, following the launch of two features: Image Search and Find It On eBay. Image Search, available on iOS and Android, allows customers to use a photo from their smartphone to search for items on the eBay site. Meanwhile, Find It On eBay, which is only available to Android customers, allows an image from any social platform, blog or website to be used to find products on eBay.


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LG smartphones available at discount with Amazon lock screen ads
 The two G6 models are the nicest phones to enter Amazon’s discounted lineup to date. Naturally, they sell for substantially more than most other phones available, at $399.99 and $499.99. That’s only a $50 discount on the standard G6, but it’s almost $200 under what Amazon plans to sell the G6 Plus for without ads — though neither will be available for another two weeks, and it’s very possible the standard G6 Plus will quickly see a discount.

There are some legitimately good phones in Amazon’s discount program

Until today, Motorola had offered the nicest phones through this discount program. The Moto X4 is currently available for $329.99, which is a good price on a good midrange phone.

LG’s other two models, the Q6 and X Charge, are on the less-expensive end of the spectrum. The Q6 will sell for $229.99, down from $299.99, and the X Charge will sell for $149.99, down from $199.99. LG doesn’t tackle any prices lower than that, leaving the very low end to Alcatel, which offers phones discounted to just below $60.

Output: LG has become the latest addition to Amazon’s Prime Exclusive Phone programme, the first time premium phones have been available on the discount scheme. In November, LG's G6 and G6 Plus will both be available to buy with ads on the lock screen and will cost $399.99 and $499.99 – about $200 cheaper than versions without ads. LG's lower-end Q6 and X Charge phones are also included in the programme, which features models from Nokia, Motorola and Alcatel as well.


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YouTube reaches over 100 million hours of daily watch time on TV
 YouTube is now seeing over 100 million hours of watch time on living room devices every single day. The new data point was revealed by Google CEO Sundar Pichai during the company’s Q3 2017 earnings call Thursday, where executives also once again called out the video service as a major revenue driver. “YouTube continues to see phenomenal growth,” said Pichai.

This was the first time Google specifically referenced the total watch time on smart TVs and other living room devices. Earlier this year, the company revealed that it now sees more than 1 billion hours of watch time across all devices.

This means that viewing on TV is accounting for roughly 10 percent of all YouTube watch time. The company previously said that more than half of its views come from mobile devices. Altogether, YouTube has more than 1.5 billion users watching an average of 60 minutes of videos every day. For reference: Back in 2012, YouTube streamed just 100 million hours per day to all devices, period.

Alphabet and Google CFO Ruth Porat used Thursday’s earnings call to once again point to YouTube as a key revenue driver for the company, without specifically breaking out YouTube’s revenue. She also pointed out that YouTube has a 95 percent ad viewability rate, compared to an average 60 percent across the industry.

However, Porat also singled out YouTube content licensing as one of the reasons for growing costs in Google’s balance sheets. YouTube continues to invest in original programming, and just this week announced that it had bought the rights for “Origin,” a Sci-Fi show from Left Bank Pictures, the production company behind Netflix’s “The Crown.”

Asked about a backlash YouTube suffered earlier this year, when some brands found their ads near inappropriate content, Porat suggested that things have vastly improved. “We have been doing a lot to protect the ecosystem and doing the right thing for advertisers,” she said, adding: “The vast majority of advertisers never left.” Out of those who did take their business of the service, many had already returned.

Pichai said that Google’s three major focus areas for YouTube going forward would be improving the community experience, driving further growth to the platform and growing its subscription businesses. Part of these efforts is also YouTube TV, the company’s internet-based TV subscription service that it launched earlier this year. “Given where we are, I’m really excited about the initial reception,” Pichai said about YouTube TV.

Output: TV viewing accounts for 10% of all YouTube watch time, while the video streaming site is racking up 100 million hours a day on living room devices, according to Google CEO Sundar Pichai in a Q3 earnings call. CFO Ruth Porat also revealed YouTube's ad viewability rate was 95%, compared with an industry average of 60%. Pichai also brushed off the recent problems of ads being placed near extremist content. He said YouTube was focusing on improving the customer experience and increasing its subscriptions business.


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Yoti launch digital identity verification app
 Yoti, a British start-up, is trying to establish a global identity system that protects users from both identity theft and having their data collected and exploited. All personal data remains within the Yoti ecosystem, where different elements - name, gender, date of birth etc - are encrypted and stored separately. Only the individual user can tie it all together.

Yoti - derived from Your Own Trusted Identity - requires a smartphone, and there are apps for both Apple iOS and Android. The potential audience is in the billions.

Yoti requires each user to create a digital identity. This involves providing biometric identifiers such as video and speech, plus an image of a government-backed identification document, such as a passport or a driving licence. Yoti discards these after the ID has been created. Yoti's co-founder and CEO Robin Tombs says passport images are deleted after seven days.

Users who have Android phones with NFC can read the chip in their digital passport. Tombs says Apple doesn't allow this at the moment.

If a company wants to verify a user, it presents them with a QR code that they can read with the Yoti app. They can verify their Yoti ID by entering a 5-digit pin or their biometrics: that is, by videoing themselves and by speaking random words displayed on the smartphone screen. If you're holding your smartphone in the usual way, the video is easily captured: the app just turns on the front-facing camera.

Tombs says the system isn't completely foolproof because some people may have fake passports or fake driving licences. However, it's more secure than alternatives such as database lookups based on names and addresses, electoral rolls, birthdays, mothers' maiden names and similar pieces of information.

One advantage for users is that they can verify their identities without divulging extra information. For example, if you proffer a driving licence or passport to prove that you are over 18, you're revealing a lot of personal information, not just your date of birth.

Another advantage is that people can use a single Yoti ID for multiple purposes, such local clubs, supermarkets, banks or whatever. It even works as a peer-to-peer system that you could use when meeting people you don't know.

Also, of course, Yoti works online, globally. It can be used as a website log-on, and includes a password manager.

Yoti doesn't need to collect or sell personal information or advertising space because it makes money by charging companies for its ID service.

"We have a mature business model," says Tombs. "Most businesses already pay to do background checks where they might only get 80 percent matches. That's not as good as being able to offer a 100 percent match... and we're cheaper than a database match."

Obviously, there's a chicken-and-egg problem with getting a service like Yoti off the ground. Most users won't make the effort to set up a digital identity on Yoti if they don't need one, and most companies won't ask for "a Yoti" if none of their users have them.

That problem would be solved almost instantly if, say, Facebook or a large government department mandated Yoti. Being adopted by a bank or a national supermarket chain - which is possible, if NCR backs the system - would be a major breakthrough. Even Twitter would be great step forward, and Twitter desperately needs a system like Yoti. (As it is, verified users may be asked for passport or driving licence images to prove their IDs,)

At the moment, Yoti is working with a couple of dozen early adopters. These include the NSPCC, the UK's national children's charity, NCR, Reed, a large recruitment agency, and Deltic, the UK's largest nightclub chain.

People who use the Free-ads website to buy and sell things can also use Yoti to confirm their IDs and get a Trusted Member badge. That approach would work on eBay, Gumtree or Craigslist, and also on online dating sites.

Whether Yoti will take off is anyone's guess, but the increase in identity theft suggests there's a market need.

Yoti says it has had 140,000 downloads so far, with about 95,000 of those being UK users.

The company was founded in 2014 and now has about 180 staff, mostly in London. Yoti aims to have more than a million users "by summer 2018, expanding into India, the US and Europe". The service can already accept passports from 140 countries.

Output: UK-based start-up Yoti has launched an encrypted identity verification app for Android and iOS which combines biometric and documentary proof. CEO Robin Tombs said the secure system enables people to confirm their identity without giving away personal information, and can even be used as a peer-to-peer service. The three-year-old company is working with early adopters including the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, and claims to have had 140,000 downloads to date. By summer next year, Yoti aims to have one million users and a presence in India, the US and Europe.


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Redrow Redrow donates thousands to community groups in Chester
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Community groups in Tattenhall are celebrating after Redrow Homes announced the successful applicants to its community fund.

Redrow set up the community fund of £5,000 at the end of the summer and invited local causes to apply for a proportion of the funds.

After a fantastic response, the housebuilder has chosen the causes they would like to support and is linking up with 10 local community groups.

The beneficiaries, and how they will be spending the funds, are:

2nd Tattenhall Rainbows – items for engineering challenge

Tattenhall Bowling Club – contribution to outdoor boards and path

Tattenhall Tennis Club – new benches and gazebo

Tattenhall Heritage Trail – funding of new leaflet

Tattenhall Bridge Club – funding of advertising campaign to attract new members

Tattenhall Junior FC – new tops

Tattenhall Community Association – catering supplies

Tattenhall Park Primary Out of School Club – new table games

Tattenhall Park Primary School Council – planters and raised beds

Tattenhall Cricket Club – new caps and shirts.

Redrow is currently building a collection of three, four and five-bedroom homes at Meadow Brook in Tattenhall following the success of its Chestnut Grange venture in the village.

Jason Newton, sales director for Redrow Homes (NW), said: “We were thrilled by the reaction to the community fund and the variety of causes and ideas that came forward.

“It was incredibly hard to make a decision as to who we should support but 10 causes were chosen and we can’t wait to see the impact the donations make on the local community.”

Louise Gibson, who applied on behalf of the Rainbows group which, along with the funds for their engineering badges, will also be treated to a special visit to Redrow’s site, said: “We’re really grateful for the funds and time Redrow has donated to our group, it will make a huge difference and will hopefully spark an interest in engineering, science or construction.

“The girls in the group range from five to seven-years-old and we are always trying to find unusual and new experiences so they are very lucky to be able to get this opportunity from Redrow. They are really excited about seeing the badge put into action and learning how science and engineering can be used in housebuilding.”

Output: UK housebuilder Redrow is supporting 10 community groups in Chester after the company set up a £5,000 ($6,606) fund during the summer, and invited local groups to apply for a share. Among those set to benefit are Tattenhall's bowling, bridge, cricket and tennis clubs. Redrow is currently working on a development at Meadow Brook in Tattenhall.


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Maersk continues to suffer in cyber attack aftermath
 Pharmaceutical giant Merck & Co says a recent cyber-attack resulted in production shutdowns and cost it around $135m in lost revenue.

Merck – known as MSD outside North America – said the attack had a particular impact on its ability to supply its human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine Gardasil, used to prevent cervical and related cancers.

The cost of implementing remediation measures in the wake of the attack also caused related costs of $175m, pegging back its gross margin in the third quarter, and forced Merck to borrow $240m-worth of Gardasil from US government stockpiles. And the costs look set to be repeated in the fourth quarter, driving up the impact even further.

Merck revealed it was hit by a massive cyber-attack in June, just a few weeks after a senior executive at the firm revealed the vulnerability of the sector at a US government committee meeting, pointing to more than a million health records exposed by breaches in recent years.

It said after the event that “on June 27 the company experienced a network cyber-attack that led to a disruption of its worldwide operations, including manufacturing, research and sales operations,” and affected both finish product and active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) manufacturing.

Other companies affected by the attack included UK consumer healthcare company Reckitt Benckiser, Cadbury chocolate manufacturer (part of Mondelez, formally Kraft Foods), freight logistics company FedEx, Danish shipping company AP Moller-Maersk, German mail and logistics firm Deutsche Post DHL Group and retailer Metro AG. The costs of these has run into billions of dollars, with Maersk alone estimating that the company took a hit of $200m-$300m.

A recent report from McAfee Labs said that in the first quarter of 2017 cyber-attacks directed at private healthcare organizations outstripped those against public organizations, with most of these attributed to the WannaCry and NotPetya ransomware attacks.

Social media users were also increasingly targeted though attacks such as the Faceliker Trojan that hijacks Facebook accounts, it said.

It is apparent that many companies are unprepared for the threat of this type of ransomware attack. A recent ControlScan report suggested that nearly half (49 per cent) do not employ people with the necessary cybersecurity skills and/or training, and only 39 per cent are using an advanced endpoint security solution to combat ransomware.

The August report also found that about one-quarter of firms (23 per cent) admit they have no idea how long it would take their organization to recover from a cyber-attack, and just 10 per cent use threat intelligence to educate their workforce about the risks.

Output: Q3 results released by Merck & Co have revealed the continuing impact of the hack it suffered in June this year, withthe pharmaceutical company reportedly losing revenue worth $135m. Merck & Co admitted that the cyber attack disrupted its supply chain, while efforts to remedy the situation negatively affected its Q3 gross margin. A recent report by ControlScan revealed that 49% of firms do not employ skilled cybersecurity staff, while almost one quarter said they had no idea how long it would take to recover from a cyber attack.


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Amazon's ad business grows to $1.12bn in Q3
 Amazon is making good on its promise to eat advertising.

In its third-quarter earnings report today, the e-commerce giant said it saw “other” revenue, which is mostly composed of ad sales (and to a much smaller extent, its credit card business), grow 58 percent year over year to $1.12 billion. That’s a slight increase from the growth rate in the prior second quarter, when it grew 53 percent year over year.

(For comparison’s sake, Alphabet, Google’s parent company, which also reported third-quarter earnings today, reported ad sales at $24 billion. Facebook’s second-quarter ad sales were $9 billion; the company reports third-quarter earnings on Nov. 11.)

“Ad revenue continues to grow very quickly,” Dave Fildes, director of investor relations said on the company’s earnings call. “We’re generally pleased with the ad business. Our goal is to be helpful to consumers and help them make better shopping decisions… while also giving them targeted recommendations, making it helpful for customers instead of intrusive.”

Fildes added that advertising is an important part of the company’s “flywheel” strategy: “The traffic and customers and Prime customers who come to site are the ones who we can help [to] select items and use advertising to help them make decisions and be more informed.”

Amazon’s head count, boosted by Whole Foods and hiring, grew to 541,900 from 382,400 in the second quarter and 306,800 a year ago.

Also in the third quarter, Amazon’s net sales from physical stores was $1.2 billion, the first time it has reported this number.

Amazon’s ad investment has increased significantly quarter to quarter across all of Amazon’s ad formats. With the tech giant hiring heavily for advertising, including announcing 2,000 jobs in New York City that will focus on its ad offerings, brands and buyers have told Digiday they’re hearing from the company more.

According to recent research by Merkle, Sponsored Products Ads are the most heavily targeted format and accounted for 82 percent of all Amazon ad spend, though Headline Search Ads and Product Display Ads did grow faster quarter over quarter in terms of spend.

Amazon has also invested in programmatic, growing its self-serve offering and trying to get more “non-endemic” brands into its platform so it can lessen reliance on retail. That’s involved courting advertisers from brands that don’t sell on Amazon, such as auto brands or wireless and telecom companies.

Amazon’s pitch is that it can offer advertisers a “total wallet” perspective — connecting what people are searching for with what they’re buying online — and with its increasing brick-and-mortar retail presences, also what people buy in person. Amazon’s third-quarter filing showed that it now has 12 bookstores across the U.S. with more planned, and with its purchase of Whole Foods, has more than 460 stores from that brand across the U.S. as well.

Amazon’s net sales this quarter were up 34 percent to $43.7 billion.

Output: Amazon has reported Q3 ad sales, which make up most of its "other" revenue, as $1.12bn, a 58% year-on-year increase, with the company said to be "generally pleased" with the business. Amazon's investment in advertising has gone up and it has gone on a hiring spree, with 2,000 jobs based in New York City announced. Research by Merkle revealed 82% of spend on Amazon was on sponsored ads. The online retailer has also turned to programmatic to persuade brands that don't sell on its platform to advertise with it. Net sales in the quarter were $43.7bn.


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Rise in Google ads helps Alphabet beat sales and earnings projections
 Alphabet Inc. 's GOOGL third-quarter diluted non-GAAP earnings of $9.57 exceeded the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $8.43. Also, earnings increased 91.0% sequentially and 32.0% year over year.

The Internet powerhouse reported decent top-line numbers. Net revenues, excluding total traffic acquisition cost or TAC (TAC is the portion of revenues shared with Google's partners and amounts paid to distribution partners and others who direct traffic to the Google website), came in at $22.27 billion, increasing 6.5% sequentially and 21.9% year over year. The top line beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $21.94 billion.

On the Other Bets front, most of the businesses included there are in early stages. However, it is gradually picking up.

Following strong third-quarter earnings, share price jumped 2.78% in the after-hours trading. Also, Alphabet's shares have returned 65.3% year to date, outperforming the industry 's gain of 46.3%.

The primary drivers of the Google business haven't changed. Pricing remains under pressure both on account of nagging FX concerns as well as continued strength in mobile and TrueView. However, volumes are encouraging as total paid click growth of 47% remains a reassuring number.

Google continues to enjoy strength in the mobile platform. One of the drivers is Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP), which is being accepted by a number of publishers and sites across the world. Management is focused on driving mobile experiences and the company is well positioned to pick up strong intent-to-buy signals by studying mobile searches from its huge database. As a result, direct response marketers continue to show interest in it.

The company also said that Google Cloud is generating substantial revenue growth, reflecting the ongoing momentum in the business.

The company has greater control on the browser through Android as well as distribution agreements with Apple AAPL . However, upcoming threats should not be ignored. Apple might not renew its agreement. Also, Microsoft MSFT Windows 10 has been increasing its overall search market share. Facebook FB graph search and the social network could also take away advertising dollars and Amazon AMZN already takes care of most product searches.

YouTube continues to remain a strong contributor, benefiting from growth in online video consumption. More than a thousand creators are currently engaged with the platform, bringing in a thousand subscribers every day.

Finally, Google platforms like Android, Chrome and Daydream continue to help it in drawing more users and selling more ads.

The Numbers in Detail

Revenues

Gross total revenues of $27.8 billion were up 6.8% sequentially and 23.7% year over year (up 24% in constant currency or CC). The increase was primarily driven by strength in core advertising business.

Google Segment

The segment includes search, advertising, Play, hardware and Cloud & Apps.

Coming to the search business, revenues from Google-owned sites increased 7.0% on a sequential basis, while that from partner sites increased 2.2%, resulting in an increase of 6.1% in total advertising revenues. However, Google-owned sites and partner sites grew 22.6% and 16.3%, respectively, year over year, and accounted for 71% and 16% of quarterly revenues.

Management said that mobile search continued to benefit from improvements in ad formats and delivery initiated in the third quarter of 2015 as well as remained optimistic about search revenue growth on both tablets and desktops.

Other revenues increased 10.2% sequentially but increased 40.0% year over year, accounting for 12.3% of third-quarter revenue.

Other Bets Segment

Alphabet broke up the segment in the March quarter of 2016. The segment includes Fiber, Verily, Calico, Nest and incubation activities in X Labs. Revenues were up 21.8% and 53.3% year over year.

This segment is gaining momentum and has performed well in the second quarter.

Total traffic acquisition cost, or TAC was up 8.1% sequentially and 31.6% year over year.

TAC paid out to network partners increased 1.9% sequentially and 18.2% year over year. Given that mobile search carries higher TAC, the increase in mobile search revenue is driving related TAC according to management.

TAC for distribution arrangements was up 17.2% sequentially and 54.0% year over year.

Net advertising revenues, excluding TAC was up 5.6% sequentially and 18.7% year over year.

Margins

Gross margin of 59.9% decreased 20 bps sequentially and 140 bps from the year-ago quarter.

Price declines remained negative in both sequential and year-over-year comparisons as the mix continued to move toward lower-margin business.

Cost per click (CPC) was up 1% but down 18%, respectively, from the previous and year-ago quarters. On a sequential basis, CPC was up 1% on Google sites but remained flat on network sites. On Google sites, CPCs were down 21% from the year-ago quarter, while network CPC declined 5%.

Paid clicks grew 6% sequentially and 47% year over year, driven partly by growing volumes of mobile and TrueView ads on YouTube. Google sites paid clicks grew 7% and 55%, respectively, from the previous and year-ago quarters. Network paid clicks increased 2% sequentially and 10% from the year-ago quarter.

Operating expenses of $8.84 billion increased 0.8% sequentially and 10.7% year over year. The operating margin was 28.0%, up 162 bps sequentially and 233 bps from the year-ago quarter.

Alphabet reported net income of $6.73 billion compared with $3.52 billion in the previous quarter and $5.06 billion in the year-ago quarter. GAAP earnings of $9.57 per share were up from $5.01 in the previous quarter and $7.25 in the year-ago quarter.

Balance Sheet

Alphabet has a solid balance sheet, with cash and short-term investments of around $100.1 billion, up $5.43 billion from the second quarter. The company generated around $9.87 billion of cash from operations in the third quarter and spent $3.5 billion on capex, netting a free cash flow of $6.3 billion.

Alphabet also spent $130 million on acquisitions and $2.7 billion to repay some debt.

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Output: Third-quarter sales and earnings have allowed Alphabet to surpass expectations, thanks to a surge in Google ad volume. Sales for the quarter were up to $22.7, increasing 6.5% sequentially and 21.9% year over year. Google's Accelerated Mobile Pages is one of the key reasons the numbers look as promising as they do, as more publishers across the world begin to use the service. Google also claims that Google Cloud is generating solid revenue growth.


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Twitter sees rise in monthly users and better-than-expected sales
 Along with a healthy bump in monthly users, Twitter reported better-than-expect third-quarter sales on Thursday.

While quarterly revenue of $590 million was down 4% year-over-year, it was still better than what analysts had predicted.

From the second quarter of the year to the third, average monthly active users (MAUs) were up 4% to 330 million, while daily active users (DAUs) were up 14%, year-over-year.

A proud Jack Dorsey said Twitter hit all the key notes, this past quarter.

“We grew our audience and engagement, made progress on a return to revenue growth and achieved record profitability,” Twitter’s second-time CEO stated. Ned Segal, Twitter’s CFO, said the company’s momentum was driven by improved execution from its sales team and strength in video and direct response ad formats.

advertisement advertisement

Segal added Twitter’s data business experienced its third consecutive quarter of accelerating year-over-year growth.

Analysts seemed pleased with Twitter’s performance, on Thursday.

“Underlying revenue trends provided confidence that the company is on track towards a resumption of top-line growth,” Brian Wieser, a senior analyst at Pivotal Research, said in a research note.

Wieser was particularly impressed by the fact that Twitter’s largest 100 advertisers increased spending on the platform by 23% globally, and 7% domestically.

“This reinforces our observation that many advertisers like and value Twitter as a marketing platform and continue to use it,” Wieser noted.

Casting a cloud over the strong earnings report, Twitter on Thursday was forced to restate the audience estimates it reports to advertisers and investors. In a letter to shareholders, the social giant said it overstated MAU counts for three years.

The restatement was due to incorrectly recording “1 million to 2 million users per quarter” from certain “third-party applications” to Twitter’s MAU count, it said.

The readjustment does not impact its DAUs, Twitter said. Due to its “data retention policies,” Twitter said it could not “reconcile periods prior to the fourth quarter of 2016.”

Of course, poor measurement isn’t Twitter’s only problem. The company continues to struggle with trolls, bullies, sexual harassers and fake-news spreaders.

In its latest response to this problem, the company recently outlined a fresh set of rules designed to curb bad actors.

This past quarter, Twitter also addressed the presence of Russian agents on its platform -- and their efforts to influence the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

To encourage more tweeting, Twitter finally budged on its long-held 140-character limit, this past quarter. Rather than a sweeping change, the company is testing a more lenient 280-character limit among a “small group” of users.

Looking ahead to the fourth quarter, Twitter said on Thursday it is expecting an adjusted EBITDA between $220 million and $240 million, and adjusted EBITDA margins between 35% and 36%.

Output: Twitter has recorded better results than expected from third-quarter sales with revenue of $590m. While the revenue figure was down 4% year on year, the number of monthly average users has risen 4% up to 330 million, with daily users up 14% year on year. Twitter's 100 largest advertisers increased their spending by 23% globally and 7% domestically.


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Corlnnova raises $6m for robotic heart-failure treatment device
 CorInnova said today that it raised $6.1 million from Wellcome Trust for the EpicHeart device it’s developing to treat heart failure.

Houston-based CorInnova said EpicHeart is a direct cardiac compression device that uses a collapsible, thin-film, pneumatically actuated soft robotic device to surround both ventricles of the heart. It’s designed to use air to inflate and increase cardiac output by gently squeezing the heart.

Founded to commercialize technology developed at Texas A&M University’s Cardiac Mechanics Laboratory by Dr. John Criscione, CorInnova is backed by a group of private investors, the National Heart Lung Blood Institute and National Science Foundation, the Texas Emerging Technology Fund and now the Wellcome Fund, a charitable foundation. CorInnova is also a resident at Johnson & Johnson Innovation, JLABS @ TMC, a life science incubator in Houston.

“Our EpicHeart technology is innovative and groundbreaking. We believe it will lead to a new paradigm for heart failure treatment,” CEO William Altman said in prepared remarks. “We are honored to have our work recognized by the Wellcome Trust. We are further honored to have been chosen by JLABS as one of a limited number of companies to be invited to join its life sciences incubator. Due to its minimally invasive nature and its potential for reduced adverse events from blood contact, CorInnova’s non-blood-contacting soft robotic cardiac assist device could potentially triple or quadruple the number of heart failure patients who could be eligible for such a life-saving device therapy.”

“Wellcome is pleased to support the development of this innovative technology for the treatment of congestive heart failure,” added Dr. Philip Jordan of Wellcome’s Innovations team. “Congestive heart failure is a chronic condition that affects roughly six million people in the US alone and is a leading cause of death and disability. A significantly less-invasive medical device that could restore a certain level of heart function would be potentially transformative for patients.”

Last month CorInnova won a $50,000 award at the annual Pediatric Device Innovation Symposium.

“We are pleased that the compelling advantages of CorInnova’s technology for heart failure treatment in adults is equally compelling for treatment for children,” product development VP Boris Leschinsky said.

Output: Houston-based medical company CorInnova has raised $6.1m in funding from the Wellcome Trust to develop its EpicHeart soft robotic device that's hoped to restore cardiac function to heart failure patients. The collapsible, pneumatic machine uses air to gently squeeze the heart and elevate cardiac output. Chronic heart disease affects about 6 million people in the US, and EpicHeart's non-blood-contacting device, described as "innovative and groundbreaking", could increase the number of patients eligible for treatment by up to four times.


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Regtech firm Templum raises $2.7m for compliant ICO exchange
 Templum LLC, a company offering regulatory compliant solutions for ICOs as securities and subsequent secondary trading, a competitor to the ICO platform being developed by Overstock’s tZERO, today announced that it has closed a seed funding round totaling $2.7 million. The seed round was led by Raptor Group, Galaxy Investment Partners, Blockchain Capital, and firstminute.capital.

The funding follows Templum’s recent strategic partnership agreement with broker-dealer Liquid M Capital, to launch a US regulatory compliant turn-key solution, known as Templum, for the initial issuance and secondary trading of Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) as securities. Templum will use the seed capital for operational expansion, product development, and talent acquisition.

Chris Pallotta, Templum Founder, and Chief Executive Officer stated:

“ICOs offer innovative organizations an efficient alternative for raising capital. However, ICOs in their current form can be highly risky for issuers and investors. Templum will provide the necessary transparency, accountability and investor protection to reduce risks and encourage more widespread acceptance of ICOs.”

Bart Stephens, Blockchain Capital Co-Founder, and Managing Partner said:

“Templum has entered the ICO market at the ideal time when compliance and investor protection are top of mind for industry participants. Their solutions provide much needed certainty regarding regulatory obligations, safeguards to protect investors and a vital secondary marketplace for liquidity. We’re excited to partner with Templum to further democratize access to digital assets while bolstering overall market integrity.”

Until recently, the U.S. ICO market has operated in a manner that did not focus on compliance with the U.S. and foreign securities laws. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) released an investigative report on July 25, 2017, concluding that offers and sales of digital assets that are securities by “virtual” organizations in the U.S. are subject to the requirements of the federal securities laws.

Subsequently, some ICOs conducted prior to the SEC’s investigative report could be deemed to have violated securities laws and ICO issuers could be held liable for these violations. In response, Templum and Liquid M Capital recently submitted a letter asking the SEC to grant ICO issuers a grace period of 180 days to remediate any possible violations related to their past ICOs, except those that may have involved fraud.

Summarizing on the letter, Mr. Pallotta said:

“We will continue to advocate for the advancement of the digital asset community that is balanced with the need for regulatory compliance and investor protection. We believe narrowly tailored remedial relief solution for these issuers and investors will support the innovative ICO model while helping issuers meet the necessary regulatory requirements within an established securities framework like the one we offer.”

Output: Regtech firm Templum has raised $2.7m in seed funding to expand its regulatory-compliant ICO trading platform. Raptor Group, Blockchain Capital, Galaxy Investment Partners and firstminute.capital led investment and the proceeds will also be used to develop products and hire new staff. Templum recently signed a deal with broker-dealer Liquid M Capital to create a US regulation-compliant turn-key product for the issuance and secondary trading of ICOs.


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Intel widens DLT business via coin-storage tie-up with Ledger
 Technology major Intel has partnered with virtual currency hardware startup firm Ledger as of late October 2017 in a bid to introduce new solutions for storing cryptocurrency holdings. Under the collaboration, Ledger’s Blockchain Open Ledger Operating System (BOLOS) will be integrated into Intel’s Software Guard Extension (SGX) secure storage product line.

According to Ledger chief executive officer (CEO), Eric Larchevêque, the partnership allows them to provide innovative solutions for digital currency and Blockchain applications to their growing client base.

"Following the launch of a line of hardware wallets based on our operating system integrated in a secure chip, working with a leading player like Intel is a unique opportunity to keep providing our growing client base with innovative solutions for cryptocurrency and Blockchain applications.”

Brief details of the partnership project

Under the partnership, Intel and Ledger will focus on developing a so-called “enclave” wherein private keys are stored and where transactions are both generated and signed. The project is similar to the deal focusing on secure storage that was signed by Ledger and Gemalto in early October 2017. The Ledger/Gemalto collaboration involved Ledger’s BOLOS and Gemalto’s Hardware Security Module (HSM) cryptographic key storage system.

The collaboration is also part of Intel’s focus on hardware under its distributed ledger technology (DLT) strategy. One example of this strategy is the technology giant’s collaboration with startup company 21 Inc. on the distribution of Bitcoin mining chips in consumer electronic devices.

The plan is to integrate the mining chips into Intel’s products like desktop personal computers (PC).

Based on the press release issued by the partners, there are already several cryptocurrency wallets that are scheduled to use their proposed virtual currency holdings storage system. Among them are provider services MyEtherWallet and Electrum.

Intel has also built alliances with Tencent earlier this year and other Blockchain companies for the former’s bid to become one of the leading providers of commercial Blockchain applications.

Output: Chipmaker Intel has taken another step into the distributed ledge technology space through a partnership deal with digital currency hardware provider Ledger that will see them offer cryptocurrency storage products. The tie up will incorporate Ledger's Blockchain Open Ledger Operating System into Intel's Software Guard Extension (SGX) secure storage product. The companies will develop an “enclave” to store private keys and to generate and sign transactions.


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Amazon pharmaceutical distribution licensed in 12 states
 St. Louis Post-Dispatch found more hints that Amazon is truly thinking of getting into the prescription drug biz, which was first reported earlier this month. The publication reviewed public records and found that the e-retail giant has received licenses to become a wholesale drug distributor in at least 12 states. Nevada, Arizona, North Dakota, Louisiana, Alabama, New Jersey, Michigan, Connecticut, Idaho, New Hampshire, Oregon and Tennessee have already approved the company's application, whereas Maine is still thinking about it.

Boston-based Leerink Partners analyst Ana Gupte told St. Louis Post that the discovery "strengthens [their] conviction on the likely entry into the drug supply chain." A lot of people must have thought the same, because the stock prices of some of the biggest names in the industry, including CVS, plummeted after the publication published its piece.

Even so, only Amazon can say for sure whether it'll start selling prescription meds itself in the future. It might have secured the licenses as part of a partnership with another company, or it might be for another purpose altogether. Nicodemo Fiorentino, the drug supply chain researcher who tipped the Post about the news, said Amazon must first secure a pharmacy license to be able to sell directly to customers. Unfortunately, Amazon refused to talk to the Post about "rumors and speculations," but we might not have to wait that long for anything more definitive anyway -- according to the earlier report by CNBC, it has to decide if it wants to enter the pharmacy biz before Thanksgiving.

Output: Stock prices of some of the biggest pharmaceutical firms in the US fell after it was revealed Amazon had been granted wholesale drug distributor licences by 12 states, according to the St Louis Post-Dispatch. It followed weeks of speculation about the online retail giant's intentions toward the sector. According to researcher Nicodemo Fiorentino, Amazon must obtain a pharmacy licence to sell directly to consumers. The company declined to comment.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

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China to pass US as largest air travel market sooner than guessed
 China is going to surpass the U.S. as the world's largest air travel market in the next five years -- sooner than expected.

In its annual forecast, the International Air Transport Association shifted its expectations about the center of gravity of world air travel eastward, away from the U.S. and Europe.

The global airline industry group anticipates that 7.8 billion passengers will travel by air by 2036. That's nearly double the 4 billion it anticipates will fly this year.

The IATA forecast, released Tuesday, said it expects that half of the new passengers who will fly over the next 20 years will live in Asia. While IATA predicts significant changes over the next two decades, the most dramatic shifts will happen in the next five years.

China will displace the U.S. as the world's largest aviation market by 2022, two years sooner than previously expected, the IATA forecast predicts. An aviation market is defined as traffic to, from and within a country.

Related: India's airports will be at breaking point by 2022

Chinese airlines have been rapidly expanding their international destinations in recent years. Air China and Hainan Airlines this week announced three new routes to the U.S., including Shenzhen to Los Angeles, and Chongqing and Chengdu to New York.

Emerging markets in Asia will dominate the next 20 years, according to IATA. The U.K., today the third largest market, will drop to fifth place, falling behind India in 2025 and Indonesia in 2030, it said.

Related: China's 1st big passenger jet completes maiden flight

Europe's influence will continue to wane, as Thailand and Turkey will also enter the top 10 largest markets over the next 20 years. France and Italy, meanwhile, will fall in the rankings to 11th and 12th respectively, according to IATA.

Both India and Indonesia have been at or near the top buyers of new jetliners from Airbus (EADSF), Boeing and others as budget airlines improve the affordability of traveling by air.

Airbus and Boeing (BA) are accelerating production of their most popular single-aisle and twin-aisle jetliners to meet demand for growth and to replace older, less-efficient airliners. Boeing on Wednesday said airlines were putting "upward pressure" on it to increase production of its single-aisle 737 jetliners, in large part due to demand from countries like India and China.

Related: Airbus takes control of Bombardier jet Boeing tried to kill

Boeing anticipates China will need more than 7,200 new airplanes worth more than $1 trillion dollars.

Both companies have established industrial presences in China to court buyers who need the blessing of the central government. Airbus assembles its competing A320s in Tianjin, and Boeing is opening a new factory near Shanghai where its 737s will have their interiors installed prior to delivery to Chinese carriers.

While Airbus and Boeing focus on China, the country this year began testing its own homegrown C919 airliner from the Commercial Airplane Corporation of China, or Comac.

Output: China will bypass the US as the world's biggest air travel market by 2020, two years sooner than formerly predicted, according to the International Air Transport Association. It suggests there will be 7.8 billion passengers travelling by air by 2036, almost double the 4 billion expected to fly in 2017, with half of the new passengers living in Asia. Also, it predicts the UK, which is currently the third largest market, will fall to fifth place behind India in 2025, and Indonesia in 2030.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

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German startup Medigo targets medical tourism market
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When he hit 146kg, Neil Adamson decided to do something about his weight. The 49-year-old chef from Newcastle was based in Qatar at the time and as an ex-pat, it would have been difficult to get the surgery through the NHS. He started researching so-called hospital holidays to Thailand, but found them more expensive than he was expecting. Then he came across another option: Medigo.

“The NHS won’t do surgery unless they believe you have a psychological danger to yourself, or unless there’s a concern about your obesity becoming critical to your health. But I wanted to deal with it before it got to that stage,” Adamson says.

People have travelled for medical treatment for thousands of years, ever since Greek pilgrims set out for the Saronic Gulf, which was believed to be the sanctuary for the healing god Asclepios. But cheap flights and Google mean it’s never been easier. The industry was worth $19.7bn (£14.9bn) in 2016, according to Orbis research, and it is estimated to be growing at 18.8 per cent a year, with a forecast value of $46.6bn by 2021.

Medical tourism hasn’t been the most obvious industry for entrepreneurs. But its growth rate has attracted increasing numbers of startups hoping to act as the gateway between doctor and patient. Medical Departures, based in Hong Kong, secured $2.5m in series A funding in March 2016 for its plan to become “the Airbnb for medical tourism”. Oxa Medical, which started in Hyderabad in December 2016, has been funded by an undisclosed amount by a UAE-based venture capital. Singapore has DocDoc, and Malaysia has BookDoc.

Ugur Samut, who founded Medigo in Berlin in 2014, thinks it has the edge. To date, Medigo has connected over 60,000 patients with doctors in 178 different countries for procedures ranging from brain surgery and cancer treatment to breast implants and tummy tucks. It has secured over €10m (£8.96m) of investment, most recently through an extension round of €3.5m in January 2106 from CL Ventures, based in China.

“We are there to help people,” Samut said. “We don’t charge the patient and we insure the patient in case something goes wrong.” So far they have not paid out, but Samut says it could happen. The insurance lasts for six months after treatment and is taken out in the patient’s home country, so if an Australian has dental work in Thailand, their insurance is in Australia.

Medigo does not want to be the Airbnb for medical tourism. “Unlike Airbnb, capacity is not the issue: we just want the best hospitals,” Samut says. “We’re not listing hotels, we’re asking people to go and get surgery that might be life-threatening.” In the beginning, Medigo spent most of the €2.2m raised from seed investors like Atlantic Internet on checking records.

“If there are 1,000 hospitals in Poland, our goal is to find the best 10 or 15,” he says. Medigo’s team of researchers start by checking public health records and evaluating its findings with doctors in each destination. It takes eight weeks to list a dentist, Samut says, by way of example, from the the first contact to the listing.

Professor Dr Philip Schöttle works with several medical tourism facilitators to reach patients for his bone surgery in Munich. “Medigo’s level of professionalism and service is comparably one of the highest,” Schöttle says. “Patient referrals are highly professional and all necessary information is provided before I see a patient.”

People come to him from all over the world because he specialises in novel orthobiological medicine, which involves reconstructing damaged tissues or organs, involving stem cells. Some of his patients didn’t know such procedures were an option before they found out on the Medigo website.

“Our institute gives patients access to proven, innovative treatments that aren’t yet available in many parts of the world. That can only be a good thing,” Schöttle says.

Yet he recognises that not everyone will be able to afford to pay out of pocket for innovative treatment. And another downside is the lack of industry regulation, which allows for some untrustworthy players in the market: “But they usually don’t last long,” Schöttle says. “In today’s globalised world, there’s nowhere to hide and patients are increasingly informed about their healthcare options.”

Samut is from Istanbul, where he studied for an undergraduate degree in business before moving to Barcelona for a masters in marketing. He started working for Rapid Internet, one of Europe’s biggest startup companies, in Berlin, where he first got interested in the travel industry. At the time, medical travel was growing at 25 per cent year-on-year.

He has since learned that medical tourists come in two groups. There are the wealthy patients from what Samut calls “emerging markets”, often in Asia, seeking better quality treatment in Germany, Switzerland and the UK especially. And then there are those from Western nations who travel to avoid high costs or waiting lists. The Americans and Australians travel to avoid high costs. Waiting lists are mostly the preserve of Canadians and the British.

While the average wait time for a patient on the NHS has been quite stable since 2008, data shows that there has been a steady increase in patients waiting longer than 18 weeks for treatment.

Once Adamson decided to do something about his weight, he wasn’t prepared to wait any longer. He did some research and found good reviews for Dr Hussam Trabulsi, a Syrian surgeon based at Zulekha Hospital in Dubai, just one hour by plane from his home in Qatar. Through Medigo he made the connection. They assigned him an agent from their Care Team who was on hand to answer questions and offer support throughout the process. He says: “The type of surgery I had would probably have taken me a long time on the NHS, and as you get older you realise, ‘It’s time I do something about this’.”

On the morning of the surgery, Adamson arrived at Dubai airport at 6.30am and went straight to the hospital, where he waited for the doctor to start his day. The surgery went well, and he stayed in the hospital for three nights to recover.

Now Adamson weighs 95kg. “Undoubtedly the best money I ever spent,” he says. ”[It] saved my life and indeed, changed my life. I have recommended Medigo to many people.”

Samut says Medigo hopes to make a profit by next summer, after which it will seek further funding to expand either in the US, or in Asia.

“Crossing borders has never been easier for most people in the world, and it’s never been more common,” Schöttle says. “Crossing borders for medical care gives patients options they may not have had before.”

Output: Berlin-based start-up Medigo is aiming to capitalise on the growing medical tourism market with its innovative online platform. It has so far connected more than 60,000 patients with with medical professionals across 178 different countries, with all doctors, dentists and clinicians vetted by Medigo staff. The three-year-old company also offers support via its Care Team Assistance service, which can help with issues including travel arrangements and post-surgical treatment. The medical tourism market is set to be worth $46.6bn by 2021.


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MIT team create AI that's capable of writing horror fiction
 Cue a lightning flash and some portentous music: I have written with a robot.

The robot is Shelley, who isn’t really a robot, but actually an artificial intelligence developed by researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Over the past couple of weeks, Shelley has been posting on Twitter the start of a horror story, and inviting users to continue it.

So, in the time-honoured question directed at any writer, where does Shelley get her ideas? No lofty explanations of the author’s craft here; Shelley has been trained to scour the Reddit online community sub-forum /r/nosleep, where users share their own spooky stories.

Learning the language of terror, Shelley – named and gendered for the godmother of horror, Frankenstein author Mary Shelley – puts together eerie little vignettes and, crucially, aims to continue them from the replies posted by Twitter users in a kind of round-robin collaborative writing exercise.

With a new story started every hour, you certainly can’t doubt her prolificness. But are the stories actually any good? Here are a couple of Shelley’s recent efforts:

I was standing right across the street, when a ghost stood behind me. I was so scared I couldn’t move. I couldn’t move. I wasn’t able to move my eyes, I was screaming.

My body was pulled into the room by the presence of someone who was standing somewhere in the hallway. I looked around once and there they were, standing in the corner of the room, as they stared at me, unmoving.

The screen flickered, and everything went black. I closed my eyes, and sat up. The darkness had subsided, and the page was the same as the one before, and the one in the middle of the message. I clicked the link, and the first few minutes, then black. I woke up this morning, screaming and crying.

Nothing, perhaps, to give Stephen King sleepless nights, but you can – and probably have – read far worse on the internet written by flesh-and-blood beings. The real magic of Shelley is more apparent when people reply, using the hashtag #yourturn to indicate to the bot to put her thinking cap on and continue the story. The tale Look Away, co-authored by Shelley and several Twitter users, hangs together enough to make you forget that one of the participants isn’t human.

So would Shelley play with me? It’s actually more difficult than you’d think to get involved: Shelley’s algorithms look for replies from Twitter users that have collected favourites or retweets to help her decide who to respond to. Mine didn’t get many thumbs-ups … either that, or Shelley just didn’t like me.

I tried to follow up on several of her stories, at one point throwing my takes on every story she posted on the hour. She has deigned to work with me once, so far. The story begins:

I started to breathe again. The chains in my ankle twitched and the shadow continued to stare. A silent cry and a few signs of life began to form.

Didn’t make a huge amount of sense to me, but I had a go: “But the chains! The chains! How was I to get myself free?”

Shelley duly responded: “I was losing my mind! I couldn’t move. The creature was there with me. What was it doing?”

Which, to be honest, I didn’t feel moved the narrative on much. Still, I had another go: “Then I noticed something. The beast was chained also. We were both prisoners in this place. But why? Who was responsible for this?”

We will perhaps never know. Shelley has decided to work on new material rather than conclude our short-lived story together. Does the experiment work? I suppose she can make a decent fist of continuing narratives with a measure of logic. While some of her efforts make little to no sense at all, some of them, like the aforementioned Look Away, do actually stack up in a basic fashion. Perhaps Shelley’s available database of the Reddit forum is too limiting; the MIT boffins should give her access to the entire body of horror literature. Or maybe that way madness lies …

Output: MIT researchers have created "Shelley AI", a deep learning algorithm that uses inspiration from original horror stories published online and Twitter suggestions to create short fiction in the horror genre. Named after the author of Frankenstein, Mary Shelley, the programme can identify terror-inspiring words from existing text "seeds" and reuse them in original tales.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

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HSBC launches elite luxury credit card for world travellers
 EXCLUSIVE – HSBC has a new credit card, the bank announced today.

The card is called the HSBC Premier World Elite Mastercard Credit Card, and is designed deliberately to target travelers.

The bank describes the card as a luxury credit card. The new credit product is a black metal card, that weights noticeably more than a traditional plastic card. HSBC did not reveal the credit limit or range of this card.

An aspect of the credit card that seems to have garnered attention as the sweet spot from both fintechs and tradition financial institutions is in rewards space.

Other benefits and rewards include no foreign transaction fees, unlimited Boingo WiFi access at over one million hotspots, $85 application fee credit for TSA PreCheck, and $100 annual statement credits for Uber and Lyft rides, up to $100 in annual air travel statement credit benefit, in addition to other shopping and travel benefits.

The card is powered by Mastercard.

Output: HSBC has launched a premium credit card it says caters to the needs of the bank's globe-trotting clients. The black metal Premier World Elite Mastercard comes with no foreign transaction fees and up to 15% reductions at spas, restaurants and selected duty-free shops -- among many other perks. Pablo Sanchez, head of retail banking and wealth management for HSBC in the US and Canada said the card "represented the most valuable collection of features and benefits ever offered in an HSBC credit card".


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

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PayPal's marketing tools show shopping behaviour and preferences
 PayPal has launched a new suite of free marketing solutions for merchants that provide them with analytics around how shoppers use the online payment platform.

According to the announcement, the newly-released shopping insights tools will include aggregated and anonymous data tracking the behaviors and preferences of PayPal users.

“This includes things like how many shoppers are mobile shoppers; how many shop for big-ticket versus small-ticket items; how a particular merchant site attracts customers compared to other similar sites,” writes PayPal in its release announcing the rollout.

To use the tools, merchants will need to install a PayPal code snippet on their sites, which will collect information on PayPal web visitors and customers including:

cookies,

browser,

device and type,

IP address,

page impressions and clicks,

and URL.

In return, merchants will receive analytics data — similar to packages like Google Analytics — that they can employ to improve conversions and better serve their customers.

The code also allows merchants to enable PayPal’s “Smart Incentives,” a promotional messaging feature that informs users they can use PayPal Credit and One Touch checkout on the site, which PayPal says will help drive conversions from customers who like to pay using those methods. PayPal Credit provides 6-month interest-free financing for purchases over $99 and the company’s research found that 40% of users say they have spent more money online due to the program.

These new features are available to any merchants that use its payment processing, PayPal Credit and other PayPal solutions, including those who use them via third-party ecommerce platforms such as BigCommerce, WooCommerce, or Shopify.

The online payment platform says it will soon provide recommendations for merchants to help them increase conversions based on the data it tracks.

Output: PayPal is offering marketers a suite of tools similar to Google Analytics, which provides anonymous, aggregated data about the behaviour of the online payment service's users. PayPal said the data would include information about sites' popularity, the percentages of mobile shoppers and the cost of what they bought. To access the analytics, marketers must install a PayPal access code, which will also enable the site's Smart Incentives – allowing users to check out using PayPal Credit and One Touch.


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 Tykn aims to give 'invisible children' identity via blockchain
 Imagine: you don’t have any proof of your existence and therefore lack access to healthcare, education or insurance. This is the reality of the CEO of Dutch impact startup and Rockstart-alumnus Tykn, Tey El-Rjula. As an ‘invisible man’ – his birth certificate was destroyed during the Gulf War – the Kuwait-born entrepreneur conceived a solution that uses blockchain technology to identify children with similar difficulties.

Which problems are you solving?

“We are collectively tackling the issues of paper-based vital records systems, and with 230 million children worldwide without birth certificates, this became our primary focus with Project ZINC (Zero INvisible Children). Having said this, the birth certificate is also by far the weakest link in the identity chain. Where passports, ID cards, and driver’s licenses have just about thirty different security features, birth certificates are largely still a piece of paper, which you have to pick up at the municipality where you were born just to claim the proof of existence that serves as your ticket towards healthcare, education, insurance, etc.

Not to mention the fact that, in conflict zones, the fallible nature of these documents is even more threatening, since it can effectively turn people ‘invisible’ if a birth registry is destroyed; pair this with geographical immobility, lack of financial means and a significant knowledge gap, and you can start to see the hurdles to birth registration in LEDCs (Less Economically Developed Country, ed.) and conflict zones that we are trying to resolve.”

How are you using Blockchain technology?

“Even though we try to remain fully Blockchain agnostic, we are currently leveraging Hyperledger Indy (a ledger specifically tailored to accommodate identity solutions, ed.) through the Sovrin Network as the back-end to our APIs. By doing so we can permanently certify vital records and grant decentralized, digital identities, even to those without direct access to an electronic device through the use of Pure Decentralized Identifiers, for the purpose of authentication and verification.

Output: Dutch start-up Tykn is developing a blockchain solution aimed at providing vital certification for the 230 million "invisible children" worldwide whose lack of proof of identity can prevent them from gaining access to services such as healthcare and education. Project Zero Invisible Children (ZINC) links the Hyperledger Indy platform to an app via the Sovrin Network. The solution would offer a permanently certified proof-of-existence without a subject having to provide sensitive information. The alpha release of the app is set for Q1 2018.


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AR anatomy T-shirt shows wearers the workings of their body
 Ed Barton in his Virtuali-Tee ILKA & FRANZ

When it comes to augmented and virtual reality, Ed Barton has been there and got the T-shirt. His Brighton-based startup Curiscope produces The Virtuali-Tee, a garment printed with a stylised QR code that resembles a rib cage. Hover your phone over it, and using its app, you can explore the human chest cavity and peer at the heart, lungs and veins. "We use a mix of VR and AR to see inside the anatomy," explains Barton, 28. "With positionally tracked AR, you can position VR experiences physically within your environment." Curiscope has sold more than 3,000 Virtuali-Tees. Barton (pictured) and co-founder Ben Kidd have raised almost $1 million (£780,000) in seed funding from LocalGlobe.

When the pair founded the company in 2015, they began making 360° YouTube videos. Their first upload in January 2016, featuring a shark dive, became one of the site's most-watched VR videos. But they felt something was missing. Surely there was more to VR than videos? For Barton, the solution was positionally tracked AR, which lets them overlay 3D imagery on to the material world. "YouTube is fantastic, but doesn't give us the scope to do transformative work with physical products," Barton says. With positional tracking, he says, "we have a blurring of physical and digital items, and an experience more tightly connected to reality". This was the birth of the Virtuali-Tee. Barton and Kidd conceived the product in March 2016 and went into production thanks to £74,000 in Kickstarter funding. "With the Virtuali-Tee, AR is your interface and VR is used to transport you somewhere else. The technologies should be merging."

Next up for Curiscope: the launch of the Great White Shark AR app, due to coincide with the autumn release of iOS 11. Barton and Kidd's book, All About Virtual Reality, is published by Dorling Kindersley and available now. And in November, the pair will launch Operation Apex, a VR experience with HTC Vive Studios in which people are placed in a virtual environment with sharks. "We began talking with Vive Studios in 2016 and realised there was a big opportunity to be at the centre of this technology," Barton says.

Output: UK start-up Curiscope has blended virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) to develop an app that offers a glimpse inside the human body. An app-enabled smartphone scans a stylised QR code printed on to its Virtuali-Tee T-shirt to bring up a VR and an AR version of the wearer's internal organs. Curiscope has raised more than $1m in seed funding and shipped more than 3,000 T-shirts, while industry analysts predicted the firm's blurring of AR and VR could find applications in anatomy and biology education.


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Tesla builds solar-plus-storage facility in Puerto Rico
 After Tesla CEO Elon Musk promised earlier this month to help restore power in Puerto Rico, the company has brought electricity back to a hospital on the island, which was recently battered by Hurricane Maria. In a tweet Tuesday, Tesla posted photos of Hospital del Niño, where it just completed installation of solar panels and large battery packs to provide power even with the grid down. The batteries can store excess energy harvested by the solar panels, ensuring a steady flow of power even when sunlight isn't available.

Tesla first discussed sending energy-storage battery packs to Puerto Rico as a source of emergency power in late September, and Musk pledged to go all-in October 5. Not surprisingly for the Twitter-loving CEO, the relief effort was shaped by a series of tweets.

When asked whether Tesla could help restore power to Puerto Rico, Musk replied in the affirmative, saying the company had already undertaken electricity projects on smaller islands and that the technology could be scaled up. The final decision would be up to the Puerto Rico government, Musk noted. Puerto Rico Governor Ricardo Rosselló subsequently replied "Let's talk."

Even without the added impetus of compensating for hurricane damage, islands are particularly well-suited to renewable energy and electrical storage. They're not connected to the mainland grid, after all, and generating power locally can be difficult, as fuel must be shipped in. Prior to Hurricane Maria, most of Puerto Rico's power was generated by burning oil, which had to be imported.

Output: Tesla has installed solar panels and energy storage at the Hospital del Niño in San Juan for children in Puerto Rico. Tesla's CEO, Elon Musk, has delivered on his promise in October that his company would help bring electricity to the island of Puerto Rico following the devastation caused by Hurricane Maria. Writing on Twitter, Musk said the facility was "first of many solar + storage projects" that would be installed on the island.


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AI will bring autonomous cars within four years: Nvidia CEO
 Reuters

NVIDIA Corp chief executive Jensen Huang said on 26 October that artificial intelligence would enable fully automated cars within 4 years, but sought to tamp down expectations for a surge in demand for its chips from cryptocurrency miners.

NVIDIA came to prominence in the gaming industry for designing graphics-processing chips, but in recent years has been expanding into newer technologies including high-performance computing, artificial intelligence, and self-driving cars.

Its expansion has been richly rewarded with a 170 percent stock surge over the past year, boosting its market value to $116 billion. “It will take no more than 4 years to have fully autonomous cars on the road. How long it takes for the vast majority of cars on the road to become that, it really just depends,” Huang told media after a company event in Taipei.

Global tech firms such as Apple Inc, Facebook, Alphabet Inc, Amazon and China’s Huawei are spending heavily to develop and offer AI-powered services and products in search of new growth drivers.

Apple Chief Operating Officer Jeff Williams said earlier this week that the firm sees its mobile devices as a major platform for AI in the future. “There are many tasks in companies that can be automated... the productivity of society will go up,” said NVIDIA's Huang.

But Huang joined peers taming expectations of strong revenue growth from a wave of interest in cryptocurrencies. Advanced Micro Devices Inc expected this week that there will be some levelling off of cryptocurrency demand.

“Revenue for us in crypto is over $100 million a quarter. For us, it’s a small percentage... It’s obviously not a target market,” Huang said. Cryptocurrencies are digital currencies that use encryption techniques for security and can be traded. Miners use computers to process cryptocurrency transactions, and they are rewarded with additional cryptocurrency.

Output: Jensen Huang, CEO of California-based chip manufacturer Nvidia, has said he expects to see the first fully autonomous cars on the roads in four years, thanks to advances in artificial intelligence (AI). Nvidia has thrived after expanding from designing graphics-processing chips into AI and high-performance computing, with its shares rising 170% during the past year, giving the company a valuation of $116bn. However, Huang played down the importance of cryptocurrency mining, where people use computers to process cryptocurrency transactions and are rewarded with additional cryptocurrency, saying that it is not a market the company is targeting.


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Methane detector chip could significantly reduce emissions
 Artistic rendering depicts the new silicon photonic absorption spectrometer, which is smaller than a dime and can be manufactured using high-volume computer chip fabrication techniques. The portion of infrared light protruding outside the waveguide is absorbed by methane molecules, enabling spectroscopic measurement of the methane concentration. Credit: Joe Green, Beaverworks Canada

The process of extracting natural gas from the earth or transporting it through pipelines can release methane into the atmosphere. Methane, the primary component of natural gas, is a greenhouse gas with a warming potential approximately 25 times larger than carbon dioxide, making it very efficient at trapping atmospheric heat energy. A new chip-based methane spectrometer, that is smaller than a dime, could one day make it easier to monitor for efficiency and leaks over large areas.

Scientists from IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, NY, developed the new methane spectrometer, which is smaller than today's standard spectrometers and more economical to manufacture. In Optica, The Optical Society's journal for high impact research, the researchers detail the new spectrometer and show that it can detect methane in concentrations as low as 100 parts-per-million.

Low maintenance, high impact

The spectrometer is based on silicon photonics technology, which means it is an optical device made of silicon, the material used to make computer chips. Because the same high-volume manufacturing methods used for computer chips can be applied to make the chip-based methane spectrometer, the spectrometer along with a housing and a battery or solar power source might cost as little as a few hundred dollars if produced in large quantities.

"Compared with a cost of tens of thousands of dollars for today's commercially available methane-detecting optical sensors, volume-manufacturing would translate to a significant value proposition for the chip spectrometer," said William Green, leader of the IBM Research team. "Moreover, with no moving parts and no fundamental requirement for precise temperature control, this type of sensor could operate for years with almost no maintenance."

Such low-cost, robust spectrometers could lead to exciting new applications. For example, the IBM team is working with partners in the oil and gas industry on a project that would use the spectrometers to detect methane leaks, saving companies the time and money involved in trying to find and fix leaks using in-person inspection of thousands of sites.

"During natural gas extraction and distribution, methane can leak into the air when equipment on the well malfunctions, valves get stuck, or there's a crack in the pipeline," said Green. "We're developing a way to use this spectrometer-on-a-chip to create a network of sensors that could be distributed over a well pad, for example. Data from these sensors would be processed with IBM's physical analytics software to automatically pinpoint the location of a leak as well as quantify the leak magnitude."

Methane is a trace gas, the classification given to gases that make up less than 1 percent of the volume of Earth's atmosphere. Although the researchers demonstrated methane detection, the same approach could be used for sensing the presence of other individual trace gases. It could also be used to detect multiple gases simultaneously.

"Our long-term vision is to incorporate these types of sensors into the home and things people use every day such as their cell phones or vehicles. They could be useful for detecting pollution, dangerous carbon monoxide levels or other molecules of interest," said Eric Zhang, a member of the research team. "Because this spectrometer offers a platform for multispecies detection, it could also one day be used for health monitoring through breath analysis."

Shrinking the spectrometer

The new device uses an approach known as absorption spectroscopy, which requires laser light at the wavelength uniquely absorbed by the molecule being measured. In a traditional absorption spectroscopy setup, the laser travels through the air, or free-space, until it reaches a detector. Measuring the light that reaches the detector reveals how much light was absorbed by the molecules of interest in the air and can be used to calculate the concentration of them present.

The new system uses a similar approach, but instead of a free-space setup, the laser travels through a narrow silicon waveguide that follows a 10-centimeter-long serpentine pattern on top of a chip measuring 16 square millimeters. Some of the light is trapped inside the waveguide while about 25 percent of the light extends outside of the silicon into the ambient air, where it can interact with trace gas molecules passing nearby the sensor waveguide. The researchers used near infrared laser light (1650 nanometer wavelength) for methane detection.

To increase the sensitivity of the device, the investigators carefully measured and controlled factors that contribute to noise and false absorption signals, fine-tuned the spectrometer's design and determined the waveguide geometrical parameters that would produce favorable results.

Side-by-side comparison

To compare the new spectrometer's performance with that of a standard free-space spectrometer, they placed the devices into an environmental chamber and released controlled concentrations of methane. The researchers found that the chip-based spectrometer provided accuracy on-par with the free-space sensor despite having 75 percent less light interacting with the air compared to the free-space design. Furthermore, the fundamental sensitivity of the chip sensor was quantified by measuring the smallest discernable change in methane concentration, showing performance comparable to free-space spectrometers developed in other laboratories.

"Although silicon photonics systems—especially those that use refractive index changes for sensing—have been explored previously, the innovative part of our work was to use this type of system to detect very weak absorption signals from small concentrations of methane, and our comprehensive analysis of the noise and minimum detection limits of our sensor chip," said Zhang.

The current version of the spectrometer requires light to enter and exit the chip via optical fibers. However, the researchers are working to incorporate the light source and detectors onto the chip, which would create an essentially electrical device with no fiber connections required. Unlike current free-space sensors, the chip then does not require special sample or optical preparation. Next year, they plan to start field testing the spectrometers by placing them into a larger network that includes other off-the-shelf sensors.

"Our work shows that all of the knowledge behind silicon photonics manufacturing, packaging, and component design can be brought into the optical sensor space, to build high-volume manufactured and, in principle, low cost sensors, ultimately enabling an entirely new set of applications for this technology," said Green.

More information: L. Tombez et al, Methane absorption spectroscopy on a silicon photonic chip, Optica (2017). DOI: 10.1364/OPTICA.4.001322 Journal information: Optica

Output: A newly-developed methane spectrometer could help to monitor and prevent leaks of methane from pipelines covering large areas. The device, built by researchers from the IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center in New York, is smaller and more economical than its competitors, and can detect methane in as low a concentration as 100 parts per million. The device is made from silicon, the same material found in computer chips, making it easy and cheap to manufacture. Research leader William Green said the device could operate for years with almost no maintenance.


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Asia-Pacific bond ETFs more popular than equity counterparts
 Factor Investing Strategy Briefing - Thursday 29th June 2023 - The Connaught, Mayfair. Please join us for our annual smart beta and factor investing event, featuring Goldman Sachs Asset Management, FlexShares, First Trust, MSCI and WisdomTree. Please register now if you would like to attend.

ETFGI, an ETF industry consultancy, has reported that fixed income ETFs listed in Asia Pacific (ex-Japan) have proved significantly more popular with investors than equity ETFs during September. ETFs that track bonds have gained $835 million during the month compared to outflows of $1.0 billion seen by equity ETFs listed in the region.

Despite the strong inflows seen during the month, fixed income ETFs have struggled to attract assets in 2017, seeing net outflows of $127m in the year-to-date (YTD), compared to inflows of $2.9bn over the same period last year. Equity ETFs have experienced a similar fate, seeing YTD outflows of $1.6bn compared to outflows of $834m over the same period last year.

In total, ETFs domiciled in Asia Pacific gathered $262m in September. YTD inflows stand at $920m, well shy of the $7.9bn of net new assets gained over the same period in 2016.

Commodity ETFs have fared equally poorly, seeing net outflows of $60m during September. YTD outflows now stand at $398m compared to inflows of $942m seen over the same period last year.

Vanguard was the issuer that gathered the most new assets in the region during the month. The firm added $400m to its locally listedfunds, followed by Samsung AM with $336m and Yuanta with $220m.

YTD flows by issuer tells a similar story with Vanguard collecting $1.8bn, followed by Samsung AM with $1.3bn and Yuanta with $1.2bn.

Output: Exchange-traded funds focusing on fixed-income investments are proving more popular with investors in the Asia-Pacific region than their equity counterparts. Bond ETFs pulled in $835m during September, compared to $1bn leaving the coffers of equity products over the same period, according to figures from consultancy ETFGI. Both categories of funds have seen net outflows for the year to date. Vanguard Group, Samsung AM and Yuanta were the three firms with the greatest inflows during September.