Tausi Insider

Brookfield Asset Management Inc.’s renewables affiliate is committing to invest up to US$700-million in a newly formed U.S. recycling business, targeting recycled materials as part of the push to cut global carbon emissions. Brookfield Renewable Partners LP has invested an initial US$200-million for a minority stake in Circular Services, a new company that is majority owned and managed by New York-based investment firm Closed Loop Partners. Brookfield Renewable is also committing to invest another US$500-million to help Circular Services grow. The investment is being made through the US$15-billion Brookfield Global Transition Fund, which is co-led by vice chair and former Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney and Brookfield Renewable CEO Connor Teskey. It is Brookfield’s first fund focused on investments intended to help speed the transition to a net-zero economy. Circular Services owns and operates a dozen municipal recycling facilities in the United States. And it has large municipa...

Japanese electronics and entertainment conglomerate Sony Group Corp SONY-N said on Tuesday it has the technology to make humanoid robots quickly once it has identified how they could be effectively used. “In terms of technology, several companies in the world including this one have enough technology accumulated to make them swiftly once it becomes clear which usage is promising,” Sony Chief Technology Officer Hiroaki Kitano told Reuters in an interview. “The key is the development of application,” Kitano said. Sony launched a robot dog called Aibo more than two decades ago. It sold about 150,000 units of Aibo from 1999 until 2006 and launched an advanced version in 2018, selling about 20,000 units in the first six months. Humanoid robots have been in development for decades by Honda Motor Co and Hyundai Motor Co and in September, Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk showed off a prototype of its humanoid robot Optimus. Musk’s company is floating plans to deploy thousands of the robots in...

Samsung is having some neat deals right now, especially if you qualify for their Samsung Offer Programs , which adds up to 30% on some previously-discounted TVs . To qualify , you need an active student email and go through a verification process, though some p eople have noted being able to use family or friends who are still in school . Some employers are also eligible, as well as government workers, first responders, and veterans. If you do mange to get the verification, you can get a 75" Class QN85B Samsung Neo QLED 4K Smart TV for $1,259. The same model sells for $1,797 on Amazon, which has been the lowest price since its release in March , according to Camelcamelcamel . The same model is also available in 55", 65", 85", and 98" sizes at similar discounts. https://www.tausiinsider.com/6-of-the-best-tv-deals-you-can-still-get-before-christmas/?feed_id=328440&_unique_id=6424feb81c0e1

U.S. retail sales rose 7.6% between Nov. 1 and Dec. 24, which encompasses a majority of the holiday season, as steep discounts lured deal-hungry consumers, a Mastercard report showed on Monday. The increase is higher than the 7.1% growth Mastercard had forecast in September, when it anticipated consumers would pull purchases to October in the hunt for early deals. However, this year’s holiday retail sales growth is less than the 8.5% increase last year as decades-high inflation, rising interest rates and the threat of a recession turned consumers cautious. Retailers including Amazon.com Inc and Walmart Inc in the United States offered large discounts during the holiday season to get rid of excess stock and bring back inventories to normal levels. That led to strong demand for everything from toys to electronics during the five-day-long period between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday. However, sales of electronics dropped 5.3% over the broader roughly two-month period, according to the ...

Photo : Kaspars Grinvalds ( Shutterstock ) The new Always-On Displays on the iPhone 14 Pro and iPhone 14 Pro Max provide a nifty way to keep tabs on your smartphone without needing to interact with it. However, Apple’s original design choice was odd: By default, the 14 Pros dim your wallpaper in addition to the clock and notifications, which is both confusing and a presumed battery drain. Apple “fixed” the problem with iOS 16.2 , offering users the option to disable their wallpaper on the AOD . Since the 14 Pro has an OLED display, it can turn off the pixels that aren’t in use. You’d think, then, disabling the wallpaper for AOD, and thus leaving a lot of the display black, would net big battery savings. Well, apparently not. PhoneBuff recently ran a test comparing battery performance of three iPhone 14 Pro Maxes: One with the default AOD with wallpaper enabled, one with only text enabled, and one with the AOD disabled. For added measure, PhoneBuff reset all the phones to be free...

Shoppers visit a Best Buy on Black Friday, in Toronto, on Nov. 26, 2021. Tijana Martin/The Canadian Press Best Buy, BBY-N one of the country’s largest consumer electronics retailers, is laying off about 0.7 per cent of its workforce, estimated to be about 700 employees. Anna LeGresley, a spokeswoman for Best Buy Canada, says the job losses come as the chain works to “support our stores and serve our customers.” LeGresley says some staff have also moved to different stores. It’s unclear whether the restructuring includes any store closures. Best Buy did not share whether the job losses are in both Canada and the U.S., or whether the layoffs include corporate office employees in addition to retail workers. While stores often shed temporary staff after the busy holiday season, the layoffs appear to be more than usual. At the end of fiscal 2022, Best Buy employed approximately 105,000 employees in the U.S. and Canada, according to the company’s annual report. It said its workforce is abo...