Venture Beat reports:
The Trump administration took measures to crimp exports of artificial intelligence software as part of a bid to keep sensitive technologies out of the hands of rival powers like China. Under a new rule which goes into effect on Monday, companies that export certain types of geospatial imagery software from the United States must apply for a license to send it overseas.“They want to keep American companies from helping the Chinese make better AI products that can help their military." The measure covers software that could be used by sensors, drones, and satellites to automate the process of identifying targets for both military and civilian ends
“They want to keep American companies from helping the Chinese make better AI products that can help their military,” said James Lewis, a technology expert with the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank. The rule will likely be welcomed by industry, Lewis said, because it had feared a much broader crackdown on exports of most artificial intelligence hardware and software.
The measure covers software that could be used by sensors, drones, and satellites to automate the process of identifying targets for both military and civilian ends, Lewis said, noting it was a boon for industry, which feared a much broader crackdown on exports of AI hardware and software.
The measure is the first to be finalized by the Commerce Department under a mandate from a 2018 law, which tasked the agency with writing rules to boost oversight of exports of sensitive technology to adversaries like China, for economic and security reasons. Reuters first reported that the agency was finalizing a set of narrow rules to limit such exports in a boon to U.S. industry that feared a much tougher crackdown on sales abroad.
The rule will go into effect in the United States alone, but U.S. authorities could later submit it to international bodies to try to create a level playing field globally. It comes amid growing frustration from Republican and Democratic lawmakers over the slow roll-out of rules toughening up export controls, with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, a Democrat, urging the Commerce Department to speed up the process.
“While the government believes that it is in the national security interests of the United States to immediately implement these controls, it also wants to provide the interested public with an opportunity to comment on the control of new items,” the rule release said.2019's U.S. TV advertising trends across Amazon, Apple, Google, Facebook, and Microsoft
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First, a topline insight: For each of the brands below, sports, and especially NFL football, reigns supreme for both spend and TV ad impressions. Excluding Facebook Watch, which primarily opted for ads during NBA basketball and skipped NFL games entirely this year, these specific brands combined have spent 69.81% more on ads during NFL football games than last year, and in turn have seen a 49.89% increase in impressions year-over-year.
With the avalanche of OTT/streaming options for consumers, sports remains one of the best ways to ensure a live, captive audience — but that’s not the whole story. News and late night talk shows also feature heavily when it comes to the programming with the most spend and highest impressions for the tech marketers we tracked.
We also uncovered interesting differences in frequency and duration of campaigns (more specifics below), but it’s worth noting that in general, Amazon Prime — although it didn’t start airing ads until the end of February — has generally been the most continuous spender on TV advertising, followed by Microsoft Surface.
Microsoft Surface is a big spender, but Amazon Prime sees biggest year-over-year growth
One of the biggest tech spenders on TV advertising last year was Microsoft, specifically for its Surface brand. The company spent an estimated $219.1 million on ads for the product, an 18.76% increase year-over-year. But that increase is modest compared to what we saw with Amazon Prime this year: The subscription service upped its spend on TV ads by an incredible 487.07%, although the total estimated spend still comes in under Surface at $210.1 million.
It’s important to note that more spend doesn’t always equal more impressions. Although Microsoft shelled out more on Surface ads than Amazon Prime, commercials for the latter generated more impressions: 11.4 billion compared to 9.06 billion. Another key difference is the number of spots each aired: While Surface ran 23 spots over 15,000 times, Prime’s 14 spots aired over 40,000 times.
For both brands, NFL is king when it comes to budget allocation and impressions generated, and notably both spent nearly an identical amount: $37.2 million for Surface vs. Prime’s $37.5 million. The Walking Dead and NBA Basketball are both No. 4 and 5, respectively, for spend for both. But differences pop up when it comes to second- and third-place programming: On the Surface side of things, The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon had the second highest spend (est. $8.5 million), followed by NHL hockey (est. $6.4 million), compared to Prime’s No. 2 of college football (est. $6.1 million) and Ridiculousness (est. $4.6 million) in third place.
Facebook spent heavily to advertise Groups and Portal
Last year, Facebook prioritized budget on ads that promote its platform in general as well as specific services including Groups, Live, and Marketplace ($147.6 million, a 105.75% YoY increase). Its 12 spots generated 5.8 billion TV ad impressions, with nearly half (2.48 billion) generated by an ad promoting Facebook Groups, featuring a father bringing his daughter to her first baseball game. With that kind of theme, you’d think MLB would be a big target, but Facebook prioritized spend to NFL football, which was also the biggest driver of impressions.
It’s worth noting that Facebook Watch, although with a relatively modest estimated spend of $12.6 million, had the biggest YoY increase in budget (120.46%). That said, its 13 ads have generated nearly 1 billion TV ad impressions. On the other hand, ads for Portal had a much bigger outlay, an estimated $103.7 million, representing a slight year-over-year increase of 12.62%, and its 19 ads generated 4.5 billion TV ad impressions.
Apple and Google focus on specific products
Although these two juggernauts promote myriad products, we’re narrowing things down to focus on two with some of the biggest TV ad budgets this year: the iPad and Chromebook.
Although the iPad was the product Apple pushed the most on TV last year, there have been only two main windows of activity: during January, when a single ad ran up 824.8 million impressions with an estimated spend of $26.4 million, and again in late November through the present, with two versions of the same heartwarming holiday ad, one in Spanish. The English-language spot saw an estimated outlay of $22.4 million and generated 355.6 million TV ad impressions, primarily driven by, you guessed it, NFL football (162.6 million impressions). The version in Spanish had a much smaller estimated outlay ($210,700) and 20.8 million impressions, all from shows on Telemundo and Univision.
Overall, iPad ads have had an estimated TV ad budget of $49.1 million, whereas Google spent an estimated $76.6 million on ads for its Chromebook, with over 11,000 airings that have generated 5.07 billion TV ad impressions. While, yes, the NFL delivered big (195.6 million impressions), morning news shows and The Big Bang Theory (episodes of the final season earlier this year, plus reruns on TBS) are also in the top five for impressions generated for Google Chromebook.
“Switch,” encouraging computer users to ditch their old laptops for the Chromebook, was its most-seen ad, with 1.86 billion impressions and an estimated spend of $32.3 million. Google also targeted a Spanish-language audience, with five of its 20 Chromebook spots running in Spanish.
Holiday season trends (November 25 through December 25)
Of the brands/products mentioned above, Facebook Portal had the biggest spend from Thanksgiving to Christmas, with an estimated outlay of $40.1 million — but that represented a 25.35% decrease from the same period in 2018.
Facebook also owned the most-seen spot in this time frame: the Christmasy, feel-good “Mama Claus” ad promoting Facebook Groups, with 770.6 million impressions. The biggest push for this spot occurred on Thanksgiving Day, during NFL football and the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, which combined generated over 48 million TV ad impressions, with about 24 million each.
Speaking of football, while NFL and college football were big drivers of impressions between Thanksgiving and Christmas, airings of the holiday classic “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation” on AMC also made the top five list of programs for impressions for Facebook, Apple iPad, and Google Chromebook.
What’s to come
There’s no denying the importance of news and sports when it comes to capturing live viewers, and we expect to see continued increases in those programming categories in 2020 for tech marketers. But another area to watch is Spanish-language programming. Of the brands mentioned above, four ran Spanish-language TV ads (Surface, Facebook Watch, iPad, and Chromebook).
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