Facebook argues against company break-up, says 'we keep you safe'

Faced with new questions about whether it’s a monopoly, Facebook Inc. is making a bold argument: owning so many communications platforms helps keep users safe.

On Tuesday, the European Parliament asked Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg whether he should be allowed to own two of the world’s largest chat applications, Messenger and WhatsApp, in addition to the biggest social network and the photo app Instagram. The company answered Wednesday in an online post, saying there are “many consumer benefits” to having Facebook control so much of the world’s communication. “By working together we have been able to improve safety across all these services," the company wrote. When Facebook sees spam, exploitative images or illegal content, for example, it can obliterate it on all platforms at once.

European regulators may not buy the argument, especially since they spent some of Tuesday’s hearing critiquing Facebook for not being effective enough in its treatment of harmful content. Though Facebook is investing in computer-based solutions, the company still relies heavily on users to flag the worst offenders on its apps. Also, Facebook has shown it doesn’t necessarily have to own something to help keep it safe. The social network shares its tips on terrorist content with other companies, including Twitter Inc. and Google, through the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism, for example.

Behind Seattle's Amazon Tax: A tech boom that sent house rents soaring

It was, as the local public radio station said, the day “Seattle Nice” died. On May 2, the residents of Seattle were hit with a one-two punch. For months, the city council had been debating a new tax on large employers to raise $75 million for new affordable housing and services for the homeless, whose growing population had burst out of shelters and into tents around the city.

In the late morning, just before a council hearing, a columnist for the Seattle Times broke the news that Amazon.com Inc., the city’s largest employer, was playing hardball. The typically hermetic company said it paused expansion plans for buildings that would house about 7,000 employees pending the outcome of the upcoming tax vote.

Later that night, hundreds of residents packed a Methodist church in the gentrifying Ballard neighbourhood, turning what was supposed to be a civil town hall discussion into a scrum that exposed deep division in the city.

Jio bowls another googly with international calling rates at 50 p/min

Reliance Jio Infocomm announced a new unlimited postpaid plan on Thursday with national roaming, international calling and international roaming plans among others.

The 'zero touch' plan, starting at Rs 199, comes with auto payment and add-on services like access to the Jio app universe similar to what Vodafone Red, Airtel Infinity and Idea Nirvana plans have in place.

The new ISD calling activated plan comes with international calling rates starting at Rs 50p/minute and roaming charges at Rs 2/ min and Rs 2/ MB for countries like US and Canada.

International roaming plans are split across Rs 575 to Rs 5,751 price range. While international calling rates are distributed across six price slabs ranging from 50 p/ min to Rs 6 /min, international roaming charges are split across two slabs of Rs 2/min and Rs 10/min.

This plan is likely to deal a heavy blow to incumbent telcos who so far still had a strong presence in the international calling arena due to their presence or collaborations across international networks.

Why Walmart's Flipkart acquisition is its admission of defeat in India

Walmart Inc. might want to portray its $16 billion purchase of India's largest e-commerce firm, Flipkart Group, as a brilliant strategic move, long-planned in secret, that would allow the U.S. retail giant to manage the transition away from big-box stores globally. Yet, the truth is that the deal represents a second-best outcome -- if that -- for Walmart as well as for Indian consumers and farmers.

In the 11 years that Walmart has operated in India, it’s signally failed to build up its own business. That’s not entirely the company’s fault. In fact, it’s a reminder that India remains, in some ways, as inhospitable to foreign businesses as the People's Republic of China.

For over a decade, successive Indian governments have denied permission to Walmart -- and peers such as Carrefour SA -- to open up their own stores. Foreign investors can enter into partnerships with local retailers -- Walmart had one with Bharti Enterprises Pvt. Ltd. -- but they can't control the consumer-facing end of the business, and their supply chains are subject to fearsome additional regulations. When foreign investment in supermarkets was finally permitted in 2012, for example, the previous government required any major, foreign-backed outlets to source 30 percent of the processed or manufactured goods they sold -- by value -- from tiny Indian enterprises worth less than $1 million apiece. The government also blocked companies such as Walmart from expanding into small-town India, restricting them to cities with populations over 1 million people.

Judges 'swipe left' on Tinder's 'discriminatory' pricing for older users

A panel of seven mostly middle-aged Californians blew off Tinder’s plea for another chance to explain why discounting its dating app for users under 30 isn’t illegal discrimination against older people.

The California Supreme Court voted Wednesday, without comment, to let stand a lower court’s January ruling that the Match Group Inc. unit’s age-based discount for its premium service violates the state’s civil rights law.

The case was brought by a man who complained that it’s unfair for Tinder Plus to charge $19.99 a month to people over 30 and only $9.99 or $14.99 for younger people.

A trial judge dismissed the claims, saying the age-based pricing didn’t constitute discrimination because it was based on market testing showing that younger users are more budget-constrained. But a three-judge appeals panel in Los Angeles revived the class-action case, concluding that the pricing model “employs an arbitrary, class-based generalization about older users’ incomes as a basis for charging them more than younger users.”

VW chief met FBI over emission scam, obtained guarantees:Reports

Volkswagen chief Herbert Diess met FBI investigators over the diesel emissions cheating scandal and secured guarantees from Washington days before US authorities indicted his predecessor, German media reported today.

Diess reportedly travelled to the United States on May 1 and gave statements to investigators from the FBI and justice department that are "apparently rated as incriminatory" for ex-VW chief Martin Winterkorn, Bild daily said, quoting unnamed sources.

Winterkorn's indictment on May 3 has brought the US criminal case to the top echelons of Volkswagen, which pleaded guilty last year to lying to American environmental regulators about emission control systems.

Winterkorn faces four counts, including conspiracy to defraud the US and wire fraud.

American prosecutors say Winterkorn knew of the company's emissions cheating as early as May 2014 but decided to continue with the fraud, the Justice Department said in a statement.

While Winterkorn cannot leave Germany due to the threat of an arrest on an international warrant, Diess has managed to obtain assurances that he is free to travel to the US and elsewhere, German media reported.

Move over electric cars: Musk now wants to make bricks for low cost housing

Move over, candy and flamethrowers. Elon Musk tweeted out plans Monday for yet another side venture: alleviating the nation's housing crisis.

"The Boring Company will be using dirt from tunnel digging to create bricks for low-cost housing," he wrote in a tweet about his nascent tunnelling enterprise.

Company spokesman Sam Teller confirmed the plans, saying the bricks will come from the "excavated muck." "There will be an insane amount of bricks," Teller wrote in an email.

How many affordable housing units that will create, though, is a different matter, says Juan Matute, a lecturer at the University of California, Los Angeles, and associate director of UCLA's Institute of Transportation Studies.

Musk’s tweet "assumes that housing costs are driven by construction materials, and particularly, construction materials that can be replaced by bricks," Matutue said. "That's not the case." At least in California, the only state where Boring Co. has started digging a tunnel, land and labour drive prices more than anything else.

It's not me, it's Berkshire: Buffett says his firm's name will outlast him

If a major company needs capital or a private firm wants to sell, Warren Buffett’s checkbook is often the one they seek out.

Will that stay the case when it’s someone else’s signature?

That was the question from several Berkshire Hathaway Inc. shareholders at the firm’s annual meeting Saturday, adding a fresh angle to the topic of succession for the 87-year-old chairman. Berkshire’s desire to utilize a cash pile that has grown to more than $100 billion makes finding large-scale deals a key issue for whoever will be the conglomerate’s next leader.

Buffett downplayed any unique skill he has to drum up deals, using his inability to find recent ones as evidence. Berkshire often makes large investments in times of panic, when its stable capital, and not the Buffett name, is the allure, he argued.

“The reputation belongs to Berkshire now,” Buffett said at the meeting in Omaha, Nebraska. “We are the first call and will continue to be the first call.”
Charlie Munger, Buffett’s 94-year-old vice chairman, said already most acquisitions are coming from the chiefs of the company’s operating subsidiaries, not he and Buffett.

To finance Monsanto acquisition, Bayer sells Covestro stake for $2.64 bn

Pharmaceutical group Bayer has sold a further stake in plastics company Covestro for 2.2 billion euros ($2.64 billion), placing a holding of 14.2 per cent via an accelerated book-building process.

Covestro was spun off from Bayer in 2015, and Bayer said this latest sale marks the start of the full separation from its former unit.

Bayer, which is buying seed maker Monsanto, raised 1.8 billion euros ($2.15 billion) in January by selling a 10.4 per cent stake in Covestro.

The latest sale of $28.8 million shares to institutional investors valued Covestro stock at 75.50 euros apiece, Bayer said on Friday, bringing the total gains from the sale of Covestro shares to more than 9 billion euros.

"The proceeds from the sale are higher than expected. This will be considered when determining the size of the share capital increase to finance the proposed acquisition of Monsanto," finance chief Johannes Dietsch said in a statement.

Tesla burnt $ 1 billion in Q1 and Musk finds analysts' questions 'boring'

The earnings report started optimistically enough, with Elon Musk forecasting an end to Tesla Inc.’s cash-burning days after blazing through another $1 billion last quarter.

But by the end of Tesla’s first-quarter conference call, Musk was berating analysts for asking “boring” questions, the shares had plunged and any shred of predictability was out the window.

Musk, 46, has built up a showman’s reputation as the founder and chief executive officer of Tesla, calling on true believers to help him overcome the “haters” who question his company’s ability to usher in an electric-vehicle age on an ambitious timetable. His performance Wednesday revealed his willingness to bite the hand that feeds, ridiculing representatives of Wall Street’s biggest banks who tried to pinpoint how he’d live up to his promises to build more Model 3 sedans and generate cash in the second half of the year.

“The boring questions can also be categorized as the tough ones,” said Dave Sullivan, an analyst at AutoPacific Inc. “I hope the Tesla fans know how to swim, because without the answers to the tough questions, it looks like Musk is leading them straight into the water.”

Apple earnings show growing immunity to smartphone's sales slowdown

Apple Inc.’s results confirmed that, while the days of double-digit smartphone industry growth are over, Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook has a plan to withstand the slowdown.

The shares gained in late trading Tuesday after the company reported iPhone sales in line with analysts’ expectations, gave a bullish revenue forecast and highlighted a surging services business. A new $100 billion stock repurchase plan and higher dividend also helped.

The numbers show that Cook’s strategy of selling a growing array of services through a base of more than 1.3 billion Apple devices is working. The smartphone sector saw shipments fall 2 per cent in the past year, according to Strategy Analytics, so the company must evolve beyond its reliance on a device that still accounts for more than 60 per cent of revenue.

“Slowly but surely, [Apple] is morphing into more than just an iPhone story and is displaying ability to sustain revenue growth irrespective of iPhone trajectory,” Amit Daryanani, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets, wrote in a research note.

The company reported iPhone unit sales grew just 2.9 per cent in the fiscal second quarter. While the flagship iPhone X may not have matched the hype from its launch late last year, the device’s $999 starting price helped boost phone revenue growth 14 per cent.

By leaving Facebook to play Frisbee, WhatsApp co-founder to lose $1 billion

Jan Koum’s exit from Facebook Inc. could prove costly. A speedy departure may prevent him from collecting as much as $1 billion in stock awards.

The chief executive officer of messaging unit WhatsApp confirmed in a Facebook post-Monday afternoon that he was leaving the company. The announcement comes before the final three vesting dates of restricted stock unit awards tied to Facebook’s $22 billion purchase of WhatsApp in 2014.

Koum, 42, got about 24.9 million restricted shares as part of the deal. The stock vests in increments until late 2018, with 1.9 million shares due to vest in mid-May and mid-August, plus a final tranche of 2.1 million set to be issued in November.

The awards are contingent on him still being employed through those dates. He would forfeit 5.8 million shares, worth $997.5 million as of Monday’s close, if he left before May 15, unless his exit is categorized as an involuntary termination or a good-reason resignation, regulatory filings show.

Audit finds Aramco oil reserves slightly higher than reported: sources

An audit of Saudi Aramco's oil reserves - an essential part of the preparatory work for its planned initial public offering - has found the state oil giant to have higher reserves than it previously reported, sources familiar with the matter told Reuters.

Saudi Arabia's reserves of easily recoverable oil have long been the world's largest.

Two sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the independent external audit has found the proven oil reserves to be at least 270 billion barrels, which is slightly higher than the 260.8 billion barrels the company reported in its 2016 annual review.

Having an internationally recognized reserves audit has become a key task for Aramco as it seeks to become the world's most valuable company when it lists a 5 percent stake in an IPO later this year or early 2019.

Aramco's official reserves figures were "more than confirmed" said one source. "This is good for the company's valuation," another source said.

Aramco did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

P&G to acquire consumer health unit of Germany's Merck for about $4.21 bn

Procter & Gamble Co said on Thursday it has signed an agreement to acquire the consumer health business of German pharmaceuticals company Merck KGaA for about $4.21 billion (3.4 billion euros).

The acquisition enables P&G to add to its portfolio of existing consumer healthcare capabilities and brands such as Vicks, Metamucil, Pepto-Bismol, Crest and Oral-B.http://www.business-standard.com/article/international/p-g-to-acquire-german-merck-s-consumer-health-business-for-about-4-21-billion-118041900220_1.html

Amazon Prime has now topped 100 million subscribers, reveals Jeff Bezos

Amazon has persuaded more than 100 million shoppers to subscribe to its Prime service that offers free two-day shipping and other perks that help bind people to the company and its ever-expanding empire.

CEO Jeff Bezos quantified the size of Amazon's Prime membership for the first time Wednesday in his annual letter to the Seattle company's shareholders. Before Bezos' revelation, analysts had been left to guess how many people had been willing to pay $99 per year for the Prime service, which Amazon launched 13 years ago as a way to foster customer loyalty.

The scope of Prime's success stunned even the most optimistic of analysts, such as GBH Insights' Daniel Ives. He had previously estimated Amazon had 92 million Prime subscribers.

"It's a mind-boggling number that serves as a key barometer to how big Amazon's kingdom has become," Ives said.

Costco has been selling annual memberships to get bargains on goods stocked in its warehouses for decades, and already been outdone by Amazon's Prime service. Costco has 50.4 million memberships that allow 92 million cardholders to shop in its warehouse and website.

Suspended Cambridge Analytica CEO Nix cancels UK parliamentary appearance

The chair of the British Parliament's media committee says that Cambridge Analytica's former CEO, Alexander Nix, says he will no longer testify at an upcoming session on fake news, citing an ongoing investigation by the information commissioner's office.

Nix had been recalled by the committee to testify on Wednesday following testimony by whistleblower Christopher Wylie on the use of data by some 87 million Facebook users in the campaign for Donald Trump's presidential election.

Committee chair Damian Collins rejected Nix's reason for not appearing, as he has not "not been charged with any criminal offence and there is no active legal proceedings." Collins says Tuesday that the committee "is minded to issue a formal summons for him to appear on a named day in the very near future.

WPP CEO Martin Sorrell calls it quits after 33-year in top advertising game

WPP Plc Chief Executive Officer Martin Sorrell is resigning after 33 years, following allegations of personal misconduct and misuse of company assets, marking an abrupt end to a storied career at the top of the advertising industry.

Sorrell, 73, will step aside immediately, according to a statement late Saturday by WPP. Chairman Roberto Quarta becomes executive chairman until the appointment of a new CEO, while Mark Read, who heads WPP agency Wunderman, and Andrew Scott, WPP’s corporate development director, become joint chief operating officers.

It took Sorrell decades to turn a wire shopping basket manufacturer into the world’s largest advertising company, a colossus of more than 400 agencies across 112 countries, counting 200,000 employees. His fall from grace took less than a month after WPP announced April 3 that it was investigating the allegations.

Cipla arm recalls multiple lots of antidepressant drug from US market

Pharma major Cipla's arm InvaGen Pharmaceuticals Inc is recalling 11 lots of antidepressant bupropion HCl extended-release tablets from the US market due to failed dissolution specifications, latest enforcement report of the US health regulator has said.

InvaGen Pharmaceuticals Inc is recalling four lots of bupropion HCl extended-release tablets USP (SR) in the strength of 100 mg, United States Food and Drug Administration (USFDA) said in an enforcement report.

The company is also recalling seven lots of the tablets in the strength of 150 mg, it added.

The report, however, did not mention the quantity of the product.

The ongoing nationwide voluntary recall for both the strengths is on account of "failed dissolution specifications; during stability testing," it added.

Trump orders review of postal service after accusing Amazon of causing loss

President Donald Trump ordered the creation of a task force to review business practices at the United States Postal Service, a move that could affect one of the president’s favorite. corporate targets: Amazon.com Inc.

“The USPS is on an unsustainable financial path and must be restructured to prevent a taxpayer-funded bailout,’’ according to an order from the president on Thursday night. The order calls for an examination of the Postal Service’s pricing, policies and workforce costs.

The Postal Service has lost more than $65 billion in the last decade as more Americans have used online services to transmit messages, according to the executive order. The task force will be chaired by Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin or his designee, according to the order.

In a series of Twitter messages, Trump has accused Amazon of draining the Postal Service of money it cannot afford to lose.

Zuckerberg's Congress testimony is over, but scrutiny is just ramping up

For 14 years, Mark Zuckerberg was free to use any means he could imagine to build his social network into an internet and advertising colossus with tens of billions of dollars in revenue. Now Congress is waking up to what that freedom meant for Facebook Inc users.

The chief executive officer’s first congressional testimony -- roughly 10 hours answering to US Senate and House lawmakers over the past two days -- kick-started a new era of government scrutiny of Facebook, whose swift emergence outpaced any regulations on the books at its founding. While questions ranged from data privacy to prescription drug sales to employee diversity, most lines of inquiry highlighted the challenge of trying to grasp and confront Facebook’s immense power in consumers’ lives, in ways most of its users don’t completely understand.

Congress is looking more broadly at Facebook’s reach, beyond the user data leaks that brought Zuckerberg to testify. While investors were cheered by Zuckerberg’s calm responses to barrages of questions, many lawmakers have begun to express outrage at the ways the company has run its business for years. There were dozens of unanswered or follow-up questions that the executive promised his team would respond to later, and some of his talking points aren’t likely to hold up to future analysis.