In the fall of 2014, a little-known Chinese entrepreneur named Zhang Yiming toured Silicon Valley, visiting the offices of Facebook, Tesla and Airbnb. One thing that struck Mr. Zhang, whose startup in Beijing was beginning to gain traction, was China’s growing influence. He met some Facebook and Twitter employees who loved Xiaomi phones, for example. He noticed how Alibaba’s U.S. ...

In a sign of how Hulu’s programming decisions have shifted since Disney took control of the streaming service, Hulu executives have begun telling outside studios that Disney will likely have partial ownership in most shows Hulu buys, according to multiple studio executives and Hollywood agents.

In recent weeks, Hulu executives have told outside studios that in the future most of ...

Uber has held recent talks to buy Seattle-based Mighty AI, a startup that helps autonomous vehicle developers train their computer vision algorithms to better identify objects on the road, said three people briefed on the discussions.

The potential deal is another sign of a looming shakeout in the self-driving car field, where companies have collectively raised billions of dollars to tackle ...

Critics who believe Amazon has gotten too big and powerful often quote estimates that the company accounts for nearly 50% of online sales in the U.S. But one widely cited source for that figure—the research firm eMarketer—recently revised Amazon’s market share estimate sharply downward after the ecommerce giant disclosed new data.

A spokesperson for eMarketer told The ...

When Thomas Kurian, a high-profile former Oracle executive, left the software company last September, his peers at the database software company expected Oracle to replace him.

But Larry Ellison, Oracle’s co-founder and chief technology officer, had other plans. Mr. Kurian had been leading Oracle’s response to a growing threat from Amazon, which offers online alternatives to ...

Apple is in talks to buy a key part of Intel’s smartphone modem business—its German operations—in a deal that could boost the iPhone maker’s plans to internally develop a modem for its devices, according to four people briefed on the discussions.

The talks come as Intel considers selling its struggling modem business in pieces. Apple is focusing on one of the strongest ...

The hiring boom in artificial intelligence research is finally slowing down.

The frenzied competition for talent that drove the cost of hiring data scientists and AI researchers into the stratosphere appears to have sharply cooled. At both Alphabet and Microsoft, two of the biggest recruiters of AI talent, the growth rate of hiring for “pure” AI research positions is declining, ...

Uber’s sluggish public market debut has meant losses for some investors. But CEO Dara Khosrowshahi is sitting on healthy paper gains, thanks to changes that were made to his stock options before the company went public.

The exercise price of Mr. Khosrowshahi’s options was lowered to $33.65 per share by the company early last year, eight months after they were issued at $41.65. Such ...

As Cruise set out in 2017 to verify the safety of its self-driving vehicles, it came up with a set of milestones to measure progress in its software development. These milestones, which measure the frequency and severity of safety incidents, offer a rare view of how autonomous vehicle developers judge the quality of their software, and the progress they’re making toward commercializing ...

In the middle of April, Honda Motor CEO Takahiro Hachigo hopped into a self-driving car prototype made by General Motors’ Cruise Automation for a demonstration ride. It didn’t go well. About 20 minutes in, the car’s software suddenly turned itself off even as the car kept moving. A man sitting behind the wheel—the backup driver—had to take control. Attempts to ...

Apple is in the process of acquiring a well-known but struggling self-driving shuttle firm, Drive.ai, for its engineering talent in order boost Apple’s own development of a self-driving vehicle system, according to two people briefed about the situation.

The planned deal, described as an “acqui-hire” of the Silicon Valley firm by these people, could result in dozens of ...

Facebook plans to cede control of its forthcoming cryptocurrency to outside backers, a move meant to encourage trust in the digital payment system and reassure financial regulators, The Information has learned.

In recent months, the social network has courted dozens of financial institutions and other tech companies to join an independent foundation that will contribute capital and help govern ...

Ari Emanuel, one of the most high-profile Hollywood agents of the past 25 years, has long been the public face of Endeavor, the talent agency-turned-entertainment conglomerate. But as the company goes public, with a heavy debt load and operating losses, another figure will be in the spotlight: President Mark Shapiro.

Mr. Shapiro, a former CEO of both Six Flags Entertainment and Dick Clark ...

WeWork wants to be the office-space provider for big as well as small companies. But it is finding that bigger clients come with bigger expectations.

Take Amazon. The e-commerce giant is one of WeWork’s biggest customers, occupying dozens of WeWork spaces around the world. But earlier this year, when it prepared to expand in Nashville, Amazon signed a deal with a smaller WeWork rival, ...

For years, Tesla CEO Elon Musk has been making bold claims that the “Autopilot” feature that allows Tesla drivers to drive hands-free is safer than traditional driving.

In 2016, for instance, he said that “half a million” people would be saved if Autopilot were more widely available. In 2017, Musk tweeted that the latest Autopilot software update could reduce collisions ...