TL;DR: Like an intrepid traveler collecting passport stamps, robotaxis are about to hit the road in a slew of cities around the world. This week, Uber revealed plans to bring robotaxis to its network in Japan and said it’s teaming up with three different AV tech providers—the latest example of robotaxi companies leveraging partnerships to boost growth plans. It seems that analysts’ predictions that 2026 would be the year that robotaxis meaningfully scaled beyond the US and China were on point.

What happened: Uber, Nissan, and Wayve (an AV tech provider) announced on Wednesday that they plan to launch a robotaxi service in Japan—with a trial run kicking off in Tokyo later this year. Nissan will supply the vehicles, outfitted with Wayve’s end-to-end autonomous driving software, and Uber will work with a licensed taxi partner to offer autonomous rides on its network (and the ride-hailing giant said today that it’s adding new robotaxis to its network in Las Vegas).

The companies described the move in Japan as “the next milestone” in their global robotaxi rollout, which “includes planned services across more than 10 cities worldwide, including London.” Robotaxis from numerous companies are already ferrying riders around cities in China and a limited but expanding number of cities in the US, as well as making forays into the Middle East, Europe, and other parts of Asia. Chinese robotaxi companies are behind many of these moves—opening yet another front in the US-China tech competition, even as American companies like Uber and Lyft lend their platforms to companies around the world.

New market opportunity: Robotaxi companies see Japan as a natural next step for expansion because of the country’s demographic trends. “When you layer in Japan’s aging and shrinking population, it becomes clear that the demand for autonomous vehicle solutions is at an inflection point,” Tom Tang, chief people and customer operations officer for AV company May Mobility (which operates in Japan), told Tech Brew, citing driver shortages in the country.

Teamwork makes the dream work: Like a college senior, the AV sector is in networking mode. Uber has been on a partnership spree, with more than two dozen deals announced in the last couple of years.

Earlier this week, Amazon-owned Zoox said it’s teaming up with Uber to put its AVs on the ride-hailing company’s platform in Las Vegas later this year and in Los Angeles next year. And today, Hyundai-backed Motional announced that Uber riders traveling to and from a handful of destinations in Las Vegas can now match with Ioniq 5 robotaxis. Riders can accept or decline a driverless ride—and there’s an option in the Uber app for customers to indicate their preference.

Partnering with ride-share companies “can save billions of dollars and many years of leveraging” those networks’ customer bases, Tang said. May Mobility has partnerships with Uber, Lyft, and Grab (a Southeast Asia-based “superapp”).

The bottom line: For years, robotaxis have been limited to a handful of US markets like San Francisco and Phoenix, and to major cities in China like Beijing and Shanghai. Now, the industry is in growth mode, with players like Waymo and Uber racing to significantly scale their AV operations. But some regulatory hurdles remain: New York still requires a human behind the wheel, keeping the largest US taxi market off-limits to robotaxis for now. —JG

We tried the fitness tracker for your metabolism

I don't have diabetes. I don't have prediabetes. But I do have a family history of it, a recurring afternoon energy slump I'd never fully explained, and apparently, a lifelong habit of eating fruit before eggs that was quietly spiking my glucose every morning.

That realization came after a month with the Dexcom Stelo, the first FDA-cleared, over-the-counter glucose biosensor, with no prescription required. You apply a small sensor to the back of your upper arm, and it tracks your glucose regularly for up to 15 days, beaming data to a companion app via Bluetooth. The sensor was barely noticeable day to day—only when washing my arm in the shower, when going to bed (I’m a side sleeper, so had to avoid sleeping on that arm), or when pulling on a long-sleeved shirt—and after 30 days, I got on a call with a Dexcom-provided MD to review my results (it’s fairly easy to share your data with your doctor through a separate Dexcom app).

My glucose was 99% in range (average: 103), which I hadn't expected. Those dramatic spikes and dips I kept seeing? Dr. Grace, the physician who reviewed my data, told me they were actually a good sign, evidence my pancreas was doing its job. And that afternoon slump? Sure enough, it tracked with my glucose dropping. The bigger shift is conceptual: Stelo turns glucose into a trackable vital sign. In the same way people monitor temperature or blood pressure at home, the sensor makes metabolic feedback visible. Over time, that feedback nudges small behavioral changes—like adjusting the order in which I ate my food at breakfast (eating the eggs first didn’t spike my glucose).

For the last two weeks of my trial, I manually tracked everything I ate separately, then cross-referenced it with my glucose data, a tedious process the app's new AI features, which rolled out recently, now handle for you. As Dexcom CEO Jake Leach told me at the Consumer Electronics Show in January, the goal is to help people "understand how different food impacts them." Given that roughly 1 in 3 Americans have prediabetes—most without knowing—it’s an appealing pitch.

The Good: The app is intuitive. The sensor is unobtrusive, and Stelo’s over-the-counter availability lowers the barrier to trying continuous glucose monitoring. The new AI logging tools make it far easier to connect meals with glucose patterns, and the daily insights help translate raw data into something actionable. (Although keep in mind that Stelo is not a replacement for an actual doctor.)

The Bad: Cost is the biggest drawback. A one-time pack of two sensors (30 days) runs $99, or $89 per month with a subscription. It’s FSA/HSA eligible, but still expensive for long-term use. This feels more like a tool for short-term experimentation—a dietary overhaul, a new fitness routine—and not necessarily a forever subscription.

Verdict: Signal —SM

Valve would like to inform you that its video game loot boxes are no different from the ugly-cute blind-box monster dolls your Gen Z cousin collects. PC gaming's dominant storefront compared its in-game mystery boxes to "baseball cards, Pokémon, Magic: The Gathering, and Labubu," responding to a lawsuit filed by the New York attorney general in late February that accuses Valve of promoting illegal gambling. The argument: If it's fine to not know which tiny plush toy you just bought, it should be fine to not know which virtual gun you're getting in Counter-Strike 2, the popular multiplayer game made by Valve. The company pocketed about $1 billion from keys for such CS2 boxes in 2023, not counting the 15% cut it swipes from item resales.

These loot boxes have come under fire for essentially working like slot machines, complete with spinning-wheel animations that build to a grand—or extremely disappointing—reveal. Most contain cosmetic items that give you no edge in the game—part of Valve's defense is that loot boxes are optional, and most players never buy them. The company also says it's locked over 1 million Steam accounts connected to gambling, fraud, and theft to date, which it seems to offer as proof of its anti-vice bona fides. (Or, as the NYAG might argue, a preference for keeping it in-house.)

Valve isn't the first to face the loot box inquisition. Belgium outright banned them in 2018. The Netherlands fined Electronic Arts €10 million (around $11.5 million) over a similar feature before a higher court reversed it. Many gamers say they hate loot boxes too, roasting Valve’s analogy: “They're not wrong, but I think that's more a condemnation of booster packs and labubus than it is a defense of loot boxes,” wrote one Redditor. At least with a Labubu, you're getting a real (if creepy) object to clutch in your hand.

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