The U.S. tech giant is reportedly making plans to create an all-in-one app that combines web search, news feeds, shopping, messaging and other functions to break Google and Apple’s monopoly on mobile search. The company’s top executives were partly inspired by China-based Tencent’s WeChat app where users don’t have to leave the app to access other services, sources told The Information. (The Information)
The food-delivery app said Canadian restaurants will now be able to choose between three plans—with commissions ranging between 20 and 29 per cent—that offer more services, such as a larger delivery area, for the highest tier. (The Logic)
The Canadian government’s per-capita spending on cloud computing is one-third that of the U.S. government, Deloitte has found, a slowness the consulting firm argued is holding back service improvements and efficiencies. (The Logic)
Lam will leave the user-generated fiction platform at the end of the year to “pursue new ventures,” the company said in a blog post. KB Nam, previously head of strategy and research at Naver Webtoon, will replace her on an interim basis. (The Logic)
In a call with reporters during his trade mission in Germany and Belgium, Innovation Minister François-Philippe Champagne said he has been reassuring companies that Canada will honour its fall economic statement promises to keep Canada competitive in the wake of the U.S. Inflation Reduction Act. (The Logic)
The Canadian billionaire entrepreneur will step down in January, just days after Salesforce co-CEO Bret Taylor’s surprise resignation. Salesforce acquired the communications platform in 2020 in a US$27.7-billion deal following Slack’s 2019 IPO. (The Logic)
The provincial agency Innovate BC will operate the Integrated Marketplace Initiative, identifying testbeds where groups of large organizations will pilot participating startups’ solutions, then can buy from them if they prove successful. (The Logic)
Voluntary deals with “big digital platforms like Google and Meta” aren’t enough to support New Zealand’s journalism outlets—and especially small community newspapers, Broadcasting Minister Willie Jackson said Sunday. The government will bring in mandatory bargaining for payments to Kiwi outlets as a backstop, he said, citing as a model Canada’s in-progress legislation to do the same. (The Logic)
The provider of online tools for educators said it has entered into a deal to acquire Aktiv, a New York-based provider of interactive learning solutions for STEM subjects. The companies did not disclose the deal’s financial details. (The Logic)
The bill, enacted in August, includes US$369 billion in funding for clean energy projects, EV tax credits and other emission-reductions measures. “We believe this runs a real risk of a global subsidies race, which will benefit no one and will actually slow our green transformations,” Valdis Dombrovskis, European Commission executive vice-president, told reporters in Ottawa on Friday. (The Logic)