Chinese smartphone company Honor has released devices that fold up to be nearly as thin as an iPhone.
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BARCELONA — Honor on Sunday pledged $10 billion in artificial intelligence investments over the next five years and announced a deepening partnership with Google, as the Chinese smartphone maker looks to bolster its market share overseas.
The investment plan, revealed at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, is designed to reposition the firm from a smartphone player into an “AI device ecosystem company,” according to Honor.
The Chinese company is somewhat of an upstart in the smartphone world, after spinning off from Huawei in 2020 when the tech giant was hit with U.S. sanctions. Since then, Honor has looked to expand outside of China and push into the higher-end part of the market where Apple and Samsung play.
The company has made some headway by releasing some innovative devices, including foldable phones, but it still remains a small player globally. Its smartphone market share outside of China stood at 2.3% in 2024 versus 1.7% in 2023, according to IDC data.
An Honor spokesperson told CNBC the money would go toward putting AI into hardware as well as next generation AI agents, which are often described as more advanced virtual assistants.
Another part of the investment will go toward creating a “platform for a wide range of AI devices.”
“This is not limited to our own devices, but also AI devices from different partners, so the different kinds of AI devices can talk to each other, and consumers can have more choices and seamless experiences,” the Honor spokesperson said.
A small portion of the investment will also be used to “prepare for the AGI (Artificial General Intelligence) era.”
AGI generally refers to AI that is smarter than humans.
Closer Google ties
On Sunday, Honor demonstrated a proof of concept “AI agent”. One example involved a user asking the agent to book a restaurant with specific requirements, such as the type of preferred cuisine and the distance from the user. The agent went ahead and made a reservation. Honor said it is working with Google and chip designer Qualcomm on developing its AI agent, but did not give a timeline for its release.
Meanwhile, Honor is also using the technology behind Google Gemini, the U.S. firm’s AI system, for the AI features on its latest devices.
Meanwhile on Sunday, Honor announced that it would commit to seven years of employing the Android operating system and security updates for its Magic series of flagship smartphones — becoming just one of very few vendors to pledge this. Google’s own Pixel devices and Samsung’s S series of flagship smartphones are the only other devices to offer similar support.
Android is the operating system created by Google. While the seven year support is not directly related to Google, it highlights Honor’s commitment to the operating system.
While there are many Android smartphone players, not all of them have as close a tie to Google as do Samsung, the biggest Android user in the world, and Xiaomi, the second largest. Honor is now joining that list.
“Honor’s deeper partnership with Google is very significant,” Ben Wood, chief analyst at CCS Insight, told CNBC. “To date, it has felt as though Google was keeping Chinese smartphone makers at arm’s length when it came to the most advanced aspects of Gemini AI, but this appears to put the Honor on par with Samsung Galaxy and Google’s own Pixel products which is quite a coup.”
Amazon announced Monday its millionth worker robot, and said its entire fleet will be powered by a newly launched generative artificial intelligence model. The move comes at a time when more tech companies are cutting jobs and warning of automation.
The million robot milestone — which joins Amazon’s global network of more than 300 facilities — strengthens the company’s position as the world’s largest manufacturer and operator of mobile robotics, Scott Dresser, vice president of Amazon Robotics, said in a press release.
Meanwhile, Dresser said that its new “DeepFleet” AI model will coordinate the movement of its robots within its fulfillment centers, reducing the travel time of the fleet by 10% and enabling faster and more cost-effective package deliveries.
Amazon began deploying robots in its facilities in 2012 to move inventory shelves across warehouse floors, according to Dresser. Since then, their roles in factories have grown tremendously, ranging from those able to lift up to 1,250 pounds of inventory to fully autonomous robots that navigate factories with carts of customer orders.
Meanwhile, AI-powered humanoid robots — designed to mimic human movement and shape — could be deployed this year at factories owned by Tesla.
Job security fears
But although advancements in AI robotics like those working in Amazon facilities come with the promise of productivity gains, they have also raised concerns about mass job loss.
A Pew Research survey published in March found that both AI experts and the general public see factory workers as one of the groups most at risk of losing their jobs because of AI.
That’s a concern Dresser appeared to attempt to address in his statements.
“These robots work alongside our employees, handling heavy lifting and repetitive tasks while creating new opportunities for our front-line operators to develop technical skills,” Dresser said. He added that Amazon’s “next-generation fulfillment center” in Shreveport, Louisiana, which was launched late last year, required 30% more employees in reliability, maintenance and engineering roles.
However, the news of Amazon’s robot expansion came soon after CEO Andy Jassy told CNBC that Amazon’s rapid rollout of generative AI will result in “fewer people doing some of the jobs that the technology actually starts to automate.”
Jassy said that even as AI eliminates jobs in certain areas, Amazon will continue to hire more employees in AI, robotics and elsewhere. But in a memo to employees earlier in June, the CEO had admitted that he expects the company’s workforce to shrink in the coming years in light of technological advancements.
The decline may have already begun. CNBC reported that Amazon cut more than 27,000 jobs in 2022 and 2023, and had continued to make more targeted cuts across business units.
Other big tech CEOs such as Shopify’s CEO Tobi Lutke also recently warned of the impact that AI will have on staffing. That comes as a vast array of firms investing in and adopting AI execute rounds of layoffs.
According to Layoffs.fyi, which tracks technology industry layoffs, 551 companies laid off roughly 153,000 employees last year. And a World Economic Forum report in February found that 48% of U.S. employers plan to reduce their workforce due to AI.
U.S. President Donald Trump (right) and C.C. Wei, chief executive officer of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (left), shake hands during an announcement of an additional $100 billion into TSMC’s U.S. manufacturing at the White House in Washington, DC, U.S., on March 3, 2025.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
The latest version of U.S. President Donald Trump’s “big beautiful bill” could make it cheaper for semiconductor manufacturers to build plants in the U.S. as Washington continues its efforts to strengthen its domestic chip supply chain.
Under the bill, passed by the Senate Tuesday, tax credits for those semiconductor firms would rise to 35% from 25%. That’s more than the 30% increase that had made it into a draft version of the bill.
The new provisions expand on tax incentives under the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act, which provided grants of $39 billion and loans of $75 billion for U.S.-based semiconductor manufacturing projects.
But before the expanded credits come into play, Trump’s sweeping domestic policy package will have to be passed again in the House, which narrowly passed its own version last month. The president has urged lawmakers to get the bill passed by July 4.
Trump versus Biden
Since Trump’s first term, Washington has been trying to onshore more of the advanced semiconductor supply chain from Asia, support its domestic players and limit China’s capabilities.
Although tax provisions in Trump’s sweeping policy bill expand on those in the Biden administration’s CHIPS Act, his overall approach to the semiconductor industry has been different.
Earlier this year, the president even called for a repeal of the CHIPS Act, though Republican lawmakers have been reluctant to act on that front. Still, U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said last month that the administration was renegotiating some of the Biden administration’s grants.
Trump has previously stated that tariffs, as opposed to the CHIPS Act grants, would be the best method of onshoring semiconductor production. The Trump administration is currently conducting an investigation into imports of semiconductor technology, which could result in new duties on the industry.
In recent months, a number of chipmakers with projects in the U.S. have ramped up planned investments there. That includes the world’s largest contract chipmaker, TSMC, as well as American chip companies such as Nvidia, Micron and GlobalFoundries.
According to Daniel Newman, CEO at tech advisory firm Futurum Group, the threat of Trump’s tariffs has created more urgency for semiconductor companies to expand U.S. capacity. If the increased investment tax credits come into law, those onshoring efforts are only expected to accelerate, he told CNBC.
“Given the risk of tariffs, increasing manufacturing in the U.S. remains a key consideration for these large semiconductor companies,” Newman said, adding that the tax credits could be seen as an opportunity to offset certain costs related to U.S.-based projects.
Elon Musk, chief executive officer of Tesla Inc., during a meeting between US President Donald Trump and Cyril Ramaphosa, South Africa’s president, not pictured, in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC, US, on Wednesday, May 21, 2025.
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Tesla shares have dropped 7% from Friday’s closing price of $323.63to the $300.71 close on Tuesday ahead of the company’s second-quarter deliveries report.
Wall Street analysts are expecting Tesla to report deliveries of around 387,000 — a 13% decline compared to deliveries of nearly 444,000 a year ago, according to a consensus compiled by FactSet. Prediction market Kalshi told CNBC on Tuesday that its traders forecast deliveries of around 364,000.
Shares in the electric vehicle maker had been rising after Tesla started a limited robotaxi service in Austin, Texas, in late June and CEO Elon Musk boasted of its first “driverless delivery” of a car to a customer there.
The stock price took a turn after Musk on Saturday reignited a feud with President Donald Trump over the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, the massive spending bill that the commander-in-chief endorsed. The bill is now heading for a final vote in the House.
That legislation would benefit higher-income households in the U.S. while slashing spending on programs such as Medicaid and food assistance.
Musk did not object to cuts to those specific programs. However, Musk on X said the bill would worsen the U.S. deficit and raise the debt ceiling. The bill includes tax cuts that would add around $3 trillion to the national debt over the next decade, according to an analysis by the Congressional Budget Office.
The Tesla CEO has also criticized aspects of the bill that would cut hundreds of billions of dollars in support for renewable energy development in the U.S. and phase out tax credits for electric vehicles.
Such changes could hurt Tesla as they are expected to lower EV sales by roughly 100,000 vehicles per year by 2035, according to think tank Energy Innovation.
The bill is also expected to reduce renewable energy development by more than 350 cumulative gigawatts in that same time period, according to Energy Innovation. That could pressure Tesla’s Energy division, which sells solar and battery energy storage systems to utilities and other clean energy project developers.
Trump told reporters at the White House on Tuesday that Musk was, “upset that he’s losing his EV mandate,” but that the tech CEO could “lose a lot more than that.” Trump was alluding to the subsidies, incentives and contracts that Musk’s many businesses have relied on.
SpaceX has received over $22 billion from work with the federal government since 2008, according to FedScout, which does federal spending and government contract research. That includes contracts from NASA, the U.S. Air Force and Space Force, among others.
Tesla has reported $11.8 billion in sales of “automotive regulatory credits,” or environmental credits, since 2015, according to an evaluation of the EV maker’s financial filings by Geoff Orazem, CEO of FedScout.
These incentives are largely derived from federal and state regulations in the U.S. that require automakers to sell some number of low-emission vehicles or buy credits from companies like Tesla, which often have an excess.
Regulatory credit sales go straight to Tesla’s bottom line. Credit revenue amounted to approximately 60% of Tesla’s net income in the second quarter of 2024.