fortune--2020-08-27--We need a COVID vaccine. We also need to figure out how to get it to people

Why CEOs must take action on democracy and election integrity—and how they can do it

Good afternoon, readers.
I’m moving to the opposite side of the country in a few days after 12 years on the East Coast. I plan to come back to New York one day—but I don’t know when. I’ve booked a one-way ticket to Southern California and am going to stay with my parents and little sister for a few months because, why not?
You see, my lease is expiring at the end of the month and I was faced with the decision of whether or not I stay or go. It’s a decision thousands of people in the concrete jungle, and other urban centers, have had to make. I’m sure there’s no shortage of readers who have had to make similar choices.
I love New York. I’ve lived here in Brooklyn for four and a half years. I fully plan on coming back (I’m even leaving half my stuff here so I don’t just lay around in California indefinitely). But I don’t know when. And part of me is filled with dread of taking a cross-country flight to an area that hasn’t exactly been the best about masking and social distancing, especially since my parents are at high-risk of COVID. I plan on self-isolating for two weeks at an Airbnb before I see them.
I’m leaving behind my friends and colleagues (many of whom I haven’t seen in months to begin with) on the most abrupt terms. I feel selfish in a sense because I’m one of the lucky ones. I’m not sick. I still have a job. Millions of Americans can’t say the same of themselves or their loved ones. But I still feel robbed by not having the opportunity to say goodbye in person to so many people in my life.
If this pandemic has taught us anything, it’s that we take far too much for granted and brush aside fundamental problems in our health care system. Last week, we wrote about the World Health Organization (WHO) director-general’s plea to “prevent vaccine nationalism.”
At the end of the day, a vaccine—an effective vaccine—will be the only way to emerge from this crisis which has plagued our lives for so many months. I had a fascinating talk with the leaders of Covaxx, one of the companies developing a COVID vaccine, on why they think they may have a leg up on the dozens of other firms in the space.
“I think our vaccine candidate is one of the best. We have a platform that we know how to scale,” says Mei Mei Hu. “You have to actually be able to manufacture it. Doubling a recipe doesn’t always work, so it’s much easier to have a proven platform that you know how to scale.” More on that here.
Read on for the day’s news, and see you again next week (from California).
Sy Mukherjee
sayak.mukherjee@fortune.com
@the_sy_guy
DIGITAL HEALTH
Amazon, Airbnb vet joins Blink Health. We've previously covered Blink Health, the digital health startup with ambitions of slashing prescription drug costs by bypassing the middlemen in the medial industry. They're now taking a slightly different approach—and spoke with me about it in the first interview the company has done with CEO Geoffrey Chaiken and the new president, Vinayak Hegde, who helms from the likes of Amazon and Airbnb. Here's a little teaser: "When you have such a huge market, the obvious question is, you know, like why hasn't this been cracked?" says Chaiken. "And the basic reason for that is that it's an incredibly complicated problem to solve. And the problem I'm talking about solving is getting patients the lowest price on their prescriptions and giving them control and agency over their prescription so they can control where it's built." (Fortune)
INDICATIONS
FDA chief apologizes after searing criticism on blood plasma benefits. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) commissioner Stephen Hahn has been getting slammed by critics who believe that recent actions by the agency smack of political persuasion from the Trump administration. Specifically, critics have pointed out that a recent press conference about the promise of convalescent plasma to treat COVID sounded more like a press release than a sober scientific explanation—and included some stark inaccuracies which blurred the lines between relative and absolute risk when it comes to this form of coronavirus treatment. The backlash was significant enough to get Hahn himself to apologize. "The criticism is entirely justified," he said in a tweet on Monday. "What I should have said better is that the data show a relative risk reduction not an absolute risk reduction." (NPR)
THE BIG PICTURE
The postal crisis could be a catastrophe for women's birth control. My colleague Emma Hinchliffe reports that a lack of U.S. Postal Service funding is threatening women's access to birth control. "In the past month, some providers have reported that their customers are experiencing delays. The startup Simple Health, which prescribes birth control online, says that about 5%—or a few thousand—of its customers have reached out over the past few weeks to ask why their prescriptions are late, a trend that CEO Carrie Siu Butt calls "very upsetting," Emma writes. More here. (Fortune)
REQUIRED READING
Insurers nervous about Hurricane Laura's landfall, by Jeremy Kahn
Boris Johnson is urging parents to send their kids back to school, by Bloomberg
Warby Parker gets a $3 billion valuation, by Lucinda Shen


fortune--2020-08-27--PwC releases its first-ever diversity report

We need a COVID vaccine .
We also need to figure out how to get it to people

Our mission to help you navigate the new normal is fueled by subscribers. To enjoy unlimited access to our journalism, subscribe today.
Yesterday afternoon, Tim Ryan, PwC’s U.S. chairman and senior partner, shared the results of the firm’s first-ever Diversity & Inclusion (D&I) Transparency Report in a live webcast with its 55,000 U.S. employees. It was a promise kept: Ryan had pledged full transparency as part of six new commitments to accelerate PwC’s goal of racial equity in the aftermath of George Floyd’s death.
While the firm has made headway in some areas, the news is mixed.
Women and racially diverse talent now account for 65% of entry-level hires, 7% of whom identify as Black, 12% as Latinx. It’s an improvement from previous years. Although Black and brown partners are still underrepresented—at just 2% and 3%, respectively—racially diverse partners have increased by 8% over the last three years, and PwC’s current partner class is nearly 50% women or racially or ethnically diverse leaders.
But in the spirit of transparency, the firm has parsed its numbers in some commendable ways. For example, one way to gauge opportunity within the firm is to look at the people who get the juicy gigs—people with leadership roles on PwC’s Fortune 500 accounts. It’s some of the most high-profile and complex work they do. From this perspective, barriers emerge: PwC worked with 468 of the Fortune 500 companies during the 2020 fiscal year, but only 19% of those accounts were led by women or racially/ethnically diverse partners, and only 25% of the firm’s 20 largest audit accounts by revenue were led by women or racially/ethnically diverse partners.
Ryan has been unusually forthright on the subject of race and has encouraged the firm to confront difficult issues early in his tenure—including candid conversations about police violence and the criminal justice system. Part of that work includes Ryan’s CEO Action for Diversity and Inclusion, an alliance of some 1,200 CEOs who are working collaboratively on inclusion issues in their workforce.
While Ryan’s team had made a commitment to being open with the numbers, plans to release them publicly were accelerated by recent events.
“The decision to share our data had been planned, but the events around George Floyd’s killing boosted our desire to get this data out there and start sharing our plans earlier,” Ryan tells Fortune. “We aim to be a leader on diversity and inclusion, and the data tells an important story.”
Part of that story has been the frustration of some Black employees who felt they were denied opportunities to advance—which includes the kinds of assignments that get them in front of important clients. Over the last two years, Ryan’s teams have been using data, surveys, and employee feedback to help redesign their systems to address barriers and bottlenecks throughout PwC’s talent pipelines.
Shannon Schuyler, the firm’s chief purpose and inclusion officer, says they’re aiming to move faster from here. If PwC’s stated goal is to make sure that 50% of partners in the U.S. market are not white men, it means, in part, a better early pathway through the firm and an improved recruitment strategy.
“We know that our focus is going to be on our Black and Latinx and women [talent] at various different levels,” says Schuyler. With the data, she says, they better understand where people get lost or excluded. “There’s been a series of programs, intentional and targeted interventions, that really allow us now to look at the full complement of our people’s journey.”
Fortune has been following the firm’s inclusion efforts—which span two decades—and will be reporting on some of the ambitious interventions PwC has been developing since Ryan took the helm in 2016.
But full transparency is a good first step, though Ryan shares the data with all the usual caveats. “We know we are not where we want to be yet,” he says. He sees full representation as both a competitive advantage for the firm, and part of building an anti-racist society. “When you look at where we’re trying to head for representation overall, which you’ll see laid out over many different pages, [we’re not focusing] on just our partners. We’re really focused on looking to be aligned with the U.S. workforce.”


fortune--2020-08-27--‘At a tragic impasse’: White House and Pelosi call to discuss stimulus checks and extra unemployment

‘At a tragic impasse’: White House and Pelosi call to discuss stimulus checks and extra unemployment goes nowhere

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On Thursday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and White House chief of staff Mark Meadows spoke to discuss another coronavirus stimulus package.
But the two sides couldn’t come to an agreement for a broad stimulus package. Both parties would like such a bill to include items like a second round of stimulus checks, enhanced unemployment benefits, and another round of Paycheck Protection Program loans.
“[We’re] at a tragic impasse,” Pelosi told reporters after the phone call with Meadows. She told Bloomberg Democrats offered to come down from their request for $3.4 trillion to $2.2 trillion—the same size as the CARES Act passed in March—but Meadows rejected that offer.
It’s unclear if the White House has increased its offer of $1 trillion, which it made earlier this month.
If a deal can’t be made, Republicans may try to push forward with a limited stimulus package in the Senate of around $500 billion, which would include enhanced unemployment benefits, funding for schools, Paycheck Protection Program loans, and funding for a vaccine and testing. That limited bill would exclude a second round of stimulus checks and state government funding.


fortune--2020-08-27--Why Covaxx thinks it has a COVID-19 vaccine game changer on its hands

We often take vaccines for granted: “Yes, of course I need to get my shots, and those shots will be available.”
But vaccine development isn’t magic. It’s science and—especially during a pandemic—logistics. The coronavirus crisis has led to a veritable gold rush (and what some may call an arms race) in the biopharmaceutical industry. One company thinks it has a major advantage in that particular race: manufacturing.
The firm is Covaxx, a spinout of companies within the biotech firms United Biomedical and United Neuroscience (recently re-dubbed as Vaxxinity). Covaxx tells Fortune that its specific technology can give it a leg up over the dozens of larger companies ranging from Johnson & Johnson to AstraZeneca, as well as fellow upstarts like Moderna, in the necessary aspect of delivering a vaccine to people on time.
Why does Covaxx think it’s special? Its reasoning combines cool science, geopolitics, and the assistance of professionals like Mei Mei Hu—a luminary who is trying to engineer an Alzheimer’s vaccine and who also happens to be a McKinsey consultant with a Harvard Law degree and a rare female executive in an industry not known for its diversity.
Hu has help from the likes of Covaxx cofounder and vice chairman Peter Diamandis, known better for his work with the X Prize Foundation and Singularity University, who was excited by the prospect of using United Biomedical’s platforms to treat infectious diseases. “It was the idea of using vaccines to treat chronic diseases. Can you activate the immune system to bring your body back to a state of normalcy?” he tells Fortune, adding that the company’s work on Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s captured his attention.
The science, still in early stages, is fascinating. Diamandis compares it to a cop walking the beat, but for a biological threat—that is, it requires a more targeted approach than searching for one criminal. Viruses attack multiple sites within our bodies, he says, and we must address all of them if we seek true protection.
“If it’s a police force, how many police are there on a city block?” Diamandis asks, referring to the various regions of the coronavirus that can be targeted. “And then: How effective are those police at actually neutralizing the criminals?”
But all the experimental science in the world means nothing if patients can’t ultimately get their hands on a proven COVID vaccine. That’s where Hu thinks that Covaxx has an advantage. Though the company is independent, it can rely on the manufacturing capacity that United Biomedical can provide around the globe.
“I think our vaccine candidate is one of the best. We have a platform that we know how to scale,” she tells Fortune. “You have to actually be able to manufacture it. Doubling a recipe doesn’t always work, so it’s much easier to have a proven platform that you know how to scale.”
Hu points out that many of the coronavirus candidates in development have to be chilled with liquid nitrogen and can’t be kept in conventional freezers for more than a few days. “I don’t think people realize that,” she says. “Producing 10,000 doses is different from producing 1 million and very different from producing 100 million. We don’t naturally keep things like that in a freezer.” Covaxx’s technology, she says, would make distribution far easier.
The company says that it will enter human trials of its vaccine candidate within the next few weeks in Taiwan, which would potentially serve as a major manufacturing site in the future. It’s also aiming for early-stage trials in the U.S. with the University of Nebraska Medical Center by this fall.
“The interesting thing about Taiwan, is this is already a nationalist thing,” referring to the global vaccine arms race. “These are considerations we’ve never had to consider, but they’re ones we have to consider in COVID time.”
The goals are broad: 100 million doses of the vaccine by the end of the first quarter of 2021, according to Hu—and somewhere between 500 million to one billion by the end of next year.


fortune--2020-08-27--Warby Parker raises $245 million for a $3 billion valuation

Eyeglasses startup Warby Parker has raised $245 million with investments from D1 Capital, Durable Capital Partners, T. Rowe Price, and Baillie Gifford.
A source familiar with the financing tells Fortune that the new funding values the company at about $3 billion, a sizable uptick compared to $1.75 billion following its valuation at its last announced funding in 2018.
As Warby Parker’s origin story goes, its founders were overcome with sticker shock when shopping around for new glasses, so they devised a way to lower prices and go direct-to-consumer. The brand took off, becoming a poster child of the e-commerce movement that would spawn many a “Warby Parker of X”s. In 2017, the company became profitable on an EBITDA basis for the first time since its founding in 2010.
While Warby Parker did not disclose more recent financials or updates on its performance amid the the pandemic, Warby Parker co-CEO Neil Blumenthal told CNN earlier this month that the company closed all 120 of its physical locations when the virus first hit stateside, representing a “big chunk of our revenue.” But, as many other brands also have experienced, online business “has gone gangbusters” he said, while most of the company’s stores have also reopened.
“We’re lucky to be in a category like glasses, which is a necessity,” Blumenthal said.


fortune--2020-08-27--After years of ‘too much TV,’ the pandemic means there’s now barely enough

The competition for screen time seems greater than ever these days. In addition to the persistent impulse to scroll through Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube on our phones, the battleground also includes larger displays as television networks duke it out with an increasing glut of streaming services, seemingly equipped with a never-ending pipeline of new shows.
But after nearly six months of COVID-19 production delays, traditional broadcast networks are finding there’s barely enough fresh programming to fill their fall schedules. Streaming companies, for all their back catalogs of on-demand content, aren’t in a much better position—they also film original productions. Anything new and enticing to viewers will be in high demand, and competition to license it will be fierce.
“Production got completely screwed up for four to five months, and even now production is slow because they’re filming with crazy [strict] safety protocols,” says Michael Pachter, a media analyst at Wedbush Securities. “All of these shows are still out of production, and [networks and streaming companies] are desperate. It’s hard finding shows. Everybody has the same problem.”
The likes of CBS, ABC, NBC, and Fox have been forced to get a little creative ahead of the fall TV lineup that traditionally rolls out with debut series and returning favorites. CBS, unable to complete filming of stalwarts like NCIS and Survivor, has opted to import the first season of Star Trek: Discovery that debuted on the network’s streaming service, CBS All Access, in 2017. NBC switched American Ninja Warrior into The Voice‘s time slot after deeming the latter wouldn’t finish production in time. The CW announced its popular series Riverdale would be delayed until at least January of next year.
With a lack of scripted content finished on time, reality television and acquisitions of already produced international shows have been used to fill the gap. NBC, unable to resume production of the third season of medical drama New Amsterdam, has instead brought on the Canadian medical drama Transplant, which it acquired in May. The lead-in ahead of its 10 p.m. air time? Two hours of America’s Got Talent, which was extended through September because of pandemic production issues.
Streaming companies are also employing similar strategies. In the U.K., Netflix is outbidding the country’s traditional broadcast networks, leaving them in flux when it comes to filling their own programming schedules. “I know a lot of people who work for streamers in acquisitions, and they are buying everything,” John McVay, head of the trade body Pact, which represents the U.K.’s independent television production companies, told the Guardian.
The pandemic’s forced stay-at-home orders was a huge boon to Netflix, adding 26 million global subscribers in the first half of this year, compared to 12 million during the same period last year. But Netflix’s massive growth, along with its subsequent acquisitions, isn’t just a sign of strength—it also represents some vulnerability, analysts say.
“They have a monster they have to feed now,” says Eric Schmitt, a media analyst at Gartner. “They have no choice but to keep feeding that machine, and if that means paying above the market price of content to keep users happy and keep it out of the hands of competitors, it’s really only the choice they have at this point.”
For all of Netflix’s deep library of content, the company—which operates just as much a prolific production company as a streaming service—has also had to halt or slow down production on new original series, though it has been able to keep premiering a number of them in the midst of the pandemic. And unlike newer streaming competitors like Disney+, HBO Max, or NBCUniversal’s Peacock, Netflix no longer has as stacked of a roster of beloved licensed shows that users continually watch again and again (think The Office or Friends).
“They have to license content created before 2011, their first year with original content, while the other guys own it,” Pachter said, adding that he’s currently enjoying older hits like HBO’s Deadwood, BBC’s Extras, and the original British version of The Office. “Netflix has to pay for all of this, while the other guys presumably have a library that includes [The Dick Van Dyke Show]. If you haven’t seen these old shows, they’re new to you.”
That means Netflix’s strategy of acquiring shows that have yet to premiere in the U.S. will likely continue in the short to medium term. But it won’t be the only one in times of desperation due to the pandemic, as NBC’s acquisition of Transplant shows.
Networks and streamers alike may get more creative with their programming, relying more on animation and user-generated content—like web series on YouTube.
“I think this is going to spur a lot of innovation on the content side,” said Gartner’s Schmitt. “More reality shows, more animation, more things that can be done with lower production costs. You can’t overlook the farm system that YouTube is building for content. TV people for years turned their heads and said it’s not a real thing. But hey, it’s people viewing things on the screen.”


fortune--2020-08-27--Spotify loses Joe Budden, its first big podcasting star

Spotify Technology SA is losing Joe Budden, one of its most popular podcast hosts, after failing to come to terms on a new deal.
Spotify said it offered Budden a significant raise that reflected his market value. “Unfortunately, we could not come to terms and we respect his wishes to find a new home for his show,” the company said Thursday.
Budden was Spotify’s first original hit in podcasting, and a sign of its growing ambitions. The former rapper signed a deal in 2018 to make his talk show exclusive to Spotify, and was regularly cited as one of the most popular programs on the platform. His show remains in the top 20 in the app’s U.S. rankings.
Spotify has since spent hundreds of millions of dollars acquiring podcast companies such as Gimlet Media and the Ringer, and committed more than $100 million for the exclusive rights to Joe Rogan, another popular host.
Budden says Spotify used him as a guinea pig for this larger strategy, and accused the company of not supporting him. “Spotify never cared about this podcast individually,” he said on his latest podcast. “Spotify only cared about our contribution to the platform.”
Podcast listening has soared on Spotify in the past two years, and Budden’s departure isn’t going to cause much of a dent in the short term. However, his claims will reverberate in a podcasting community already wary of Spotify’s growing power, and may damage Spotify’s reputation among musicians who say the company doesn’t compensate them adequately for their work.


fortune--2020-08-27--Pelosi says she won’t budge on stimulus ahead of call with Meadows

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she won’t budge from Democrats’ demands on a new pandemic relief package when she has her first discussion in three weeks with White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, diminishing prospects for progress in negotiations.
Pelosi and Meadows have scheduled a call Thursday afternoon, which will be the first time the key negotiators have spoken since stimulus talks hit an impasse on Aug. 7. The call is set for 2:30 p.m. Washington time, according to people familiar with the plan who requested anonymity to discuss the matter.
“They are just going to have to come up with more money,” Pelosi said. “That could be a very short conversation if they aren’t ready to meet in the middle.”
Democrats want Republicans to double their roughly $1 trillion stimulus offer in exchange for reducing their $3.4 trillion proposal by $1 trillion.
Meadows on Wednesday predicted that there would be no stimulus deal with House Democrats until the end of September, and said that they may be combined with a stopgap resolution needed to sustain funding of the federal government beyond Oct. 1, and avert a shutdown.
The new talks come after Meadows on Saturday tried to have an impromptu meeting with Pelosi while she was at the Capitol and went with his entourage to her suite, only to be told she was in a meeting.
Economic Warnings
Aid to state and local governments, the conditioning of school aid on fully re-opening classrooms, and the level of weekly unemployment insurance payments have been the biggest sticking points in the stalled talks. Democrats have been seeking $915 billion for regional authorities and a $600-per-week added unemployment benefit into 2021, significantly beyond what Republicans favor.
The White House has put $150 billion for states and localities on the table, and President Donald Trump on Aug. 8 signed an order creating a temporary $300-per-week benefit using limited disaster relief funds.
That temporary unemployment benefit, which hasn’t yet been distributed, is expected to run out in under five weeks once the program gets up and running.
The U.S. economy continues to suffer from the coronavirus slowdown. Initial jobless claims in regular state programs were 1.01 million in the week ended Aug. 22, the second straight week above 1 million, Labor Department data showed Thursday.
Fiscal Imperative
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell warned the U.S. faces a “long tail” of relatively high unemployment as people struggle to find work in industries hit hard by the pandemic. “We need to stay with those people. We need to support them,” Powell said Thursday at a virtual iteration of the Kansas City Fed’s annual Jackson Hole conference.
Powell also called for more direct aid to small businesses, putting the onus on Congress to step up on fiscal policy.
Senate Republicans continue to refine a slimmed-down stimulus proposal with $300 per week in unemployment benefits but without the $1,200 direct stimulus payments for most people — which both Trump and Pelosi have favored.
Discussions over the proposal aren’t expected to yield congressional floor action for weeks. The Senate isn’t scheduled to return to Washington until Sept. 8, with the full House returning for votes the following week.


fortune--2020-08-27--‘House of Cardin’ aims to be more than a fashion documentary

P. David Ebersole and Todd Hughes are documentary filmmakers and Pierre Cardin fans—but they never actually intended to make a documentary about the legendary designer.
“We collect Pierre Cardin, so we have furniture—we have all the sort of fun items like the backgammon set and glassware,” Ebersole tells Fortune.
“We were in Paris by chance with our last film, and we happened upon the Cardin museum. Then we went into the store and started talking to the guy who worked at the store about our obsession, and he said, ‘Oh, Mr. Cardin loves to meet people like you that really know all of his work.’ And we were like—there’s a Mr. Cardin?”
“We thought it was like one of those mythical names, right? Like Betty Crocker,” Hughes adds, laughing.
Instead, they realized “not only was there a man, but he was 95 years old, and he still goes to work every day, signs every check,” Ebersole says.
Now, about three years after the filmmakers first met Cardin, and about a year since it debuted on the festival circuit, their documentary House of Cardin is getting a virtual and limited theatrical release Friday, before it becomes available on demand on Sept. 15 to coincide with New York Fashion Week.
“House of Cardin” looks back at the career and designs of Pierre Cardin, while also delving into his more recent efforts. Courtesy of the Pierre Cardin Archives and The Ebersole Hughes Company
The documentary dives into Cardin’s history, from his origins as an haute couture designer in 1950s Paris to his expansion into ready-to-wear clothing for a global market and eventually, industrial design. The man himself, now 98, is featured via both archival footage and fresh interviews, alongside members of his inner circle, as well as a number of high-profile designers and celebrities, including Jean-Paul Gaultier, Alice Cooper, and Naomi Campbell.
“We asked [Naomi] because she was the only celebrity that we know of that wears vintage Cardin on the red carpet,” says Ebersole. “And of course we knew that he was so involved with diversifying the runway, and that’s one of her great causes.”
The filmmakers grew to view Cardin as something of a beloved uncle over the course of making the documentary. And as their subject watched them work, he grew increasingly relaxed, Hughes says.
The first day filming with Cardin involved a sit-down interview inside the restaurant Maxim’s, which is owned by the designer. His answers were so direct that the planned shoot was over in about half an hour, Ebersole says.
“Then he said to us, ‘Well, do you want to go upstairs?’ And our poor camera crew just had to grab cameras and follow, because when he goes, he goes,” Ebersole says. “He took us up to that Art Nouveau museum that was on the top floor of Maxim’s and walked us through his whole private collection.
“Working with him was very spontaneous,” he continues. “At his age, there are days when he’s up and days when he’s not. We’d come to Paris with two weeks free and just know, it’s going to be kind of at Mr. Cardin’s whim.”
Pierre Cardin in a still from “House of Cardin.” Courtesy of the Pierre Cardin Archives and The Ebersole Hughes Company
Though the film is a fashion documentary, it also isn’t one, Hughes says, calling the sphere Cardin inhabits “expansive.”
“Even now it’s hard to tell people what it is,” Hughes says. “It’s a celebration of a life; it’s a celebration of creativity.”
And it was important to the filmmakers to also convey what was beneath Cardin’s work, as a way of preserving his legacy.
“Underneath each achievement or decision to do something that was outside of the norm was a [political act]…It’s not just about selling clothes,” Ebersole says. Cardin brought Japanese model Hiroko Matsumoto on to model his clothes at a time when couture houses weren’t known for diversity; he was also the first European designer to go to post Cultural Revolution China.
“‘Why should the world be shut down for some people and open for other people?’ And same idea for diversifying the runway—why should fashion and self-expression only be for rich white Frenchwomen?” Ebersole adds.
Though Cardin was able to make it to the world premiere at the Venice Film Festival last year, where he received a standing ovation, the film is now coming out for mass consumption during strange times. Thanks to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, theatrical releases are a lot more limited (if theaters are even open), and many audiences are catching new releases on demand.
The fact that the documentary is being released under slightly different circumstances than the norm is somewhat fitting, the filmmakers say.
“[It] feels so Pierre Cardin,” Ebersole says. “We’re hoping it’s the right movie for the right moment.”
House of Cardin hits select theaters and also has a virtual theatrical release on Aug. 28. It will be available on demand Sept. 15.


fortune--2020-08-27--Athletes, from the NBA to tennis stars, are striking to protest the police shooting of Jacob Blake

NBA players didn’t come to Disney solely for a restart. They also wanted social reform.
The Milwaukee Bucks showed how far they’re willing to go to get it by opting not to play in their playoff game Wednesday. Two more games were postponed later in the day, the second time this season NBA basketball came to an immediate halt.
Other sports followed, just as they did in March when the season was suspended four months because of the coronavirus pandemic.
Later Thursday, the NBA’s board of governors will meet and likely address whether the playoff games scheduled for the night will be played. The players also will meet separately to decide how long the stoppage lasts.
“The biggest thing that we all understand is if we’re not playing, what are we doing? What are we doing to show and to help what’s going on outside this bubble?” Boston Celtics forward Grant Williams said, shortly before the Bucks were scheduled to tip off their game against the Orlando Magic.
Instead, the Bucks players remained in the locker room, finally emerging hours later to read a statement demanding action from lawmakers and encouraging voting by citizens.
They changed the narrative across the entire sports landscape, putting the focus squarely on social justice reform in protest of the shooting of Jacob Blake, a Black man, by police in Kenosha, Wisconsin, while three of his children in his car looked on.
While players and teams from baseball, the WNBA, MLS and tennis sat out their competitions Wednesday night, NBA players and coaches met for nearly three hours in a Disney hotel to determine next steps, including whether the season should continue. They did not come to a consensus, a person with knowledge of the meeting told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because details weren’t revealed publicly.
The Western & Southern Open won’t be played Thursday, with the U.S. Tennis Association, along with the ATP and WTA Tours, announcing play would be paused after two-time Grand Slam women’s champion Naomi Osaka had already said she wouldn’t play her semifinal match.
“I don’t expect anything drastic to happen with me not playing, but if I can get a conversation started in a majority white sport I consider that a step in the right direction,” Osaka tweeted. “Watching the continued genocide of Black people at the hand of the police is honestly making me sick to my stomach.”
More lost NBA games would be another punishing financial blow in a season in which the league was already headed to losses of hundreds of million of dollars, potentially leading to ramifications that would be felt in future years.
Before coming to Disney, many NBA players wrestled for weeks about whether it was even right to play, fearing that a return to games would take attention off the deaths of, among others, Breonna Taylor and George Floyd in recent months.
They ultimately decided coming to the bubble and playing televised games would give them the largest platform, though now at least some are wondering if that’s still true. Toronto coach Nick Nurse said he’s heard some players on his team say they were thinking about going home.
Clippers coach Doc Rivers hopes they won’t.
His players considered boycotting a playoff game in 2014 after audio tapes featuring former owner Donald Sterling were revealed. He said this time is different because it’s the whole league, rather than one team, weighing the decision.
“I think every team has to decide what they want to do and honestly I hope everyone plays,” Rivers said. “I just think showing the excellence in doing your job, there’s nothing wrong with that, but also fighting for what’s right is important as well.”
It certainly is for the Bucks, who play about 40 miles from Kenosha. Sterling Brown, one of the players to read the statement, has a federal lawsuit pending against the city of Milwaukee alleging he was targeted because he was Black and that his civil rights were violated in January 2018 when officers used a stun gun on him after a parking violation.
And it is for the Raptors, whose team president, Masai Ujiri, had an altercation with an Oracle Arena security guard after Game 6 of last year’s NBA Finals. A video of it released recently appears to show an Alameda County sheriff’s deputy initially shoved Ujiri, who is Black, twice.
They are scheduled to open the second round Thursday against Boston, but Nurse said his players were already having discussions about not playing.
“Boycotting the game has come up for them and again, as a way to try to demand a little more action and I think that’s really what they want,” Nurse said.
“I think there’s enough attention and there’s not quite enough action and I think that’s what I can sense from the discussion. Their disappointment of man, how can we get something to change?”
It probably starts with actions like the Bucks took. Rivers and LeBron James had passionately described the emotions the NBA community felt after seeing the video of Blake’s shooting.
But it’s going to take more than players sitting out NBA games.
“It’s going to take all our institutions to stand up for our values,” former President Barack Obama tweeted, commending the NBA and WNBA players while posting a link to Rivers’ comments from earlier this week.


fortune--2020-08-27--Walmart joins Microsoft in effort to buy TikTok

Walmart has teamed up with Microsoft in a joint bid to acquire TikTok, a surprise move that signals the retail giant’s desire to become a force in technology and media and reach younger shoppers.
Walmart said in an emailed statement that the move could help grow its third-party online marketplace unit along with its nascent advertising arm, two areas that Chief Executive Officer Doug McMillon has said he’d like to expand. The two companies already work together, as Walmart uses Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform across the entire company.
Walmart’s shares jumped as much as 3.6% to $135.47 in New York following news of the joint pursuit of TikTok, the biggest intraday gain since July 7.
Microsoft has been in discussions for weeks to buy TikTok’s business in the U.S., Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Other companies have also emerged as potential bidders, including Oracle Corp. and Twitter Inc. It’s unclear how far those discussions have gone. Microsoft is the only company to publicly confirm acquisition talks.
Walmart’s interest in the popular app shows how serious McMillon is about moving the world’s biggest retailer into the faster-growing arena of media and online content. It has partnered, and bought a stake in, Israeli video-production company Eko, which has developed things like interactive toy catalogs for Walmart.
Vudu Sale
Other moves have failed, though: Walmart sold it video-streaming service Vudu earlier this year, as the business had been leapfrogged by subscription services like Netflix and Hulu.
TikTok, owned by China-based ByteDance Ltd., is fielding interest in its operations in the U.S. and a handful of other countries. President Donald Trump recently ordered ByteDance to sell TikTok’s U.S. assets within 90 days.


fortune--2020-08-27--USPS delays threaten women’s access to birth control

Changes in U.S. Postal Service operations have disrupted everything from baby chicks on their way to farmers to prescriptions sent via the Veterans Administration.
For some who rely on the postal service, the delays have interfered with an equally important delivery: birth control.
According to the Centers for Disease Control, 12.6% of American women between the ages of 15 and 49 take an oral contraceptive; thousands of those women receive their pills by mail.
In the past month, some providers have reported that their customers are experiencing delays. The startup Simple Health, which prescribes birth control online, says that about 5%—or a few thousand—of its customers have reached out over the past few weeks to ask why their prescriptions are late, a trend that CEO Carrie Siu Butt calls “very upsetting.” Pandia Health, a competitor in the industry, has also heard reports of delays, though it estimates that the complaints have come from less than 10% of its users. “Just like for senior citizens and veterans who get their medications in the mail, if your medication doesn’t arrive on time for birth control, there will theoretically be a dire consequence,” says Pandia Health CEO Sophia Yen.
Postmaster General Louis DeJoy appeared before the House Oversight Committee earlier this week to answer questions about the service. He confirmed during his testimony that changes he implemented this summer had led to delays, saying, “While we have had a temporary service decline which should not have happened, we are fixing this.” Three state attorneys general have filed suits related to recent changes in the postal service. USPS declined to comment and referred Fortune to DeJoy’s testimony.
Women often rely on birth control for medical needs other than, or in addition to, preventing pregnancy. Conditions treated by oral contraceptives include endometriosis, polycystic ovary syndrome, and heavy menstrual bleeding. Physicians also prescribe birth control to patients who would face health risks if they were to become pregnant, including women who suffer from cardiac disease or are undergoing some cancer treatments.
The way birth control is prescribed means that delays can be especially hard to navigate. Insurers generally don’t allow prescriptions to be sent until seven days before they run out, Siu Butt says. But, in some cases, mail is taking up to 10 days to arrive.
Not all providers are encountering issues with the mail; larger organizations, including the company Nurx and the prescription provider Express Scripts, say their shipments are not experiencing any unusual delays.
As a stopgap measure while the postal service faces these issues, Simple Health is working on providing cash-pay refills and negotiating with insurers to send refills earlier. For patients who are encountering delays, Adrienne Werth, a fourth-year ob/gyn resident at Christiana Care Health System in Delaware, recommends asking a provider to transfer a prescription to a physical pharmacy. “But it can be hard, because when you rely on mail order, there’s usually a reason why,” she says. “Some people can’t get a ride or are too busy to go to the pharmacy.” For patients who depend on these mail-only services, a general practitioner will often prescribe birth control if needed.
“When you expect to have care and all of a sudden you don’t,” Werth says, “it changes your day-to-day life.”


fortune--2020-08-27--COVID-19 and climate change expose the dangers of unstable supply chains

When a high-rise goes up, it is designed to withstand everything from gale-force winds to earthquakes and fires. But few multinational companies have applied the same kind of pre-emptive stress testing to their supply chains. Manufacturers have built intricate production networks to deliver efficiency but have left little margin for error. The COVID-19 pandemic has revealed how fragile lengthy, complex supply chains can be—and how much society has riding on their continued smooth functioning.
In recent decades, global supply chains have evolved in ways that leave them more exposed to shocks. Some industries, including communication equipment, computers, and textiles, have grown two to three times more geographically concentrated over this period. Some 80% of world trade now flows through countries with declining political stability scores, as measured by the World Bank. More global production happens in areas that are highly vulnerable to climate change. And the world has grown more interconnected: When disaster strikes in one region, flows of goods, finance, people, and data quickly transmit ripple effects far and wide—as Hurricane Laura is demonstrating this week.
Even before the pandemic, companies were facing mounting losses from periodic supply chain bottlenecks and shutdowns. Those costs aren’t “unforeseeable” anymore. In fact, our research found that shutdown lasting a month or more occur every 3.7 years on average. Manufacturers in some industries can expect unexpected events to erase the majority of a year’s profits over the course of a decade—and that’s just the baseline, accounting for probabilities like recurring storms and shipping snafus. Extreme one-off events can be far more damaging for companies and societies at large.
Given that the world is undergoing its second “once-in-a-generation” disruption in 12 years, a reappraisal is in order. Building a more resilient form of globalization will require action by both CEOs and policymakers.
A growing awareness of risk may cause some companies to restructure and regionalize their supply chains—at least where there’s a solid business case. Governments, too, may take action to boost domestic production of goods that are deemed essential or important to national competitiveness, reshaping industries in ways that market forces alone would not. All told, we estimate that up to a quarter of global goods exports, worth up to $4.5 trillion annually, could shift to different countries in the next five years or so.
But that leaves three-quarters or more of export flows fairly entrenched where they are at present. Luckily, companies have many other strategies for hedging against disruptions. Most large companies have little visibility beyond the suppliers they deal with directly, but they need to understand vulnerabilities in the deeper tiers of the network. Firms can also engage redundant suppliers for critical inputs, reduce product complexity for more flexible manufacturing, or hold more inventory and cash, just for a start.
A lot of this is well-established conventional wisdom. So why haven’t more companies acted on it? Short-termism is one reason. Many were unwilling to bear the present-day cost of preparing for future hypotheticals. But today technology offers opportunities to be more resilient and more productive. In an increasingly volatile world, insuring against disruptions can pay off quickly.
CEOs are rapidly awakening to this new reality. Supply chain operations were rarely on their radar; now for more and more it’s at the top of their agenda.
The empty supermarket shelves and shortages of medical supplies of recent months have driven home the fact that supply chain stability is not just a business issue. It’s also about protecting the public interest. Policymakers have a role to play and can actively shape the likelihood and severity of supply chain shocks. Governments have capabilities at their discretion to manage risk that individual companies do not, such as building infrastructure to mitigate flooding and other climate risks, investing in early warning capabilities, and maintaining cutting-edge emergency management capabilities. Countries that want to build robust supply chains will require a long-term commitment to adopting advanced manufacturing technologies, developing workforce skills that align with industry needs, and building robust digital and physical infrastructure.
For more than two decades, global supply chains have pushed the boundaries of distance and efficiency. Now the pandemic has delivered a wake-up call that some are stretched too thin—and it’s time to build more safeguards and resilience into the system.
Kevin Sneader is the global managing partner of McKinsey & Company. Susan Lund is a partner at the McKinsey Global Institute, the firm’s business and economics research arm.


fortune--2020-08-27--Stimulus talks to resume: White House and Pelosi to discuss coronavirus checks and extra unemploymen

Stimulus talks to resume: White House and Pelosi to discuss coronavirus checks and extra unemployment benefits

White House chief of staff Mark Meadows is set to reopen discussion on a coronavirus stimulus package on Thursday with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
This marks the first time Democratic and Republican leaders have discussed a stimulus bill since August 7 when talks ended in a bitter stalemate. Those negotiations fell apart with Democratic leaders still asking for $3.4 trillion in stimulus, while the White House wouldn’t budge from its offer of around $1 trillion. Democratic leaders proposed coming down $1 trillion if Republicans came up $1 trillion, however, that offer was rebuffed.
This restart in talks comes after Meadows publicly stated Wednesday he had reached out to Pelosi to resume talks. It’s unclear if the two parties would move forward with a broad stimulus package—including things like stimulus checks, enhanced unemployment, Paycheck Protection Program loans, and state governments fundings—or a more limited package.
On Wednesday, CNBC reported Republicans may try to push forward with a limited stimulus package in the Senate of around $500 billion, which would include enhanced unemployment benefits, funding for schools, Paycheck Protection Program loans, and funding for a vaccine and testing. That limited bill would exclude a second round of stimulus checks and state government funding.
Democratic leaders have said that a limited stimulus package, or anything below $2 trillion, is a nonstarter.
And both the White House and Pelosi are going into the call with limited expectations. Meadows said Wednesday he think it’s unlikely anything gets signed before the end of September.
But the pressure is mounting. The expiration of the $600 enhanced unemployment benefits on July 25 and slowing economic numbers are helping to bring both parties back to the negotiating table.


fortune--2020-08-27--Low interest rates may be here to stay, following Fed Chief Powell’s new approach on inflation

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell unveiled a new approach to setting U.S. monetary policy, letting inflation sometimes run faster than it traditionally allowed, in a shift that will likely keep interest rates low for years to come.
Powell said the Fed will seek inflation that averages 2% over time, a step that implies allowing for price pressures to overshoot after periods of weakness. It also adjusted its view of maximum employment to allow labor-market gains to run more broadly.
“Our revised statement emphasizes that maximum employment is a broad-based and inclusive goal,” Powell said in a speech delivered virtually for the central bank’s annual policy symposium traditionally held in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. “This change reflects our appreciation for the benefits of a strong labor market, particularly for many in low- and moderate-income communities.”
During the longest U.S. economic expansion on record until the pandemic hit earlier this year, many groups benefited — including minorities and women — in their ability to find work. With unrest breaking out across the U.S. over racial inequality, questions about how the Fed’s policy helps communities broadly have been raised.
Price Pressures
In its new statement on longer-run goals, the Fed said its decisions would be informed by its assessment of “shortfalls of employment from its maximum level.” The previous version had referred to “deviations from its maximum level.” The change de-emphasizes previous concerns that low unemployment can cause excess inflation.
The markets took Powell’s remarks as another indication that the Fed is in no rush to raise interest rates. Bonds and U.S. stocks rose along with gold prices.
Regarding price pressures, the document says the committee will target “inflation that averages 2% over time” and will aim to bring inflation above the 2% target following periods when inflation runs below that level.
The shift Powell announced represents the product of an unprecedented review of the Fed’s strategies, tools and approach to communications that began in early 2019.
Since the central bank officially set its inflation target at 2% in 2012, the Fed’s preferred measure of price increases has consistently fallen short of that objective, averaging just 1.4%.
Low inflation contributes to low interest rates, reducing the Fed’s ability to fight off economic downturns and potentially making them deeper and longer. Powell noted a risk, saying that “if excessive inflationary pressures were to build or inflation expectations were to ratchet above levels consistent with our goal,” the central bank wouldn’t hesitate to act.
He called the changes “a robust updating of our monetary policy framework.”
–With assistance from Steve Matthews.


fortune--2020-08-27--The stock market is hitting new records—but a warning signal called the ‘VIX’ is flashing

Fear gauges for the S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 indexes may be providing fresh reasons for caution about the rally in U.S. stocks.
The S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 scaled new peaks Wednesday, but their respective measures of implied volatility also rose in tandem. Simultaneous increases in equity and volatility gauges are unusual, and a reason for concern for some.
Wednesday was the first time in about two decades the Cboe Volatility Index — or VIX — rose more than 5% as the S&P 500 rose over 1% to a record, Jason Goepfert, president of Sundial Capital Research Inc., wrote in a note. History suggests stocks tend to decline a median 1.2% in the following month when that happens, he added.
“This might be the weirdest market I’ve ever seen,” Goepfert said, adding he’s seen market oddities for weeks, and so far “they haven’t mattered.”
That’s underscored by a surge in U.S. stocks that defied convention and skeptics alike. The Nasdaq 100 has rebounded 71% from the virus-induced lows in March, and the S&P 500 is up 56%. The rally has stretched valuations, and faces risks from stalled U.S. fiscal stimulus talks and the struggle to contain the pandemic.
Wednesday’s session also saw a 2.1% rise in the Nasdaq 100 Index accompanied by a more than 10% increase in the Cboe NDX Volatility Index. Both have climbed in August, but the move in the volatility measure may be due to investors chasing the stock rally, according to Susquehanna Financial Group LLLP.
“We are seeing more ‘upside panic’” in the Nasdaq, Chris Murphy, a derivatives strategist at Susquehanna, wrote in a note.
A range of uncertainties are set to be resolved in the months ahead, such as over stimulus spending, November’s U.S. presidential election and the possible introduction of a Covid-19 vaccine.
That’s going to bring VIX down to about 16, from about 23 currently, according to Michael Kelly, head of multi-asset at PineBridge Investments LLC. “It’s extraordinarily unusual for the VIX to stay above 20 for an extended period of time without a crisis situation going on,” he said in an interview.
(Updates market performance in the fifth paragraph.)
–With assistance from Cormac Mullen and Gregor Stuart Hunter.


fortune--2020-08-27--Amazon jumps into smart wearables market with Halo activity tracking band

Amazon’s health efforts took a new twist, as the e-commerce giant on Thursday announced an app-based health advice service for consumers—called Halo—that requires its own activity tracking band.
The service already has signed on some major partners in the health care market including leading data service Cerner and insurer John Hancock. Customers can apply for “early access” to the service starting immediately. Amazon didn’t say when the service would be more widely available.
While superficially similar to activity tracking bands from Fitbit, Huawei, and others, the Halo band collects more kinds of health data and is focused entirely on improving health at the expense of other functions. The band links with a smartphone app for data collection and analysis, but it doesn’t have a screen and doesn’t offer notifications, calls, or other phone app connections.
The Halo band captures a wide range of sensory data, including the wearer’s heart rate, skin temperature, movements, amount of sleep, and tone of voice. It comes in three sizes and three colors and costs $65 for early participants.
Amazon announced a new health tracking and advice service called Halo that comes with its own activity tracking band. Courtesy of Amazon
Data collected by the band gets turned into health advice via an A.I.-backed app on the user’s phone. Early users will get six months of the premium health advice service for free and then have to pay $4 per month. The band and app will offer rudimentary data collection if the user opts not to pay for continuing the service after six months, Amazon said.
“We are using Amazon’s deep expertise in artificial intelligence and machine learning to offer customers a new way to discover, adopt, and maintain personalized wellness habits,” Dr. Maulik Majmudar, principal medical officer for the new service, said in a statement.
The announcement comes just days after Fitbit announced its newest smartwatches and fitness bands. The new $100 Inspire 2 activity tracker is different from the Halo, however, with a small screen that provides phone notifications and app alerts.
John Hancock’s Vitality wellness program will give away Halo bands as part of its service and include three years of the Halo app service for free. A connection via Cerner will allow Halo users to send their health data to their doctor or other care providers. Halo users can also link the service to their account at WW, formerly Weight Watchers.
The Halo’s built-in microphone and other sensitive data collection methods on the device may raise questions about how much consumers will trust Amazon. The company said all data would be encrypted when sent and stored; users could delete all their data at any time; and speech samples would be analyzed on the user’s own phone and then automatically deleted. “Nobody, not even the customer, ever hears them,” Amazon said.
More basic wearables have been selling better than fancier smartwatches during the COVID-19 pandemic. Sales of activity trackers rose 16% in the second quarter while sales of smartwatches declined 7%, according to IDC.


fortune--2020-08-27--Warby Parker gets a $3 billion valuation

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Eyeglass-selling startup Warby Parker has raised $245 million with investments from D1 Capital, Durable Capital Partners, T. Rowe Price, and Baillie Gifford.
A source familiar with the financing tells Fortune that the new funding values the company at about $3 billion, a sizable uptick compared to $1.75 billion following its valuation at its last announced funding in 2018.
The unicorn, which sells glasses both online and in stores, was created after its founders realized they could undercut existing prices on glasses and go direct-to-consumer—and the brand took off, becoming a poster child of the e-commerce movement that would spawn many a “Warby Parker of X”s. In 2017, the company became profitable on an EBITDA basis for the first time since its founding in 2010.
While Warby Parker did not disclose more recent financials or updates on its performance amid the the pandemic, Warby Parker co-CEO Neil Blumenthal told CNN earlier this month that the company closed all 120 of its physical locations when the virus first hit stateside, representing a “big chunk of our revenue.” But, as many other brands also have experienced, online business “has gone gangbusters” he said, while most of the company’s stores have also reopened.
“We’re lucky to be in a category like glasses, which is a necessity,” Blumenthal said.
What makes a direct listing that allows you to raise funding different from an IPO?
Warby Parker has long been on the IPO watch list, with co-CEO Dave Gilboa suggesting in 2018 that it was in the stars at some point in the future.
Of course since 2018, there’s been a swirl of new ways to go public. There’s the first iteration of the direct listing, through which companies have raised existing shares without additional capital; there’s the much talked about SPAC, during which a company combines with a publicly traded shell—and now, there’s the direct listing that can raise additional capital.
On Wednesday, the Securities and Exchange Commission approved a proposal from the New York Stock Exchange that will allow companies to issue new shares via a direct listing process. The move could boost the popularity of the financing method that was once suitable only for cash-rich private companies with strong brand recognition.
So now, what separates an IPO from a direct listing? Well, the company going through the direct route is likely to pay fewer fees as they are hiring bankers as advisors rather than underwriters. Direct listings also tend to have no lockup period, or multi-day investor roadshows used to price the stock. Though that also means banks won’t provide price stabilization should the price fall in the first day of trading.
Lucinda Shen
Twitter: @shenlucinda
Email: lucinda.shen@fortune.com
VENTURE DEALS
- Synthego, a Redwood City, Calif.-based genome engineering company, raised $100 million in Series D funding. Wellington Management, RA Capital Management, and 8VC led the round and were joined by investors including Founders Fund, Menlo Ventures, and Intel Capital.
- Triumvira Immunologics, an Austin, Texas-based biopharmaceutical company developing a novel platform for engineering T-cells to attack cancers, raised $55 million in Series A funding. Leaps by Bayer and Northpond Ventures led the round and were joined by investors including Oceanpine Capital and Viva Biotech Holdings.
- Restream, an Austin, Texas--based multiplatform live streaming solution, raised $50 million in Series A funding. Sapphire Ventures and Insight Partners led the round.
- Clene Nanomedicine, Inc., a Salt Lake City-based clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company, raised $42.5 million in Series D funding. SymBiosis II led the round.
- ChartHop, a New York-based organizational management platform, raised $14 million in Series A funding. Andreessen Horowitz led the round and was joined by investors including Abstract Ventures, Basement Fund, CoFound Partners, Company Ventures, Cowboy Ventures, the a16z Cultural Leadership Fund, Flybridge Capital, Ride Ventures, the Todd and Rahul Angel Fund, Tokyo Black, SemperVirens, Shrug Capital, and Work Life Ventures.
- GRID, a Reykjavík, Iceland-based SaaS spreadsheet startup, raised $12 million in Series A funding. New Enterprise Associates led the round and was joined by investors including BlueYard Capital, Slack Fund, and Acequia Capital.
- EnerVenue, a Fremont, Calif.-based company energy storage company, raised $12 million in seed funding. Investors include Doug Kimmelman of Energy Capital Partners and Dr. Peter Lee of Towngas.
- ACTO, Toronto-based education and engagement platform for life sciences, raised $11.5 million in Series A funding. Resolve Growth Partners led the round and was joined by investors including Salesforce Ventures and Panache Ventures.
- Juni Learning, a San Francisco-based digital education platform, raised $10.5 million in Series A funding. Forerunner Ventures led the round and was joined by investors including AME Cloud Ventures, Index Ventures, and Pear VC.
- Habi, a Bogotá-Colombia-based real estate company for Latin America, raised $10 million in Series A funding. Inspired Capital led the round and was joined by investors including 8VC, Clocktower, Homebrew, Zigg, and Vine Ventures.
- Berbix, a San Francisco-based identity verification platform, raised $9 million in Series A funding. Mayfield led the round and was joined by investors including Initialized Capital, Y Combinator, and Fika Ventures.
- Fox Robotics, an Austin, Texas-based robotic forklift maker, raised $9 million in Series A funding. Menlo Ventures led the round and was joined by investors including Eniac Ventures, SignalFire, and Famiglia. Read more.
- Narrative, a New York-based software company for data distribution, raised $8.5 million in Series A funding. G20 Ventures led the round and was joined by investors including Glasswing Ventures, MathCapital, Revel Partners, Tuhaye Venture Partners, and XSeed Capital.
- Esusu, a New York-based rent platform, raised $2.3 million in seed extension funding. Investors included Acumen Fund, Concrete Rose Capital, Global Good Fund, Impact America Fund, Next Play Ventures, and Zeal Capital Partners.
- LaunchNotes, a product change communication platform, raised $1.8 million in seed funding. Cowboy Ventures and Bull City Venture Partners co-led the round.
- Artis Technologies, an Atlanta, Ga.-based provider of lending solutions for businesses, raised $1.5 million in additional seed funding. Investors include Fintech Ventures Fund and its affiliates.
- Morpheus Space, a German space propulsion startup, raised an undisclosed amount. Investors included Vsquared Ventures, Lavrock Ventures, Airbus Ventures, In-Q-Tel, Pallas Ventures, and Techstars.
PRIVATE EQUITY
- GI Partners acquired Clinical Ink, a Horsham, Pa.-based clinical trial company. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Clearview Capital Fund recapitalized Higdon Outdoors, a Paducah, Ky.-based outdoor brand, and its Power Calls Company brand. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Sovos Brands, backed by Advent International, agreed to acquire Birch Benders, a Denver-based producer of pancake and waffle mixes. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- NetRate System, backed by Polaris, plans to merge with MGA Systems, a software provider. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
OTHERS
- Impact, backed by Silversmith Capital Partners and Providence Strategic Growth, acquired ACTIVATE, a New York-based influencer marketing platform.
- Hipcamp, backed by A16z, acquired Youcamp, an Australian-based camping community. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Fastly (NYSE: FSLY), a provider of an edge cloud platform, agreed to acquire Signal Sciences, a web application security company, for about $775 million in cash and stock.
IPOS
- TPG is preparing to raise around $700 million via two blank-check companies, per Bloomberg. One will aim to acquire a firm in the technology sector, while the other will seek a firm in the ESG space. Read more.
- Brii Biosciences, a China- and U.S.-based company focused on treatments for diseases such as COVID-19 and HIV, is weighing an IPO in Hong Kong to raise as much as $400 million as soon as the first quarter of next year, per Bloomberg. The company is backed by investors including ARCH, Sequoia, and Boyu Capital. Read more.
EXIT
- Capital One acquired Freebird, a Cambridge, Mass.-based startup that helps to sell flight insurance. Freebird’s investors have included American Express and Alumni Ventures. Read more.
- PAI Partners is considering a sale of the molecular diagnostics unit of ELITechGroup, a French maker of medical testing equipment. A sale could value the ELITech unit at more than 1 billion euros ($1.2 billion), per Bloomberg. Read more.
- India plans to sell as much as 15% of Hindustan Aeronautics, its state-run defense contractor. Read more.
F+FS
- BITKRAFT Ventures, a venture capital firm focused on gaming, closed its first fund with $165 million in commitments.
- Digital Currency Group’s subsidiary called Foundry will invest $100 million into mining Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies in North America. Read more.
PEOPLE
- ParkerGale Capital named Cass Ziebel as a Principal.


fortune--2020-08-27--HSBC walks the tightrope between Beijing and the U.S.

This is the web version of Eastworld, Fortune’s newsletter focused on business and technology in Asia. Subscribe here to get future editions in your inbox.
HSBC CEO Noel Quinn likes to describe the mission of the sprawling, 155-year-old financial institution he helms as providing a “bridge between China and the international trading community.”
In a recent call with journalists, Quinn argued that, while tensions between China and the U.S. “inevitably create challenging situations” for the bank, sticking with that mission is the best way to ensure “the greatest long-term benefit” for customers, no matter “the political context at the time.”
It’s a noble goal. But as relations between the two superpowers grow ever-more contentious, analysts, investors, and the financial press have come to see HSBC’s “mission” as a predicament—one better portrayed with a different metaphor: “walking a tightrope.”
U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo complicated HSBC’s hire-wire act Wednesday by attacking the British lender for allegedly shutting accounts for people linked to Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement even as it continues to operate bank accounts for individuals sanctioned by the U.S. government.
In a statement, Pompeo blasted HSBC for freezing credit card and personal bank accounts of senior executives at Next Digital, a publishing company whose flagship tabloid, Apple Daily, has been critical Beijing’s oversight of Hong Kong. Next Digital founder Jimmy Lai, a frequent participant in pro-democracy demonstrations, was arrested on August 10 on charges of violating Beijing’s controversial new national security law.
Pompeo decried “the Chinese Communist Party’s coercive bullying tactics” against British companies. HSBC’s shares slumped in Hong Kong trading Thursday.
The facts of the Next Digital case are murky. Mark Simon, a senior executive of the company who has left Hong Kong, told Reuters that HSBC has frozen Lai’s personal and private business accounts, as well as Simon’s own personal and credit card accounts. Next Digital’s business accounts reportedly remain open.
HSBC isn’t commenting. China’s foreign ministry was also mum. A spokesman for the British Foreign & Commonwealth Office said only that it was in “close contact with a wide range of businesses in Hong Kong.”
But Pompeo’s broadside is the latest of many that have tested HSBC’s acrobatic skills in recent months. The bank has drawn harsh criticism from lawmakers and investors in the U.S. and the U.K. for publicly affirming its support for the new national security law. Pompeo called that move a “corporate kowtow.”
HSBC also has been thrown off balance by allegations in China’s state-owned press that it colluded with U.S. authorities in “fabricating facts” and “maliciously framing” Meng Wanzhou, chief financial officer of telecommunications giant Huawei Technologies. Meng, daughter of Huawei founder Ren Zhengfei, remains under house arrest in Canada, where she faces extradition to the U.S. on charges of violating sanctions against Iran. HSBC took to Chinese social media to debunk what it called a “misinterpretation of the facts”—only to have its account on WeChat blocked.
Financial pressures on the bank don’t help. Although HSBC’s headquarters are in London, more than 80% of its profits come from Asia, mostly Hong Kong. The bank announced a “pivot to Asia” strategy in 2015, and doubled down this year with a restructuring plan that will cut 35,000 jobs and shift more resources to Asia.
Bloomberg reports that, in China, HSBC has ramped up investment in commercial banking, credit cards, investment banking, and wealth management, and now employs more than 8,000 in 170 outlets in the country.
HSBC’s long history in China is unique. But it’s dependence on China for future growth is not. We’ve argued often in this space that, for all its challenges, China remains the best growth story in the global economy—one that many Fortune Global 500 CEOs know they can’t afford to ignore. As the Wall Street Journal noted earlier this month, China’s rebounding consumer economy has offset plummeting sales back home for many U.S. companies.
In this week’s Eastworld Spotlight conversation, Jefferies International chief global strategist Sean Darby argues that the importance of the China market looms especially large for companies in finance—not just HSBC, but competitors including Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan and Credit Suisse. Sean, who’s one of the savviest China analysts we know, also argues that over the last five years, China’s equity markets have deepened and matured, leaving China’s emerging tech ventures far less dependent on Western exchanges for raising capital.
More Eastworld news below!
Clay Chandler
clay.chandler@fortune.com
This edition of Eastworld was curated and produced by Grady McGregor. Reach him at grady.mcgregor@fortune.com.
Eastworld news
High seas
On Wednesday, the U.S. government blacklisted 24 companies for their role in helping construct artificial islands in the South China Sea, which reportedly preceded Beijing launching ballistic missiles in the contested waters. The U.S. has previously blacklisted Chinese companies over national security concerns and for allegedly conspiring to commit human rights abuses in Xinjiang. This week's move marks the first time the U.S. has punished China over its advances in waters where Taiwan, Vietnam, and other Asian governments have competing claims. The tensions in the South China Sea come as the Philippines blasted Beijing this week for encroaching in waters that it claims. New York Times
Fishing in the Galapagos
China has the world’s largest fishing fleet, and critics argue that its nearly 17,000 vessels are responsible for depleting fish stocks around the world. This vast armada has recently come under greater scrutiny after the Ecuadorian government discovered that over 300 vessels were fishing just off the coast of the Galapagos Islands, the protected marine reserve that inspired Charles Darwin’s Theory of Evolution. China has announced plans to reduce its fleet to 3,000 vessels by the end of 2020, but environmental organizations argue that Chinese fleets continue to grow and routinely subvert international authorities by shutting off tracking equipment. The Guardian
Extradition, financial scandals, and a boat
A Wall Street Journal investigation published this week would be hard to believe if it was a Hollywood script. The Journal found that one of China’s top government officials met with a senior Republican fundraiser to lobby for the extradition of Guo Wengui, a billionaire Chinese exile and prominent critic of China living in New York. The meeting was allegedly set up through Jho Low, the mastermind of the Malaysian 1MDB scandal, the world’s largest-ever financial con. For his part, Guo is a close associate of Steve Bannon, the China-hawk and former Trump administration official who was recently arrested on fraud charges while aboard Guo’s boat. Wall Street Journal
An uncomfortable home
The increasing scrutiny that Chinese tech behemoths like Huawei and Tencent face abroad may pale in comparison to the constraints China places on them in their home market. This week, Financial Times columnist Henny Sender argues that the Chinese government views the growing power of Chinese tech giants and the individuals who lead them as a potential threat to its control. To rein them in, the Chinese government has placed a ceiling on their growth prospects in China and has sought to bring them closer to the government. Financial Times
Campus politics
In August, Amazon opened its largest campus in the world in Hyderabad, a city of nearly 10 million in southern India. The planned 1.8 million-square foot campus provides Amazon a base of operations in a rapidly growing e-commerce market, where it currently trails only Walmart-backed Flipkart in market share. The project confirms Amazon’s commitment to the country, but analysts in India worry about Amazon’s history of alleged anti-competitive behavior and say that the firm is already pushing out smaller traders and retailers. New York Times
Coronavirus by case
Hong Kong
The pandemic is infecting an average of 200,000 people per day globally, but one man’s case in Hong Kong this week had the power to move markets and spark fears about the effectiveness of a potential vaccine. Scientists in Hong Kong confirmed on Monday the world’s first known COVID-19 reinfection, finding that a 33 year-old-man tested positive for coronavirus after recovering from a separate strain of the virus months before. The man’s case signals that “there will be no such thing as 100% immunity” for COVID-19, a researcher at Hong Kong University tells Fortune, and that any immunity to COVID-19 may be finite. On the bright side, the researcher said, early trial data shows that a vaccine may offer more protection than actually getting infected with the virus. Fortune
Markets and movers
X-Peng – The Chinese electric vehicle maker has increased the size of its Thursday initial public offering in New York to $1.5 billion, which would value the company at $11.2 billion, sources told Reuters.
Alibaba – The Chinese tech giant has suspended investments in India amid China’s tensions with the Indian government, according to Reuters. Alibaba has invested over $2 billion in India since 2015 and has no immediate plans to reduce stakes in those investments. Reuters
Facebook – The U.S. social media giant is preparing legislation against the Thailand government for forcing it to block a group with 1 million members that's critical of the country’s monarchy. This comes as protesters in Thailand continue to organize near daily anti-government demonstrations that have called for curbs on the king's power. CNN
TikTok – Recently appointed CEO Kevin Mayer stepped down from his position on Wednesday, weeks before the U.S. government's ban on the app is set to go into effect. TikTok also launched a lawsuit against the U.S.'s order that will force TikTok to sell its U.S. operations to an American entity or be banned from the market entirely. Financial Times
Final figure
48%
After the U.S. postponed trade talks with China last week, trade negotiators from the U.S. and China finally met over the weekend to review progress on the phase I trade deal. Data released after the meeting, however, suggests that both sides will have a lot of ground to make up to fulfill the deal, according to the trade deal tracker from the Peterson Institute for International Economics (PIIE). On Tuesday, PIIE found that through July, China had purchased $39.2 billion worth of goods covered in the trade deal, or 48% of what it would have needed to stay on track to meet its $172.7 billion target by the end of the year. China is even farther behind in its purchases of energy goods; through July, it imported just 17% of what it needs to keep pace with its trade deal objectives. PIIE


fortune--2020-08-27--FEMA spends more preparing for terrorism than hurricanes

In the days and hours before Hurricane Laura reached the Gulf Coast, emergency personnel took up positions in Texas and Louisiana and readied half a million meals and 800,000 liters of water. It’s the role of the Federal Emergency Management Agency to coordinate the immediate response to storms, floods and wildfires, all of which have become more common as a result of global warming. But even though scientists have warned of increasingly extreme weather, preparation for climate-related disasters hasn’t been FEMA’s top spending priority.
An analysis of preparedness grants disbursed by FEMA shows the agency spends far more on counter-terror than natural disasters. In 2019, for example, the U.S. Government Accountability Office found more than $1 billion in FEMA grants assigned to counter-terror preparation and only $315 million in readiness for natural disasters.
Most Americans think of FEMA as the agency that responds to major storms. Its role is most visible in aftermath of hurricane like Laura, which forecasters described as the worst in a century to hit the western U.S. From 2005 to 2019, FEMA spent at least $460 billion to clean up and rebuild after natural disasters, according to the GAO. That’s about $30 billion per year, on average.
FEMA is part of the Homeland Security Department, so preparation for terrorism threats is also part of its job. The current spending disparity is a result of laws passed after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. “Most preparedness grants since 9/11 have been spent on counter-terrorism,” said Chris Currie, a director in GAO’s homeland security team who wrote a recent report on FEMA disbursements. FEMA did not respond to a request for comment.
Only one of FEMA’s three main preparedness grant programs allows money to be spent without meeting a terrorism requirement. That program, the Emergency Management Preparedness Grant, has been funded sporadically over the years and, unlike the two counter-terror grants, requires a 50/50 matching expenditure from localities receiving the funds. As a result, poorer municipalities have less access to preparedness money for storms and floods.
There are new FEMA grant programs for 2020 that will disburse $660 million in funding for what the agency calls “pre-disaster mitigation,” focusing on resiliency against flooding and the relocation of vulnerable communities. Last year, however, approximately 75% of FEMA’s total preparedness grants went to the programs with counter-terrorism links, according to the GAO report.
‘Most preparedness grants since 9/11 have been spent on counter-terrorism’
The agency’s Sept. 11-influenced spending priorities weren’t adjusted all that much even after Hurricanes Florence and Michael caused over $50 billion of damage in 2018 across the Carolinas and Florida. A review of FEMA grant requests made by the latter state for 2019 through 2020 shows that a large chunk of the nearly $14 million has been sought for law enforcement communication, SWAT training, and bomb detection.
“The state uses this grant to prepare for all hazards, including terrorism, cybersecurity, hurricanes, floods, wildfires,” said Samantha Bequer, spokeswoman for the Florida Division of Emergency Management. “Although [Hurricane Michael] was a natural disaster, many first responders relied upon Department of Homeland Security’s grant-funded training, equipment and technology for response and recovery efforts.”
Craig Fugate, who was FEMA administrator under President Obama, agreed that preparedness grants are flexible enough to allow local officials to build up search-and-rescue and emergency management capabilities that would be as helpful in a terrorist attack as a hurricane. And counter-terrorism spending can help with another critical problem: mass shootings. Fugate pointed to the 2015 hostage situation that took place in San Bernadino, California. “A lot of the equipment—everything from robotics, drones, vehicles to get in close, and the training and exercises beforehand—are things funded with Homeland Security money,” he said.
Still, security-focused grants aren’t the best way to make communities more resilient against storms and floods. The recent GAO report cited “long-standing capability gaps” caused in part by counter-terror requirements. And, of course, there have been far more disasters caused by extreme weather than terrorist attacks. This year alone the U.S. is facing record wildfires in California and a hurricane season on pace to be among the most active ever.
FEMA’s funding has also been caught up in the policy response to the coronavirus pandemic. The Trump administration recently ordered FEMA to divert $44 billion from the agency’s disaster-relief fund to pay for federal unemployment benefits. The measure was a stopgap after Congress failed to enact another Covid-19 stimulus package.
Federal emergency managers maintain their readiness to help states and localities meet the moment, and President Trump declared national emergencies in Texas, Mississippi, Puerto Rico and Louisiana ahead of Hurricane Laura’s landfall. “I don’t think people should be worried about FEMA running out of money during the initial response,” Fugate said in an interview Wednesday evening on Bloomberg Television.
To outside observers, though, FEMA’s preparedness priorities are out of step with the need to defend against global warming. “We need to invest much more in the people and programs we rely upon for these efforts,” said Rob Moore, asenior policy analyst with expertise on preparedness at the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group. “If we don’t, we’re going to stay stuck behind an ever steepening curve of climate-fueled disasters.”


fortune--2020-08-27--Why Palantir’s departure won’t doom Silicon Valley

This is the web version of Data Sheet, Fortune’s daily newsletter on the top tech news. To get it delivered daily to your in-box, sign up here.
Fortune senior writer Michal Lev-Ram in for Adam this morning.
I’ve seen many startups come and go in downtown Palo Alto—Google, PayPal, and Facebook, to name just a few. These departures have primarily been driven by necessity, either because a company outgrew its digs, or because it had to shut down, sometimes in a spectacular flurry of failure. (Remember Color, the photo-sharing app that raised more than $40 million before it had a single user and then quickly collapsed?) Not so with Palantir, though. The data analytics company is leaving my adopted hometown not because of hypergrowth or sudden failure, but due to irreconcilable differences.
Earlier this week, Palantir announced its intent to go public but also made news for moving its headquarters from Palo Alto to Denver. “Our company was founded in Silicon Valley,” Alex Karp, Palantir’s CEO, wrote in a letter accompanying Palantir’s filing. “But we seem to share fewer and fewer of the technology sector’s values and commitments.”
Karp’s beef with the Valley’s “engineering elite,” as he referred to local talent, appears to have two prongs: In his letter, he called out both consumer Internet companies’ reach into the most intimate aspects of our lives and the backlash against companies who sell to defense and intelligence agencies—like Palantir.
Pre-pandemic, Palantir did generate unwanted attention for such contracts. Activists took particular issue with the software company’s business with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, organizing protests outside of its Palo Alto offices on several occasions.
Interestingly, there were others who didn’t love the company’s presence in Palo Alto, but for very different reasons.
Palantir once dominated downtown Palo Alto. You couldn’t blow a vape cloud here without it hitting a young engineer in a black Palantir jacket. Over a number of years, the company took over so much office space—even repurposing an entire building to serve as its corporate cafeteria—that some in Silicon Valley complained it had “sucked the life out of the startup ecosystem in Palo Alto.” Being the largest commercial tenant meant that there was little (literal) space for fledgling startups, or at least that was the allegation.
Quietly, Palantir has already vacated several of the buildings it used to fill. Now, with the company officially moving its HQ to Denver, you’d think its critics would rejoice. That’s not exactly the case.
“Pre-COVID, it would have helped the revival of Palo Alto as a startup spot,” Jeff Clavier, founder and managing partner of Uncork Capital, says of Palantir’s departure. The Silicon Valley investor is a long-time former resident of Palo Alto and still rents a small office in town. I first interviewed him in the mid-2000s, when I was a reporter at Business 2.0., a magazine that was so good at chronicling the rise and fall of tech companies that it too experienced a dramatic boom and bust. Over the years, I’ve had several conversations with Clavier, including about Palantir’s presence in Palo Alto, which he believed stifled the startup scene. Now, he’s not so sure the empty buildings Palantir leaves behind will be filled with new investment opportunities, at least not any time soon.
“There are good reasons to leave California,” Clavier told me over the phone, after apologizing for having to speak through a mask. (In case you haven’t heard, the Bay Area is now dealing with the pandemic and a horrifying string of fires which have burned homes and forests and made our air almost unbreathable.) “And we’re entering a phase where founders can make personal choices [on where they want to be located].”
Does that mean Palo Alto will never again be a center for entrepreneurs? I wouldn’t be too concerned. If covering the Valley from inside the Valley has taught me one thing, it’s that, like annoying buzzwords, companies come and go. Of course, if Stanford University and Sand Hill Road ever move to Denver too, then we really are screwed.
Michal Lev-Ram
@mlevram
michal.levram@fortune.com
This edition of Data Sheet was curated by Aaron Pressman.
NEWSWORTHY
Always burning since the world's been turning. In March, Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff pledged no layoffs despite the coronavirus pandemic for at least three months. While some companies struggled, Salesforce then did quite well during those three months. Its second quarter revenue jumped 29% to $5.2 billion, as Robert noted yesterday. It's also getting added to the Dow. Those bits sent its stock price up 26% on Wednesday. It's now up 67% for the year and at an all-time high. Any other Salesforce news of note? Oh yeah, the company is “reallocating resources” by laying off 1,000 people.
The blunders are all there on the board, waiting to be made. Elsewhere on Wall Street, Box delighted investors with an 11% jump in second quarter revenue to $192 million. Box's stock price jumped 7% giving it a 15% gain for the year. Smartsheet, which has been growing even faster, said it agreed to pay $155 million for Denver startup Brandfolder, which helps companies manage digital assets. Fastly is picking up web app developer Signal Sciences for $775 million. And the consortium led by Bain Capital that bought Toshiba's memory chip business two years ago will take the unit, now called Kioxia Holdings, public in Japan in October.
One thing leads to another. A few days after the newest Fitbit devices debuted, Amazon unveiled its own activity tracker dubbed the Amazon Halo. The $65 device also includes six months of a free A.I.-driven health advisory service that tracks body composition, tone of voice analysis, sleep and activity tracking. It's $4 a month after the first six free.
Everything looks like a nail. Lawmakers are debating legislative fixes for the tech industry in the wake on their yearlong investigation that culminated in the "Big Four" CEOs testifying last month. Rep. David Cicilline, chair of the House antitrust committee, says one possibility is a law forcing the separation of different businesses, modeled after the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933 (which banned banks from investment banking activities).
It's always too soon to quit. I wish there was something funny about the TikTok saga but it just remains straight and serious. Overnight, CEO Kevin Mayer, who joined from Disney in May, resigned. Not the job he signed up for, Mayer explained, and who could blame him? Vanessa Pappas, general manager of TikTok for North America, takes over.
The app rich get app richer. The soon-arriving update to Apple's iOS software will tighten privacy protections for users, but that's not great for companies that track users for advertising purposes. Facebook said on Wednesday that apps using its audience network may suffer. The bottom line is those app developers may need to use even more Facebook data, which helped push the company's stock up 8% on Wednesday and 48% for the year.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
China's government not only bans foreign apps, it also heavily censors the apps it does allow, like Baidu's maps app. But that allowed a team of reporters at BuzzFeed led by Alison Killing to develop an ingenious high-tech method to uncover widespread evidence of the regime's oppression of Muslim Uighurs.
Our breakthrough came when we noticed that there was some sort of issue with satellite imagery tiles loading in the vicinity of one of the known camps while using the Chinese mapping platform Baidu Maps. The satellite imagery was old, but otherwise fine when zoomed out, but at a certain point, plain light gray tiles would appear over the camp location. They disappeared as you zoomed in further, while the satellite imagery was replaced by the standard gray reference tiles, which showed features such as building outlines and roads.
...We analyzed the masked locations by comparing them to up-to-date imagery from Google Earth, the European Space Agency’s Sentinel Hub, and Planet Labs.
...In total we identified 428 locations in Xinjiang bearing the hallmarks of prisons and detention centers. Many of these locations contain two to three detention facilities — a camp, pretrial administrative detention center, or prison. We intend to analyze these locations further and make our database more granular over the next few months.
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This online tool can tell you if your home is likely to flood this hurricane season By Andrew Nusca
By one key measure of 5G tech prowess, the U.S. ranks dead last By Aaron Pressman
China will spend $300 billion on semiconductor imports as U.S. squeezes chip supply By Eamon Barrett
There’s (digital) gold in them thar hills: Crypto giant DCG is betting $100 million on mining Bitcoin in North America By Jeff John Roberts
Why is Hurricane Laura so frightening? Two words: storm surge By Clifton Leaf
(Some of these stories require a subscription to access. Thank you for supporting our journalism.)
BEFORE YOU GO
An interesting gadget arrived at my house via special delivery from Microsoft on Wednesday. It's the new Surface Duo folding phone/tablet. I'm not allowed to show or discuss how the software works yet but I can say that it's very slick and attractive and slightly smaller than my favorite paperback (when folded closed). Stay tuned for a full review.
Aaron Pressman
@ampressman
aaron.pressman@fortune.com