Image of the week: Back to the future
As yet another sports car gets a good feather-dusting at the inaugural Japan Mobility Show (formerly known as the Tokyo Motor Show), it’s easy to overlook what else is going on in this picture. Yes, it’s a flying car.
The giant shiny egg-poacher thing manifesting above the duster’s head is the Subaru Air Mobility Concept, which has a tinted cabin and five electric turbines. Alas, it doesn’t appear to be going into production any time soon, with Subaru simply saying that it has its aerospace and automotive engineer people working on it. Cool.
Although we’re still some distance from the frantic flying-car world of 2015 depicted in the 1989 film Back to the Future Part II, Japan’s Subaru isn’t the only company pursuing innovations in this space. Also on display in Tokyo was the prototype of a flying car being developed by specialists SkyDrive together with Suzuki, with the two partners intending to make their first deliveries in 2026.
Between these pricey status symbols and all the commercial drones knocking about, the skies of the future could be very busy indeed.
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In numbers: Chocolate high
44
Years since cocoa futures have traded as high as they did on Wall Street this week. Poor El Niño-related weather conditions have hurt crops in top exporters Ivory Coast and Ghana, prompting fears of a supply shortage.
$3,786
Price of cocoa per ton in New York futures markets on Monday. This was the highest level since January 1979. Cocoa prices have surged more than 40 per cent in 2023, leading to higher costs for chocolate makers.
25%
Drop in cocoa arrivals expected this year in ports in Ivory Coast, according to the Coffee and Cocoa Council. The world’s biggest cocoa producer is also encountering resistance from multinationals as it bids to improve how much its impoverished farmers are paid.
Getting to know: Tinder Matchmaker
Dating app Tinder has caught up with a wheeze beloved of television commissioning editors: what if people searching for a partner let their friends and family pick someone out for them? Under a new feature called Matchmaker, Tinder will allow users to create a matchmaking link that can be shared with up to 15 people, who then have 24 hours to recommend profiles on their behalf. What could possibly go wrong?
The good news is that these matchmakers cannot chat or send messages to potential dates on your behalf. The bad news – for those who like the sound of outsourcing decisions about their love-life – is that Matchmaker is, for now, only available in 15 countries and they don’t include Ireland. Insert brokenhearted emoji here.
The list: Cohen-Trump reunion
Popcorn buckets were filled to the brim this week as Michael Cohen, erstwhile lawyer of Donald Trump, strolled into a New York court to testify against the former president in his civil fraud trial. Here are five of the highlights.
1. Five-year catch-up: Cohen, who once claimed he would “take a bullet” for Trump but turned on him in 2018, described the first time they had been in the same room in five years as a “heck of a reunion”.
2. Reverse engineering: Cohen testified that Trump asked him to “reverse engineer” multiple assets to increase their value, with this process based on a number that Trump would pluck out of the air “arbitrarily”.
3. Truth and lies: Asked by Trump’s lawyer Alina Habba if he had “lied under oath numerous times”, Cohen – who pleaded guilty in 2018 to lying in Congress about hush money payments he made on Trump’s behalf – answered “that’s correct”. Your move, Ms Habba.
4. Bon Jovi and the Bills: The case has resurfaced Trump’s failed bid for the Buffalo Bills American football team, which involved a Trump associate attempting a character assassination of rival bidder Jon Bon Jovi. Cohen said Trump had inflated his assets to prove he had the funds to purchase the Bills.
5. Trump’s take: “He’s a proven liar,” the ex-president told reporters as he arrived at court. It’s a crowded field.
