In today’s Bulldog wrapup of technology news:

  • A startup wants to bring robotic trucks to highways
  • China’s Huawei aims to grow its smartphone brand
  • Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg to meet with conservatives
  • Amazon is expanding its brands, says The Wall Street Journal

The details:

  • Startup wants to put self-driving big rigs on US highways

Picture an 18-wheel truck barreling down the highway with 80,000 pounds of cargo and no one but a robot at the wheel.

To many, that might seem a frightening idea, even at a time when a few dozen of Google’s driverless cars are cruising city streets in California, Texas, Washington and Arizona.

But Anthony Levandowski, a robot-loving engineer who helped steer Google’s self-driving technology, is convinced autonomous big rigs will be the next big thing on the road to a safer transportation system.

Levandowski left Google earlier this year to pursue his vision at Otto, a San Franciscostartup the he co-founded with two other former Google employees, Lior Ron and Don Burnette, and another robotics expert, Claire Delaunay.

Otto is aiming to equip trucks with software, sensors, lasers and cameras so they eventually will be able to navigate the more than 220,000 miles of U.S. highways on their own, while a human driver naps in the back of the cab or handles other tasks.

For now, the robot truckers would only take control on the highways, leaving humans to handle the tougher task of wending through city streets. The idea is similar to the automated pilots that fly jets at high altitudes while leaving the takeoffs and landings to humans.

“Our goal is to make trucks drive as humanly as possible, but with the reliability of machines,” Levandowski says.

  • China’s Huawei looks to build global smartphone brand

Chinese tech giant Huawei wants Americans to start thinking of it as a stylish smartphone brand.

Huawei Technologies Ltd., which pulled out of the U.S. market for network switching gear four years ago due to security fears, became the No. 3 global smartphone seller last year and passed Apple in China. This year, it launched a new flagship smartphone, the P9, and is positioning it to compete with Apple and Samsung.

“China has yet to create a high-end consumer brand. We want to take that goal onto our shoulders,” Eric Xu, one of Huawei’s three rotating co-CEOs, told industry analysts at a meeting in April.

To do that, Huawei must succeed in the United States the second- largest market for handsets after China, accounting for one-sixth of global sales, according to industry analysts. There, it starts with almost no market share and a name that consumers, if they know it at all, might associate with anxiety about possible Chinese spying rather than technology and style.

“It is more difficult than any other market they have ever entered,” said Nicole Peng of research firm Canalys. “I don’t think they have concrete plans yet.”

Outside the United States, the company is cranking up a global marketing campaign for the P9 featuring Hollywood stars Henry Cavill and Scarlett Johansson. For markets from Bangladesh to Mexico, it has recruited pop singers and football teams. It partnered with German photography powerhouse Leica to develop the camera on the P9.

The company has yet to say when it might sell the Android-based P9 to Americans or exactly how it will rebuild its U.S. presence.

“We’re definitely very patient with the U.S. market,” said Joy Tan, Huawei’s president for communications, when asked how it planned to connect with buyers. “We hope these phones will be accepted by American consumers.”

  • Facebook CEO to meet with Glenn Beck, other conservatives

Radio host Glenn Beck and American Enterprise Institute president Arthur Brooks are some of the conservative leaders Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg plans to meet with this week.

The meeting, scheduled for Wednesday, follows a report that Facebook employed bias in the way it selected stories for its “Trending Topics” feature. A report in the tech blog Gizmodo claimed that Facebook downplays conservative news subjects. Facebook denies that report, which relied upon a single anonymous individual with self-describedconservative leanings.

Nonetheless, Zuckerberg said the Menlo Park, California, company is investigating the matter and has invited conservative leaders to meet with him. Others invited include Zac Moffatt, the co-founder of conservative technology company Targeted Victory, and Dana Perino, co-host of The Five on Fox News Channel.

“I want to have a direct conversation about what Facebook stands for and how we can be sure our platform stays as open as possible,” Zuckerberg said in a Facebook post last week.

Facebook has said that a series of checks and balances — involving both software formulas and humans — ensures that stories displayed in the “trending topics” section aren’t biased. In a blog post last week, the company also linked to a 28-page internal document it uses to determine trending topics, after the Guardian published a similar document that was leaked to it.

  • Report says Amazon to expand its store-brand offerings

Amazon is planning to expand the store-brand items it sells to new categories including food and household products, according to a report by The Wall Street Journal.

The new products could include nuts and spices and other consumer goods such as diapers and laundry detergent.

The Wall Street Journal report cites unnamed people familiar with the matter. Amazon.com Inc. declined to comment.

Amazon already sells an array of private-label products, or products designed by a third-party manufacturer and sold under a retailer’s name — usually cheaper than name-brand products — but food would be a new category.

It has been making a push into the grocery aisle, however. It offers Prime Fresh, a $299 annual grocery delivery service, in several cities on the West and East Coasts. Its Prime Pantry service lets you order a box full of groceries for a flat delivery fee of $5.99.

Currently, the Seattle company’s Amazon Basics line includes everything from patio furniture to office products. It also sells clothes under its labels Lark & Ro and Franklin & Freeman and others.

In 2014, Amazon launched its own line of baby wipes, Amazon Elements. Amazon has limited sales of those wipes to members of its $99-a-year Prime program to encourage more shoppers to sign up. According to the WSJ article, the new private-label goods will only be available to Prime members as well.

The move comes as competition in the online grocery delivery sector is heating up. In addition to delivery services such as Fresh Direct and Instacart, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. last month said it’s expanding its service that allows customers to order groceries online and then pick them up in the parking lot of their local store. That service, now available in 150 stores in 22 markets, will be offered in 200 stores in 30 markets.