Welcome to the Remark Holdings First Quarter Financial Results Conference Call. Today's conference is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Becky Herrick of LHA. Thank you all for joining us today for the Remark Holdings first quarter 2017 financial results conference call. On the call today are Chairman and CEO, Shing Tao; and CFO, Doug Osrow. After the prepared remarks, we'll open the call for questions. A webcast replay of today's call will be available at www.remarkholdings.com. Some of the statements made today may be forward-looking statements. These statements involve risks, uncertainties and other factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. Any forward-looking statements reflect Remark Holdings current views and Remark Holdings expressly disclaims any obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements after the date hereof. This disclaimer is only a summary of Remark Holdings' statutory forward-looking statements disclaimer which is included in its filings with the SEC.

A judge rejected self-driving company Waymo's request Monday to order Uber to stop using technology that may have been stolen, the Verge reported. Waymo filed a lawsuit in February claiming Uber executives who previously worked at Google had taken self-driving technology with them when they left them company. Those individuals, identified as Anthony Levandowski and Lior Ron in court documents, quit working at Google to start their own self-driving car company called Otto. The company was then purchased by Uber in August. The judge granted Waymo a partial injunction and ordered the return of any and all stolen documents to Waymo, and required Levandowski have nothing further to do with the development of the technology.

A judge has granted a partial reprieve to Uber in its high-profile intellectual property lawsuit with Google's self-driving car operation, allowing the ride-hailing company to continue developing its autonomous vehicle technology. The judge, however, has barred an Uber executive accused of stealing trade secrets from Google spin-off Waymo from continuing to work on self-driving cars' radar technology, and has ordered Uber to return downloaded documents to Waymo. The judge also said that evidence indicates that Waymo's intellectual property has "seeped into Uber's own … development efforts" – suggesting that Uber could face a tough battle as the case moves ahead. Google's lawyers were seeking a broader injunction against Uber, which could have significantly impeded the taxi startup's entire self-driving car program, a move that could have been a fatal setback. The partial victory for Uber follows a judge's recommendation that federal prosecutors launch a criminal investigation into the accusations that it stole Waymo's technology.

Jerry Kaplan does for the future what Jared Diamond did for the past: He pulls together our human (or humanoid) fate in sparkling,often hilarious, prose. Kaplan begins by offering the non scientific reader (me) a clear overview of the AI advances that are poised to make human workers obsolete--offering eye popping examples explaining how the pace of technology is destined to overwhelm the human landscape of life and work. He then charts the changes that span FAR more than driverless cars. Mechanical robots (or what Kaplan calls "forged intelligences") will be more adept (and. of course, far more cost effective) than humans at performing every routine job from collecting our garbage to stocking our grocery shelves (and make those physical stores quaint relics of the past). "Synthetic intelligences" (machines that think and analyze information) will outwit humans at making complex diagnoses or writing legal briefs--automating out many of the hapless law school or medical students spending decades accumulating those mountainous student debts .

Despite what we see on TV, the legal industry has always been rather slow at adopting new technology. Even now, most of a lawyer's research is done the old fashioned way and requires a small army of assistants and paralegals. However, recent advancements in artificial intelligence are set to change that permanently.

The U.S. Department of Justice has begun a criminal investigation into Uber's use of a software tool that helped its drivers evade local transportation regulators, two sources familiar with the situation told Reuters. Anthony Levandowski, shown here during a briefing at a garage owned by his self-driving truck company Otto, which Uber bought in 2016. SAN FRANCISCO -- A judge has ruled that Uber can continue testing its self-driving cars, although one of its lead engineers has been officially barred from working on a part of the project that led Google's self-driving car unit to sue the ride-hailing company over stolen trade secrets. The ruling is a partial victory for Uber after the judge overseeing the lawsuit last week ordered that the case be reviewed separately by the U.S. Attorney for possible criminal charges. The suit was brought by Waymo, the new name for Google's eight-year-old autonomous car program, in February after it says it discovered that a former self-driving project employee, Anthony Levandowski, had downloaded 14,000 files shortly before quitting.

The ruling from U.S. District Judge William Alsup in San Francisco, made public on Monday, said Uber "likely knew" or should have known that the engineer, who now works at Uber, took Waymo materials while Uber was contemplating buying the engineer's company. However, the judge also said few of Waymo's alleged trade secrets have been traced to Uber's self-driving car technology, and that Waymo's patent claims against Uber have proved "meritless."

FILE- In this Dec. 13, 2016, file photo, Anthony Levandowski, head of Uber's self-driving program, speaks about their driverless car in San Francisco. In an order filed Monday, May 15, 2017, a federal judge ordered Uber to stop using technology that Levandowski downloaded before he left Waymo, the Alphabet Inc. autonomous car arm that was spun off from Google. The order filed Monday in a trade secrets theft lawsuit also forces Uber to return all downloaded materials.

Uber's self driving car plans have been thrown into chaos after a federal judge ordered Uber to stop using technology that a key executive downloaded before he left Waymo, the Alphabet Inc. autonomous car arm that was spun off from Google. The order filed Monday in a trade secrets theft lawsuit also forces Uber to return all downloaded materials. Judge William Alsup in San Francisco says in the ruling that Waymo has shown compelling evidence that a former star engineer named Anthony Levandowski downloaded confidential files before leaving Waymo. High-profile: Levandowski, a'swaggering' six-foot-seven tech leader, is one of Silicon Valley's most significant figures in the development of self-driving cars In lidar -- or light detection and ranging -- scanning, one or more lasers sends out short pulses, which bounce back when they hit an obstacle, whether clouds, leaves or rocks. In self-driving cars, the sensors constantly scan the surrounding areas looking for information and acting as the'eyes' of the car.

A federal judge has ordered Uber to stop using technology that a key executive downloaded before he left Waymo, the Alphabet Inc. autonomous car arm that was spun off from Google. The order filed Monday in a trade secrets theft lawsuit also requires Uber to return all downloaded materials. The high-stakes corporate espionage case revolves around Waymo's allegations that Uber's work on self-driving cars has been riding on trade secrets stolen by a former Waymo engineer, Anthony Levandowski. Judge William Alsup in San Francisco said in Monday's ruling that Waymo has shown compelling evidence that Levandowski downloaded confidential files before leaving Waymo. The judge also said evidence shows that before he left Waymo, Levandowski and Uber planned for Uber to acquire a company formed by Levandowski.