Tech giant Huawei's first-quarter profits surged over fivefold year-on-year, a company filing showed Tuesday, as the US-sanctioned firm continues a rebound and bit into competitor Apple's sales in China. Huawei has long found itself caught in the middle of an intense technological rivalry between Beijing and Washington, which has warned the firm's equipment could be used for Chinese espionage operations -- allegations denied by Huawei. Sanctions imposed by Washington in 2019 restricting the company's access to US-made components greatly inhibited Huawei's production of smartphones at the time ..read more

Pakistan is set to embark on a ground-breaking lunar mission, as the country's historic ICUBE-Q satellite prepares for launch on Friday. The satellite will be carried aboard China's Chang'E6 spacecraft, scheduled to depart from Hainan, China, at 1250 PST. According to the Institute of Space Technology (IST), the satellite ICUBE-Q has been designed and developed by IST in collaboration with China’s Shanghai University SJTU and Pakistan’s national space agency SUPARCO. ICUBE-Q orbiter carries two optical cameras to image the lunar surface. Following successful qualification and testing, ICUBE-Q ..read more

In the hills outside the Tajik capital Dushanbe, shepherd Bakhtior Sharipov was watching over his flock of giant Hissar sheep. The breed, prized for profitability and an ability to adapt to climate change, garners celebrity status in the Central Asian country, which is beset by a shortage of both meat and suitable grazing land. "They rapidly gain weight even when there is little water and pasture available," 18-year-old Sharipov said. Facing a serious degradation in farmland due to years of overgrazing and global warming, the hardy sheep offer a potential boon to Tajikistan's farmers and plent ..read more

Last year, a who’s who of world leaders, corporate executives, and academic experts gathered at Britain's Bletchley Park for the world’s first global AI Safety Summit, hoping to reach a consensus on the regulation of a technology some warned posed a threat to humanity. Tesla mogul Elon Musk and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman rubbed shoulders with some of their fiercest critics, while China co-signed the Bletchley Declaration alongside the United States and others, signaling a willingness to cooperate despite mounting tensions with the West. Six months later, the second AI Safety Summit, a pri ..read more

Three Chinese astronauts aboard Shenzhou-18 spaceship on Friday successfully entered China's space station, state-run media said. The astronauts were welcomed by their colleagues on the Shenzhou-17 mission, Xinhua News Agency reported. The six astronauts will live and work together for about five days. On Thursday, the Shenzhou-18 spaceship lifted off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center atop a Long March 2F rocket at 8.59 p.m. (1259GMT). Earlier, a sending-off ceremony for the three taikonauts, the term used for Chinese astronauts, was held at the centre. Read also: China prepares to laun ..read more

The Chang'e-6 lunar probe is scheduled for launch at an appropriate time at the beginning of May, according to the China National Space Administration (CNSA). The combination of the Chang'e-6 lunar probe and the Long March-5 Y8 carrier rocket was transferred vertically on Saturday to the launching area at the Wenchang Space Launch Center in south China's Hainan Province, the CNSA said. The combination on a removable launch pad was moved out of the vertical test building, and then safely transported to its launching area. Read: Pakistan joins China’s club of lunar base partners   The funct ..read more

 Erich Andersen, general counsel for TikTok and Chinese parent company ByteDance, will step down from that role in June to focus on fighting efforts to force a sale of the video app in the US, the company said on Friday. Andersen will remain at the company and become its special counsel to lead TikTok's effort to overturn legislation signed into law by President Joe Biden on Wednesday that gives ByteDance 270 days to divest short-video app TikTok in the United States or face a ban. TikTok said this week it plans to file a lawsuit to challenge the legislation but has declined to say when i ..read more

The decision to reject traditional employment in favour of starting one's own business is more prevalent now than ever before. "Generation Z," born after 1996, is at the forefront of this movement, both globally and in Pakistan. This trend is on the rise for various reasons. Many individuals from Generation Z are motivated by a desire to escape the rigid schedules of traditional jobs and the constant oversight from superiors. According to a report by BBC Urdu, they seek the freedom to explore the world with just a laptop and a reliable internet connection. Moreover, they crave independence and ..read more

Intel shares slumped more than 12% on Friday after a downbeat forecast signaled that the boom in AI was diverting enterprise spending away from its traditional data center chips. The stock has fallen around 30% so far this year as Intel trails rival chip companies such as Nvidia in producing advanced artificial intelligence (AI) chips and components. Intel forecast second-quarter revenue of $12.5 billion to $13.5 billion, compared with analysts' average estimate of $13.57 billion, according to LSEG data. "While we believe they are doing everything they can to try to repair things, it is clear ..read more

South Korea on Wednesday launched its nanosatellite into orbit as part of its project to create a satellite constellation by 2027, local media reported. The Earth observation satellite lifted off aboard Rocket Lab's Electron rocket from a spaceport in Mahia, New Zealand, Seoul-based Yonhap News Agency reported, citing a Ministry of Science and ICT statement. The satellite, named NEONSAT-1, was deployed into space at an altitude of 520 kilometres (323 miles), about 50 minutes after the rocket's launch, according to the report. The satellite developed by the state-run Korea Advanced Institute of ..read more