Lab Weekly - 03/01/2024
AI’s Busy February; Plus, the latest news about New Gen-AI Video tool, Samsung’s new smart ring, and more
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AI Is Ready to Transform Customer Service
February has been a busy month in the ongoing AI arms race. From the controversial, headline-grabbing releases of Google Gemini and OpenAI’s text-to-video tool Sora, to the brewing AI chips showdown between Groq and Nvidia, to Microsoft’s latest $16 million investment in French AI startup Mistral, there have been a whole lot of big AI development to keep up with. For consumer-facing brands, however, the deployment of generative AI in supplementing customer service has garnered significant traction, thanks to two companies’ success stories, that warrants a closer look.
In case you missed it…
Electrifying Rides & Robotaxi Growing Pains: Key 2024 Mobility Trends
The growth of EV sales is slowing down in the U.S., with some automakers blaming weak demand and slashing production, whereas the rollout of self-driving cars in the forms of robotaxi services has been fraught with tensions and setbacks, as public backlash over safety and ethical concerns continues to pose significant hurdles to widespread adoption. Yet, there is hope on the horizon.
What Marketers Should Know About Apple Vision Pro At Launch
Nearly a week post-Vision Pro launch, much ink has been spilled over speculating on how Vision Pro might shift the paradigm of personal computing, entertainment, and digital interaction. Based on this initial wave of reactions and hot takes, some key aspects about this much-anticipated headset are becoming a bit more defined. By extension, its long-term impact on the media landscape is also starting to take shape.
What Arc Search Tells Us about the Future of AI Search
In this week’s Lab Original article, we explore the shift in online search towards AI, focusing on the latest examples of Arc Search and Perplexity, both of which offer summary-based search experiences. Innovations in AI-led search challenge traditional search engines and could disrupt digital media's revenue models, causing new headaches for brand advertisers. Still, AI search would need to close the consumer trust gap first.
Lightricks Debuts AI Storyboarding Tool “LTX Studio” [TechCrunch]
Lightricks, known for popular apps like Facetune and Videoleap, unveiled LTX Studio, an AI-powered storyboarding tool that allow creators to generate short video clips to help them visualize their ideas. This web-based platform, currently open for waitlist sign-ups, will be made freely available to all next month. It also features a shot editor for detailed scene edits and a character tab for character customization, ensuring consistency throughout the story.
For brands looking to utilize gen AI in their creative process, tools like LTX Studio and OpenAI’s Sora offer a cost-effective way to visualize ideas and evaluate various executions. In today’s digital landscape where trends and consumer preferences shift rapidly, the ability to quickly produce and modify creative concepts would no doubt be helpful. However, human oversight is obviously still very much needed to ensure the integrity of AI’s creative output.
Related: Inkitt, the self-publishing platform using AI to develop bestsellers, nabs $37 million in funding [TechCrunch]; IPG forges first-to-market partnership with Adobe to revolutionize content creation for brands and marketers [Yahoo Finance]; Adobe reveals Generative AI tool for music [TechCrunch]
Samsung Unveils The “Galaxy Ring” [Engadget]
The annual Mobile World Congress (MWC) event has been underway in Barcelona, and Samsung has unveiled the Galaxy Ring, designed to “enhance everyday wellness.” Currently, the Oura ring has cornered the still-niche market of smart rings that feature a suite of sensors to monitor various health metrics. The Galaxy Ring, however, does benefit from being part of the Samsung Health ecosystem for more cross-device tracking and integration with other Samsung devices and, perhaps down the road, its smart home appliances.
It is worth noting here that Apple reportedly had considered making a smart ring too, but ultimately passed on the project to focus on the Vision Pro headset. And given that leaked patents have historically rarely resulted in a brand new product from the highly secretive iPhone maker, it seems highly unlikely that this new smart ring from Samsung would spur Apple to reconsider. Still, more form factor diversity in the wearable market is certainly welcomed to keep things interesting,
Related: Google Wear OS is revamping notifications to improve battery life [The Verge]; This ring lets you whisper to your phone [Engadget]; Top tech from MWC 2024 [Digital Trends]
Apple Wisely Drops Car Project [Mobile Tech Journal]
In retrospect, perhaps we should’ve seen this one coming. Last week, Bloomberg reportedly that Apple’s long-winded car project has been pushed off to 2028. Now it looks like the project has been put on ice indefinitely. The New York Times reports that “internal disagreements over the direction of the Apple car” was what led Apple’s effort to sputter for years before it was shut down this week.
While we may be disappointed about Apple’s unrealized impact on the future of mobility, scrapping its stalled car project for now would actually help mitigate some auto OEMs’ current aversion towards Apple CarPlay. In other words, without the looming threat of Apple entering the car market as a direct competitor, these OEMs might be more open to integrating CarPlay, thereby expanding Apple's ecosystem into more vehicles.
Related: Apple's scrapped car project means AI and headset bets are more urgent [Bloomberg]; Huawei spin-off Honor shows off tech to control a car with your eyes and chatbot based on Meta's AI [CNBC]
Situational Awareness:
FuboTV sues Disney, Fox, Warner Bros. over sports joint venture [CNBC]
These days, why bother filing an antitrust lawsuit if not partly out of self-interest? Good luck, FuboTV! Most sports fans will likely misunderstand your intentions and hate you for it. But, the real ones know that you’re doing your part to keep the sports bundle cheap (and fragmented).
Tinder Owner Match Group signs ChatGPT deal [Gizmodo]
The dating app giant says its long-term plan is to squeeze artificial intelligence into “literally everything” in its apps. But jokes on them — Gen Z is already ditching algorithmic dating apps anyway.
Humane pushes AI Pin ship date to mid-April [TechCrunch]
Just in time for warmer weather in the northern hemisphere when fewer people will be wearing coats or jackets with lapels to pin this chunky AI pin on!
China’s next cultural export could be TikTok-style short soap operas [MIT Review]
And here I thought TikTok was trying to become more like YouTube by embracing longer videos and even horizontal videos. Guess it’s time to resurrect As the World Turns in the style of a Quibi show!
U.S. viewers spent more hours watching TV in January than any month since the covid lockdown, according to new data from Nielsen, Bloomberg reports. Streaming’s share of TV viewing climbed more than three percent from a year ago. Almost all of that came out of cable. YouTube and Netflix have increased their shares; they combined to account for almost 17% of all TV viewing. Meanwhile, Amazon, Hulu and Disney+ all lost share YoY.
Threads, Meta’s X (fka. Twitter) competitor, now consistently sees more daily downloads than X and appears to be widening that gap, TechCrunch reports, citing Appfigures data. For example, on February 25, Threads saw 486,803 installs on Google Play and 342,228 on iOS. X, by comparison, saw 225,408 Google Play downloads and 112,625 on iOS. That’s nearly triple the downloads on iOS for Threads and more than double the downloads on Google Play.
Gen Alpha, born between 2010 and 2024, is more brand-aware than ever, but they have few dedicated spaces or brands targeting their specific needs. Mature brands are ready to welcome these young shoppers – and for good reason. As an estimated 2.5 million Gen Alphas are born weekly, the demographic's economic footprint is expected to reach $5.46 trillion by 2029 – almost as much as the spending power of millennials and Gen Z combined, BBC reports.
If you find our insights valuable and would like to have a deeper conversation on technology and media innovations, or need to sound smarter in a client meeting or a pitch, please feel free to reach out to Chelsea Freitas, our VP of Strategy, at chelsea@ipglab.com.
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