Longtime employees of Uber will find it easier to quit the company, thanks to a change in how it deals with stock options.

The ride-sharing firm is dropping the requirement that employees who quit must exercise any options they have within 30 days, or lose them, according to three people briefed on the change. Instead the departing employees will have as many as several years to exercise the ...

HBO’s former programming head Michael Lombardo met with Apple executives earlier this year to discuss Apple’s video programming strategy, says a person familiar with the talks. The talks suggest Mr. Lombardo could be a candidate to run Apple’s video efforts. Apple has been looking to fill that role, said another person briefed on those efforts.

Hiring a programming chief would ...

A Chinese online auto-financing marketplace backed by local tech giants Tencent, Baidu and JD.com, is planning a Hong Kong IPO that could value the company at nearly $5 billion, people familiar with the matter said.

Yixin Capital, a closely-held arm of U.S.-listed Chinese online car information portal Bitauto, could go public as early as the end of this year, and Citigroup is currently working ...

Cisco Systems CEO Chuck Robbins’ corporate shopping spree shows no signs of ending. He has lately kicked the tires of several startups in storage, security and networking software, looking to upgrade Cisco’s product portfolio with new technology tied into cloud computing.

The tire-kicking has led to at least one previously undisclosed deal. Cisco has made an $80 million investment ...

Airbnb is deep in negotiations for what would be the biggest office lease in San Francisco this year, according to two people familiar with the matter. It would also make Airbnb one of the biggest office tenants in San Francisco, giving it room to grow as it heads toward a possible IPO next year.

The company is in talks to lease at about 250,000 square feet from the struggling gaming company ...

BuzzFeed is aiming for a 35% jump in revenue this year to around $350 million, as it tries to show investors that it can maintain strong growth while keeping costs low, according to two people familiar with the matter. Among sources of growth are its video ads business and e-commerce efforts like book sales, say people familiar with the company’s financials.

Internally there’s been ...

Alphabet is shuttering Accelerator, a year old-service designed to speed streaming performance of popular YouTube videos in Asian countries with slow Internet access, according to a person who has worked on the project. Alphabet wants to focus on Google Station, a more recently developed effort meant to be introduced in more countries, said a person close to Alphabet.

Accelerator launched in ...

Julie Larson-Green, a senior executive within Microsoft’s Office team who was once seen as a possible successor to former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, is leaving the team, citing health reasons, according to an internal email sent earlier last month. She will take on a broader position at the company, serving as the chief experience officer on “cross-company initiatives,” the ...

Tencent, the company behind China’s largest social network and the world’s biggest online games business, always gets props for its products—but not necessarily for its cutting-edge tech. Now the juggernaut is taking steps to change that perception with a big push into AI.

The owner of the WeChat messaging app will soon open an AI research center in the Seattle area, according ...

To take on Snapchat, Instagram has done more than just copy its features. It’s also heavily ramped up advertising on its parent site Facebook, and adopted other growth strategies long used by Facebook, such as sending more messages to users to get them to reopen the app.

Instagram last year boosted digital ad spending by 30% to 40% to about $80 million, mostly on Facebook, according to a ...

As Uber grapples with controversies over its workplace culture, CEO Travis Kalanick is considering a bevy of measures to tackle another enormous business challenge: the accelerating exodus of Uber drivers.

The company is leaning toward allowing in-app tipping by riders, a longtime item on drivers’ wish list, say people involved with the company’s efforts. In addition, Uber is ...

As the ride-sharing market was exploding in the U.S. between 2014 and the early part 2016, Uber had an advantage over Lyft that helped Uber maintain its lead, The Information has learned. Thanks to a secret software-based effort within Uber called “Hell,” Uber could track how many Lyft drivers were available for new rides and where they were, according to a person who was involved ...

The rivalry between Facebook and Snap reached a very public boiling point in recent weeks as Facebook ramped up its blitz to mimic Snapchat’s app. It’s even gotten a little nasty. There have been public shots like saucy anti-Facebook rants from Evan Spiegel’s fiancée, model Miranda Kerr, and jabs at Instagram by Snapchat’s product chief Tom Conrad. Facebook ...

The battle between Alphabet and Amazon over the home assistant market is heating up.