All posts tagged: soared

What It Really Means That a Failing Shoe Brand “Pivoted to AI” and Its Stock Soared 700 Percent

What It Really Means That a Failing Shoe Brand “Pivoted to AI” and Its Stock Soared 700 Percent

Published by José Betancourt

Sign up to see the future, today Can’t-miss innovations from the bleeding edge of science and tech As it turns out, all it takes to turn a cash-bleeding company into the New York Stock Exchange’s latest obsession are three magic words: “pivot to AI.” In a baffling announcement today, struggling tech bro shoe company Allbirds said that it was closing a $50 million deal that “will enable the Company to pivot its business to AI compute infrastructure” — under the new name, “NewBird AI,” of course. Put simply, the company is planning to buy extremely-hard-to-obtain AI chips and rent computing power to tech startups as a “fully integrated GPU-as-a-Service.” To call it a reinvention would be an understatement. A mere two weeks ago, the company held a fire sale for all of its intellectual property and other assets, shutting down its footwear business for just $39 million. That’s a long cry from its once lofty $4 billion market cap only five years ago. Its promise to jump on the AI gravy train, however, has seemingly …

A meteor soared across Europe—and possibly hit a house

A meteor soared across Europe—and possibly hit a house

Published by Jenni Sidey

Get the Popular Science daily newsletter💡 Breakthroughs, discoveries, and DIY tips sent six days a week. The European Space Agency (ESA) is investigating a bright fireball that lit up the early evening sky across at least five countries on March 8th. At around 5:55 p.m. local time, residents across Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands spotted a glowing object soaring across the sky for an estimated six seconds before disintegrating into multiple fragments. In the German town of Güls—around 50 miles west of Frankfurt—at least one house was damaged by debris . Although more information is needed, the ESA’s Planetary Defense team believes the object was a meteor measuring at least a few feet in diameter. And while astronomers stressed there isn’t much to fear, there is no denying it: such events aren’t exactly rare. “Objects in this size range strike Earth from once every few weeks to once every few years,” the ESA explained. Fireball over Europe, 8 March 2026 The planet is bombarded by thousands of tiny space rocks every day, but …

App downloads declined again in 2025, but consumer spending soared to nearly 6B

App downloads declined again in 2025, but consumer spending soared to nearly $156B

Published by skeptic

The subscription economy helped boost mobile app revenues in 2025, even as app downloads declined for the fifth consecutive year, according to app intelligence firm Appfigures‘ annual report. In 2025, global downloads of all mobile apps and mobile games via the App Store and Google Play reached an estimated 106.9 billion, 2.7% lower than the year prior. Consumer spending, meanwhile, climbed 21.6% to reach an estimated $155.8 billion during the same period. The data indicates that app developers, marketers, and publishers have been successful in getting their users to make in-app purchases or activate subscriptions, even as the number of new users downloading apps has been falling. The report also reflected the continued shift away from mobile games as the primary revenue driver for the app economy. In 2025, consumers spent $72.2 billion on mobile games, accounting for about 46% of all spending within mobile apps. While that figure is up 10% year-over-year, spending on non-game mobile apps also increased. In fact, non-game app spending is up 33.9% year-over-year and reached $82.6 billion in 2025, …

Tech billionaires cashed out billion in 2025 as stocks soared

Tech billionaires cashed out $16 billion in 2025 as stocks soared

Published by skeptic

While tech stocks were busy setting records in 2025, the executives behind those companies were equally busy turning their paper fortunes into actual cash — more than $16 billion worth, according to Bloomberg’s analysis of insider trading data. Jeff Bezos led the way. The Amazon founder sold 25 million shares for $5.7 billion in June and July, right around the time he was getting hitched to Lauren Sanchez in Venice. Oracle’s former CEO Safra Catz wasn’t far behind at $2.5 billion, followed by Michael Dell at $2.2 billion. Nvidia’s Jensen Huang watched his company become the world’s first $5 trillion business, and sold $1 billion along the way. Arista Networks CEO Jayshree Ullal cashed out nearly $1 billion as demand for the company’s high-speed networking gear soared and her personal net worth crossed $6 billion. Most of these sales happened through pre-arranged trading plans that executives file in advance; they weren’t spur-of-the-moment decisions. Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg sold $945 million through his foundation, while Palo Alto Networks CEO Nikesh Arora and Robinhood co-founder Baiju Bhatt each …

Crypto soared in 2025 — and then crashed. Now what? : NPR

Crypto soared in 2025 — and then crashed. Now what? : NPR

Published by Sam Flores

A bitcoin logo is displayed at a conference in Hong Kong on Aug. 28, 2025. Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies soared this year — until crashing in October. Vernon Yuen/AFP via Getty Images hide caption toggle caption Vernon Yuen/AFP via Getty Images This was supposed to be crypto’s year. President Trump got elected vowing to make the U.S. “the crypto capital of the world” — and by many measures, he delivered. From the crypto-friendly regulators he appointed to major legislation passed by the Republican-led Congress, the government has been removing roadblocks for the sector while allowing crypto to become more closely integrated into the country’s financial system. For example, Trump picked Paul Atkins, a consultant who has worked with the crypto industry, as his new chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission, the primary federal agency that supervises the financial sector. The GENIUS Act, which Congress passed this year, established rules for a growing area of crypto called stablecoins — a digital currency that allows for almost instantaneous transfers between parties anywhere in the world. The …