Consumer Tech News (Mar 17-Mar 21): Google To Acquire Wiz, US Bans DeepSeek, Nvidia Does Big Revealation At GTC 2025 Event & More – Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN)

The U.S. Commerce Department has reportedly banned Chinese artificial intelligence model DeepSeek on government devices.

Technology

Google parent Alphabet Inc. GOOG inked an agreement to acquire cloud security firm Wiz for $32 billion in an all-cash deal.

Young Liu, the CEO of Foxconn FXCOF, also known as Hon Hai Technology, has publicly criticized President Donald Trump’s tariff policy, warning it’s creating chaos for tech giants like Apple and Amazon.com, Inc. 

As the AI race intensifies, Baidu, Inc. BIDU has positioned itself as a serious contender by launching two new models it says rival top competitors.

Once a potential acquisition target for Amazon.com, Inc. AMZN, iRobot Corp IRBT — the maker of Roomba — is now playing catch-up to hold its ground against Chinese competitors.

On The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, LinkedIn co-founder and tech entrepreneur Reid Hoffman voiced concern about Elon Musk’s growing influence over U.S. government operations, warning that treating public service like a startup could come with serious consequences.

Just days ahead of its expected unveiling, Alphabet Inc.’s GOOG subsidiary Google’s Pixel 9a has appeared in full in hands-on video reviews, revealing the budget phone’s refreshed design and upgraded specs.

SoundHound AI, Inc. SOUN is presenting its conversational AI voice technology this week at the 2025 NVIDIA GPU Technology Conference (GTC) in San Jose, California. 

A new memoir by a former Meta Platforms Inc. META executive reveals how Facebook’s massive campaign to promote Free Basics in India was ultimately undone by a single click.

A renowned industry analyst has said that Nvidia Corp.’s NVDA GTC 2025 conference could serve as a key turning point for its stock—but only if the company tackles investor concerns around its next-gen AI chips, server production, and the future of scaling laws.

Nvidia is betting big on embodied AI, with a generalist robot brain that mimics human cognition and could help fill a growing labor gap.

Nvidia just landed another heavyweight deal—this time with General Motors Co GM—and it’s one that could shake up the autonomous driving race.

At the GTC 2025 conference in San Jose, Nvidia announced that the company’s newly released open-source software, Dynamo, can make China’s DeepSeek R1 AI model 30 times faster when run on its latest Blackwell GPU chips.

Nvidia Corporation CEO Jensen Huang dismissed reports that the company is involved in any negotiations to take over Intel Corp’s INTC foundry operations.

Short seller The Bear Cave has taken a swipe at Ibotta Inc IBTA in a new report highlighting slowing growth and collapsing customer and employee relationships.

Smartphones/Electronics

Apple Inc. AAPL is reportedly entering its annual Top 100 executive retreat this week. This comes amid mounting criticism over the company’s stalled artificial intelligence efforts.

Security researchers found that the Passwords app introduced with Apple’s iOS 18 was using unencrypted HTTP connections, exposing users to potential phishing attacks until a quiet fix was issued.

Eric Migicovsky, the creator of the original Pebble smartwatch, has said Apple’s iOS restrictions stifle innovation and make building third-party wearables a painful uphill battle.

After months of investor frustration, Samsung Electronics Co.’s SSNLF leadership is once again on the defensive—this time pledging bold moves to recover lost ground in AI and chip dominance.

Qualcomm Inc. QCOM has launched three new Snapdragon G-series platforms designed to elevate handheld gaming experiences across various platforms.

Artificial Intelligence (AI)

A new study suggests artificial intelligence has officially passed the meme Turing Test, with large language models now generating memes rated funnier than those created by the average human.

A blockchain project backed by Sam Altman is working to fight off AI bots in video games, one of the latest news pieces since the company rebranded from Worldcoin to World Inc.

Andrej Karpathy, the former Tesla autopilot head and an ex-OpenAI researcher has outlined practical steps to improve digital privacy and security, offering a clear roadmap for anyone looking to protect their online identity better.