Alexa, read my mind: AI assistants will soon be able to anticipate our needs and respond to them, so we can stop micromanaging Alexa, said Alexa senior VP Tom Taylor, speaking at the Web Summit tech conference in Lisbon this week. This evolving “ambient intelligence” will use AI to weave together devices and intelligent services, and is the future of personal assistants, according to Taylor. Alexa Routines already allows users to program the device to perform recurring actions at a specific time of day or in response to a trigger sound, paving the way for the device to perform more complex, independent tasks. Since it first launched seven years ago, Alexa has gone from performing 13 simple tasks to 130k skills, recording bns of interactions each week.

You can now buy your very own Pulp Fiction scene: Quentin Tarantino is jumping on the NFT bandwagon, auctioning off uncut scenes from Pulp Fiction, according to CNBC. The scenes will also come with original handwritten scripts from the film and audio commentary from Tarantino himself. The collectibles will be auctioned on NFT marketplace OpenSea which supports tokens built on the so-called Secret Network, allowing more privacy and anonymity, meaning the content will only be viewable by the owners of these NFTs. Hollywood has taken a liking to these kinds of transactions with MGM recently partnering with digital collectibles platform VeVe to launch NFTs for James Bond film No Time to Die. We’ll be keeping an eye on how much the Pulp Fiction NFTs sell for. Considering the number of die-hard Tarantino fans out there, we’re guessing a lot.

Or for the sneakerheads… a digital Nike sneaker: Major sneaker brand Nike is the latest to bring its shoes into the metaverse, with the company filing trademark applications to allow it to sell digital versions of its sneakers, according to the Wall Street Journal. The boom in digital sneaker sales picked up earlier this year with RTFKT Studios bringing in USD 3.1 mn in just seven minutes in their virtual shoe sale. While the rise of digital clothing has been a trend for a while now, Nike seeking intellectual property rights in the digital world shows the company’s confidence that the metaverse could drive new revenue streams while indicating a new frontier for trademarking brands.

As demand rises for electronics, global chipmakers struggle to limit emissions. With research showing that energy intensive chip manufacturing accounts for the majority of an electronic device’s carbon footprint, chipmakers will struggle to achieve their net zero-targets unless they shift to clean energy sources, amid an increased demand for electronics that drove the global micro-chip shortage earlier this year. The world’s three largest chip-makers — the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), Samsung, and Intel — have all pledged to reduce carbon emissions and shift to renewables, according to CNBC. TSMC, which produced 15 mn tons of emissions in 2020 alone, has pledged to reach zero emissions by 2050 and shift to 40% renewable energy by 2030, though its emissions are still increasing rapidly due to expansion. Manufacturing accounts for up to 80% of the carbon emissions produced over an electronic device’s lifecycle, according to Greenpeace East Asia’s Program Manager.

Israeli pharma company TEVA raised a record USD 5 bn from its “sustainability-linked” bonds but investors are raising flags on what they say is a lack of transparency in how the Israel-based company will use the record amount it raised from the sale, according to the Financial Times. It is seemingly unclear whether the bond actually has ESG goals, and the instrument provides little recourse should the company fail to achieve its sustainability objectives, leaving its potential backers in a state of flux. It also involves Teva using new debt to refinance repayments that will come due from next year. Sustainability-linked bonds are broader in their goals than green bonds, which direct proceeds to specific environmentally-friendly projects.