• 2026 BYD Sealion 8 price and specs

    January 16, 2026

    The BYD Sealion 8 isn’t Australia’s cheapest plug-in hybrid (PHEV) SUV, but it’s among them. BYD has announced a base price of $56,990 before on-road costs for the large crossover SUV, which translates to a drive-away price of $60,773 in New South Wales. That undercuts the Chery Tiggo 9 Super Hybrid ($59,990 before on-roads, $65,430 in NSW) but puts it above the (admittedly significantly smaller) Tiggo 8 Super Hybrid ($45,990 to $49,990 drive-away). CarExpert can save you thousands on a new car. Click here to get a great deal. Orders are now open, ahead of deliveries commencing before the end…

  • Amazon is making a Fallout Shelter competition reality TV show

    January 16, 2026

    The second season of Amazon’s excellent Fallout show is currently airing, but the company is already looking to expand its programming around the popular franchise. Prime Video has greenlit a unscripted reality show titled Fallout Shelter. It will be a ten-episode run with Studio Lambert, the team behind reality projects including Squid Game: The Challenge and The Traitors, as its primary producer. Bethesda Game Studios’ head honcho Todd Howard is attached as an executive producer. Amazon’s description of Fallout Shelter is: “Across a series of escalating challenges, strategic dilemmas and moral crossroads, contestants must prove their ingenuity, teamwork and resilience as…

  • Google AI Releases TranslateGemma: A New Family of Open Translation Models Built on Gemma 3 with Support for 55 Languages

    January 16, 2026

    Google AI has released TranslateGemma, a suite of open machine translation models built on Gemma 3 and targeted at 55 languages. The family comes in 4B, 12B and 27B parameter sizes. It is designed to run across devices from mobile and edge hardware to laptops and a single H100 GPU or TPU instance in the cloud. TranslateGemma is not a separate architecture. It is Gemma 3 specialized for translation through a two stage post training pipeline. (1) supervised fine tuning on large parallel corpora. (2) Reinforcement learning that optimizes translation quality with a multi signal reward ensemble. The goal is…

  • Get ready for Waymo’s autonomous cars on Australian roads – report

    January 16, 2026

    Waymo is looking to test its autonomous vehicles on public roads in Australia later this year, with reports suggesting it’s in discussions with the federal government to begin trials. According to The Sizzle, Waymo – owned by Alphabet, the parent company of Google – has held meetings with federal government officials to discuss trials of its autonomous cars on public roads as soon as this year. The company has reportedly held a private, preliminary briefing with federal Transport Minister Catherine King as part of the process. There’s no word on exactly where or when Waymo may roll out on local…

  • Netflix’s expanded Sony deal includes streaming rights to the Legend of Zelda movie

    January 16, 2026

    As part of a new agreement, films from Sony Pictures Entertainment will stream on Netflix first, the companies announced via a joint statement. The new deal expands on the exclusive rights Netflix had to Sony films in the US, and means the service will be the first place people will be able to stream upcoming projects like the live-action adaptation of The Legend of Zelda, and a quartet of biopics about The Beatles. Sony’s films will stream worldwide on Netflix in what’s called “Pay-1,” the first window of availability after a movie’s theatrical and VOD releases. As part of the…

  • Tiger Global loses India tax case tied to Walmart-Flipkart deal in blow to offshore playbook

    January 16, 2026

    India’s top court has ruled against Tiger Global in a tax case stemming from its Flipkart exit during Walmart’s 2018 takeover, a decision that strengthens New Delhi’s ability to challenge offshore treaty structures and could raise tax risk for global funds counting on predictable exits from one of the world’s fastest-growing major markets. On Thursday, the Indian Supreme Court backed the tax authorities in a dispute over whether Tiger Global could use its Mauritius-based entities to claim protection under the India–Mauritius tax treaty and avoid paying capital gains tax in India on profits linked to its exit in the Walmart–Flipkart…

  • Volvo EX60 set to beat Tesla Model 3 and become Australia’s EV range king

    January 16, 2026

    Move over Tesla Model 3, there’s a new hypermiling king among electric vehicles (EVs): the Volvo EX60 electric SUV. Key charging capabilities have been revealed for the EX60 ahead of its official unveiling on January 21 and Australian arrival later this year, with its claimed 810km (WLTP) range better than any EV currently on sale locally. It will also boast the ability to add up to 340km of range after just a 10-minute charge, albeit at 400kW speeds which aren’t offered in Australia, although Tesla Superchargers can deliver up to 320kW.  Volvo shared the details in a statement, with the…

  • Bluesky’s ‘Live Now’ badge is available to everyone

    January 16, 2026

    After testing the feature in a limited beta, Bluesky is making its “Live Now” badge for streamers available for everyone on the social network to try. Live Now is included as part of Bluesky’s v1.114 update, alongside “cashtags,” a separate type of hashtag for collecting conversations about publicly-traded companies. Bluesky first started testing its Live Now badge in May 2025 with a limited group of accounts, including the official NBA account. The feature lets Twitch streamers with Bluesky profiles append a Live Now badge to their profile picture that links directly to their livestream. Live Now badges are limited to…

  • Parloa triples its valuation in 8 months to $3B with $350M raise

    January 16, 2026

    Berlin-based Parloa has raised $350 million in Series D funding from existing investors, valuing the six-year-old customer service AI startup at $3 billion. The round comes just eight months after the company raised $120 million at a $1 billion valuation. The new round was led by General Catalyst, with participation from returning backers, including EQT Ventures, Altimeter Capital, Durable Capital, and Mosaic Ventures. Parloa is one of many startups developing AI agents that promise to automate the kind of customer service work previously handled by human representatives and help desk staff. The company’s competitors include Sierra, co-founded by OpenAI chairman…