Tech Digest daily roundup: Value of Vietnamese EV maker VinFast greater than Ford
Vietnamese electric vehicle (EV) maker VinFast’s stock market valuation has soared above Ford and General Motors (GM) on its first day of trading. Shares in the firm, which has yet to make a profit, closed above $37 (£29) each in their New York’s debut. That gave VinFast a stock market valuation of $85bn, much higher than Ford’s $48bn and GM’s $46bn. It comes as motor industry giants and newer manufacturers fight for a slice of the booming EV market. The listing added around $39bn to the wealth of VinFast’s chairman and founder Pham Nhat Vuong, who was already Vietnam’s richest man. BBC
What just happened? Tesla EVs are expensive, there’s no arguing about that, but the company has now revealed cheaper versions of its Model S and Model X. The caveat is that they both have shorter ranges than the standard base and Plaid options and aren’t as quick. Tesla calls the new variants the Standard Range options, both of which are $10,000 cheaper than their base model counterparts. Tesla’s website lists the Model S Standard Range at $78,490, while the base version is $88,490 and the Tri-Motor Model S Plaid costs $108,490. Techspot
Royal Mail’s electric lorry supplier will move its headquarters to the US under a merger with a New York-listed company after it ran into financial difficulties. Tevva Motors, a taxpayer-backed Essex start-up making electric and hydrogen-powered trucks, is merging with ElectraMeccanica, an electric car maker listed on the Nasdaq. Tevva, founded a decade ago by Asher Bennett, the brother of Israel’s former prime minister Naftali, who is known as the “Elon Musk of Essex”, had let go of staff and been faced with legal demands from suppliers as its cash reserves dwindled. Telegraph
Google is preparing for the “quantum apocalypse”. Experts have warned for years that the development of quantum computers could undermine the encryption that currently secures everything from our private messages to our banking details. Quantum computers are a still largely theoretical technology that proponents claim could dramatically beat the performance of the classical computers we have today. That could be a major positive for applications such as drug research and quantum computing – but could be disastrous for security technology. Independent
According to a survey by the consultancy AWA published this week, the British are more reluctant to go back to the office than workers in almost any other major developed country. Even as bosses plead with them to go back in, the average office worker in this country is only showing up at their office 1.6 days a week, an attendance rate of 32 per cent, compared with 55 per cent in the European Union. Spectator
Social media giant Twitter appeared to apply a five-second delay that would slow access to sites – a process known as throttling – including to the New York Times, Reuters, Instagram and Blue Sky, another social network, the Washington Post reported on Tuesday. The sites with slowed links included competitors to Twitter and news publications that have been on Twitter owner Elon Musk’s bad side due to critical reporting. The Guardian
E-bike and e-scooter owners have been urged to check whether they are using appropriate chargers to power their devices, so as not to risk a potentially catastrophic fire. If they are not compatible with the voltage of the battery, it risks a process called thermal runway – a self-heating chemical reaction that can quickly prove devastating. A survey by charity Electrical Safety First suggests 43% of owners use secondary after-market chargers – and more than one in three of them know it’s not compatible, while one in five don’t know. Sky News
