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Google and Ford today announced a new partnership around bringing Android Automotive to Ford’s Ford- and Lincoln-branded cars, starting in 2023. But at the same time, the two companies also announced that Ford has chosen Google Cloud as its preferred cloud provider.

“With Google Cloud, Ford will digitally transform from the front office to the car to the manufacturing plant floor,” Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian said in a press conference today. “And there are a number of different applications, including modernizing product development, improving manufacturing and supply chain management, using computer vision AI for employee training, inspection of equipment on the assembly line and other applications.”

Kurian also noted that Google and Ford are working to find new ways to monetize Ford’s data through features like maintenance requests and trade-in alerts.

“At Ford, we’ve got world-class in-house data insights and analytics teams,”  David McClelland, Ford’s VP for strategy and partnerships, said. “We’ve recruited significant software expertise and we’re making great progress in this area. And we’re moving rapidly towards commercializing our new self-driving business. And with this news that Thomas [Kurian] and I are announcing today, we’re turbocharging all of that.”

McClelland stressed that Google “brought the entire company to the table for us across cloud, Android, Maps and much more.” It’s maybe also no surprise, given Google’s expertise in this area, that for is looking to leverage Google Cloud’s AI tools as well. This work will go beyond the actual driving experience, too, and include work on modernizing Ford’s product development, manufacturing and supply chain, as well as predictive maintenance in Ford’s plants.

Like other car manufacturers, Ford is also looking to find ways to use the data it collects to create a connection to its drivers that goes beyond the buying experience and (maybe) the occasional maintenance visit to a dealership. For this to work, it needs to be able to understand its customers and offer personalized experiences.

Today’s announcement marks a bit of a turnaround for Ford, which had previously banded together with a group of other car manufacturers with the explicit goal of keeping Google’s role in the automotive industry to a minimum. Now, only a few years later, the two are coming together in one of the deeper partnerships in the industry.

It’s also worth mentioning, that not too long ago, Ford had a deep partnership with Microsoft, which provided the basis of Ford’s Sync technology.

“From the first moving assembly line to the latest driver-assist technology, Ford has set the pace of innovation for the automotive industry for nearly 120 years,” said Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google and Alphabet. “We’re proud to partner to apply the best of Google’s AI, data analytics, compute and cloud
platforms to help transform Ford’s business and build automotive technologies that keep people safe and connected on the road.”

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Source: https://techcrunch.com/2021/02/01/ford-bets-on-google-cloud-for-its-digital-transformation/

Apple has introduced an iCloud Passwords Chrome extension that will make life easier for those who use both Windows computers and other Apple devices, like a Macbook or an iPhone. The new browser extension lets you access the passwords you saved in Safari on your other Apple devices, then use them within Chrome when you’re on a Windows PC.

You can also save any new passwords you create in Chrome to your iCloud keychain, so it’s synced across your Apple devices.

Image Credits: Apple

Apple didn’t formally announce the new feature, but reports of an iCloud Passwords extension had already been referenced in the release notes of the new iCloud for Windows 10 (ver 12), which arrived at the end of January. After the update, a “Passwords” section appeared in the app designated by the iCloud Keychain logo. This directed users to download the new extension, but the link was broken, as the extension was not yet live.

That changed on Sunday, according a report from 9to5Google, which found the new Chrome add-on had been published to the Chrome Web Store late on Sunday evening. Now, when Windows users access the new Passwords section, the dialog box that prompts the download will properly function.

Once installed, Chrome users on Windows will be able to access any passwords they saved or allowed iCloud Keychain to securely generate for them within Safari for macOS or iOS. Meanwhile, as Windows users create new credentials, these, too, will be synced to their iCloud Keychain so they can later be pulled up on Mac, iPhone, and iPad devices, when needed.

This is the first Chrome extension to support iCloud Keychain on Windows, as before Apple had only offered an iCloud Bookmarks tool for older Windows 7 and 8 PCs, which reached over 7 million users.

Image Credits: Apple

Some users who have tried the extension are reporting problems, but it seems that’s related to their PCs not having been first updated to iCloud for Windows 12.0, which is a prerequisite for the new extension to work.

Though Apple typically locks users into its own platforms, it has slowly expanded some of its services to Windows and even Android, where it makes sense. Today, Apple offers its entertainment apps like Apple Music and Apple TV on other platforms, including Android, and has launched Apple TV on its media player rival, Amazon Fire TV, among others. And 9to5Mac notes that Apple appears to be working to bring Music and Podcasts to the Microsoft Store in the future, as well.

Source: https://techcrunch.com/2021/02/01/apple-launches-an-icloud-passwords-extension-for-chrome-users-on-windows/

New transparency figures released by Amazon show the company responded to a record number of government data demands in the last six months of 2020.

The new figures land in the company’s bi-annual transparency report published to Amazon’s website over the weekend.

Amazon said it processed 27,664 government demands for user data in the last six months of 2020, up from 3,222 data demands in the first six months of the year, an increase of close to 800%. That user data includes shopping searches and data from its Echo, Fire, and Ring devices.

The new report presents the data differently from previous transparency disclosures. Amazon now breaks down the top requesting countries. U.S. authorities historically made up the bulk of the overall data demands Amazon receives, but this latest report shows Germany with 42% of all requests, followed by Spain with 18%, and Italy and the U.S. with 11% share each.

But the report also removes the breakdown by legal process, and now only differentiates between the requests it gets for user’s content and for non-content. Amazon said it handed over user content data in 52 cases.

For its Amazon Web Services cloud business, which it reports separately, Amazon said it processed 523 data demands, with 75% of all requests made by U.S. authorities, and Amazon turned over user’s content in 15 cases.

An Amazon spokesperson would not say what led to the sharp rise in data demands. (Amazon seldom comments on its transparency reports.)

Amazon’s transparency report is one of the lightest reads of all the tech giants at just three pages in length, and spends most of the report explaining how it responds to each legal demand than on the data itself. The company, known for its notorious secrecy, became the last of the major tech giants to push out a transparency report in 2015. Where most tech companies added data to their transparency reports, like takedown notices and account removals, Amazon bucked the trend by removing data from its reports, despite the company’s growing reach into millions of homes.

The Financial Times reported this weekend that Ring, the video doorbell and home security startup acquired by Amazon for $1 billion, now has 2,000 law enforcement partners across the United States, allowing police departments to access homeowners’ doorbell camera footage.

Source: https://techcrunch.com/2021/02/01/amazon-government-demands-spiked/

Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines.

This is Equity Monday, our weekly kickoff that tracks the latest private market news, talks about the coming week, digs into some recent funding rounds and mulls over a larger theme or narrative from the private markets. You can follow the show on Twitter here and myself here — and make sure to check out last week’s main episode and companion chat about Robinhood.

This morning we ran into quite a lot of the same material, with Robinhood back in the news and the stock market looming large. Here’s what we talked about:

• American stocks are set to rise, bitcoin is flat, and meme-stocks are mixed.
• In India, news is out that a new law could ban bitcoin (whatever that means), and this morning India forced Twitter to take down some accounts that had been critical of government policy. That’s a pretty bad look. And it comes as we see a coup in Myanmar leading to a decline in internet connectivity; there is a clear link between authoritarianism and a desire for Internet control.
• Robinhood’s CEO went on Clubhouse, where he was interviewed by Elon Musk about last week’s mess; it turns out the National Securities Clearing Corporation, or NSCC, had asked Robinhood for $3 billion in deposit requirements. That number was reduced to $700 million, with Robinhood limiting some consumer behavior, allowing the company to open Friday morning.
• This morning the key news stories include the mess that is Facebook Groups, and the EU is appealing a tax decision that could impact tech company structure for years to come.
• Ben raised $2.5 million
• Phocas Software raised $34 million
• DesignCrowd raised $7.6 million
• And, finally, we are heading into earnings season, so strap in and get ready for a deluge of results.

All that and we are back Thursday, if not before. Hugs and hellos from the Equity crew!

Source: https://techcrunch.com/2021/02/01/equity-monday-rich-tech-folks-chat-rich-tech-things-on-rich-tech-app-funded-by-rich-tech-investors/

The GameStop debacle has been hailed by many as a first of its kind form of digital activism, with the ‘crowd’ coming together to stick it to Wall Street, and specifically hedge funds that are in the business of short selling.

However, what if you’re a startup or scale-up caught in the middle of such an unprecedented and unstoppable set of events, requiring you to make rapid business and product decisions almost seemingly on the fly. Especially if there is significant reputational damage at stake when things don’t go to plan.

That’s exactly the position that trading platform Robinhood found itself in last week. Despite promising to make finance accessible for all, the company temporarily limited trading on GameStop, AMC, and other memestocks, leaving users upset that the fintech darling wasn’t living up to its name. The specific reasons may have been short-term and technical, but the choice was viewed with suspicion by much of Robinhood’s users, not least because Robinhood has a large hedge fund as a customer. This saw the Robinhood app receive hundreds of thousands of 1-star ratings on the app stores, which Apple and Google helped remove.

But what role did UX play in all of this and how could better UX choices have mitigated the Robinhood backlash? That’s the question we asked together with Built for Mars founder and UX expert Peter Ramsey, who tracked Robinhood’s product changes throughout the GameStop crisis.

If you want more UX content, Peter and Steve write a regular UX column over at Extra Crunch, so do also check out other recent UX teardowns:

• Hulu UX teardown: 5 user experience fails and how to fix them
• Disney+ UX teardown: Wins, fails and fixes
• Coinbase UX teardown: 5 fails and how to fix them
• (How to fix) 5 common UX mistakes in online banking

Specifically, we highlight 5 UX fails and suggest ways to fix them. As you’ll see, the fast moving events meant it was a continuously moving target and would have been very challenging for any product team. With that said, there are many learnings that can be applied to other existing digital products or ones you are currently building, regardless of whether or not you’re hit by the next GameStop-styled crisis.

Removing Gamestop from search results

Robinhood wanted to stop people buying GME shares, so they just removed Gamestop from the search results.

Image Credits: Built For Mars

The fail: Robinhood didn’t want people to find the page to purchase Gamestop shares, so they just removed Gamestop from the search results.

The fix: Robinhood absolutely should have left Gamestop in the search results. By removing it entirely the company did three things: created ambiguity, provided no explanation, and looked suspicious.

The rule: Great UX is about being definitive and clear, and the absence of information is the opposite of this.

Blocking people from buying Gamestop shares

People could still get on to the GME stock page, so Robinhood simply disabled the buy button and showed this generic message:

Image Credits: Built For Mars

The fail: Robinhood stopped people buying shares—essentially closing the free market—and disabled the buy button with a generic message.

The fix: This is an unprecedented move from a brokerage, and most Robinhood users will never have considered this to be a possibility. They should have included a link to more information about why they had to take this decision. In this instance, with insufficient info, users flocked to Twitter but found no explanation on the Robinhood Twitter account either.

The rule: When delivering bad news which will directly affect customers, you need to have spent the time to properly explain why this has happened, how it affects them, and what happens next.

Fractional shares are unavailable

Robinhood is known for fractional shares, but it temporarily blocked people buying fractional shares of Gamestop. This was after Robinhood re-allowed people to buy shares, but with limits:

No fractional shares
Limited number of shares

Image Credits: Built For Mars

The fail: When people tried to buy fractional shares, they would put in their order, and see this error message. It explains what you can’t do, but doesn’t provide any context as to why.

The fix: Simple: add context explaining why they’ve had to make this decision. The company removed one of the key USPs of Robinhood, and it didn’t even mention if it’s temporary.

The rule: You shouldn’t just add an explanation in one place and expect all your users to see it. You should proactively place links to your detailed response in all of the places and features that are affected by your restrictions.

Creating sell orders on your behalf

People were claiming on Twitter that Robinhood were automatically creating sell orders, and not allowing people to cancel them. (As it turns out, the T&Cs state that Robinhood has the legal right to do this.)

Image Credits: Built For Mars

The fail: If this is true, it means that Robinhood was taking drastic action to mitigate their liquidity issues. This action directly affects the finances of their users, and still, there’s no explanation why.

The fix: Whilst good UX can’t make this okay, a decent explanation in context of why they’re having to do this at least provides a good rationale. Also, it’s not an ‘error’, so labelling it an error feels disingenuous.

The rule: Stopping your user from doing an action is one thing, but taking control and doing something that may be against their will is another. This should only be done with sufficient context, explanation and empathy.

Failing to get statements

People wanted to leave Robinhood, and were claiming that other brokerages needed a ‘statement of portfolio’ to initiate a switch.

Twitter blew up as the ‘download statement’ function was broken for people all weekend. We never saw Robinhood address it, and naturally people assumed it was a dirty tactic to keep customers from leaving.

The fail: When trying to download a statement users saw this error message. This didn’t just happen once, but users were claiming that it was broken and they were unable to download their statements.

Image Credits: Built For Mars

The fix: Unlike the other examples, this doesn’t require more context, but does need an alternative method of reaching the same result. Some features are vital and urgent, some aren’t.

The rule: Some actions are important enough that it’s not good enough to just fail. In these instances, you need to provide an alternative way to reach the same goal.

Source: https://techcrunch.com/2021/02/01/5-rushed-ux-changes/