Business

The Verge reports: An open letter to SpaceX decrying CEO Elon Musk’s recent behavior has sparked open discussion among the company’s employees in an internal chat system. Employees are being encouraged to sign onto the letter’s suggestions, either publicly or anonymously, with a signed version of the letter to be delivered to the desk of SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell. The …

Reuters reports: IKEA said on Wednesday it would sell factories, close offices and reduce its nearly 28,000-strong workforce in Russia, the latest move by the world’s biggest furniture brand to cut its operations there following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. The move comes after IKEA temporarily closed stores and paused sourcing in Russia, joining a mass corporate exodus as Western companies …

People Magazine reports: After first announcing the decision last year, Microsoft will shut down Internet Explorer on Wednesday. The move comes about 27 years after the company first debuted the browser. Starting Wednesday, most people who try to open the application will be directed to Microsoft Edge — the company’s newer browser. Although the browser is nowhere near as popular …

Ad Age reports: Last week, Burger King Austria caused a stir on social media with its “Pride Whopper” campaign that didn’t quite land as intended with the LGBTQ+ community. The agency behind it, Jung von Matt Donau, has apologized. “The intended message of the ‘Pride Whopper’ was to spread equal love and equal rights,” the Austrian outpost of Germany-based Jung …

Business Insider reports: Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal told workers on Monday that the company will be hosting another all hands meeting, this time with a guest speaker fielding questions: Elon Musk. In a brief email viewed by Insider, Agrawal said the virtual meeting with Musk will take place Thursday. Twitter workers will be able to submit questions for him to …

CNBC reports: Bitcoin tumbled below $23,000 on Monday, hitting its lowest level since December 2020, as investors dump crypto amid a broader sell-off in risk assets. Meanwhile, a crypto lending company called Celsius has paused withdrawals for its customers, sparking fears of contagion into the broader market. Over the weekend and into Monday morning, more than $200 billion had been …

Reuters reports: It might look and smell like McDonald’s but now it’s Vkusno & tochka. The golden arches are gone, the Filet-O-Fish is simply a fish burger. The Big Mac has left Russia. A new era for Russia’s fast-food and economic scene dawned on Sunday, as McDonald’s restaurants flung open their doors in Moscow under new Russian ownership and with …

The New York Times reports: Starbucks’s chief executive, Howard Schultz, says the company is considering ending its open bathroom policy. Speaking on Thursday at The Times’s DealBook D.C. policy forum, Mr. Schultz said the coffee giant might no longer allow people who were not customers to use their stores’ bathrooms. The move would reverse a policy Starbucks instituted in 2018 …

Axios reports: CEOs of more than 220 U.S. companies on Thursday will release a letter calling on the Senate to “take immediate action” to reduce gun violence, Axios has learned exclusively. Why it matters: This is the latest example of corporate America delving into a hot-button issue where solutions often break down along partisan lines. The companies employ workers in …

Courthouse News reports: Tech giant Apple lost to Swiss watchmaker Swatch on Wednesday in a court fight over its use of the “Think Different” slogan. The company had appealed to the European General Court after Swatch successfully challenged Apple’s “Think Different” copyright before the European Union Intellectual Property Office in 2018 on the basis that the slogan was no longer …

The Washington Post reports: After a weeks-long impasse, Twitter’s board plans to comply with Elon Musk’s demands for internal data by offering access to its full “firehose,” the massive stream of data comprising more than 500 million tweets posted each day, according to a person familiar with the company’s thinking, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the …

CNBC reports: Elon Musk’s efforts to arrange new financing that will limit his cash contribution to his $44 billion acquisition of Twitter Inc have been put on hold because of the uncertainty surrounding the deal, people familiar with the matter said. Musk has been threatening to walk away from the deal unless the social media company provides him with data …

Changing America reports: A fleet of driverless box trucks will soon begin delivering paper goods such as Dixie cups and toilet paper to dozens of Sam’s Club stores in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, a significant stride toward making driverless technology a reality on U.S. roads. Autonomous vehicle startup Gatik on Tuesday announced a commercial partnership with Georgia Pacific, a manufacturer …

Reuters reports: Apple will have to change the connector on iPhones sold in Europe by 2024 after EU countries and lawmakers agreed on Tuesday to a single mobile charging port for mobile phones, tablets and cameras in a world first. The political intervention, which the European Commission said would make life easier for consumers and save them money, came after …

Gothamist reports: It may soon be easier to get your busted iPhone fixed. Under a bill passed by the state legislature, digital electronics manufacturers – such as Apple or Samsung – will be required to make repair instructions and parts available to both consumers and independent technicians. The “right to repair” legislation, which still needs to be signed into law …

Bloomberg News reports: JetBlue Airways Corp. improved its offer for Spirit Airlines Inc., boosting a breakup provision to $350 million and adding an upfront cash payment days before shareholders will vote on a pending buyout agreement with Frontier Group Holdings Inc. The revised offer increases JetBlue’s reverse breakup fee by $150 million and provides for about $164 million payable as …

The Associated Press reports: Elon Musk is threatening to end his $44 billion agreement to buy Twitter, accusing the company of refusing to give him information about its spam bot accounts. Lawyers for the Tesla and SpaceX CEO made the threat in a letter to Twitter dated Monday that the social platform included in a filing with the Securities and …

The Associated Press reports: Abbott Nutrition has restarted production at the Michigan baby formula factory that has been closed for months due to contamination, the company said Saturday, taking a step toward easing a nationwide supply shortage expected to persist into the summer. The February shutdown of the largest formula factory in the country led to the supply problems that …

CNBC reports: In 2017 and 2018, as some workers sought to form a union at the Tesla factory in Fremont, California, Elon Musk’s electric vehicle company was paying a consultancy, MWW PR, to monitor employees in a Facebook group and more broadly on social media, according to invoices and other documents reviewed by CNBC. Two things that MWW PR watched …

AM New York reports: Governor Kathy Hochul and officials with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey along with Delta Air Lines cut the ribbon on LaGuardia Airport’s new Terminal C Wednesday, June 1. The $4 billion project, which will open to the public Saturday, June 4, consolidated the former terminals C and D into one space, marking …