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Elon Musk bares his soul as Tesla stays on track

Elon Musk
Tesla CEO Elon Musk speaks to shareholders. (Tesla via YouTube)

Tesla shareholders at today’s annual meeting swatted down challenges to billionaire CEO Elon Musk, who laid out an admittedly optimistic plan for the crucial months ahead.

“This is going to sound maybe a little cheesy, but at Tesla, we build our cars with love,” an emotional Musk told the crowd at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, Calif. “We really care.”

He contrasted the dedication of the Tesla team with what he said was the typical mindset in the auto industry. “At a lot of other companies, they’re built by the marketing department and the finance department. There’s no soul, you know?” Musk said.

Musk acknowledged that the team has faced a lot of “incredible headwinds” in the course of manufacturing electric cars, battery storage systems and solar panels.

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Boeing confirms $4.25 billion acquisition of KLX

Boeing logo
Boeing  is the biggest U.S. manufacturer of commercial airplanes. (GeekWire Photo)

The Boeing Co. says it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire KLX Inc., a Florida-based aerospace parts distributor, as part of its drive to boost its global services business.

Today’s announcement comes just a few days after The Wall Street Journal reported that such a deal was in the works. The agreement involves an all-cash transaction for $63 a share as well as the assumption of about $1 billion of net debt, for a total of $4.25 billion, Boeing said.

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Boeing earnings give a lift to its outlook – and 767s

Boeing 767s in factory
Boeing 767 jets take shape at the company’s factory in Everett, Wash. Boeing says it’s raising 767 production due to strong demand for the jet as a cargo freighter. (Boeing Photo)

The Boeing Co. is raising its financial sights for the year as a result of a stronger-than-expected first quarter, and that was reflected today in its stock price as well.

First-quarter revenue was up 6 percent year over year at $23.4 billion. and net earnings per share rose 57 percent to $4.15, the company reported. Adjusted earnings per share hit $3.64, 68 percent higher than the year-ago figure and 40 percent higher than the consensus forecast from analysts.

Vertical Research Partners’ reaction to the financial results was headlined “Everything Goes Right.”

Boeing attributed the improved performance to higher commercial airplane deliveries, with a more profitable mix of planes, plus growth in its defense and service lines. As a result, the company’s full-year guidance for earnings per share was increased by 50 cents, to between $16.40 and $16.60.

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Boeing outperforms expectations, boosting stock

Boeing logo
Boeing, which has its corporate headquarters in Chicago, is reporting record results. (Boeing Photo)

The Boeing Co. today reported better-than-expected financial results for the fourth quarter of 2017 and a rosier-than-expected outlook for the year ahead, sending its share prices up 5 percent.

“Thanks to the dedicated efforts of employees throughout our company, Boeing delivered 2017 financial results that included record earnings, record cash flow, and record commercial aircraft deliveries,” Dennis Muilenburg, the company’s CEO, president and chairman, told journalists and analysts in a conference call.

Boeing’s performance was boosted by an upturn in the airline industry’s jet purchases as well as the recently enacted tax-cut bill, and the company projects a continuation of the positive trend in 2018.

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AI2 program will help engineers build startups

Allen Institute meeting
Team members at the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence celebrate the launch of Semantic Scholar during an impromptu meeting at the institute’s Seattle headquarters. (AI2 Photo via Glassdoor)

Is technical expertise the key to success in the fast-moving world of artificial intelligence market? Or is it entrepreneurship?

Top-notch engineers with a yen to build a startup can get the best of both worlds through a newly created CTO residency program at Seattle’s Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence, or AI2.

“Google has DeepMind, Facebook has FAIR, Microsoft has Microsoft Research AI,” Jacob Colker, managing director of the AI2 Incubator, told GeekWire. “But AI2 is one of the few places where entrepreneurs and early-stage startups can access the same kind of talent that’s available to the big guys.”

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U.S. officials slap 220% tariff on Canadian jets

Delta Bombardier jet
An artist’s conception shows Bombardier’s CS100 jet in Delta Air Lines’ livery. (Delta Illustration)

The U.S. Commerce Department today issued a preliminary finding that Canada’s Bombardier aircraft company was getting unfair subsidies for its CSeries jets — and laid out a plan that would more than triple the cost of the jets being bought by Delta Air Lines.

As a result of the ruling, the importers of Canadian civil aircraft with a capacity of 100 to 150 seats would have to pay a 219.63 percent tariff.

The ruling sides with Boeing, which filed a petition complaining that Bombardier’s sale of 75 CS100 jets to Delta was being subsidized by the governments of Canada as well as Britain. Bombardier is based in Montreal, but its wings are built in Northern Ireland.

“The U.S. values its relationships with Canada, but even our closest allies must play by the rules,” Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said in a statement. “The subsidization of goods by foreign governments is something that the Trump administration takes very seriously, and we will continue to evaluate and verify the accuracy of this preliminary determination.”

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Blue Origin points the way for Amazon’s HQ2

Jeff Bezos in Florida
Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos shows off an artist’s conception of the New Glenn rocket as Florida Gov. Rick Scott looks on during 2015’s announcement that Blue Origin would build a rocket factory in the Sunshine State. Will there be a similar production for Amazon’s HQ2 announcement? (NASA via YouTube)

What do Jeff Bezos and his lieutenants look for when they’re in an expansive mood? That’s a key question in the multibillion-dollar contest to attract Amazon’s second headquarters, and the Blue Origin space venture – Bezos’ other multibillion-dollar enterprise – may well offer clues to the answer.

Over the past few years, Blue Origin has gone through not just one, but two high-profile nationwide searches for expansion sites.

In 2015, the company chose Florida’s Space Coast for a 750,000-square-foot rocket manufacturing facility and an orbital launch pad. This June, Blue Origin tentatively tapped Alabama for a 200,000-square-foot engine factory.

The scale of Amazon’s HQ2 project will be much bigger: An estimated $5 billion in investment and about 50,000 jobs are at stake for the host city – as opposed to $205 million in investment and 330 high-tech jobs for Blue Origin’s Florida operation, and $200 million and 350 jobs for Alabama.

Nevertheless, it’s not unreasonable to think that at least some of the calculations behind Bezos’ HQ2 process will be similar to those that drove Bezos’ Blue Origin process.

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President Trump disbands 2 business councils

White House panel
President Donald Trump convenes a meeting of the White House Strategic and Policy Forum in April. (White House via YouTube)

President Donald Trump says he’s disbanding two of his business advisory councils, focusing on manufacturing as well as strategy and policy.

The move comes amid a wave of criticism and resignations sparked by last weekend’s deadly violence at a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Va.

The Strategic and Policy Forum reportedly decided to disband today even before Trump’s announcement, which was issued via Twitter.

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Amazon hands out refunds for eclipse glasses

Solar eclipse glasses
Agena Astro says that its solar eclipse glasses were made by a vendor on the American Astronomical Society’s list of reputable manufacturers, and that reports claiming they’re unsafe are “completely untrue and incorrect.” (Agena Astro Photo)

Amazon says it’s giving customers refunds for solar viewing glasses and filters that aren’t covered by the American Astronomical Society’s list of reputable vendors.

“Safety is among our highest priorities,” Amazon explained in a statement provided to GeekWire. “Out of an abundance of caution, we have proactively reached out to customers and provided refunds for eclipse glasses that may not comply with industry standards. We want customers to buy with confidence anytime they make a purchase on Amazon.com, and eclipse glasses sold on Amazon.com are required to comply with the relevant ISO standard.”

Amazon’s action sent some of the affected sellers scrambling to defend their products, with the Aug. 21 solar eclipse just a little more than a week away.

The brouhaha began a little less than two weeks ago, when the AAS reported that some vendors were selling eclipse glasses that didn’t block enough of the sun’s potentially eye-damaging radiation, and were going so far as to print bogus certification labels on the glasses.

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Stoplight tips workmates to leave you alone

FlowLight at work
A green light means it’s OK to chat with a FlowLight user. (UBC Photo)

It’s a classic conundrum for coders: Sometimes you get so absorbed in what you’re doing that you hate being interrupted, and you can’t even stop to put up a “Do Not Disturb” sign.

That’s where FlowLight could come in handy.

The gadget, invented by a computer scientist at the University of British Columbia, monitors your keystrokes and mouse clicks to determine how deeply you’re engaged in your work. When the activity hits a pre-set level, the light on the device turns from green to red.

“The light is like displaying your Skype status – it tells your colleagues whether you’re busy or open for a chat,” Thomas Fritz, an assistant professor at UBC who started work on the invention at the University of Zurich, explained in a news release.

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