20231127

Elon Musk to Meet Israeli President as Antisemitism Furor Brews

Elon Musk will meet with Israeli President Isaac Herzog and representatives of the families of hostages held in Gaza, in an apparent effort to defuse a growing furor over his endorsement of an antisemitic tweet.

The Tesla Inc. and SpaceX chief executive is slated to join a closed-door discussion Monday with the family representatives and Herzog about the need to curb online antisemitism, a spokesperson for the president’s office said in a brief statement.

The billionaire has denied being racist and defended his views after endorsing the tweet, which drew condemnation from the White House and rights activists. Critics have accused the world’s richest person of amplifying anti-Jewish hatred on X, the service formerly known as Twitter that Musk bought for $44 billion last year. The backlash came around the same time Media Matters published a report pointing out alleged pro-Nazi content, triggering an exodus of advertisers including IBM Corp. and Apple Inc. Musk has sued the liberal watchdog group.

EK: Time for impression management. Musk is such a character.

Singapore’s Changi Airport Tests AI Security Screening to Cut Time: ST

Singapore’s Changi Airport is testing an artificial intelligence-driven system that could potentially halve time spent on passenger security checks, the Straits Times reported Sunday.

The trial at Terminal 3 uses AI and machine learning to screen and interpret images from X-ray machines that check cabin baggage at the boarding gate. This reduces time needed to process these images and chances of human error, the newspaper said, citing the city-state’s airport operator.

Initial results show the new system is performing as well as, or better than, human security screeners in flagging some prohibited items, according to the report. The development is still in its early stages with an eventual goal to raise the level of automation.

EK: That’s just great. It’s unprejudiced too.

Fewer Than 10% of CEOs in FTSE 350 Are Women

Even as Britain’s largest companies are hiring women in executive leadership roles at the fastest pace in five years, there’s a big hurdle to cross: they are still unlikely to be in influential roles overseeing the commercial side of the business.

That’s according to a report by gender consultancy The Pipeline, which found that while women made up almost every third executive committee member in the FTSE350 as of July 2023, they tend to be in so-called “functional roles.” This tends to mean they’re promoted to HR and marketing positions rather than roles with profit and loss responsibilities — which are more likely to lead to a CEO position. Male CEOs account for 91% in the index.

The data comes as voices across the City of London in particular are expressing frustration at the slow pace of change on gender equality in the wake of high-profile sexual harassment scandals, including allegations against hedge fund titan Crispin Odey and the Confederation of British Industry, the country’s largest business lobby group.

Parliamentarians have opened an inquiry into the state of sexism in financial services and industry watchdogs the Financial Conduct Authority and the Prudential Regulation Authority are considering making companies publish data that would shine a light on whether underrepresented groups are making progress at their firms.

The Pipeline report also said that almost half of women they polled thought that workplace environment and culture were the most difficult obstacles to overcome to progress to leadership roles. About 48% highlighted flexibility at work and career advancement as the most important areas for leadership teams to focus on to help women rise up the corporate ladder.

EK: Tokenism – there could be selection bias, though. There are more men that major in finance or other econ majors.

Crypto Entrepreneur Do Kwon to Be Extradited From Montenegro

Montenegro’s high court approved the extradition of crypto entrepreneur Do Kwon, who is sought by the US and South Korea on fraud charges.

The justice minister will make the final decision on which country to extradite Kwon to, the court said on its website on Friday. A phone call to the Justice Ministry went unanswered.

The Terraform Labs co-founder and its former chief financial officer Han Chang-joon were caught at the airport in Montenegro’s capital Podgorica in March when they tried to board a private jet to fly to Dubai after months as fugitives. They were sentenced to four months in prison for traveling with forged documents. Both pleaded not guilty.

Kwon has been charged by US prosecutors with orchestrating a years-long cryptocurrency fraud that wiped out at least $40 billion in market value following the implosion in May 2022 of TerraUSD, an algorithmic stablecoin. He faces similar charges in South Korea.

The collapse of TerraUSD and its sister token Luna accelerated a broader $2 trillion downturn in the crypto market. Officials in South Korea have said the Terra project Kwon helped create was a “fabrication” from its inception as the algorithm that helped keep TerraUSD at a stable price was impossible to get right.

EK: What to live for?

How Ferrari’s CEO Stays Ahead of His Competition

Since you are high up in the hierarchy, you may think you know everything. Instead you have to keep your eyes and ears open to what other people are saying inside and outside of the company.

I believe that when you want to do something new, the smaller team has one more gear. In a big team you feel like a number. In a small team, you are a person that’s contributing one way or another. Also, the speed of learning from mistakes is much faster.

You always have to be paranoid. Because when you are on the leading edge and you want to stay there, it always comes to the same story: Listen to what is happening around you.

Becoming greener is important, especially for a luxury company because a luxury company makes an emotional product, a symbolic product, not a functional product. So becoming green is important for the social license. We are highly committed – we want to become carbon neutral by 2030.

There will be people that may not know how to drive and there will be people that will take pleasure in learning to drive and driving. Also, there are some skills that you can develop when you’re driving. We’re in a world where sometimes things are done too much by computers. We have to pay attention that the new technology — AI, whatever — it’s always a tool that must be used by people. Not the other way around.

EK: Green, luxury cars sound fancy.