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☆ Travis Kalanick's $15 billion food tech company cuts employees globally in profitability push
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-03 | by ( Meghan Morris | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

download the appSign up to get the inside scoop on today’s biggest stories in markets, tech, and business — delivered daily. Read previewSix months after layoffs at food technology company City Storage Systems, another round of cuts hit teams globally, per leaked audio obtained by Business Insider. More than 80 US employees were cut at Otter, the company's restaurant tech arm, said a source familiar with the people laid off. This story is available exclusively to Business Insider subscribers. In fall 2021, CEO Travis Kalanick raised $850 million for CSS from investors including Microsoft, at a $15 billion valuation.

Persons: —, Guido Gabrielli, Otter, Travis Kalanick, Kalanick, Uber, Gabrielli Organizations: Service, Storage Systems, Business, CSS, Microsoft, BI Locations: Canada, Latin America

☆ Elon Musk and 'anti-Biden brain trust' bonded at exclusive Hollywood Hills dinner, report says
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-01 | by ( Katherine Tangalakis-Lippert | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Read previewElon Musk, at an exclusive April dinner, commiserated with a group of billionaires about their distrust in Democratic politicians like Joe Biden, according to a new report by Puck. The outlet reported that Musk and venture capitalist David Sacks hosted the private event at Sacks' $23 million estate in the Hollywood Hills. This story is available exclusively to Business Insider subscribers. Related storiesRepresentatives for Musk, Sacks, and other dinner attendees identified by Puck did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Business Insider. "In the past I voted Democrat, because they were (mostly) the kindness party," Musk wrote in a tweet in May 2022.

Persons: —, Elon, Joe Biden, Puck, David Sacks, Sacks, Peter Thiel, Travis Kalanick, Steven Mnuchin, Donald Trump, Biden, Musk, Michael Milken, Milken's, Milken, Trump, OpenSecrets, Don Lemon, Lemon Organizations: Service, Hollywood, Business, Democratic, Biden, Houston Chronicle, SpaceX hasn't, Trump, National Republican Congressional Committee, Democratic Party, Republican, The New York Times, CNN Locations: Palm Beach , Florida

☆ The rapid rise and fall of ghost kitchens
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-14 | by ( Kenneth Niemeyer | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Ghost kitchens are restaurants with no storefront and no seating that customers never see and which only do delivery. Several influencers and celebrities have used ghost kitchens to produce their own lines of food, like YouTuber Jimmy Donaldson, known online as Mr. AdvertisementAnd as quality issues and late delivery times worsen, some ghost kitchens are starting to see legal challenges. Cracker Barrel also opened its own virtual restaurant using CloudKitchens, another ghost kitchen group, according to Restaurant Business. The company owns three virtual brands, Banda Burrito, The Meltdown, and Burger Den.

Persons: —, Jimmy Donaldson, Burger, Noah Schnapp, It's, TenderFix, Brinker, Kevin Hochman, Donaldson, MrBeast, Travis Kalanick, Kelli Valade Organizations: Service, Business, The New York Times, Kroger, Times, Restaurant Business, Banda, Denny's

☆ Uber's smooth operator Dara Khosrowshahi has done something Travis Kalanick never could: turn a profit
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-08 | by ( Hasan Chowdhury | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Read previewWho knows what kind of fate would have awaited Uber had Travis Kalanick decided not to relinquish his power in 2017. But instead of crashing, Uber has seemingly defied the odds thanks to Kalanick's successor, Dara Khosrowshahi. Net profit for the year hit $1.9 billion versus an enormous $9.1 billion loss in 2022, which had been inflated by revaluations of Uber's equity investments. Former Uber boss Travis Kalanick. But having been at the helm of online travel business company Expedia for 12 years before moving to Uber, Dara's success appears to come from his pedigree as an operator.

Persons: —, Uber, Travis Kalanick, Dara Khosrowshahi, Khosrowshashi, Eric Piermont, Khosrowshahi, SoftBank, Didi Chuxing Organizations: Service, Business, AFP Dara's Locations: Silicon, San Francisco, China

☆ Travis Kalanick's CloudKitchens loses its chief financial officer
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-02 | by ( Meghan Morris | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

The chief financial officer of City Storage Systems, the umbrella company of Travis Kalanick's foodtech juggernaut, left last month, two employees told Business Insider. Before City Storage Systems, Curran spent more than a dozen years at Amazon, where he was most recently the vice president of finance and chief financial officer for the international consumer business, per his LinkedIn. His social-media profile lists a January end date for his latest role, the chief financial officer of "stealth startup." City Storage Systems is a multifaceted effort to reinvent food production, just as Kalanick aimed to upend the taxi industry by founding Uber. Tech and real-estate businesses such as City Storage Systems face challenges, including inflation and higher interest rates.

Persons: Travis Kalanick's, John Curran, Curran, Uber, Kalanick Organizations: Storage Systems, Business, City Storage Systems, Uber, LinkedIn, Otter, Tech, Systems

☆ Ghost kitchens were supposed to revolutionize restaurants. They’re crashing
▼ + stars: | 2023-12-05 | by ( Nathaniel Meyersohn | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

But ghost kitchens are now crashing. Ghost kitchens are stripped-down commercial kitchens with no dine-in option. Sometimes called cloud kitchens, dark kitchens or virtual kitchens, ghost kitchens fulfill online orders from delivery apps like Grubhub and Uber Eats. Ghost kitchens also offered big chains a way to test new menu concepts, items and brands at lower rents and with less labor. So restaurants have shut down their ghost kitchens and funding for the concept has dried up.

Persons: Uber, Pat Greenhouse, ”, John Gordon, ” Wendy’s, Travis Kalanick, Applebee’s, “, Stephen Zagor, ” John Gordon, Tiffany Hagler, Wendy’s, Kalanick’s CloudKitchens, ” Gordon Organizations: New, New York CNN, Big, Kroger, Reef Technology, Boston Globe, Technology, Wings, Columbia Business School, National Restaurant Association, Geard, Bloomberg, Getty, Butler Locations: New York, South Boston, Dobbs Ferry , New York, U.S

☆ Sam Altman's return to OpenAI means he joins Steve Jobs and Jack Dorsey on a list of CEOs who left companies they founded – then eventually came back.
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-26 | by ( George Glover | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Apple’s Steve Jobs and Twitter’s Jack Dorsey made similar comebacks at the companies they founded. NEW LOOK Sign up to get the inside scoop on today’s biggest stories in markets, tech, and business — delivered daily. download the app Email address Sign up By clicking “Sign Up”, you accept our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy . AdvertisementPerhaps the most obvious example is Steve Jobs, who famously left Apple in 1985 after a boardroom struggle. If your company's board is willing to get rid of you once, they'll probably do it again.

Persons: Sam Altman, –, Steve Jobs, Jack Dorsey, —, hadn't, Altman, Greg Brockman, Jobs, John Sculley –, he'd, Travis Kalanick –, Uber, they'll, Dorsey, Elliott, Paul Singer, Elon Musk, Bob Iger, Howard Schultz, Uber's Kalanick, Adam Neumann Organizations: Service, Microsoft, Apple, PepsiCo, NeXT, Twitter, Elliott Management, Disney, Starbucks – Locations: Recode

☆ OpenAI's unique corporate structure left Sam Altman vulnerable. Now he's out
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-18 | by ( Rohan Goswami | In Rohangoswamicnbc | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

Leah Millis | ReutersOpenAI's unusual company structure weakened Sam Altman's position as CEO and left him open to surprise on Friday when he was quickly ousted from the company. But Altman and co-founder Greg Brockman, who also left OpenAI Friday, didn't have the power that Kalanick had. "I have no equity in OpenAI," Altman said in a May Senate hearing on A.I. OpenAI's capped profit structureThe easiest way to think of OpenAI's structure is to picture a waterfall. Limited returnsOpenAI added its capped profit OpenAI Global subsidiary in 2019.

Persons: Sam Altman, OpenAI, Chuck Schumer, Leah Millis, Sam Altman's, Travis Kalanick, Altman, Greg Brockman, didn't, Kalanick, John Kennedy's, Kennedy, – Organizations: Intelligence, Senate, U.S, Capitol, Reuters, OpenAI, Microsoft, OpenAI Inc, Global Locations: Washington , U.S, OpenAI

☆ Ruzwana Bashir Is Quietly Connecting the Tech World
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-16 | by ( ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +18 min

Story by Melia RussellPhotography by Lelanie FosterRuzwana Bashir is ransacking her kitchen cabinet for just the right tea. Bashir wears an Erdem floral-printed bra top, Erdem skirt, Giuseppe Zanotti shoes, Old Jewelry earrings along with her own bracelet and ring. "Part of building a business was going out and sharing what you were doing with the world," Bashir says. For years Bashir's startup had been building muscle around these capabilities; now it had an eager audience. Eating at acclaimed restaurants is fine, but Bashir prefers the more-intimate affairs at tech executives' homes because, she says, "you can stay longer."

Persons: Melia Russell, Lelanie Foster Ruzwana Bashir, Peek, She's, she's, Andy Warhol, Picasso, Bashir, I'm, Andreessen Horowitz, Jack Dorsey, Eric Schmidt, Goldman Sachs, Giuseppe Zanotti, Lelanie Foster, Bashir isn't, Elon Musk, Ronan Farrow, Roelof Botha, Mustafa Suleyman, we've, Bennett Miller, Capote, " Miller, —, doesn't, didn't, Madeleine Albright, Tom Ford, Jared Cohen, Oskar Bruening, Forbes, Mark Zuckerberg, I've, Bashir wasn't, Travis Kalanick, Adam Neumann, Ty, Emily Weiss, Bashir refashioned, Donald Trump, Bruening, Laurence Tosi's, Miller, Beyoncé, shrugs, Anna Wintour, Anna, we're, Taylor Swift, Katie Haun, Marc Benioff, Reid Hoffman, Marissa Mayer, Dick Costolo —, Cohen, Katherine Maher, Maher, Daniel Kahneman, It's, Radel, Becky Akinyode, Elaine Winter, Tiffany Bloomfield, Dela, Chad Hilliard, Enmi, Kenny Aquiles Ulloa, Cyrenae, Madison Perez, Aidan Lapp, Bashira Webb, Bryan Erickson, Jinyoung Chang, Rodriguez, Rebecca Zisser, Claire Landsbaum, Emma LeGault, Joi, Marie McKenzie, Conner Blake, Kyle Desiderio, Victoria Gracie, Nicole Forero, Virginia Alves Organizations: Google, Museum of, Business, Elon, Vogue, Roelof, Oxford University, Oxford Union, Blackstone Group, Harvard Business School, Studios, Web, Young, Organization, Dela Revoluciøn, Enmi Yang Digital Tech Locations: Manhattan, SoHo, Bahamas, United States, Balthazar, England, Israel, Petra, Istanbul, Elle, Utah, COVID, Salt Lake City, Costa Rica, Atlanta, WestCap

☆ A virtual restaurant brand run by robots is operating inside Travis Kalanick's CloudKitchens. Here's how it works.
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-09 | by ( Nancy Luna | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Better Days, a virtual brand assisted by robots, officially debuts today. Better Days by Remy Robotics wants to scale its wellness brand to 500 locations in five years. Wellness food brand Better Days is officially debuting today inside Travis Kalanick's CloudKitchens commissary kitchens. Remy Robotics founder and CEO Yegor Traiman left his job as an electric-vehicle engineer five years ago to launch Remy Robotics. Better Days, a robot-run virtual restaurant in New York City, sells chef-driven dishes like this salmon meal.

Persons: Remy, —, there's, Travis Kalanick's, Uber, Yegor Traiman, McDonald's, Jose Andres, El, Ferran Adrià, Traiman Organizations: Remy Robotics, Service, Disney Locations: New York City, White, Chipotle, Europe, Brooklyn

☆ After job cuts at Travis Kalanick's food tech startup, an exec discusses challenges and rallies staff with bullish comments on Future Foods
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-09 | by ( Meghan Morris | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

A particular focus was an Otter business called Future Foods. But now, Future Foods is generating healthy revenue, relative to the cost of customer acquisition. He did not disclose revenue for Future Foods or other businesses on the call. 'Healthy tension'Gabrielli did admit there's a "healthy tension" with the Future Foods team, saying that they "tend to sandbag a little bit their capabilities." Future Foods also asks would-be customers if they maintain at least a four-star rating on one delivery app.

Persons: Travis Kalanick, Uber, Otter, Guido Gabrielli, Gabrielli, it's Organizations: Storage Systems, CSS, Otter, Tech, Foods, Future Foods

☆ Everyone is going bankrupt
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-09 | by ( Dan Defrancesco | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

NEW LOOK Sign up to get the inside scoop on today’s biggest stories in markets, tech, and business — delivered daily. download the app Email address Sign up By clicking “Sign Up”, you accept our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy . WeWork, the real-estate company that cosplayed as a tech startup, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy this week. AdvertisementAdvertisementBut one Wall Street veteran believes WeWork will be the first of many companies to succumb to a similar fate. 3 things in marketsANGELA WEISS / Getty ContributorCan the stock market keep this momentum going?

Persons: —, AFTRA, Tesla, Brooks Kraft, It's, WeWork, David Trainer, Jennifer Sor, Insider's Vishal Persaud, Katie Notopoulos, Adam Neumann, we've, ANGELA WEISS, Jeff Gundlach, OpenAI's, Google's Bard, Min, Uber, Travis Kalanick's, Matthew Tortoriello, Sherrod Brown, Malte Mueller, Dan DeFrancesco, Naga Siu, Hallam Bullock, Lisa Ryan Organizations: Service, SAG, Hollywood, Tech, Google, Brooks Kraft LLC, Getty, Wall, P, Bank of America, Wall Street, Nasdaq, ExxonMobil, Tesla, Apple, Brooks, Amazon, YouTube, NFL, News Corp, Sony Locations: French Montana, New York City, San Diego, London, New York

☆ Travis Kalanick's $15 billion ghost kitchen company lays off staff
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-08 | by ( Meghan Morris | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +1 min

Travis Kalanick's ghost kitchen company laid staff off on Wednesday. In 2021, Kalanick raised $850 million at a $15 billion valuation for the company. The cuts come as tech and real estate companies rethink staffing needs in a more difficult market. Travis Kalanick's ghost kitchen company cut jobs on Wednesday, two employees told Insider. It wasn't immediately clear how many CSS employees were affected.

Persons: Travis, Kalanick Organizations: Storage Systems, Staff

☆ Inside the implosion of dark kitchen startup Kbox Global, another pandemic-era boom beginning to bust
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-23 | by ( Callum Burroughs | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

In 2019, after years of investing in and setting up food and beverage brands internationally, she founded dark-kitchen startup Kbox from London. But two years after this funding, large for an early-stage European startup, Vellani exited the business suddenly, citing health issues. "You're only judged on food quality, but if the chef is doing 10 times the work for same money, then it's a fundamental problem." Both Uber Eats and Deliveroo, after an initial burst of interest, would eventually go on to cut back on virtual brands. In an email comment, Vellani acknowledged her lack of direct technical experience but said she sought to fix this through other C-suite hires.

Persons: Salima Vellani, Uber, Travis Kalanick, Vellani, Butler, CloudKitchens, Kbox, MrBeast Burger, YouTuber MrBeast, Jimmy Donaldson, Influencer Jimmy Donaldson, Burger, Brexit, Vellani didn't, Karim Vellani, Karim, Ben Schultz, Nick Holloway, I've Organizations: Balderton, Hoxton Ventures, Reef Technologies, Lean, Network, United, Advisory Locations: London, Saudi, Revolut, COVID, Kbox, Sydney

☆ Harvard-trained expert shares how to 'move fast and fix things': It's surprising 'how infrequently people actually do it'
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-20 | by ( Ece Yildirim | In Ecedyildirim | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +5 min

Mark Zuckerberg's five-word motto "move fast and break things" spawned Meta's multibillion-dollar success and inspired an entire generation of Silicon Valley entrepreneurs. In a TED Talk earlier this year, Morriss decried the idea behind Zuckerberg's phrase, suggesting instead that CEOs and leaders everywhere should "move fast and fix things." She offered a five-step guideline you can use to fix problems in your workplace, with each step assigned to a day of the week to keep you on schedule. Your goal should be to create a "good enough" plan to fix your problem, Morriss said. So, if we have not first earned trust and we go fast, we will break things guaranteed.

Persons: Mark Zuckerberg's, It's, Anne Morriss, Morriss, Zuckerberg, it's, Frances Frei, Frei, Uber, Travis Kalanick, Dara Khosrowshahi Organizations: Harvard Business School, TED, Harvard Business, Khosrowshahi's Locations: Silicon Valley

☆ CloudKitchens, ghost restaurant news and updates
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-25 | by ( Meghan Morris | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

In 2021, Kalanick raised $850 million at a $15 billion valuation from backers including Microsoft. One, a physical ghost kitchen arm called CloudKitchens in the US, transforms mainly warehouses into private kitchen spaces that big companies and mom-and-pops alike can rent. 2021 fundraiseTravis Kalanick Theo Wargo/WireImageIn late 2021, CloudKitchens' parent company raised $850 million at a $15 billion valuation, Insider exclusively reported. Some entry-level sales employees have struggled at Otter, Insider reported. CloudKitchens US locationsA 2021 Insider analysis showed how CloudKitchens (and competitor Reef) snapped up properties across the US.

Persons: Travis, Kalanick, Travis Kalanick, Uber, –, fundraise Travis Kalanick Theo Wargo, CloudKitchens, John Curran, they're, Sawyer, Meghan Morris Organizations: Microsoft, Morning, Storage Systems, CSS, Investors, Uber, Financial, City Storage Systems, Wall Street, Amazon, CIA, Otter Locations: Los Angeles, Saudi, Miami

☆ Mark Cuban passed on an early Uber investment—his $250,000 would be worth $2.3 billion today: ‘Whoops’
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-19 | by ( Tom Huddleston Jr. | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

"Just think: If I would've given him $250,000 on a [$10 million] valuation, it'd be billions," Cuban said. Specifically, given Uber's market capitalization of $90.1 billion as of Friday, Cuban's $250,000 would be worth $2.25 billion today. But, still," said Cuban, whose net worth is currently estimated at $5.1 billion. Cuban and Kalanick already had history at the time: Cuban invested $1.7 million in Kalanick's previous venture, a peer-to-peer networking startup called Red Swoosh, in 2005. However, Cuban said he didn't agree with Kalanick's $10 million valuation of the startup at the time: "I said, 'I'll do it at [a] $5 million valuation...' for Uber!"

Persons: Mark Cuban's, Uber, Travis Kalanick, Kevin Hart's Peacock, Hart, Cuban's, Kalanick, Cuban, Troy Carter, Carter, Mark Cuban, Warren Buffett Organizations: Uber, Cuban, SXSW, CNBC

☆ Inside Otter University: How Travis Kalanick's sales boot camp for young techies went off the rails
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-17 | by ( Meghan Morris | Darius Rafieyan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +21 min

"It seemed like a cool, innovative new company," Lam said. Starting in early 2022, the company poured millions of dollars into an experimental sales boot camp called Otter University. She joined the company in 2020 as Otter's head of sales enablement and helped dream up the idea of a sales boot camp a year later. Two former OtterU employees said that Law and another Otter executive urged managers to join their teams for late-night drinks following team dinners. But the late nights and free-flowing alcohol struck some OtterU employees as inappropriate for the workplace, especially when managers had to deal with hungover teams the next day.

Persons: Brian Lam, messaged, Travis, Lam, Uber, It's, Kalanick, voraciously, they're, Otter, wasn't, salespeople, Cory Epstein, Phoebe Law, Law, people's, –, Kalanick's Uber, Otter's, Kate, Samul Beal, I'd, Beal, didn't, terminations, he'd, OtterU, I'm, grads, Salespeople, Guido Gabrielli, Keith Dunphy, Dunphy, Bram van Staalduinen, Phoebe Law's, Debra Glaser, Jen Zablotny, there's, Ordermark, Burger, Meghan, Darius Organizations: Texas, Otter, Storage Systems, Microsoft, Otter University, Law, Adobe, SAP, Houston, OtterU, hungover, NCR, Google, Brands, Houston Rockets Locations: Korean, Houston, Toronto, LA, Las Vegas, Miami, Seoul, South Korea, Houston ., OtterU, Otter, Canada

☆ MrBeast sabotaged his own burger brand, his restaurant partner claims in a new lawsuit. The YouTube star recently sued the ghost kitchen operator, accusing it of making 'terrible quality' food.
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-07 | by ( Nancy Luna | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Last week, YouTube star MrBeast sued the restaurant firm behind his namesake burger brand. YouTube star Jimmy Donaldson used his fame to "torpedo" the burger brand, the VDC suit says. The lawsuit comes a week after Beast Investments sued Virtual Dining Concepts alleging that VDC had ignored the MrBeast Burger Brand. MrBeast Burger debuted in 2020 and is sold in hundreds of restaurants seeking to use excess kitchen space to earn additional revenue. The reality is that the overwhelming majority of customers were highly satisfied, and the product was excellent," the VDC suit said.

Persons: MrBeast, Jimmy Donaldson, Donaldson, Burger, MrBeast Burger, Donaldson's, Travis Kalanick's CloudKitchens, Dorothy Calba Organizations: Concepts, YouTube, Service, Beast Investments, Dining, Twitter, Burger, Kitchen United, Euromonitor Locations: Wall, Silicon, New York, MrBeast, Florida, Washington

☆ MrBeast says 'ghost kitchen' partner is hurting his brand with 'terrible quality' burgers
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-01 | by ( Sindhu Sundar | Nancy Luna | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

The burgers' 'terrible quality' was the fault of a business partner, he alleged in a new lawsuit. His company alleged complaints raised to partner Virtual Dining Concepts “fell on deaf ears.”Get the inside scoop on today’s biggest stories in business, from Wall Street to Silicon Valley — delivered daily. Reef, which sells MrBeast Burger, has logged multiple consumer complaints about uncooked burgers, Insider previously reported. Representatives for Virtual Dining Concepts did not respond to Insider's request for comment. Insider's Brittany Chang wrote last year about eating a "mediocre burger" at a physical MrBeast burger joint in New Jersey's American Dream mall.

Persons: MrBeast, Jimmy Donaldson, Donaldson's, Travis Kalanick's, Burger, Brittany Chang Organizations: Service, YouTube, Beast Investments Locations: Wall, Silicon, New

☆ Uber’s next CFO has one simple task
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-11 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

NEW YORK, July 11 (Reuters Breakingviews) - Uber Technologies (UBER.N) boss Dara Khosrowshahi has an opening to shift into higher gear. His eventual replacement can dial back on spending even more and really open up a spigot of cash flow. And this year, Uber might finally start making profit, with analysts polled by Refinitiv expecting full-year earnings of some $26 million. Uber shares have nearly doubled over the year, handily beating the S&P 500 Index (.SPX), as profit pulls into view. Ensuring that Uber keeps its eyes on that prize is a worthy task for future executives.

Persons: Dara Khosrowshahi, Nelson Chai, Travis Kalanick’s, Uber, Refinitiv, Tesla, Jennifer Saba, Jonathan Guilford, Sharon Lam Organizations: YORK, Reuters, Technologies, –, Twitter, Thomson Locations: U.S, China

☆ OpenAI's mysterious new headquarters features nap rooms, a two-story library, and lounges for viewing both sunrise and sunset, according to planning documents
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-10 | by ( Darius Rafieyan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

It's only fitting then that OpenAI should have a headquarters befitting its status as the vanguard of new AI revolution. But the company has kept details about its San Francisco headquarters a closely guarded secret. A reporter for Insider was even less successful, turned away by a security guard on an intercom who refused even to confirm or deny the existence of an OpenAI office at the location. But we may now have some hints about what it's like inside the offices of the world's most famous AI company, thanks to architectural plans and planning documents viewed by Insider. "It's an impressive space," said Peter Eisenbeiser, a city official who performed the final inspection of the 1960 Bryant Street space.

Persons: OpenAI, Peter Eisenbeiser, Travis Organizations: San Francisco's Mission, Microsoft, San, San Francisco, Florida Street, Bay, Eaton Hall, Architects, Boston Consulting Group Locations: San Francisco's, London, San Francisco, Florida, Seattle

☆ 10 Things in Tech: Apple Vision Pro, Big Tech's big AI salaries, and Marc Andreessen's plan to save the world
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-07 | by ( Nathan Rennolds | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Apple Vision Pro. Apple's Vision Pro looks amazing, but why buy it? The Vision Pro also comes with a host of caveats beyond the price tag, such as a battery life of just two hours. Read more about the Apple Vision Pro's limits here. He said AI companies should be able to build fast and aggressively — and without regulation.

Persons: Nathan Rennolds, let's, Tony Fadell, Apple, Salesforce's Marc Benioff, Justin Sullivan, Marc Benioff, Marc Andreessen, Travis Kalanick's, Adam Beswick, he's, grads, Z, Leigh Thompson, Jack Sommers Organizations: Apple Vision, Apple, Companies, Meta, Sony, Getty, Salesforce, Amazon, Oracle, Big Tech, CloudKitchens, Stanford, UCLA, USC, Sequoia Capital, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University Locations: London

Mobile ordering and delivery have boosted Starbucks' bottom line and have become an incremental and growing part of the business. Starbucks would not share specifics on the size of its delivery business but has previously said the segment has seen a 20% year-over-year growth. CloudKitchens, which rents small, private kitchen bays that share a reception, offers one solution to delivery growth. Starbucks plans to open the San Francisco ghost kitchen on August 22 and operate it from 7am to 6pm, per a March filing with the city. The ghost kitchen will not sell alcohol.

Persons: Uber, —, Travis Kalanick, Laxman Narasimhan, Travis Kalanick Steve Jennings, CloudKitchens, Pat Grismer, Brady Brewer, Gloria Dawson, Darius Rafieyan, Meghan Morris Organizations: Starbucks, Service, CloudKitchens, Mobile, Buffalo Wild Wings, Getty, TechCrunch, Food Locations: Francisco, San Francisco, China, New York

☆ Uber’s Diversity Chief Put on Leave After Complaints of Insensitivity
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-21 | by ( Kellen Browning | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

The term Karen has become slang for a white woman with a sense of entitlement who often complains to a manager and reports Black people and other racial minorities to the authorities. A prominent “Karen” incident occurred in 2020, when Amy Cooper, a white woman, called 911 after a Black man bird-watching in New York’s Central Park asked her to leash her dog. Mr. Khosrowshahi’s efforts included increased diversity initiatives under Ms. Lee, who has led the effort since 2018. “I can confirm that Bo is currently on a leave of absence,” Noah Edwardsen, an Uber spokesman, said in a statement. Ms. Lee did not respond to a request for comment.

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