Just as Intel’s (NASDAQ: INTC) CEO Brian Krzanich opens the regular staff meetings before a dramatically reduced IDF2015 Shenzhen conference, it is a good time to review how government and enterprises don’t see eye to eye when it comes to strategic business.

China’s Tianhe-2 supercomputer is world’s fastest supercomputer, at 33 PFLOPS demonstrated and 55 PFLOPS theoretical performance.

Remember the Tianhe-2 machine at Guangzhou Supercomputer Center, the current World’s number one according to Top 500 Supercomputer list? Unlike some other China supercomputers – Tianhe-2 is fully Intel based machine,  the world’s largest assembly of Intel Xeon CPUs and Xeon Phi accelerators.

Even after Intel ‘opened the kimono’ and gave a nearly 70%  discount on its processors and accelerators, it has given Intel, and therefore US technology sector a major foothold in China and Asian region as such. Over the course of past two years, we were involved in a lot of discussions with Intel staff who were not privy to see the financial impact of the deal — and even argued our undoubtedly solid information. We’re not here to report how things should be, or are in marketing and investor presentations to its numerous staff, but how things really are.

During 2015, the Tianhe-2 supercomputer was supposed to be doubled in its size, up to 110 PFLOPs peak, again using the very same Intel processors and accelerators. Since now these are mature products with lower real manufacturing cost for Intel, they could finally make some real money.

Well, it was not to be: our tweety bird from the window chirped to us that Uncle Sam has put this supercomputer centre, together with National University of Defense Technology in Changsha, the system’s creators, and Tianjin centre, among others, on so a so-called “Denial List”, which prevents any high technology from the USA to be sold to these sites. Our sources used even harsher words.

Knowing that these several sites alone are expected to order some 250+ PFLOPS of compute in the next few years (around 500,000 top-end Broadwell-EP Xeon E5v4 processors, or  approximately $1 billion high margin list price) and they were THE Intel friendly ones, this is quite a loss to Intel, thanks to Uncle Sam.

But, what’s worse strategic loss in time is that, based on this decision as an excuse, indigenous China high end processor architectures can now push the government to gradually remove any dependence on US. This means just one thing: an AMD or Intel x86 processor technology is increasingly becoming errata non grata. Should the Chinese government react in force, it will give the Chinese vendors the blank check support to go all the way a developing their Alpha, POWER and MIPS processors for both the government and the mainstream commercial use.

You may think they are not up to the mark, but remember how fast British ARM architecture became the dominant processing architecture in the world. And this group doesn’t need to worry about the antiquated x86 ISA, worry about satisfying the dumbed down shareholder masses, or overpaying their marketing and sales staff, as well as the fat check, golden parachute-protected CxOs.

They have taken the best that the USA has developed (some of key Alpha, GPGPU and MIPS architects left US over the course of past four years, a lot of them due to non-renewed visas) and discarded due to corporate shenanigans, and the continued developing it much farther than anyone expected both on hardware and software side.

Five years ago, ShenWei showed a CPU that performed faster than the fastest GPUs of the time. Now, fifth generation is approaching, slotting between Tesla and FirePro GPGPUs and next-gen Xeon Phi accelerators. However, this is not an accelerator or a GPGPU – this is a CPU.

So, thanks to Uncle Sam, China might not have a 110 PFLOPS Intel based supercomputer but it definitely will launch a 100 PFLOPS system based on upcoming 64-core, TFLOPS-class ShenWei Alpha, with true blue CPUs possibly faster per socket then even the next generation Xeon Phi or Volta/Pascal-based Teslas.  Next, of course 100 PFLOPS Chinese POWER8 or 9 — (thank you IBM) and then possibly even Loongson MIPS – -it may come back into the high end field with renewed government support because of this Uncle Sam move. All are clean, elegant, scalable high end RISC architectures.

So who are the winners and losers from this?

NUDT and Tianhe may be the losers for now, but only short term. They will simply speed up their HPC ARM plan.

Intel comes out the big loser from this and a lot: who will want to do a phased deployment large x86 machine in China now, and worry about future phases? Then comes Uncle Sam himself: they lost even that little bit of influence on the high end China HPC. How is that for “cutting your nose to spite your face?”.

VR WORLD’s  Analysis: US government moves accelerate the Chinese CPU roadmap while curtailing juiciest sales for Intel and other US vendors.

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Being a gamer in the West pretty much means we miss out on a lot.

Whether it’s overseas exclusives like Dragon’s Dogma Online, first crack at multi-region games, or incredibly detailed cover art, Japanese gamers often have it made.

And the new Xenoblade cover art just rubs it in even more.

A new listing on Amazon Japan shows the overseas box art for Xenoblade Chronicles X in all of its supra-sci-fi Gundam-y glory.

As far as epic covers go, this is yet another staple to add in Japan’s already ample library of amazing video game box art.

Could we see this titanic masterpiece make its way West this year? Or is this cover destined to be yet another expensive collector’s item?

Only time will tell, but Japan will get their hands on Monolith Soft’s sci-fantasy epic in April whereas the rest of the gaming world will have to wait for an official 2015 release date.

Also just in case you missed it, check out our glimpse at 25 minutes of Xenoblade Chronicles X gameplay footage below. It showcases battles, New Los Angeles, and much more.

And don’t forget to drop by our Xenoblade Chronicles X coverage for more info on the Wii U exclusive, including install size, peripheral support, and even the Japanese exclusive Wii U bundle.

The post Xenoblade Chronicles X Japanese Box Art Revealed appeared first on VR World.

Indonesian e-commerce startup Tokopedia has raised a $100 million funding round led by SoftBank (TYO:9984), through SoftBank Internet and Media Inc / SIMI, and Sequoia Capital. The round is joined by SB Pan Asia Fund, an existing investor into the startup.

The company will use the freshly-raised capital to ramp up customer acquisition, hiring and other initiatives to strengthen its position as an e-commerce provider in Indonesia. “In the Asia region, the growth potential for online marketplaces particularly stands out in Indonesia, and since its founding, Tokopedia has seen remarkable growth with its innovative business model,” says Nikesh Arora, Vice Chairman of SoftBank and SIMI CEO. “Leveraging synergies with our network of Internet businesses, we are confident we can help Tokopedia’s success in the Indonesian market.”

Local e-commerce services on the rise

Internet users in Indonesia have long relied on foreign e-commerce service providers like eBay and Amazon. In fact, as of 2013, Amazon had been the most visited B2C site in the country. 2014 marked some changes, with Rocket Internet (FRA:RKET)-backed Zalora and Lazada rising fast as the top e-commerce sites in the country, a feat helped by its hyper-localized efforts.

Founded in 2009, Tokopedia is currently ranked as Indonesia’s 34th most popular site, according to Alexa. With the capital infusion, the company aims to be the top e-commerce site in the country. Meanwhile, SoftBank is also using this investment as an opportunity to expand its reach and bolster its presence as an Internet company in the region. The deal is expected to conclude by mid-December 2014.

A Nuanced e-Commerce Market

Electronic commerce in Indonesia is a heavily nuanced business, given the character of the average Internet user in the country. First, mobile is the primary means for going online, and less than half of the country’s 74.6 million Internet users are active enough to be called “netizens” — users who are online at least three hours a day. In addition, platforms like BlackBerry Messaging and other mobile chat apps are the preferred means of C2C advertising and deals.

There is also the issue with poor logistics handling, as well as poor credit card penetration. As a result, cash-on-delivery is usually the preferred payment method, although chat app developers have sought ways to incorporate carrier billing or credits-based payments in their applications.

With access to $100 million in fresh capital, Tokopedia ought to address these concerns through innovative solutions that will enable faster and more convenient B2C and C2C transactions within Indonesia.

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