There are more promising signs from ongoing efforts to develop a vaccine that’s effective in preventing COVID-19: Two early trials, one from the University of Oxford, and one from a group of researchers in Wuhan funded in part by the National Key R&D Programme of China. Both early trials showed efficacy in increasing the presence of antibody responses to SARS-CoV-2, the virus that leads to COVID-19, and also indicated that these prospective vaccines were safe to administer based on available information.

The University of Oxford study is one of the leading vaccine development efforts in the world, and among those that are furthest along in development. The results of their study covered 1,077 participants, all of whom were health adults aged between 18 and 55 with no prior confirmed history of having contracted SARS-CoV-2. That’s important because they received double randomized trials of the vaccine candidate, or an existing vaccine for meningitis as a control acting as a placebo. The results showed that across the group, 100 percent of the participants had demonstrated neutralizing antibody responses by the end of the course, which include a booster does.

Additionally, while some participants exhibited side effects, including “pain, feeling feverish, chills, muscle ache, headache and malaise,” none of these represented what the researchers consider series reactions, and these were also mitigated with use of paracetamol (standard painkillers available over the counter). Patient reactions were monitored for 28 days following the administration of the vaccine.

Oxford’s team is now ready to move on to its Phase 3 trial, which is a large-scale human trial that is effectively the last major step before it moves on to potential approval, production and distribution. That’s a time consuming process, but it does put this development on pace for a remarkably fast research and development process relative to prior vaccines.

Meanwhile the study in China covered health adults 18 or older, and included 603 participants, screened down to 508 who received either the vaccine candidate or a placebo. The participants also showed no adverse reactions, according to the researchers, and they’re also now likely to move on to a phase 3 development program.

Earlier this month, Moderna also announced promising early results from its phase 1 trial, but that was limited to just 45 participants between 18 and 55, and indicated some potentially serious side effects that will need to be watched in later, larger trials. These new results, while also early and requiring further development and research, are much more encouraging given the scale of both trials.

It is very early to make too many assumptions about what these early trials indicate, however. For instance, we still don’t really know how effective antibodies are in patients that have recovered from having COVID-19 once, so a lot more investigation is required by scientists in better understanding the efficacy of antibodies, and potentially vaccines, over the long term.

The United Arab Emirates has succeeded with the initial stage of its first ever Mars mission, thanks to the launch of an H-IIA rocket built by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries from Tanegashima Space Center in Japan on Sunday. The rocket carried the Al Amal (Hope) Probe for the UAE, a Mars orbiter that is set to arrive at the red planet by February 2021, and spend a Martian year (687 days) on orbit around Mars collecting data about its atmosphere.

This is the first of three separate planned missions to Mars that are scheduled to take place during July, including a launch of a Mars orbiter and launder from China set to take place later this week, and NASA’s Mars Perserverance rover mission, which is currently planed for July 30.

The Al Amar probe from the UAE has the specific scientific mission of taking measurements from Mars’ atmosphere, with the intent of helping scientists better understand how Mars went from being a warmer world with liquid surface water to becoming the incredibly cold, rocky and dry planet we know it as today. Following its successful launch, UAE reported successful ground communications with the Mars probe and good trajectory for its multi-month journey.

This marks the UAE’s first entry into deep space exploration, and it’s a remarkable achievement for a country that only actually founded its space agency in 2014. The’ve launched satellites twice previously, but this is their first extra orbital mission, and the probe was developed in just six years, throughout partnerships including one with a research team working out of the University of Colorado Boulder’s Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics.

It’s a busy season for Mars launches for a reason: The timing means that spacecraft currently enjoy the shortest possible trip for a rendezvous with the red planet, given their relative orbits around the Sun – and this only happens about once every two years, so it’s a long wait for the next good window.

Xpeng Motors, the Chinese electric vehicle startup, has raised about $500 million in Series C+ funding from investors including Aspex, Coatue, Hillhouse Capital and Sequoia Capital China.

Based in Guangzhou, Xpeng’s other backers include a roster of top Chinese tech companies and investors, including Alibaba Group, Xiaomi, IDG Capital, Morningside Venture Capital, GGV Capital and Primavera Capital.

The company’s last funding announcement before this one was in November, when it said it had closed a $400 million Series C and taken on Xiaomi as a strategic investor.

The company didn’t disclose its current post-money valuation, but a source told TechCrunch after its Series C in November that it was “better” than the 25 billion yuan valuation it achieved after its Series B+ round announced in August 2018. Since then, Xpeng has hit two milestones: it released its second smart electric vehicle, the P7 sports sedan, in April 2020, as China was recovering from COVID-19 lockdowns, and in May 2020, secured a production license for its second factory, located in Zhaoqing, Guangdong Province.

The company’s first electric vehicle, the G3 SUV, was launched in December 2018.

Xpeng said last year it eventually plans to hold an initial public offering but wants to build its core business first. Along with other Chinese startups like Nio, Xpeng also competes with Tesla and established automakers like BYD and BAIC group that offer their own electric vehicles.

Tesla is currently suing a Xpeng engineer for allegedly misusing Tesla’s trade secrets. Last month, a United States District Court judge denied one of Tesla’s requests related to the lawsuit’s discovery process. Xpeng said at the time that the ruling “highlights Tesla’s gamemanship and use of discovery as an improper measure to stop with its competitor from competing successfully in the self-driving industry.”

One of Xpeng’s differentiators from some of its rivals is that it builds almost all of its software, and some of its essential hardware, in-house instead of relying on OEMs, including XPILOT, its autonomous driving system; Xmart OS, its in-car operating system; and over-the-air firmware updates.

All electric vehicle makers in China are coping with strong market headwinds. China has the largest electric vehicle market in the world, with more than 400 electric vehicle manufacturers registered in the country. The market grew quickly thanks in large part to government investment and subsidies for buyers, but last year many of those financial incentives were pulled back as Beijing grew concerned about the industry’s rapid expansion.

Along with the COVID-19 pandemic, which forced many Chinese automakers to shut down production earlier this year, this triggered a huge drop in electric vehicle sales (at the same time, sales of traditional cars also fell), leading to speculation that there may be consolidation among rival EV companies.

In the wake of yesterday’s landmark ruling by Europe’s top court — striking down a flagship transatlantic data transfer framework called Privacy Shield, and cranking up the legal uncertainty around processing EU citizens’ data in the US in the process — Europe’s lead data protection regulator has fired its own warning shot at the region’s data protection authorities (DPAs), essentially telling them to get on and do the job of intervening to stop people’s data flowing to third countries where it’s at risk.

Countries like the U.S.

The original complaint that led to the the Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU) ruling focused on Facebook’s use of a data transfer mechanism called Standard Contractual Clauses (SCCs) to authorize moving EU users’ data to the US for processing.

Complainant Max Schrems asked the Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) to suspend Facebook’s SCC data transfers in light of US government mass surveillance programs. Instead the regulator went to court to raise wider concerns about the legality of the transfer mechanism.

That in turn led Europe’s top judges to nuke the Commission’s adequacy decision which underpinned the EU-US Privacy Shield — meaning the US no longer has a special arrangement greasing the flow of personal data from the EU. Yet, at the time of writing, Facebook is still using SCCs to process EU users’ data in the US. Much has changed but the data hasn’t stopped flowing — yet.

Yesterday the tech giant said it would “carefully consider” the findings and implications of the CJEU decision on Privacy Shield, adding that it looked forward to “regulatory guidance”. It certainly didn’t offer to proactively flip a kill switch and stop the processing itself.

Ireland’s DPA, meanwhile, which is Facebook’s lead data regulator in the region, sidestepped questions over what action it would be taking in the wake of yesterday’s ruling — saying it (also) needed (more) time to study the legal nuances.

The DPC’s statement also only went so far as to say the use of SCCs for taking data to the US for processing is “questionable” — adding that case by case analysis would be key.

The regulator remains the focus of sustained criticism in Europe over its enforcement record for major cross-border data protection complaints — with still zero decisions issued more than two years after the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) came into force, and an ever growing backlog of open investigations into the data processing activities of platform giants.

In May, the DPC finally submitted its first draft decision on a cross-border case (an investigation into a Twitter security breach) to other DPAs for review, saying it hoped the decision would be finalized in July. At the time of writing we’re still waiting for the bloc’s regulators to reach consensus on that.

The painstaking pace of enforcement around Europe’s flagship data protection framework remains a problem for EU lawmakers — whose two-year review last month called for uniformly “vigorous” enforcement by regulators.

The European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) made a similar call today, in the wake of the Schrems II ruling — which only looks set to further complicate the process of regulating data flows by piling yet more work on the desks of underfunded DPAs.

“European supervisory authorities have the duty to diligently enforce the applicable data protection legislation and, where appropriate, to suspend or prohibit transfers of data to a third country,” writes EDPS, Wojciech Wiewiórowski, in a statement which warns against further dithering or can-kicking on the intervention front.

“The EDPS will continue to strive, as a member of the European Data Protection Board (EDPB), to achieve the necessary coherent approach among the European supervisory authorities in the implementation of the EU framework for international transfers of personal data,” he goes on, calling for more joint working by the bloc’s DPAs.

Wiewiórowski’s statement also highlights what he dubs “welcome clarifications” regarding the responsibilities of data controllers and European DPAs — to “take into account the risks linked to the access to personal data by the public authorities of third countries”.

“As the supervisory authority of the EU institutions, bodies, offices and agencies, the EDPS is carefully analysing the consequences of the judgment on the contracts concluded by EU institutions, bodies, offices and agencies. The example of the recent EDPS’ own-initiative investigation into European institutions’ use of Microsoft products and services confirms the importance of this challenge,” he adds.

Part of the complexity of enforcement of Europe’s data protection rules is the lack of a single authority; a varied patchwork of supervisory authorities responsible for investigating complaints and issuing decisions.

Now, with a CJEU ruling that calls for regulators to assess third countries themselves — to determine whether the use of SCCs is valid in a particular use-case and country — there’s a risk of further fragmentation should different DPAs jump to different conclusions.

Yesterday, in its response to the CJEU decision, Hamburg’s DPA criticized the judges for not also striking down SCCs, saying it was “inconsistent” for them to invalidate Privacy Shield yet allow this other mechanism for international transfers. Supervisory authorities in Germany and Europe must now quickly agree how to deal with companies that continue to rely illegally on the Privacy Shield, the DPA warned.

In the statement Hamburg’s data commissioner, Johannes Caspar, added: “Difficult times are looming for international data traffic.”

He also shot off a blunt warning that: “Data transmission to countries without an adequate level of data protection will… no longer be permitted in the future.”

Compare and contrast that with the Irish DPC talking about use of SCCs being “questionable”, case by case. (Or the UK’s ICO offering this bare minimum.)

Caspar also emphasized the challenge facing the bloc’s patchwork of DPAs to develop and implement a “common strategy” towards dealing with SCCs in the wake of the CJEU ruling.

In a press note today, Berlin’s DPA also took a tough line, warning that data transfers to third countries would only be permitted if they have a level of data protection essentially equivalent to that offered within the EU.

In the case of the US — home to the largest and most used cloud services — Europe’s top judges yesterday reiterated very clearly that that is not in fact the case.

“The CJEU has made it clear that the export of data is not just about the economy but people’s fundamental rights must be paramount,” Berlin data commissioner Maja Smoltczyk said in a statement [which we’ve translated using Google Translate].

“The times when personal data could be transferred to the US for convenience or cost savings are over after this judgment,” she added.

Both DPAs warned the ruling has implications for the use of cloud services where data is processed in other third countries where the protection of EU citizens’ data also cannot be guaranteed too, i.e. not just the US.

On this front, Smoltczyk name-checked China, Russia and India as countries EU DPAs will have to assess for similar problems.

“Now is the time for Europe’s digital independence,” she added.

Some commentators (including Schrems himself) have also suggested the ruling could see companies switching to local processing of EU users data. Though it’s also interesting to note the judges chose not to invalidate SCCs — thereby offering a path to legal international data transfers, but only provided the necessary protections are in place in that given third country.

Also issuing a response to the CJEU ruling today was the European Data Protection Board (EDPB). Aka the body made up of representatives from DPAs across the bloc. Chair Andrea Jelinek put out an emollient statement, writing that: “The EDPB intends to continue playing a constructive part in securing a transatlantic transfer of personal data that benefits EEA citizens and organisations and stands ready to provide the European Commission with assistance and guidance to help it build, together with the U.S., a new framework that fully complies with EU data protection law.”

Short of radical changes to US surveillance law it’s tough to see how any new framework could be made to legally stick, though. Privacy Shield’s predecessor arrangement, Safe Harbour, stood for around 15 years. Its shiny ‘new and improved’ replacement didn’t even last five.

In the wake of the CJEU ruling, data exporters and importers are required to carry out an assessment of a country’s data regime to assess adequacy with EU legal standards before using SCCs to transfer data there.

“When performing such prior assessment, the exporter (if necessary, with the assistance of the importer) shall take into consideration the content of the SCCs, the specific circumstances of the transfer, as well as the legal regime applicable in the importer’s country. The examination of the latter shall be done in light of the non-exhaustive factors set out under Art 45(2) GDPR,” Jelinek writes.

“If the result of this assessment is that the country of the importer does not provide an essentially equivalent level of protection, the exporter may have to consider putting in place additional measures to those included in the SCCs. The EDPB is looking further into what these additional measures could consist of.”

Again, it’s not clear what “additional measures” a platform could plausibly deploy to ‘fix’ the gaping lack of redress afforded to foreigners by US surveillance law. Major legal surgery does seem to be required to square this circle.

Jelinek said the EDPB would be studying the judgement with the aim of putting out more granular guidance in future. But her statement warns data exporters they have an obligation to suspend data transfers or terminate SCCs if contractual obligations are not or cannot be complied with, or else to notify a relevant supervisory authority if it intends to continue transferring data.

In her roundabout way, she also warns that DPAs now have a clear obligation to terminate SCCs where the safety of data cannot be guaranteed in a third country.

“The EDPB takes note of the duties for the competent supervisory authorities (SAs) to suspend or prohibit a transfer of data to a third country pursuant to SCCs, if, in the view of the competent SA and in the light of all the circumstances of that transfer, those clauses are not or cannot be complied with in that third country, and the protection of the data transferred cannot be ensured by other means, in particular where the controller or a processor has not already itself suspended or put an end to the transfer,” Jelinek writes.

One thing is crystal clear: Any sense of legal certainty US cloud services were deriving from the existence of the EU-US Privacy Shield — with its flawed claim of data protection adequacy — has vanished like summer rain.

In its place, a sense of déjà vu and a lot more work for lawyers.

Western intelligence agencies say they’ve found evidence that Russian cyber espionage is targeting efforts to develop a coronavirus vaccine in a number of countries.

In an advisory report, the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) said the Russia-linked cyber espionage group commonly known as ‘APT29’ — which is also sometimes referred to as ‘the Dukes’ or ‘Cozy Bear’ — has targeted various organisations involved in medical R&D and COVID-19 vaccine development in Canada, the US and the UK throughout 2020.

Per the report, APT29 is using custom malware known as ‘WellMess’ and ‘WellMail’ to target a number of organisations globally, including those involved with COVID-19 vaccine development.

WellMess and WellMail have not previously been publicly associated to APT29, it notes.

The NCSC, which is a public facing branch of the UK’s GCHQ intelligence agency, said it believes it “highly likely” that the intention of the malware attacks is to steal information and IP related to the development and testing of COVID-19 vaccines.

The findings in the report are also endorsed by Canada’s Communications Security Establishment (CSE) and the US National Security Agency (NSA).

“In recent attacks targeting COVID-19 vaccine research and development, the group conducted basic vulnerability scanning against specific external IP addresses owned by the organisations. The group then deployed public exploits against the vulnerable services identified,” the advisory adds.

It concludes by assessing APT29 is “likely” to continue to target organisations involved in COVID-19 vaccine R&D — as “they seek to answer additional intelligence questions relating to the pandemic”.

“It is strongly recommended that organisations use the rules and IOCs [indicators of compromise] in the [report] appendix in order to detect the activity detailed in this advisory,” it adds, flagging compromise indicators and detection and mitigation advice contained in the document.

Responding to the advisory the UK government condemned what it called Russia’s “irresponsible” cyber attacks against COVID-19 vaccine development.

“It is completely unacceptable that the Russian Intelligence Services are targeting those working to combat the coronavirus pandemic,” said foreign secretary, Dominic Raab, in a statement. “While others pursue their selfish interests with reckless behaviour, the UK and its allies are getting on with the hard work of finding a vaccine and protecting global health.”

“The UK will continue to counter those conducting such cyber attacks, and work with our allies to hold perpetrators to account,” he added.

Last month EU lawmakers named Russia and China as states behind major disinformation campaigns related to the coronavirus which they said had targeted Internet users in the region.

The European Commission is working on a pan-EU approach to tackling the spread of damaging falsehoods online.

Russian election meddling

The NCSC advisory follows hard on the heels of an assertion by Raab that Russia attempted to influence the 2019 UK election via the online amplification of leaked documents.

“On the basis of extensive analysis, the government has concluded that it is almost certain that Russian actors sought to interfere in the 2019 general election through the online amplification of illicitly acquired and leaked government documents,” Raab said in a statement yesterday.

The Guardian reports that UK intelligence agencies have spent months investigating how a 451-page dossier of official emails ended up with the opposition Labour party during the election campaign — providing an opportunity for then leader Jeremy Corbyn to make political capital out of details related to UK-US trade talks.

Back in 2017 former UK and Conservative prime minister, Theresa May, also warned publicly that Russia was trying to meddle in Western elections. However she failed to act on a series of recommendations from a parliamentary committee that scrutinized the democratic threats posed by online disinformation.

The timing of this latest flurry of Russian cyberops warnings from UK state sources is especially interesting in light of a much delayed report by the UK parliament’s Intelligence & Security Committee (ISC) into Russia’s role in election interference.

Publication of this report was blocked last year on orders of prime minister, Boris Johnson. But, this week, an attempt by Number 10 to install Chris Grayling, a former secretary of state for transport, as chair of the ISC was thwarted after Conservative MP Julian Lewis sided with opposition MPs to vote for himself as new committee chair instead.

Publication of the long delayed Russia report is now imminent, after the committee voted unanimously for it to be released next week before parliament breaks for the summer.

Last November The Guardian newspaper reported that the dossier examines allegations Russian money has flowed into British politics in general and to the Conservative party in particular; as well as looking into claims Russia launched a major influence operation in 2016 in support of Brexit.

In 2017, under pressure from the DCMS committee, Facebook admitted Russian agents had used its platform to try to interfere in the UK’s referendum on EU membership — though it claimed not to have found “significant coordination” of ad buys or political misinformation targeting the Brexit vote.

Last year, former ISC chair, Dominic Grieve, called for the Russia report to be published before election day — saying it contained knowledge “germane” to voters.

Instead, Johnson blocked publication — going on to be elected with a huge Conservative majority.

The U.S. App Store’s downloads have surpassed China’s downloads for the first time since 2014, in a new milestone. According to data from Sensor Tower’s Q2 2020 report, out today, the U.S. App Store saw 27.4% year-over-year growth in the quarter, compared to the 2.1% growth for the China App Store. During the quarter, the U.S. App Store generated 2.22 billion new installs compared with China’s 2.06 billion downloads, to regain the top position. This then translated to the U.S. beating China on App Store consumer spend, as well.

Contributing the shift, was the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on both China and the U.S.

The U.S. surpassed China on installs beginning in April and lasting all the way through June, the firm found.

China in Q2, meanwhile, was coming down from its own abnormally high number of downloads in March and April, due to COVID-19. But as its download figures began to normalize, the pandemic was wreaking havoc in the U.S., where it had hit slightly later.

This led to the U.S. to see a surge in downloads as suddenly, the population was forced to work from home, attend school from home, and entertain themselves at home with apps, games and streaming services.

Image Credits: Sensor Tower

Sensor Tower tells TechCrunch there was particularly significant growth in U.S. business and education apps in Q2, as a result. These categories were the largest contributors to the U.S. surpassing China’s installs.

Business app downloads grew 133.3% in Q2, followed by education (84.4%), health & fitness (57.7%), news 44.9%), and social networking (42.4%).

Image Credits:

Video conferencing app Zoom, in particular, had a breakout quarter and even shattered the record for App Store installs with nearly 94 million total downloads in a single quarter. The prior record had been set by TikTok, which had in Q1 2020 seen 67 million downloads in a single quarter. No other non-game app has ever surpassed 50 million installs in a quarter, Sensor Tower noted.

TikTok still had a strong Q2, with nearly 71 million App Store downloads in the quarter, representing 154% year-over-year growth. Its top two download markets were both the U.S. and China — the latter where it’s known as Douyin.

Image Credits: Sensor Tower

Mobile gaming was also a big hit in the U.S., as people stayed home under government lockdowns. Top mobile games by App Store downloads included titles like Save The Girl, Roblox, Go Knots 3D, Coin Master, Tangle Master 3D, Fishdom, ASMR Slicing, Call of Duty: Mobile, and others.

On this front, Roblox had a stellar quarter as kids stayed at home and went online gaming, due to being disconnected from school and their playmates in real-life. Roblox’s gaming app shot up the U.S. rankings from No. 11 in Q1 2020 to No. 2 in Q2, and achieved a new high of 8.6M downloads in the quarter.

Rollic Games had two hits in the quarter, Go Knots 3D and Tangle Master 3D, each with over 5 million App Store downloads. Its Repair Master 3D title also came in at No. 20.

Both Zoom and Rollic Games were the only new top publishers to find themselves in the top 10 on the App Store in Q2, the report found.

Image Credits: Sensor Tower

Though the U.S. surpassed China in the quarter for the first time in years, the rest of the top five — Japan, Great Britain, and Russia — remained the same as last quarter, though growing on a year-over-year basis.

Related to the surge of new downloads, the U.S. also surpassed China on consumer spending on the App Store for the first time since Q4 2018 — but that was only by 1.6% (around $53M).  In Q2 2020, the U.S. surpassed China by 14% or about $717 million.

The U.S. also saw more significant quarter-over-quarter growth in spending during the COVID-19 outbreak growing 20% between Q1 and Q2. In China, the consumer spending growth on the App Store was just 5% between Q4 2019 and Q1 2020, when it felt the full impact of the virus.

Over 2,500 mobile games have been removed from China’s App Store during the first week of July, according to a new report from app store intelligence firm Sensor Tower. The removals were expected due to a planned crackdown on unlicensed games, but this data is the first to demonstrate the impact on the app economy.

For comparison, the July figure is four times the number of games that were delisted during the first week of April, five times higher than the first week of May, and over four times higher than the first week of June.

The removals have to do with Apple’s new compliance with Chinese gaming regulations.

Apple earlier this year set a deadline of June 30 for app developers to comply with a Chinese law for mobile games, first introduced in 2016. The law requires game developers offering paid downloads or in-app purchases to get a license from one of the country’s censorship bodies, the General Administration of Press and Publication of China.

For years, iPhone game developers had skirted the law by publishing their games then waiting for their license approval. This can be a long and tedious process that could take many months, or longer if there’s a freeze underway — as in 2018. Then, the gaming industry saw a 9-month halt on the issuing of licenses as Chinese regulators reshuffled their duties to clamp down further on games containing pornography, gambling, violence and and any other content deemed inappropriate by Beijing.

Major Android app stores had already enforced the 2016 rule, but Apple’s loophole allowed a mobile gaming industry to thrive on the iPhone platform in China for years.

Apple’s decision was expected to see the removal of thousands of games from the App Store, starting July. Sensor Tower data indicates that came to pass.

However, its data is only able to capture those games that saw enough downloads to rank in the App Store’s charts, including the game subcategory charts.

Out of the 2,500+ games that were pulled, nearly 2,000 (80%) had less than 10,000 downloads since the start of 2012, the firm estimates. Together, the titles had seen a total of 133.4 million lifetime downloads.

Combined, the removed games generated $34.7 million in lifetime gross revenue, with one game accounting for more than $10 million and 6 that earned over $1 million.

Notable removals included Contract Killer Zombies 2 from Glu, Solitaire from Zynga, ASMR Slicing from Crazy Labs, Nonstop Chuck Norris from Flaregames. More recently, Hay Day from Supercell was also taken down.

The changes to the gaming market as well as the coronavirus impact on the app economy have already allowed the U.S. to reclaim the top spot in terms of iOS consumer spend in Q2. According to App Annie, the U.S. saw 30% quarter-over-quarter growth in iOS consumer spend in Q2, besting China.

The longer-term fallout from the removals may show up in Apple’s bottom line, as China has been the most lucrative mobile games market in the world, noted Sensor Tower, including on iOS. In 2019, games on China’s App Store generated an estimated $12.6 billion, or 33.2% of all global games spending on Apple’s marketplace last year, the firm said.

The UK government has confirmed a widely expected U-turn related to “high risk” 5G vendors linked to the Chinese state — attributing the policy shift to the US recently imposing tighter sanctions on Huawei’s access to its technologies.

UK digital minister Oliver Dowden told parliament the new policy will bar telcos from buying 5G kit from Huawei and ZTE to install in new network builds from the end of this year. While any of their kit that’s already been installed in UK 5G networks must be removed by 2027.

Although legislation to enable the enforcement of the policy has still to be laid before parliament and could face challenges from MPs who want to seek a more rapid removal of Huawei kit.

Yesterday telco BT warned against any overly rapid rip-out of existing Huawei kit, suggesting it could cause mobile network outages, generate security risks and further delay upgrades to the country’s fiber broadband network which the government included in its manifesto. BT CEO Philip Jansen had suggested an ideal timeframe of seven years to remove existing Huawei 5G kit so the government appears to have served up its best case scenario, while still piling additional cost on next-gen network builds.

Dowden conceded that the new policy will also delay the rollout of UK 5G networks but claimed the government is prioritizing security over economic considerations.

“Clearly since January the situation has changed. On the 15th of May the US Department of Commerce announced that new sanctions had been imposed against Huawei through changes to the foreign direct product rules. This was a significant material change and one that we have to take into consideration,” he told parliament.

“These sanctions are not the first attempt by the US to restrict Huawei’s ability to supply equipment to 5G networks. They are, however, the first to have potentially severe impacts on Huawei’s ability to supply new equipment in the United Kingdom. The new US measures restrict Huawei’s abilities to produce important products using US technology or software.”

Dowden said the National Cyber Security Center had reviewed the new US sanctions and “significantly” changed their security assessment as a result — saying the government would publish a summary of the advice that had led to the policy U-turn when challenged on the U-turn by the shadow digital minister.

“Given the uncertainty this creates around Huawei’s supply chain the UK can no longer be confident it will be able to guarantee the security of future Huawei 5G equipment affected by the change in US foreign direct product rules,” Dowden added.

A Telecoms Security Bill had been slated to be introduced before the summer recess but will now be delayed until autumn given the policy swerve.

In terms of costs and time associated with restricting and then ripping out Huawei kit from UK 5G networks, Dowden suggested it would add between two to three years more to 5G rollouts — and cost up to £2BN.

“We have not taken this decision lightly and I must be frank about the consequences for every constituency in this country,” he said. “This will delay our roll out of 5G. Our decisions in January had already set back that rollout by a year and cost up to a billion pounds. Today’s decision to ban the procurement of new Huawei 5G equipment from the end of this year will delay the rollout by a further year and will add up to half a billion pounds to costs.”

The additional set of requiring operators to rip out existing Huawei 5G kit by 2027 will entail “hundreds of millions of pounds” more to their costs.

“This will have real consequences for the connections on which all our connections relay,” he further cautioned, warning against that going any “faster and further” than the 2027 target — saying to do so would add “considerable and unnecessary” additional costs and delays.

“The shorter we make the timetable for removal the greater the risk of actual disruption to mobile networks,” he also said.

It’s a very significant change of government policy vs the package of restrictions announced in January when Boris Johnson’s government expressed confidence it could manage any risk associated with vendors with deep links to the Chinese state.

And Dowden faced a barrage of questions from opposition politicians about the “screeching U-turn” and the associated delays to the UK’s 5G network infrastructure from not having taken this decision six months earlier. 

Shadow digital minister Chi Onwurah said the government’s digital policy lay in tatters — and called for it to set up a multi-stakeholder taskforce to lead the infrastructure charge. “This entire saga has shown that the government cannot sort this mess out on their own,” she said. “We need a taskforce of industry representatives, academics, startups, regional government and regulators to develop a plan which delivers a UK [5G] network capability and security mobile network in the shortest possible timeframe.”

On government backbenches, Dowden’s statement was more broadly welcomed. Although Johnson has faced significant internal opposition from a group of rebel MPs in his own party to his earlier Huawei policy so it remains to be seen whether they can be convinced to back the new package. One rebel MP source, speaking to the Guardian, warned the fight is back on — saying they’ll table amendments to the telecoms security bill to further shrink the timeframe to rip out Huawei kit, including also for 3G and 4G, not just 5G.

On the issue of what’s to be done with kit from high risk vendors that’s in use in non-5G networks, the government sought to slip in another delay today — with Dowden telling parliament the issue “needs to be looked at”, and announcing a “technical consultation with operators to understand their supply chain alternatives”.

“Given there is only one other appropriate scale vendor for full fiber equipment we are going to embark on a short technical consultation with operators to understand their supply chain alternatives. So that we can avoid unnecessary delays to our Gigabit ambitions and prevent significant resilience risks,” he said.

The technical consultation will determine government policy toward Huawei outside 5G networks, Dowden added.

The government has said before it’s taking steps to increase diversification in the supply chain around 5G network infrastructure kit. Dowden reiterated that line today, saying the UK is working with Five Eyes partners to try to accelerate diversification, while tempering the ambition by couching it as a global problem.

Over the longer term he said the UK wants to encourage and support operators to use multiple vendors per network as standard, though again he cautioned that the development of such open RAN networks will take time.

In the nearer, medium term, he suggested other large scale vendors would be needed to step in — saying the government is already having technical discussions with alternative telecoms kit makers, including Samsung and NEC, about accessing the UK market to plug the gap opened up by the removal of Huawei equipment.

“We are already engaging extensively with operators and vendors and governments around the world about supporting and accelerating the process of diversification. We recognize that this is a global issue that requires international collaboration to deliver a lasting solution so we’re working with our Five Eyes partners and our friends around the world to bring together a coalition to deliver our shared goals,” he added.

We’ve reached out to Huawei for comment.

Luckin Coffee has replaced co-founder and (now ex-) chairman Charles Zhengyao Lu, despite his efforts to maintain control over the troubled Beijing-based coffee chain. The company disclosed in an SEC filing on Monday that Jinyi Guo, another co-founder, board member and former acting chief executive of Luckin, has been appointed as its new chairman and chief executive officer.

In today’s SEC filing, Luckin also said a total of four directors have left the board (Lu, David Hui Li, Erhai Liu and Sean Shao) and two new independent directors have been appointed. The new additions are Jie Yang, vice dean of the business school at the China University of Political Science and Law, and Ying Zeng, who was a partner at law firm Orrick Herrington and Sutcliffe and previously served as El Paso Corporation’s vice president and country manager for China.

The company’s disclosure comes after weeks of strife during which Lu sought to hold onto control of Luckin. Earlier this month, an attempt by Luckin Coffee’s directors to remove Lu as chairman failed to get enough votes during a board meeting.

The proposal to oust Lu was made on June 26 after an internal investigation found that Luckin Coffee’s net revenue in 2019 was inflated by about RMB 2.12 billion (US $300 million) and that fabrication of transactions began in April 2019, with Lu, former chief operating officer Jenny Zhiya Qian and several other employees participating in the false reports.

Luckin Coffee disclosed last month that Nasdaq had decided to delist the company, a spectacular fall from grace after it raised $651 million in its United States public offering in May before allegations of fraud caused its stock to plummet.

The chief executive of UK incumbent telco BT has warned any government move to require a rapid rip-out of Huawei kit from existing mobile infrastructure could cause network outages for mobile users and generate its own set of security risks.

Huawei has been the focus of concern for Western governments including the US and its allies because of the scale of its role in supplying international networks and next-gen 5G, and its close ties to the Chinese government — leading to fears that relying on its equipment could expose nations to cybersecurity threats and weaken national security.

The UK government is widely expected to announce a policy shift tomorrow, following reports earlier this year that it would reverse course on so called “high risk” vendors and mandate a phase out of use of such kit in 5G networks by 2023.

Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today program this morning, BT CEO Philip Jansen said he was not aware of the detail of any new government policy but warned too rapid a removal of Huawei equipment would carry its own risks.

“Security and safety in the short term could be put at risk. This is really critical — because if you’re not able to buy or transact with Huawei that would mean you wouldn’t be able to get software upgrades if you take it to that specificity,” he said.

“Over the next five years we’d expect 15-20 big software upgrades. If you don’t have those you’re running gaps in critical software that could have security implications far bigger than anything we’re talking about in terms of managing to a 35% cap in the access network of a mobile operator.”

“If we get a situation where things need to go very, very fast then you’re in a situation where potentially service for 24M BT Group mobile customers is put into question,” he added, warning that “outages would be possible”.

Back in January the government issued a much delayed policy announcement setting out an approach to what it dubbed “high risk” 5G vendors — detailing a package of restrictions it said were intended to mitigate any risk, including capping their involvement at 35% of the access network. Such vendors would also be entirely barred them from the sensitive “core” of 5G networks. However the UK has faced continued international and domestic opposition to the compromise policy, including from within its own political party.

Wider geopolitical developments — such as additional US sanctions on Huawei and China’s approach to Hong Kong, a former British colony — appear to have worked to shift the political weather in Number 10 Downing Street against allowing even a limited role for Huawei.

Asked about the feasibility of BT removing all Huawei kit, not just equipment used for 5G, Jansen suggested the company would need at least a decade to do so.

“It’s all about timing and balance,” he told the BBC. “If you wanted to have no Huawei in the whole telecoms infrastructure across the whole of the UK I think that’s impossible to do in under ten years.”

If the government policy is limited to only removing such kit from 5G networks Jansen said “ideally” BT would want seven years to carry out the work — though he conceded it “could probably do it in five”.

“The current policy announced in January was to cap the use of Huawei or any high risk vendor to 35% in the access network. We’re working towards that 35% cap by 2023 — which I think we can make although it has implications in terms of roll out costs,” he went on. “If the government makes a policy decision which effectively heralds a change from that announced in January then we just need to understand the potential implications and consequences of that.

“Again we always — at BT and in discussions with GCHQ — we always take the approach that security is absolutely paramount. It’s the number one priority. But we need to make sure that any change of direction doesn’t lead to more risk in the short term. That’s where the detail really matters.”

Jansen fired a further warning shot at Johnson’s government, which has made a major push to accelerate the roll out of fiber wired broadband across the country as part of a pledge to “upgrade” the UK, saying too tight a timeline to remove Huawei kit would jeopardize this “build out for the future”. Instead, he urged that “common sense” prevail.

“There is huge opportunity for the economy, for the country and for all of us from 5G and from full fiber to the home and if you accelerate the rip out obviously you’re not building either so we’ve got to understand all those implications and try and steer a course and find the right balance to managing this complicated issue.

“It’s really important that we very carefully weigh up all the different considerations and find the right way through this — depending on what the policy is and what’s driving the policy. BT will obviously and is talking directly with all parts of government, [the National] Cyber Security Center, GCHQ, to make sure that everybody understands all the information and a sensible decision is made. I’m confident that in the end common sense will prevail and we will head down the right direction.”

Asked whether it agrees there are security risks attached to an accelerated removal of Huawei kit, the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre declined to comment. But a spokesperson for the NCSC pointed us to an earlier statement in which it said: “The security and resilience of our networks is of paramount importance. Following the US announcement of additional sanctions against Huawei, the NCSC is looking carefully at any impact they could have to the U.K.’s networks.”

We’ve also reached out to DCMS for comment.

After reportedly spending a year and a half working on a cloud service meant for China and other countries, Google cancelled the project, called “Isolated Region,” in May due partly to geopolitical and pandemic-related concerns. Bloomberg reports that Isolated Region, shut down in May, would have enabled it to offer cloud services in countries that want to keep and control data within their borders.

According to two Google employees who spoke to Bloomberg, the project was part of a larger initiative called “Sharded Google” to create data and processing infrastructure that is completely separate from the rest of the company’s network. Isolated Region began in early 2018 in response to Chinese regulations that mean foreign tech companies that want to enter the country need to form a joint venture with a local company that would hold control over user data. Isolated Region was meant to help meet requirements like this in China and other countries, while also addressing U.S. national security concerns.

Bloomberg’s sources said the project was paused in China in January 2019, and focus was redirected to Europe, the Middle East and Africa instead, before Isolated Region was ultimately cancelled in May, though Google has since considered offering a smaller version of Google Cloud Platform in China.

After the story was first published, a Google representative told Bloomberg that Isolated Region wasn’t shut down because of geopolitical issues or the pandemic, and that the company “does not offer and has not offered cloud platform services inside China.”

Instead, she said Isolated Region was cancelled because “other approaches we were actively pursuing offered better outcomes. We have a comprehensive approach to addressing these requirements that covers the governance of data, operational practices and survivability of software. Isolated Region was just one of the paths we explored to address these requirements.”

Alphabet, Google’s parent company, broke out Google Cloud as its own line item for the first time in its fourth-quarter and full-year earnings report, released in February. It revealed that its run rate grew 53.6% during the last year to just over $10 billion in 2019, making it a more formidable rival to competitors Amazon and Microsoft.