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Yandex

The infrastructure of the service is designed bearing high loads in mind to ensure that the system is available and fault-free even if the number of concurrent requests is high. Alice, Yandex Voice assistant, is based on SpeechKit.
The service processes audio and texts in four languages: Russian, English, Ukrainian and Turkish. Yandex SpeechKit composes speech from more than a million individual phonemes, the intonation is set by a neural network trained on numerous examples from real life. HTTP API is provided to exchange data with the service.

Yandex SpeechKit

recognition

The Connectivity Standards Alliance, which includes Yandex and Sber, has released the first version of the Matter standard for smart home devices. It uses Wi-Fi and Thread and allows devices of different manufacturers to work together.

 
 Matter supports light bulbs, switches, outlets, window blinds and curtains, door locks, sensors, and TVs. The next versions will support other devices as well.

 
 <a href="https://ict.moscow/news/mezhdunarodnyi-alians-razrabotchikov-vypustil-edinyi-standart-dlia-ustroistv-umnogo-doma/" target="_blank">Original in Russian</a>

VC.ru

International Alliance of Developers Releases Universal Standard for Smart Home Devices

Yandex has begun the construction of a new data center for 3,800 server racks, which will become the largest data storage and processing center of the holding in Russia. The total design capacity of the site is 63 MW, which is 1.5 times more than the capacity of the most powerful existing data center of the company. The amount of investment was not disclosed.

 
 Yandex will use its own equipment, including the power supply units, during the construction works. The company says, there are no problems with equipment supply, despite the sanctions imposed on high-tech exports to Russia. The first zone of the data center will be opened in the first half of 2023.

 
 So far, Yandex has been using three data centers located in Moscow, Vladimir and Ryazan regions to develop cloud technologies. The new data center will be used to deploy the clients’ equipment, and for loads distribution among several data centers to help ensure fault tolerance of customer apps and reduce data loss risks.

 
 <a href="https://ict.moscow/news/iandeks-nachal-stroitelstvo-svoego-samogo-moshchnogo-v-rossii-data-tsentra/" target="_blank">Original in Russian</a>

Yandex Building Company’s Most Powerful Data Center in Russia

Yandex announces the completion of asset swap with VK. Yandex has acquired the Delivery Club food and grocery delivery service, while VK has acquired Yandex.Zen and Yandex.News in exchange.

 
 Yandex will continue developing the Delivery Club brand, its app and website will still operate. At the same time, the service will complement Yandex.Eats on the single technology platform.

 
 The deal was approved by the Federal Antimonopoly Service.

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 Earlier Yandex was <a href="https://t.me/IFX_Digital/957" target="_blank">reported</a> to have acquired 99.95% of Delivery Club, the remaining shares belonging to GIS Tekhnologii (Yandex subsidiary). The deal was closed on September 8.

 
 The details of the asset swap between Sber, Yandex and VK were <a href="https://ict.moscow/news/iandeks-pokupaet-u-vk-servis-dostavki-delivery-club/" target="_blank">revealed</a> on August 23. VK announced that it would exit the O2O Holding (joint venture with Sber) and would acquire 100% of Delivery Club, which would later be transferred to Yandex. In exchange, VK will get the news aggregator and Zen.

 
 <a href="https://ict.moscow/news/iandeks-zakryl-sdelku-po-prodazhe-dzena-i-novostei-i-pokupke-delivery-club/" target="_blank">Original in Russian</a>

Yandex Sales Zen and News and Acquires Delivery Club

Intertech Services AG, a subsidiary of Yandex, has registered a declaration mentioning the Yandex Hub smart home center. The company is assumed to plan the launch of a hub for controlling smart home devices supporting Zigbee protocol. However, the company does not comment on the information.

 
 The company’s only current device supporting Zigbee protocol is the Yandex.Station smart speaker (second generation). Yandex smart bulbs and plugs connect to the Internet over Wi-Fi. The smart speaker is sold in a package with the devices of Aqara (a Chinese company).

 
 Zigbee is a wireless communication protocol designed for low-power devices. It is used in smart home devices (lighting, sensors, etc.) certified by the Connectivity Standards Alliance (uniting more than 500 members, including Yandex and SberDevices).

 
 <a href="https://ict.moscow/news/iandeks-vypustit-novyi-shliuz-dlia-podkliucheniia-ustroistv-umnogo-doma/" target="_blank">Original in Russian</a>

Kommersant

Yandex to Launch New Gateway for Connecting Smart Home Devices

Mobile operators and EdTech representatives observe the growth of online education market from January to August 2022. According to MTS, the number of mobile users of sites and applications for online education increased by quarter during this period, the number of purchases in this category increased fivefold, and the average purchase amount doubled.

 
 MegaFon says, from January to mid-August, mobile Internet traffic in online services for training IT specialists grew by 87% compared to the same period in 2021.

 
 According to Tele2, the mobile audience on the platforms during this period was distributed as follows - Geekbrains ― 27%, Skillbox ― 26%, Netology ― 20%, Stepik ― 13%, Yandex.Practicum ― 12%.

 
 Skillbox reported a 10% increase in the average purchase amount in 2022 compared to 2021. Traffic fluctuations of 10% yoy were observed on desktops in January-August, mobile traffic remained unchanged.

 
 Yandex.Practicum reported an increase in the number of purchases of its courses by 50% since the beginning of the year compared to last year. The average purchase size on the platform from February to August grew by 30% yoy.

 
 The Skolkovo Foundation EdTech cluster representatives say that in January-August the online education market grew by 3-15%, but the growth rate slowed down - earlier it was about 25-40%.

 
 In the first quarter of the year, the revenue of the top 100 EdTech companies in Russia amounted to 21.7 billion rubles (354.8 million dollars), according to EDtechs.ru. At the end of last year, the overall revenue of the top 100 EdTech companies amounted to 73 billion rubles (1.2 billion dollars), according to Smart Ranking.

 
 <a href="https://ict.moscow/news/kompanii-fiksiruiut-rost-rynka-onlain-obrazovaniia-v-mobilnom-segmente/" target="_blank">Original in Russian</a>

Yandex SpeechKit

Yandex.News

Yandex.Music

Yandex Go

Yandex Pay

CT Scan of the Lungs

FindFace Multi

Voice2Med

VOCO