How to ensure your meetings are productive April 8, 2015 You can’t end them for good, but they need not be a waste of time. How long do you spend in meetings each year? Do you, like many, think they’re a total waste of time? A group of partners from Bain & Company studied the time budgets of 17 corporations and found that, on average, [...]
Elon Musk’s Tesla unveils new “entry level” Model S 70D April 8, 2015 Tesla, the electric car maker with the cult following, has just unveiled its latest model: the "entry level" Model S 70D. At just over $75,000 (£50,000), it's hardly a snip – but at 514 hp, it's almost as powerful as a Porsche 911…. The company's shares rose 2.9 per cent to $209.25 in pre-market trading, [...]
Tesla share price jumps after Elon Musk teases new product line March 30, 2015 Elon Musk tweets, markets react. Tesla Motors saw its share price rise by over three per cent today after its founder, billionaire investor and inventor Elon Musk, tweeted that the company would be unveiling a "major new product line" next month. Musk added that the product would diverge from Tesla's main business of designing, manufacturing and selling electric [...]
Richard Branson might jump on the electric car bandwagon March 20, 2015 Richard Branson has hinted that his Virgin brand might jump on the electric car bandwagon (the wagon bandwagon?) at some point in the not-too-distant future. The entrepreneur already has his own Formula E team – an electric version of Formula One which features battery-powered cars racing at speeds of up to 140 mph. But when [...]
Here’s everything we know about Sakti3 – the US startup Dyson just invested $15m in March 16, 2015 Some 15 years into the entrepreneur game, Sir James Dyson has made his first-ever investment outside his own business, after he ploughed $15m (£10m) in US startup Sakti3. The company, based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, develops solid-state batteries. The investment was part of a wider, $20m funding round. Dyson said the company will help it [...]
Solar Impulse 2 follows the sun around the world from Abu Dhabi March 9, 2015 SWISS adventurers Bertrand Piccard and Andre Borschberg yesterday took off from Abu Dhabi on a round-the-world flight – with no jet feul. The plane, the “Solar Impulse 2”, is powered by 12,000 solar cells on the wings and weighs about the same as a family car. It can run both day and night off solar [...]
Tesla to cut 180 of China staff as sales fail to meet expectations March 9, 2015 Electric car maker Tesla Motors yesterday said it was cutting about 30 per cent of its staff in China. Tesla, led by billionaire Elon Musk, will eliminate some positions as it makes structural changes to its business in China, Gary Tao, a local spokesman for the car maker, said. He added, however, that he didn’t [...]
Google’s Eric Schmidt: Humans are better off than ever – and it’s down to technology March 6, 2015 Humankind has never had it so good and we should be thankful for the role of technology in getting us to that point, according to Google’s Eric Schmidt. Speaking at the WorldPost's Future of Work conference, the executive chairman of the software giant said he wanted to talk about “why we are so unhappy – [...]
The non-bank of Facebook, AliBay, and AI: The future of global fintech March 5, 2015 The global fintech industry has seen some remarkable developments since we launched Level39 two years ago. But what of the future? I’d like to suggest two possibilities for what might happen, and challenge one that, contrary to some current thinking, I don’t think will. FACEBOOK: THE NON-BANK BANK More than any other social media platform, [...]
Big miss as Tesla fails to ramp up electric car sales February 11, 2015 ELON Musk’s electric car-maker Tesla disappointed investors last night after it reported a lower-than-expected 9,834 vehicles delivered in its fourth quarter due to a host of production issues. The results revealed strong revenues which grew 12 per cent to $957m (£627.9m), but missed analyst’s expectations of $1.2bn, while it reported a loss of 13 cents [...]