Plus: Australia plans to require data centers to underwrite their electricity and water supplies. And a group of Meta employees is suing the social-media company, accusing it of using AI to conduct discriminatory layoffs. Pierre Bienaimé hosts.
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[00:00:00] Deloitte expects the space economy to reach $2 trillion by 2035. Jason Garzadas, CEO of Deloitte U.S., says that growth is fueled by data and its application for businesses across industries. What's exciting is that the data and the analytic and the commercial application of the data will move to be more mainstream. It will be something that organizations of any size can benefit from the data that's being emitted from space that could be pertinent to their operation. Visit Deloitte.com to learn how the space economy is creating new opportunities.
[00:00:32] Here's your afternoon TNB Tech Minute for Wednesday, July 15th. I'm Pierre Bien-Aimé for The Wall Street Journal. SpaceX shares traded below their IPO price of $135 for the first time today in a sign of waning enthusiasm for the biggest listing of all time. Shares slipped more than 2.5% to roughly $132 in trading before rebounding slightly. The rocket maker is listed on the tech-heavy Nasdaq. Shares of tech companies have been volatile in the past month.
[00:01:00] Investors will be watching the next test flight of SpaceX's Starship rocket, a mission the company may launch tomorrow evening. SpaceX has been pouring money into the vehicle, which is key for its AI and satellite communications plans. Australia plans to require data centers to underwrite their electricity and water supplies. The country's Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, said today the government will soon introduce a set of standards for AI providers.
[00:01:25] The new standards will set out rules for large data centers, including a legal obligation to source their own new power supply, pay their full share of connection costs so consumers' energy bills aren't affected, reduce power when needed to strengthen the power grid, and be as water efficient as possible. Albanese said the government will establish an office of AI to accelerate implementation of the industry standards on a national level. The national cabinet will discuss the new standards in August, and legislation is expected early next year.
[00:01:55] And a group of Meta employees is suing the social media company over how it carried out layoffs this spring, alleging that it used AI that disproportionately cut workers with disabilities or on protected leave. The federal lawsuit was filed this week in the Northern District of California. It's one of the first in the US to scrutinize the potential role of AI in determining layoffs. Meta began laying off 8,000 employees, or roughly 10% of its workforce, in May.
[00:02:22] A company spokesman rejected the allegations and said workforce management decisions were made by people, not AI. And that's it for your TNB Tech Minutes. We'll have another quick tech update in the morning. Meditieren, yoga, joggen, nichts entspannt mich. Echt? Mich entspannt meine Steuer total. Steuer? Wie Finanzamt? Die Steuererklärung? Ja, ich hab ganz locker über 1,000 Euro zurückbekommen. Hast du geheime Connections oder Excel-Superkräfte? Nö, nur die Wieso-Steuer-App. Wow, und das ist einfach?
[00:02:51] Klar, die macht fast alles automatisch. Ich fühl mich plötzlich so. Entspannt. Hol dir dein Geld zurück. Abgabefrist 31. Juli. Was? Schaffst du ganz entspannt mit Wieso-Steuer? Ach, ach ja.