It’s game over for Alphabet’s Loon balloon broadband adventure January 22, 2021 Alphabet, the parent company of Google, said last night it will shut down its high-altitude broadband connectivity venture Loon. The announcement is at odds with its recent successful endeavours. Loon raised $125m from a SoftBank unit in 2019, and in April 2020 it launched the first balloons to provide commercial connectivity service to Kenyans following [...]
Screenshot: Is it time for a music streaming reshuffle? January 22, 2021 This week **Media Moment of the Week: Elon Musk’s personal keyboard warrior **Music streaming royalties strike a bum note **The BBC screw turns again Media Moment of the Week Elon Musk is no stranger to social media spats. His indiscretions on Twitter have moved stock markets, led to a highly-publicised defamation suit and landed him [...]
Elon Musk to turn oil rigs into floating SpaceX launchpads January 21, 2021 It’s usual practice for astronauts to splashdown in the water on their return from space, but up until now they’ve at least been able to take off from solid ground. However, this could all be about to change, after it was reported that billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk has bought two oil rigs to be converted [...]
Tesla is hiring someone to defend Elon Musk on social media January 20, 2021 Elon Musk’s indiscretions on social media have moved stock markets, led to a high-publicised defamation lawsuit and landed him a $20m fine. But it seems the blunt billionaire is now going on the defensive, hiring someone to fend off attacks by Twitter trolls. A job advert posted by Tesla, Musk’s booming electric car maker, said [...]
Elon Musk overtakes Jeff Bezos to become world’s richest person January 7, 2021 Tesla's share price has driven Elon Musk's net worth even higher to topple Amazon boss Jeff Bezos from the top spot of world's richest person
Elon’s twitter, record borrowing and Zoom stocks: City A.M.’s Business Quiz of the Year (Part 1) December 18, 2020 It’s been a… strange year. But there have been some lighter, albeit somewhat baffling, moments in the business world. See if you can remember the highs and lows of 2020, from Barclays behaving badly to the aftermath of Carlos Ghosn’s daring escape – and look out for part 2 before the end of the year.
SpaceX receives $2bn boost in latest funding round August 18, 2020 Elon Musk’s SpaceX has raised a further $1.9bn (£1.4bn) in funding, a regulatory filing on Tuesday revealed. It raises the equity value of the billionaire’s private rocket company to $46bn, Bloomberg reported ahead of the funding round last week. It is the largest single fundraising round conducted by SpaceX yet, according to PitchBook data. It [...]
SpaceX mission nears International Space Station after historic launch May 31, 2020 SpaceX’s Dragon astronaut capsule is due to dock at the International Space Station this afternoon after yesterday’s historic launch. At about 8:30 yesterday evening, NASA astronauts Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken blasted off from Florida’s Cape Canaveral launchpad in the US’ first manned space mission in nine years. The mission is also the first ever [...]
Tesla to face shareholder lawsuit Elon Musk’s ‘funding secured’ tweet April 16, 2020 Tesla boss Elon Musk must face a shareholder lawsuit over a tweet in which he stated the company had secured funding for a go-private deal worth $72bn (£58bn), a judge has ruled. Shareholders have filed a suit alleging the billionaire founder attempted to defraud them with a 2018 tweet that read: “Am considering taking Tesla [...]
How can Elon Musk keep Tesla on the straight and narrow? February 11, 2020 After a rough start to the year, Tesla ended 2019 by delivering on a promise to Wall Street. The pledge made in the summer of 2019 by Tesla chief executive Elon Musk was to return to profit after months of losses, a string of negative headlines — including his forced resignation as chairman in 2018 [...]