A MERVolicious Lithium battery charger and tester with micro USB. 8$ in parts [EXPAND]

https://imgur.com/a/8Y2ePn1via/r/ DIY https://www.reddit.com/r/DIY/comments/8uvipq/18650_lithium_battery_charger_and_tester_with/?utm_source=ifttt#diy

My occasional ROBOT REVOLUTION WARNING!

The robots are here and one company, Starship Technologies, has raised $25 million to bring even more to the mainstream. This latest round of funding includes a follow-on investment from Matrix Partners and Morpheus Ventures. New investors include Airbnb co-founder Nathan Blecharczyk, Skype founding engineer Jaan Tallinn and others.

These autonomous robots can carry items, like groceries or packages, within a two-mile radius. The plan with the funding is to deploy Starship robots in neighborhoods, corporate and university campuses in both the U.S. and Europe.

Starship has also brought on former Airbnb business development lead Lex Bayer as chief executive officer.

“We are at the point where we are ready to start deploying our network of robots at scale,” Starship co-founder Janus Friis said in a statement. “This additional funding, and Lex’s appointment, will allow us to bring our services to market. Lex joins us with a proven track record of growing businesses that change the way we live for the better.”

But Starship is by no means the only company operating in this space. There’s Boxbot, a startup that recently received a permit to test autonomous vehicles with a safety driver, and Nuro.

The race to build autonomous delivery robots rolls on

Starship has previously partnered with on-demand food delivery companies like DoorDash and Postmates to test out its robot delivery service. Last January, Starship partnered with the aforementioned companies for a pilot program in Redwood City, Calif. and Washington, D.C. To date, Starship robots have traveled more than 100,000 miles in 20 countries, across 100 cities.

Prior to this round, Starship raised $17.2 million in a seed round led by Mercedes-Benz Vans with participation from Shasta Ventures, Matrix Partners, ZX Venturers, Morpheus Ventures and others.

My occasional ROBOT REVOLUTION WARNING!

The transformations that companies like Tesla, Uber and Lyft bring to the auto industry are changing more than just the ways car companies think about drivetrains and ownership, and its opening doors for new ways of thinking about the entire mobility industry.

That’s the word from some of Israel’s top investors from the stage at our TechCrunch Tel Aviv event.

Every aspect of the auto industry is being reshaped by technological innovation and it’s opening the traditionally closed supply chains that car makers have relied on for at least a century creating more opportunities for startup vendors in areas like sensors, software, services, and yes, even electrification.

For Michael Granoff, the founder of Maniv Mobility, Chemi Peres, the founder of PItango, and Yahal Zilka, the co-founder of Magma Venture Partners, there are at least four areas of opportunity for startups (especially startups hailing from Israel’s innovation nation) to penetrate the trillion dollar mobility market.

Artificial intelligence, new business models, electrification, and enabling sensor technologies are all areas where Israeli entrepreneurs have launched businesses, and they’re all technologies in high demand from established automakers and the upstarts that would challenge them.

“It’s not just automotive, but what Israel can bring to that,” says Zilka. “The big thing in automotive was the introduction of semiconductors. Over the next 15 to 20 years it’s going to be artificial intelligence.”

How those technologies come to market for mobility used to depend on an established supply chain, where tier 2 technology vendors would sell to tier 1 suppliers and then be integrated into the cars by the big brand original equipment manufacturers like Ford, GM, BMW, Daimler, Toyota, and the like.

Tesla’s entrance into the market and the competitive threats that Uber, Lyft, Gett and others pose to the entire automotive business model have pushed these companies to shake things up, making investments in technology for the automotive industry far more attractive.

“Only when your business is effected by the digital wave of internet and connectivity, only then do you start moving,” says Peres.

For Israel, that means a window has opened for enabling technologies like sensors, artificial intelligence, data processing, and new business models.

These new companies with names like Autofleet, otonomo, Innoviz Technologies, Oryx Vision, and Via are already establishing themselves as competitors or suppliers helping to transform the existing order. 

For Peres and the other investors, automakers should expect to see even more radical changes ahead as technologies push further transformations to industrial infrastructure, the urban environment and consumer demand.

“The old generation was that you create a production facility… [and] you create masses of products, but it’s going to be completely disrupted,” says Peres. “You’re going to have much less cars and cars are going to be much more sophisticated in their services.”

Cars, Peres says, are moving to the elevator pitch — where vehicles on streets are used like elevators in buildings. “It will eliminate ownership, reduce operational costs, reduce energy costs, and will be able to get a great service and save the over 1 million people that are killed every year and the 50 million people that are injured,” Peres says.

Those changes will impact more than just the auto industry. Manufacturing will be disrupted by additive manufacturing technologies, and, eventually, advancements in nanotechnology that will allow for self-assembling machines.

Eventually, these changes are going to force more action from regulators as they grapple with how to address the increasing demand that will come with cost depreciation, according to Granoff. 

“There’s going to be a pricing mechanism that is going to be required to modulate the use of roadways,” he says. 

For Peres, the future may not be the use of roadways at all. “It doesn’t need to be cars on roads. It can be flying robots,” says the Pitango co-founder.

No matter what the ultimate solution is, given the Israeli entrepreneurial ecosystem, it’s a good bet that at some level there’ll be Israeli technology behind the wheel of each innovation.

 

What animal’s skull is this? [ENLARGE]

https://i.redd.it/rayzu1yhw7211.jpg via/r/whatisthisthing https://www.reddit.com/r/whatisthisthing/comments/8osqca/what_animals_skull_is_this/?utm_source=ifttt #oddities #weird

Strange heavy metallic disks. Found with a medal for participation in WWI. Both have a smooth greenish side (aside for the "craters") and a rough black side. They weigh 75g (2,64oz) and 95g (3,34oz). [ENLARGE]

https://i.redd.it/gocj9fuyo7211.jpg via/r/whatisthisthing https://www.reddit.com/r/whatisthisthing/comments/8osg2u/strange_heavy_metallic_disks_my_grandfather_put/?utm_source=ifttt #oddities #weird

Handmade Derby boots. Second pair done by myself. Welt construction. [EXPAND]

https://imgur.com/a/9zzv0bYvia/r/ DIY https://www.reddit.com/r/DIY/comments/8os8zu/handmade_derby_boots_second_pair_done_by_myself/?utm_source=ifttt#diy

Pulled this out of my teeth after taking a bite of steak. It feels like a tough worm. Looks like a root. It is hollow, and very stretchy. Its about an inch long. [ENLARGE]

https://i.redd.it/l3c0q8ivx6211.jpg via/r/whatisthisthing https://www.reddit.com/r/whatisthisthing/comments/8or548/pulled_this_out_of_my_teeth_after_taking_a_bite/?utm_source=ifttt #oddities #weird

Mystery glyphs on the pier. Arrow roughly pointing east. [ENLARGE]

https://i.redd.it/bvf789sr07211.jpg via/r/whatisthisthing https://www.reddit.com/r/whatisthisthing/comments/8or9pr/mystery_glyphs_on_the_pier_arrow_roughly_pointing/?utm_source=ifttt #oddities #weird

Homemade pedal board and carrying case from an old Peavey Rage 158 amp! [EXPAND]

https://imgur.com/gallery/yfMsTquvia/r/ DIY https://www.reddit.com/r/DIY/comments/8orrm5/i_made_a_guitar_pedal_board_and_carrying_case/?utm_source=ifttt#diy

Wooden, Leather and Lead, hand-made dumbbells. [EXPAND]

https://imgur.com/a/NnLd5Gpvia/r/ DIY https://www.reddit.com/r/DIY/comments/8orn97/wooden_leather_and_lead_handmade_dumbbells_did_it/?utm_source=ifttt#diy

My friend's kitchen has very little countertop space, so I made him some stow away countertop sections with an Inlaid Epoxy and Weathered Compass design on top. [EXPAND]

https://imgur.com/gallery/uYeV6G9via/r/ DIY https://www.reddit.com/r/DIY/comments/8oriav/my_friends_kitchen_has_very_little_countertop/?utm_source=ifttt#diy

What is this playground? [ENLARGE]

https://imgur.com/0bVA5Ya via/r/whatisthisthing https://www.reddit.com/r/whatisthisthing/comments/8oqte7/what_is_this_playground/?utm_source=ifttt #oddities #weird