The world’s top EV battery maker pulled off 2025’s biggest IPO. Here’s what to know

20 May 2025 at 05:00

China’s CATL, the world’s biggest electric battery maker, starts trading in Hong Kong this week, after a $4.6 billion IPO, the biggest so far this year. CATL has about 38%...

A launch event for the CATL Bedrock chassis in Shanghai, China, Dec. 24, 2024.

AI scam factories force trafficked workers to defraud global victims

Rest of World

By: Linda Yulisman

20 May 2025 at 05:00

Young Indonesians are increasingly falling for fraudulent job ads on Telegram, Facebook, and other social media and getting trafficked to scam farms in Southeast Asia, former scammers and cybersecurity experts...

Homegrown digital road maps turn into lifelines for West Bank’s Palestinians

Rest of World

By: Reem Abd ulhamid

19 May 2025 at 05:00

For Palestinians living in the West Bank, stepping onto the roads of the territory occupied by Israel is a daily journey of resilience. With movement shackled by a complex web...

NORTHERN WEST BANK, PALESTINE - 2023/03/27: Heavy traffic congestion at an Israeli military checkpoint in the occupied West Bank. The Israeli army forces set many roadblocks in the northern West Bank to search cars and check the identities of tourists in search of Palestinian gunmen who opened fire at Israeli soldiers. (Photo by Nasser Ishtayeh/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)

Why AI advancement doesn’t have to come at the expense of marginalized workers

Rest of World

By: Michelle Kim

19 May 2025 at 05:00

In her new book, Empire of AI: Dreams and nightmares in Sam Altman’s OpenAI, Karen Hao writes about the Silicon Valley firms competing to be the first to reach artificial...

AUSTIN, TX - MARCH 5: Content moderators work at a Facebook office in Austin, Texas. (Photo by Ilana Panich-Linsman for The Washington Post via Getty Images)

How Trump’s Gulf trip turned oil kingdoms into tech superpowers

Rest of World

By: Indranil Ghosh

15 May 2025 at 12:31

U.S. President Donald Trump wrapped up the first major overseas trip of his second term with a four-day blitz through Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates that delivered...

Chinese startups once downplayed their origin. Now some celebrate it.

Rest of World

By: Kinling Lo

15 May 2025 at 05:00

As Jessy Wu prepared to launch her Beijing-based artificial intelligence startup overseas last year, she grappled with a question familiar to many Chinese tech founders: Should her company hide its...

Robot chefs take over at South Korea’s highway restaurants, to mixed reviews

Rest of World

By: Michelle Kim

14 May 2025 at 05:00

On sweltering summer days, chef Park Jeong-eun would cook makguksu, an earthy Korean dish made with buckwheat noodles steeped in a tangy, ice-cold broth, topped with spicy gochujang paste. Truck...

Why Apple can’t just quit China

Rest of World

By: Viola Zhou

13 May 2025 at 05:00

Patrick McGee’s new book, Apple in China: The Capture of the World’s Greatest Company, is out this week, just as the U.S. and China agreed to lower tariff levels for...

People are seen in the flagship Apple Store in Beijing, China, April 2025.

How UAE is shifting gears to lead Middle East’s EV revolution

Rest of World

By: Paromita Dey

12 May 2025 at 05:00

Once a land of gas-guzzling super-cars, the United Arab Emirates is rapidly emerging as the Middle East’s unexpected electric vehicle leader, signaling global energy transition has reached the heartlands of...

A Tesla Inc. electric vehicle drives past residential and commercial skyscrapers in the Dubai Marina district of Dubai, United Arab Emirates, on Friday, Aug. 25, 2023. Chinese investors are gradually returning to Dubai's real estate market, joining Russian and other international buyers who have already pushed property prices in the emirate to record levels. Photographer: Christopher Pike/Bloomberg via Getty Images

How do you compete with Chinese e-commerce giants? A Vietnamese company is deploying housewives

Rest of World

By: Lam Le

9 May 2025 at 05:00

Vietnam’s e-commerce platform Sendo, once seen as a homegrown rival to deep-pocketed foreign competitors, shut down its core marketplace on April 15. While Sendo’s closure stemmed from the dominance of...

Nguyen Lan Huong, 30, receives groceries from a Sendo Farm motorbike delivery rider on May 3, 2025, in Hanoi, Vietnam. (Linh Pham for Rest of World)

The trade war is delaying the future of humanoid robot workers

Rest of World

By: Kinling Lo

8 May 2025 at 05:00

As viral clips of robots doing flips, kung-fu, and running a marathon rack up views online, U.S. and Chinese firms are locked in a more high-stakes race: deploying humanoid robots...

An employee works on a desk near displays of humanoid robot parts, at the office of developer Ex-Robots in Dalian, Liaoning province, China June 6, 2024. REUTERS/Florence Lo

Will India’s new satellite internet rules impact Starlink’s ambitions? We asked five experts

Rest of World

By: Ananya Bhattacharya

7 May 2025 at 07:03

India has just made it harder for Starlink to enter the market. Around two months after Starlink announced retail partnerships with the country’s leading telecom operators, India — home to...

What Meta’s dispute in Nigeria means for its millions of users

Rest of World

By: Damilare Dosunmu

7 May 2025 at 03:23

Meta is in trouble in Nigeria. Local authorities have fined Meta $290 million for regulatory breaches, prompting the social media giant to threaten pulling Facebook and Instagram from the country....

Who is Bhavish Aggarwal, the Indian EV founder compared to Elon Musk?

Rest of World

By: Rest of World

6 May 2025 at 11:44

This article is adapted from Rest of World’s recent feature: Inside the spectacular rise and crash of India’s largest EV company Bhavish Aggarwal is the CEO of Ola Electric, India’s...

Bhavish Aggarwal at Ola Campus in Bengaluru, India, 2022.

Argentina hopes to attract Big Tech with nuclear-powered AI data centers

Rest of World

By: Catherine Cartier and Facundo Iglesia

6 May 2025 at 05:00

Argentine President Javier Milei has an ambitious plan to transform Argentina into a global hub for nuclear energy. Nuclear energy, in turn, is the key to his goal of making...

Argentinian President Javier Milei at a conference in Maryland, USA in Febraury 2025.

How China is gaining ground in the Middle East cloud computing race

Rest of World

By: Andrea Benito

5 May 2025 at 05:00

Chinese cloud companies are quietly gaining momentum in the battle with their U.S. counterparts for the Middle East’s digital infrastructure. Amazon, Microsoft, Google, and Oracle spent years building regional tech...

The Indian company forcing Uber to change its business model

Rest of World

By: Indulekha Aravind

2 May 2025 at 05:00

A 3-year-old homegrown startup has upended India’s ride-hailing sector. Namma Yatri, launched in 2022 as an auto-rickshaw aggregator, has changed how drivers earn from ride-hailing platforms. The app, developed in...

Brazil is going after social media sites to keep its kids safe

Rest of World

By: Pedro Nakamura

30 April 2025 at 05:00

The hum of midday traffic in Santa Rita do Sapucaí, Brazil, was a familiar soundtrack to Guilherme’s hustle. Fourteen, slight, and armed with a plastic box of colorful candies —...

An influencer on his phone in the room he shares with his cousin.

Inside the spectacular rise and crash of India’s largest EV company

Rest of World

By: Atul Dev

30 April 2025 at 05:00

One evening last September, Pitambar Panda, a 24-year-old product designer in the Indian city of Pune, mounted his pearly white electric Ola scooter. He accelerated noiselessly through the city’s busy...

China’s chipmakers are catching up to Nvidia and TSMC. Here’s how they compare

Rest of World

By: Kinling Lo

28 April 2025 at 05:00

Washington’s latest export restrictions on Nvidia’s H20 chips are likely to accelerate China’s shift toward domestic alternatives, as homegrown firms strive to close the gap with global rivals. Years of...

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