Tech

In this articleTSLATesla Model 3Source: TeslaWhen Tesla decided to exclude radar sensors from its newer Model 3 and Model Y vehicles in the U.S., it had to downgrade functionality in these cars at least temporarily. As a result, Consumer Reports and the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety are suspending some key safety endorsements for those cars.Consumer Reports said it no longer lists the 2021 Tesla Model 3 as a “top pick” and reported that IIHS also plans to remove the Model 3’s “Top Safety Pick+” designation. Losing these recommendations for now could impact Tesla’s sales and marketing strength. Automakers generally tout such industry accolades in communication with prospective customers.Jake Fisher, senior director of Consumer Reports’ Auto Test Center, told CNBC that Tesla can earn back its recommendations if it fully restores all functionality to its cars.The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration ratings pages for the Tesla Model 3 and Model Y vehicles built on or after April 27, 2021, no longer have check marks indicating the agency has tested safety features in the modified Teslas, including forward collision warning, lane departure warning, crash imminent braking and dynamic brake support.Fisher notes that crash imminent braking, also known as automatic emergency braking,

In this articleCRMMarc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce.Adam Jeffery | CNBCSalesforce shares rose 5% in extended trading on Thursday after the cloud software maker issued earnings and guidance that surpassed analysts’ expectations.Here’s how the company did:Earnings: $1.21 per share, adjusted, vs. 88 cents per share as expected by analysts, according to Refinitiv.Revenue: $5.96 billion, vs. $5.89 billion as expected by analysts, according to Refinitiv.Revenue grew 23% year over year in the fiscal first quarter, which ended April 30, the company said in a statement. In the previous quarter revenue increased by 20%.The Platform and Other segment that includes the MuleSoft and Tableau products, currently Salesforce’s top segment for subscription and support revenue, contributed $1.75 billion in revenue, up 28%.Salesforce’s core Sales Cloud product that salespeople use to track business opportunities delivered $1.39 billion in revenue, up 11%. In the quarter Salesforce acquired professional-services company Acumen Solutions and announced voice features for its Service Cloud offering. The company also said over 150 government agencies and health-care organizations were using its software to manage the distribution of vaccines.With respect to guidance, Salesforce said it sees 91 cents to 92 cents in adjusted fiscal second-quarter earnings per share on $6.22 billion to $6.23 billion

In this articleBBYA shopper checks out appliances for sale at the Best Buy store in Miami, Florida.Joe Raedle | Getty ImagesAs Americans move into new houses, remodel homes and watch real estate values rise, Best Buy CEO Corie Barry said they are buying appliances and big-screen TVs and hiring the company to set up new technology.The strong housing market is one of the key reasons why the consumer electronics retailer exceeded analysts’ expectations for fiscal first-quarter earnings, according to Barry. She said stimulus checks also fueled spending on home theaters, appliances and computing.”Even with the elevated demand we have seen throughout the pandemic, we believe the nesting phenomenon will continue to drive demand for products and services that help customers improve their home experience,” she said on an earnings call.Home prices have been rising for months, as housing supply falls to near-record lows and interested buyers make competitive bids. Home prices in March saw the biggest gain in over 15 years, according to the S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller National Home Price Index. The pandemic has intensified those trends by nudging some consumers to move out of dense cities and into suburban or rural areas where they can have bigger yards or

In this articleGOOGLGoogle signage.NurPhoto | Getty ImagesAt Google’s annual marketing event Thursday, the company is showcasing ways advertisers will continue to be able to reach consumers as it reduces support for tracking cookies, which advertisers have used for decades to track users across sites to target ads and measure how effective they are.Google’s Marketing Livestream is meant to give advertisers, agencies and other partners a sense of the tech giant’s roadmap for the year ahead, and to seek feedback. Jerry Dischler, VP and general manager of Ads, one of the presenters, told CNBC that Google will be discussing privacy, measurement and automation at the event.With regulators taking a closer look at user privacy, and consumers becoming more concerned about the use of their personal data, tech giants are trying to get ahead by making changes in the name of privacy. Google announced its intention in early 2020 to end support for third-party cookies on its Chrome browser within two years.But advertising remains Google’s core business, and it needs to keep advertisers happy. The company has been the market leader in online advertising for well over a decade, and is expected to command nearly a 29% share of digital ad spending

In this article9984.T-JPKlarna CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski speaks at a technology and music conference in Stockholm, Sweden.Johan Jeppsson | Bloomberg via Getty ImagesKlarna, a European buy-now-pay-later company, is close to securing a new funding round at a valuation of more than $40 billion, according to a source familiar with the matter.The investment is being backed by SoftBank and multiple other investors, said the person, who asked to remain anonymous as the details have not yet been made public.The news, which comes ahead of a potential blockbuster stock market listing, was first reported Thursday by Business Insider.The exact size of the investment round is unknown. However, it is expected to be less than the $1 billion that Klarna raised in March, when it was valued at $31 billion, according to Business Insider.Klarna declined to comment when contacted by CNBC.Klarna is already listed as a portfolio company on SoftBank’s website through the firm’s Vision Fund 2. Klarna is also backed by big-name investors like Snoop Dogg and China’s Ant Group. A SoftBank spokesperson was not immediately available to comment.If the deal goes through, Klarna will cement its place as European’s most valuable private tech unicorn, surpassing the likes of Amazon-backed food delivery service Deliveroo and

In early May, Cybereason CEO Lior Div took his first trip back to Israel since before the pandemic to visit his 300 employees based there. It’s a journey he used to make every few months from Boston, where his company is headquartered.The visit was much more eventful than he’d anticipated. A few days into Div’s stay came the news that the operator of the largest U.S. pipeline had been paralyzed by a cyberattack that knocked out a 5,500-mile fuel network.Any big corporate hack catches Div’s interest because his start-up’s business is to keep out the bad guys. The Colonial Pipeline attack was of particular concern because the group responsible, an outfit called DarkSide, had tried to infiltrate one of Cybereason’s clients nine months earlier.”They were fairly sophisticated, active and looked very professional,” Div said in an interview. Cybereason ranked No. 23 on this year’s CNBC’s Disruptor 50 List.More coverage of the 2021 CNBC Disruptor 50Meet the 2021 CNBC Disruptor 50 companiesWhy Robinhood is the No. 1 companyA look back at the CNBC Disruptor 50: 9 years, 233 companiesWhen disruption becomes a force for good — and badWatch: Plaid, a gateway to Coinbase, on crypto investingDiscord lays out its game theory

In this articleSPCXPACXNoah Kerner, CEO of Acorns.Adam Jeffery | CNBCSavings and investing app Acorns plans to go public by merging with a blank-check company.The fintech start-up announced a deal Thursday to combine with Pioneer Merger Corp., a publicly traded special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC. The merger values Acorns at roughly $2.2 billion and is expected to close in the back half of this year.When it is finalized, Acorns will trade on the Nasdaq under the symbols OAKS — a nod to the company’s motto and analogy of growing acorns into “mighty oaks.””Now was the time to go public to accelerate our growth, and get the tools of responsible wealth-making in everyone’s hands as fast as possible, when they need it most,” said Acorns CEO Noah Kerner. “We just saw this as an accelerant on that journey.”Institutional investors Wellington Management, Greycroft, TPG’s global impact investing platform, and funds managed by BlackRock also committed to a private placement as part of the announcement. Kerner and Pioneer’s sponsor each plan to contribute 10% of their personal ownership in Acorns as a gift to eligible Acorns customers.The company was last valued at less than $1 billion, and has attracted venture investments from the

In this article.FKRX300Ada HealthGerman digital health firm Ada Health, which has developed a doctor-in-your-pocket style app that uses artificial intelligence to try and diagnose symptoms, has been backed by investment arms of South Korea’s Samsung and German pharmaceutical giant Bayer.Headquartered in Berlin, Ada Health announced Thursday that it has raised a $90 million funding round at an undisclosed valuation that brings total investment in the company up to around $150 million.Bayer led the round through its Leaps by Bayer investment arm, while Samsung invested through the Samsung Catalyst Fund, which is a U.S.-based venture capital fund that Samsung Electronics uses to back companies worldwide. Samsung Electronics’ former chief strategy officer and corporate president, Young Sohn, has joined the board of Ada Health.Founded in 2011 by entrepreneurs Claire Novorol, Martin Hirsch and Daniel Nathrath, Ada Health says that its app has been downloaded over 11 million times.How it works”The app basically works like a WhatsApp chat with your trusted family doctor, but 24/7″ Nathrath, CEO of Ada Health, told CNBC.The patient starts by entering their symptoms and an AI chat bot will ask a series of questions to try to determine the issue. After that, the app will present the patient

The logos of Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon and Microsoft displayed on a mobile phone with an EU flag shown in the background.Justin Tallis | AFP via Getty ImagesLONDON — The European Union needs to be more ambitious in its control of Big Tech and smaller acquisitions that often go under the radar, Germany, France and the Netherlands said on Wednesday.The 27-member bloc is currently discussing new legislation that could ultimately force Big Tech to change how it operates. The Digital Markets Act, a proposal put forward last December, aims to level the playing field in the EU market and could be implemented as early as 2022. In this context, Berlin, Paris and the Hague are asking for a stricter stance on mergers.”We have to strengthen and speed up merger control in particular vis-à-vis certain gatekeeper platforms to tackle the strategies of platform companies consisting in systematically buying up nascent companies in order to stifle competition,” the three countries said in a common statement.It has long been a concern for European capitals that some of the biggest tech firms in the world have bought up start-ups, including in the EU, in deals that have escaped scrutiny because they did not meet

People walking at Strandvagen in Stockholm.JONATHAN NACKSTRANDLONDON — A study has found that most Europeans would like to see some of their members of parliament replaced by algorithms.Researchers at IE University’s Center for the Governance of Change asked 2,769 people from 11 countries worldwide how they would feel about reducing the number of national parliamentarians in their country and giving those seats to an AI that would have access to their data.The results, published Thursday, showed that despite AI’s clear and obvious limitations, 51% of Europeans said they were in favor of such a move.Oscar Jonsson, academic director at IE University’s Center for the Governance of Change and one of the report’s main researchers, told CNBC that there’s been a “decades long decline of belief in democracy as a form of governance.”The reasons are likely linked to increased political polarization, filter bubbles and information splintering, he said. “Everyone’s perception is that that politics is getting worse and obviously politicians are being blamed so I think it (the report) captures the general zeitgeist,” Jonsson said. He added that the results aren’t that surprising “given how many people know their MP, how many people have a relationship with their MP (and) how