Microsoft said Tuesday its Teams communication app now has over 20 million daily active users, up almost 54% from Microsoft’s prior announcement about usage and still ahead of Slack. In July, Microsoft said Teams had more than 13 million daily active users, more than the 10 million Slack had in the three months that ended on Jan. 31. With 20 million claimed users now, Teams has pulled even farther ahead. In October, Slack said its app had 12 million daily active users. Some people have switched

Amazon on Tuesday announced the $34.99 Fire TV Blaster, a new infrared device that works with an existing Amazon gadgets to give you more ways to control your TV with your voice. With these gadgets, you can say things like “Alexa, play The Americans” and it will start streaming the show. But if you also have an Echo in the house, you can add the new Fire TV Blaster and it will let you control the TV set, cable box, or TV soundbar using voice commands. Basically, all these things working together

Travelport VP: Asia is an area of ‘tremendous growth’ for us1 Hour AgoMing Foong, vice president of strategic business development at Travelport, says the volume of economic growth in Asia “cannot be ignored.”

China has leapfrogged the US on fintech, analyst says1 Hour AgoLucy Gazmararian, senior manager at PwC Hong Kong, discusses payment innovations in China and the United States.

Blockchain may have more potential than cryptocurrencies, tech expert says54 Mins AgoJun Lu, head of the Technology Center at Lufax, discusses the potential of blockchain technology.

14 May 2019, Saxony, Zwickau: Employees at the Volkswagen Sachsen plant in Zwickau assemble Golf model vehicles on a production line. Passenger car registrations in Europe rose 8.6% in October, to their highest level since 2009, driven by robust demand in Germany and France and a rebound in demand for Volkswagen which posted a 29% gain. Registrations rose to 1.214 million cars in the countries of the European Union and the European Free Trade Agreement (EFTA), statistics published by the Europea

The technology industry and policymakers need to address public concerns about artificial intelligence (AI) which are “not the fault of AI” itself, a tech executive said Tuesday. “It is the fault of developers, so we need to solve this problem,” said Song Zhang, managing director for China at global software consultancy, ThoughtWorks. “The first phase is everyone finds it refreshing, they like something new, they want to give it a try,” said Luo. Panelists at the session acknowledged the potenti

Billionaire Richard Branson says raising children is one of the few things tougher but more rewarding than building a business. The Virgin Group founder, father of two and grandparent to five children said in a blog post published on Monday that starting a business was a lot like having a baby. Starting a business with a small team also requires taking on many different job roles, having to “pick up new skills on the fly,” he said. Branson’s son Sam, meanwhile, built his own film production comp

The first A321 LR takes off on its flight test in Hamburg, GermanyDUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Saudi low-cost carrier Flynas announced a firm order to buy 10 Airbus A321XLR jets at the Dubai Air Show Tuesday, bringing a previous order of 80 Airbus planes up to 90. A steep discount off the list price is typically negotiated by airlines. Airbus claims it delivers improved environmental performance, with 20% lower fuel burn per seat and 5,000 tons less carbon dioxide emitted per year. The Saudi bu

Getty ImagesThe U.K.’s opposition Labour party has taken aim at the country’s billionaires, saying that the super-rich and big corporations have bankrolled the ruling Conservative Party in return for tax breaks worth almost £100 billion ($129.6 billion). Releasing a report entitled, “In the pockets of the few,” on Monday night, Labour said its research showed that one-in-three of the U.K.’s billionaires had “bankrolled” Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Conservative Party. “It is also obscene that

Scanning a barcode to make payments in China could soon be a thing of the past, as technology giants such as Tencent are now studying the use of facial and fingerprint recognition for such transactions. Most people in China pay using their mobile phones to scan QR codes — a type of barcode system. They do so via the two most popular mobile payment platforms: Tencent’s WeChat Pay and Alibaba’s payments arm Alipay. “In China, payment methods using QR codes have replaced cash and cards in just five

Wang Xuepu, vice president of Chinese online video streaming company iQiyi told CNBC on Tuesday that artificial intelligence has enhanced the company’s efficiency in all aspects of the business. “Now we can cut thousands of hours of work to just hours,” Wang said in Mandarin at CNBC’s East Tech West conference in the Nansha district of Guangzhou, China. He said that the company is using AI across its business like adding subtitles or integrating multimedia more quickly. Wang added AI has increas

Tiger Qie, VP of Didi Chuxing and CTO of Didi’s Ride sharing Business Group, speaks with CNBC’s Arjun Kharpal onstage at the East Tech West event in, Guangzhou, China. Didi Chuxing, the Chinese ride-hailing company, is set to launch a so-called robo-taxi service in Shanghai “very soon.” “We are going to launch a robo-taxi service in Shanghai very soon,” Tiger Qie, Didi’s vice president and chief technology officer of its ride-sharing unit, said onstage at CNBC’s East Tech West event in Guangzhou

Colonel Alex Vindman, a Ukraine expert at the National Security Council, and Jennifer Williams, a European security expert working for Vice President Mike Pence. Following Vindman and Williams, the former top Russia and Europe expert at the NSC, Tim Morrison, will testify, along with Trump’s former special envoy to Ukraine, Kurt Volker. Morrison, Williams and Vindman were part of the small cadre of White House staffers who listened to Trump’s July 25 phone call with the newly elected Ukrainian p

“Anti-President Trump” sentiment in the U.S. could become a barrier to American investment in space exploration, according to astronaut Al Worden. The U.S. president has openly shared his aspirations for NASA to reach Mars and return to the moon. Right now, we’re on an upswing — President (Donald) Trump has said let’s go back to the moon,” he told CNBC. When JFK was president, he had the support of the country, Congress and everybody, and he could get it done. “Unfortunately, I think there’s a l

Kohl’s earnings and sales for the latest quarter fell short of analysts’ estimates, the company reported on Tuesday. Net income during the period ended Nov. 2 fell to $123 million, or 78 cents per share, compared with $161 million, or 98 cents a share, a year ago. Excluding one-time items, Kohl’s earned 74 cents per share, short of expectations for 86 cents, based on Refinitiv data. Net sales fell to $4.36 billion from $4.37 billion a year ago, missing expectations for $4.4 billion. Sales at Koh

In the not too distant future, polite robots will roam the streets delivering packages and an underground tunnel network will be woven into city planning. That is the vision of Chinese e-commerce giant JD.com, its Head of Research Hui Cheng told a panel at CNBC’s East Tech West conference in the Nansha district of Guangzhou, China on Tuesday. With 51 billion of the world’s 87 billion parcels needing to be shipped in the last year, Hui said JD intends to one day be able to automate the entire del

Home-sharing platform Airbnb needs to “localize” its platform if it is going to be successful in China, according to Tao Peng, president of Airbnb China. “Eastern culture is very different from Western culture,” Peng said Tuesday at CNBC’s East Tech West conference in the Nansha district of Guangzhou, China. In order to convince China’s 1.4 billion people to use its platform, Airbnb is trying to ensure that Airbnb China is built by “Chinese engineers for Chinese people,” Peng told CNBC’s Deirdre

Chinese electric carmaker WM Motor is seeking up to $1 billion in funding within the next six months as it targets one new model a year. WM will be launching its new model, the EX6 SUV, at the Guangzhou Auto Show on Friday. WM Motor’s EX5 electric vehicle on display at the Consumer Electronics Show Asia in Shanghai in June 2019. Autonomous driving a ‘game changer’There were also bullish sounds from fellow Chinese electric vehicle manufacturer Xpeng Motors, particularly on the subject of smart ve

In a decade’s time, there may not be a single bank branch, but that doesn’t mean all your assets are going to managed by robots. “I think the bank’s going to be in the palm of your hand” in 10 years time, said Lucy Gazmararian, associate director, PwC Hong Kong, at CNBC’s East Tech West conference in the Nansha district of Guangzhou, China. To be clear, the shift is firmly underway with many financial institutions long having offered online-only services. But younger generations have grown up wi