NEWS THAT MATTER

Eric Fallas is a senior systems engineer who is testing out a prototype of a new spacesuit that NASA hopes to use on the International Space Station by 2026. The current suits used by NASA are from the 70s and are at the end of their useful life. Despite spending an estimated $420 million over a decade to create new suits, no operational suits have been produced. If the new suits are in use by the time of production, NASA will have spent over a billion dollars on the redesign and production. NASA has been dealing with two major issues: lack of funding and no destination. In order to address this, they have contracted with commercial companies, such as Axiom Space and Collins Aerospace Industry Team, to make and maintain new suits. The current suits have 18,000 components and a small refrigerator-sized interior volume. In addition, there have been safety concerns due to the aging suits, such as an Italian astronaut nearly drowning in space due to a helmet malfunction. There have also been inventory issues, such as not having the proper suit sizes for an all-female spacewalk. The Office of Inspector General noted that only eleven of the original 18 primary Life Support System units remain in NASA's inventory for the ISS program. NASA has awarded two contracts for the development of two new spacesuits, the Exploration Extravehicular Activity Services Contract (XEVAS). Axiom Space won the first contract worth $228.5 million to design suits for the Artemis missions and Collins Aerospace won the second contract for $97.2 million to design suits for the International Space Station. The suits follow a similar structure and have modernized components, such as a pressure garment system, a liquid cooling and ventilation garment and a Portable Life Support System. The companies also have access to data from NASA's own suit development efforts. The suits are designed to fit the first to 99th percentile of astronauts using fewer parts and they weigh significantly less than the current emu. The helmet offers a better range of visibility and the upper torso is adjustable to help prevent shoulder injuries. The upper arm also provides a better range of motion. The contracts also incentivize the contractors to perform on cost and schedule and keep the expense to the government down. Collins Aerospace is working with NASA to create a new generation of spacesuits that are more advanced than ever before. These suits will require 30% less hardware to be launched into space, resulting in decreased cost and training time. They are designed for future missions such as trips to Mars and the Moon, offering greater mobility, reduced mass, better connectivity, and improved ability to see and communicate with each other. They will also be dustproof, as dust is a huge challenge for lunar missions. Finally, the suits are being designed to withstand long-term missions. For these reasons, Collins Aerospace is working hard to create suits that will help astronauts explore farther than ever before. Show NotesDownload

As tech layoffs spread, Yahoo Finance's Jared Blikre discusses which industries could be hit next.

Digital activity uses a huge amount of electricity with semiconductors near the limit of their efficiency. Now scientists are racing to perfect new chips that use much less power and handle much more data.

When officials found $1 billion worth of cocaine onboard the container ship Gayane in 2019, it kicked off a fight between the US and the world's largest shipping carrier over drug trafficking.

In 2022, the Tennessee Titans of the NFL unveiled their plans for a new stadium in the heart of Nashville. At the price tag of $2.1 billion, the 1.7-million-square-foot stadium can house 60,000 screaming football fans.. The only caveat? Taxpayers will fund more than half of the stadium's cost.: $500 million from the state and $760 million through revenue bonds issued by Nashville's Metropolitan Sports Authority. Since 2000, public funds diverted to helping build professional sports stadiums and arenas have cost taxpayers $4.3 billion. While the NFL and team owners contend that building stadiums will provide economic growth for a city, economists and urban planners claim otherwise.

Twitter owner Elon Musk confirmed he will step down as the company's CEO, but only when he identifies a successor, directly addressing for the first time a Twitter poll he created this week in which millions of users voted for his ouster. CNN's Paul La Monica and Christine Romans report. #CNN #News Show less

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky addressed members of Congress after meeting with US President Joe Biden at the White House during his first foreign trip since the war began. Watch his full speech here. #zelensky #zelenskyy #CNN

From real estate to space, Seattle's tech scene is awash in A.I. Hello World's Ashlee Vance meets up with Redfin CEO Glenn Kelman and Rendered.AI CEO Nathan Kundtz for the latest.

Traffic is a growing problem in many U.S. cities. Instead of adding more streets to accommodate cars, a growing movement is pushing to ban them in dense areas like New York City. This would give more space for bike lanes, bus routes and pedestrian plazas while also reducing noise and air pollution.

The kingdom of Saudi Arabia reigns over a giant desert, sitting on top of big pools of oil. So why, then, is it attempting a hostile takeover of one of the world's oldest sports — a game played on lush, irrigated expanses of turf, strategically placed water hazards and water-hungry putting greens? Some of pro golf's biggest names have been attracted by the deep pockets of the LIV Golf tour, which is backed by Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund. This fight — between the PGA and LIV — is very much about money. Billions and billions of dollars. It's also about the future of Saudi Arabia, a rapidly changing country trying to position itself for a world that doesn't run on oil, and its leader, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who is seeking to burnish an image tarred by the gruesome murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Five years ago, Amazon bought Whole Foods for $13.7 billion. Since then, there's been a lot of changes, including a new CEO starting Sept. 1. It added a palm-scanning payment option, hundreds of cameras and sensors to enable checkout-free shopping, and a “dark store” devoted entirely to online orders. We tried out the new high-tech shopping experience and take a look at how prices and product selection have changed since Amazon took over the specialty grocer in 2017. Amazon has opened 60 new locations, including one “dark store” entirely devoted to filling online orders. Yet Whole Foods still controls just over 1% of the grocery market, according to research firm Numerator, compared with Walmart's 19% and Kroger's 9%. Next week, Whole Foods gets a new CEO for the first time since its founding in 1980. Operating chief Jason Buechel steps into the lead role on Sept. 1, succeeding colorful, polarizing co-founder John Mackey, who was once described as a “right-wing hippie.” “When you have the kind of culture clash that I imagined John Mackey and Amazon had, it's really impressive that John stayed around in a leadership position as long as he did,” said Jason Goldberg, chief commerce strategy officer at advertising firm Publicis. “It surprised me.”

Amazon has 118+ private label brands, some that carry the Amazon name and others cleverly disguised without it. And it's been accused of using its data prowess to make nearly identical versions of bestselling brand-name items, like Peak Design's Everyday Sling Bag. Amazon says it's continuing to invest in its popular brands, despite rumors its scaling back on private label to appease regulators. Amazon may be pushing the boundaries of what's acceptable in private labeling, there's nothing illegal about copying brand-name products. It's a business practice that, in some capacity, is widely used by most major retailers. Here's how private labels work, and why experts say the high margin products like AmazonBasics batteries are going nowhere.

Virtual reality and sports seem like polar opposites. But the largest companies in Silicon Valley - including Mark Zuckerberg's former Facebook now Meta - are trying to change that, using virtual sports platforms to drive adoption and profit in this new world of the metaverse.

As supply chain chaos causes shipping delays this holiday season, experts say Amazon's logistics empire and predictive analytics will allow it to avoid the worst of it. Amazon leased long-haul planes to get goods from China to the U.S. faster, and its been making its own containers and chartering private cargo vessels for years. Now retailers like Walmart, Home Depot, Target, IKEA and Costco are trying out the tactic, chartering smaller vessels to bring goods to less congested ports.

The Vietnamese EV brand VinFast is an unknown name from a country with a tiny auto industry. But the company has already opened six stores in California and has plans for many more. It also is building a $2 billion factory in North Carolina and is planning an IPO, though timing is uncertain. It has partnerships with leading industry firms, such as LG Chem, Gotion, Pininfarina, ZF. And it has recruited alumni from some of the world's top automakers, including Ford, General Motors, Toyota, Hyundai, Porsche, Jaguar-Land Rover, Volkswagen, and others.

In July 2011, the oil tanker Brillante Virtuoso was drifting through the treacherous Gulf of Aden when a crew of pirates attacked and set her ablaze. When David Mockett, a maritime surveyor, inspected the vessel, he was left with more questions than answers. Soon after his inspection, Mockett was killed in a car bombing.

Just a couple of years ago, it seemed that space mining was inevitable. Analysts, tech visionaries and even renowned astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson predicted that space mining was going to be big business. Space mining companies like Planetary Resources and Deep Space Industries backed by the likes of Google's Larry Page and Eric Schmidt, cropped up to take advantage of the predicted payoff. After all, the holy grail of asteroids, known as 16 Psyche, had an estimated worth of $10,000 quadrillion. But fast forward to 2022, and humanity has yet to commercially mine even a single asteroid. CNBC spoke to two California startups, AstroForge and TransAstra, about how they are trying to make space mining a reality and the challenges they face.

Humanity consumes a half-trillion cups of coffee every year, yet coffee production is one of the most antiquated industries within agriculture. Now the livelihoods of 125 million people working in coffee are at risk as the crop struggles to cope with global warming.

At the turn of the century, cricket was struggling to attract audiences and its commercial future was in doubt. Now it boasts the second-most valuable sporting franchise globally, behind only the NFL. This is the story of how one country changed the fate of cricket.

Africa's tech startups raised a record $5 billion in 2021 as investors piled into firms trying to fix the continent's thorniest problems. But money isn't flowing evenly.

A leak of 3.5 million documents revealed how a Chinese-run company moved millions of dollars to former Congo President Joseph Kabila's family and allies.

The sudden cancellation of Ant Group's IPO shocked investors, but Beijing's slapdown of Jack Ma was years in the making. And Alibaba and Ant aren't the only tech firms under scrutiny by Chinese regulators.

Now that the James Webb Space Telescope has released its first images, it's time for the science programs to begin. We meet 5 scientists who will be using the telescope during its first cycle of operations looking at the earliest galaxies, red giant stars in the disc of Andromeda, star forming regions in the MIlky Way and nearby galaxies, the Trappist-1 exoplanet system, and mysterious icy bodies beyond the orbit of Neptune.

Beijing has poured billions of dollars into biotechnology as the sector undergoes a momentous expansion. AI, gene editing and synthetic biology may be the cornerstones of the next great industrial revolution, and China may lead it.

Bangladesh went from second-poorest country in the world to among the richest of South Asia in per capita terms, with one industry in particular driving its success. But now the nation is at a crossroads.

It's been a half century since Australia and China established formal relations, but neither side is really celebrating. After several years of growing tensions, the potential for a reset under Australia's new Labor government is in question as trade sanctions remain and diplomatic disputes persist.

Muhammad bin Salman, or MBS—the millennial crown prince of Saudi Arabia—appears increasingly invincible. With the war in Ukraine disrupting energy supplies, Western leaders are eager to get their hands on his oil. But should they worry about the young prince's power?

Pham Nhat Vuong is Vietnam's richest man, and he has US ambitions. His company VinFast is building an EV factory in North Carolina, hoping to sell cars to Americans. But it will be an uphill battle.

As the world searches for a way to avoid climate catastrophe, dozens of fusion startups are putting billions of dollars into the risky quest for unlimited clean power.

As the planet gets hotter, engineers are racing to find ways to store energy on a massive scale, clearing the way for a transition to renewable electricity.

The six-day stranding of the Ever Given in the Suez Canal last March did something incredibly rare: it made regular people care about shipping, the means by which more than 80% of the world's goods are transported. It took only one wrong turn for the container ship to bring a critical trading artery to a standstill. This is how a $1 billion worth of cargo got stuck, freed and impounded as the courts took over.

If a green pivot is to happen, power grids must become “supergrids,” continent-spanning networks that can move green energy thousands of miles. The technology is here, but politics may stand in the way.

Fake reviews are a big problem on Amazon. There are Facebook groups where bad actors solicit paid positive reviews to bots and click farms that upvote negative reviews in an effort to take out competition. These illegitimate reviews can boost sales of unsafe products and hurt business for legitimate sellers, causing brands like Nike and Birkenstock to sever ties with Amazon. Despite all the fake reviews on Amazon, there are professionals who earn a living reviewing products. Sean Cannell makes tens of thousands of dollars a month as a professional Amazon reviewer. He is part of the Amazon Affiliate program and reviews camera gear on his Think Media YouTube channel. Cannell makes a cut of every sale those reviews generates on Amazon.com. Meanwhile, Walmart is looking to catch up with Amazon's dominance in e-commerce as more and more shoppers take their business online. This is why Amazon dominates online shopping.

More companies are planning for a hybrid work experience — part time at home, part time in the office — but there is uncertainty how this may impact the U.S. workforce and the economy. Former U.S. Secretary of Labor Robert Reich discusses Covid pandemic-related changes to the workforce. He details how the Great Resignation reflects the growing demands of the employee and what companies must prioritize to stay competitive.

For more than a half-century, The North Face has competed in the space outfitting mountain climbers and skiers. But the outdoor recreation brand is now hoping to become a significant player in the $185 billion streetwear market. In the three months ending September 2021, The North Face had revenue of $883 million, 31% higher than a year earlier. And while interest in outdoor activities like camping has surged, climate change and consumer trends like sustainability have led to a range of challenges and opportunities for the brand.

Over the past 100 years, the technology inside airplanes has become more and more advanced from jumbo jets to smaller Cessnas. Some see the next step to full automation as removing the pilot completely. Reliable Robotics and Xwing are two Bay Area start-ups working on doing just that. Rather than build new aircraft, both companies have retrofitted Cessna Grand Caravans. The planes can fly autonomously with a remote operator who monitors the flight and can take control if needed. Both companies are working with the FAA on getting approval.

The U.S.'s approval of Biogen's Alzheimer's drug Aduhelm was heralded as a historic triumph in the fight against the memory-robbing disease. But so far, Biogen has reported only a fraction of Aduhelm revenue to meet Wall Street's expectations. Patients and physicians have been torn over the drug's murky clinical data and its high price tag. Aduhelm's lackluster launch has been costly, forcing Biogen to take measures to keep the drug afloat. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration's approval of Biogen's Alzheimer's drug Aduhelm in June was heralded as a historic triumph in the fight against a disease that kills thousands of Americans every year.

Chick-fil-A has long dominated the chicken sandwich category in fast food. After Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen launched its own version of the chicken sandwich, other fast food chains like Wendy's, McDonalds and Shake Shack got into the battle. Here's how chicken took over America.

Los Angeles consistently ranks among the most traffic-clogged cities in America. The county has been trying to reduce its traffic for decades and nothing has worked. Many researchers and economists suggest charging people for using the road in a system called congestion pricing.

Every holiday season since 2008, Amazon has hired hundreds of nomadic workers for temporary warehouse jobs. The CamperForce program is a small portion of this year's 150,000 seasonal hires, but it gained notoriety in the 2020 movie “Nomadland.” This year, it's seen its biggest growth yet, doubling to 26 sites in 14 states. Despite the growth, Amazon has shifted away from arranging workers' campgrounds and paying for them directly. Here's what it's really like to live in an RV and work for Amazon during the holidays.

Georgia is one of the few states in the United States with a ‘production-friendly' tax incentive program, and many projects get filmed in the Peach State. From 2020 to 2021, productions such as Marvel Studios' Black Panther, Sony's Spider-Man: No Way Home, and Netflix's Ozark filmed in the state. In 2020, Georgia was home to an estimated 242 film productions amid a pandemic. In FY 2020, that added $2.2 billion to the state's economy. In FY 2019, Georgia was home to 399 productions, raking in $2.9 billion.

As supply chain chaos causes shipping delays this holiday season, experts say Amazon's logistics empire and predictive analytics will allow it to avoid the worst of it. Amazon leased long-haul planes to get goods from China to the U.S. faster, and its been making its own containers and chartering private cargo vessels for years. Now retailers like Walmart, Home Depot, Target, IKEA and Costco are trying out the tactic, chartering smaller vessels to bring goods to less congested ports.

In September 2021, AMC CEO Adam Aron sat down with CNBC's Melissa Lee to discuss the “ape movement” and what the future holds for the movie theater chain.

In 2021, Ford stopped making cars in India. With the market there being mostly dominated by two-wheelers, Ford lost approximately $2 billion in its India business, prompting the company to begin slowing down its operations. General Motors has also experienced similar issues finding success in the country. These problems are due in large part to different needs in the market and predictions not panning out as anticipated, which leads companies like Ford and GM to pull back and focus more on profitability.

For years, Exxon Mobil was one of the largest publicly-traded companies in the United States. Coming climate legislation may target the core of the oil and gas giant's operation: production and exploration. The company says it will pivot. But the plan relies on capturing carbon from the oil it will keep pumping in the future. Watch the video to see what experts think of Exxon's green economy plans. Oil giant Exxon Mobil, once the most valuable company in the U.S., is fighting for its future. Over the summer, investors forced a change on Exxon's board. Since then, the company has been speeding up plans for its green economy pivot, which includes carbon capture and storage. Carbon capture is the process of capturing CO2 at its source. Companies can store the carbon dioxide permanently, but it is more profitable and common to use the captured carbon in further fossil fuel production. Congressional researchers say U.S. companies have pioneered the technology worldwide, injecting roughly 68 million metric tons of carbon dioxide back into the ground every year. Exxon Mobil recently announced a plan to increase the amount of carbon it captures from its refineries near Houston, Texas. The company says it has captured 40% of the world's captured carbon to date.

The rocket business is heating up and one startup has grand ambitions of following SpaceX to orbit. With a team comprised of industry veterans, Firefly Aerospace wants to be a dominant launch provider in the growing small satellite market. While the rewards are great, the risk are high. The company already suffered through a bankruptcy and is still trying to reach orbit. Does it have what it takes to become the next SpaceX?

Cobalt has been getting a lot of attention lately because it is one of the most expensive materials found in lithium-ion batteries, which power everything from laptops and cell phones to electric veh icles. Cobalt extraction is largely concentrated in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where it is linked to human rights abuses and child labor, while cobalt refinement is almost exclusively done in China, making cobalt part of a tenuous supply chain. These are some of the reasons why battery manufacturers like Samsung and Panasonic and car makers like Tesla and VW, along with a number of startups are working to eliminate cobalt from lithium-ion batteries completely.

Elon Musk announced that Tesla was getting into the energy business in 2015 and now it's betting that it will become increasingly important for the company. In 2020, it surpassed 3 gigawatt hours of energy storage deployments in a single year, largely due to the popularity of Megapack, its utility-scale battery product. CNBC visited PG&E's Tesla Megapack site in Moss Landing, California and learned why energy storage systems like Tesla's could be everywhere in a future of renewable power.

The recent debt ceiling standoff gave a glimpse into how catastrophic a federal default would be for the U.S. economy. While a bipartisan agreement is the easiest solution to the crisis, there are other possible solutions to breaking the standoff, including a $1 trillion coin that has gained traction in recent years. So what exactly would happen if the U.S. government fails to raise the debt ceiling, and can a $1 trillion coin really put a stop to the crisis? Despite the short-term deal struck between the Republicans and the Democrats in early October, the debt ceiling crisis is far from over. Congress needs to decide by Dec. 3 if the U.S. government will raise the debt ceiling or default on its loans. But there are other possible solutions besides bipartisan agreement. The debt ceiling can also be raised by a process known as budget reconciliation. First introduced in 1974, this process can expedite the passage of certain tax, spending and debt-limit legislation. What would otherwise require a 60-vote majority in the Senate to pass would only require 51 votes or 50 votes plus the vice president as the tie-breaker.

The more than 100-year-old movie theater chain, AMC Entertainment, has been on a wild ride this year after losing $4.6 billion dollars in revenue in 2020. The pandemic pushed the company to the brink of bankruptcy, but in October 2021 its market cap was higher than $18 billion thanks, in part, to a group of 4.1 million retail investors who now own 80% of the company. Some of these retail investors call themselves "apes," a play on Wall Street referring to them as "dumb money." In a digital uprising on Reddit, Twitter and YouTube, they have jumped into the stock giving AMC a billion dollar lifeline. The company's CEO, Adam Aron, is one of the most interesting characters in this whole drama because he has leaned into AMC's "meme stock status." Aron communicates with retail investors directly on social media and he's incorporating their ideas for the company, like accepting crypto at AMC theaters, into his strategy.

Headlights are quietly undergoing a technological revolution, and regulators are trying to catch up. For much of automotive history, innovation came to headlights gradually. But over the last few decades, the pace has quickened. Now, automakers are using LED technology to create arrays of tiny lights that can cast complex beam patterns. The so-called adaptive driving beams can illuminate an entire road while shutting off any bulbs that would shine in the eyes of oncoming drivers. Even more sophisticated headlights have such high resolution that they can display graphics or even animations. These could be used to display warnings or other important information in front of the driver. In theory, the technology could enable a car to project an entire movie from its headlamps. Get the latest news: https://anchor.fm/world-of-relaxation