From shoes to AI to . . . Smartbird? It’s been a strange, winding path to an entirely new strategy for the company formerly known as Allbirds. On Wednesday, the company made two big announcements: It has named a new CEO, Nadia Carlsten, and it changed its name from Allbirds to Smartbird. It’s also identifying itself as “an AI infrastructure provider,” which, again, is a huge change from its previous iteration as a footwear maker. Carlsten will also join the company’s board and replace current CEO Joe Vernachio, who had taken the helm of the company in March 2024. She…
Author: Staff Writer
When done right, brand activations can bring real-life awareness and connect a brand with its customers. When done poorly, they can turn sour quickly, bringing the opposite effect to a brand—as recently happened with activewear company Lululemon. On Tuesday, the Canadian athletic clothing retailer organized a massive yoga festival on China’s Great Wall as part of its move toward gaining share in the Chinese market. However, the promotional event, which was meant to be a celebration of Chinese culture and wellness with 2,000 guests—quickly backfired.According to Chinese state-owned publication Global Times, Chinese actor Zhu Yilong was among the guests present…
ASIA: The major Asian stock markets had a mixed day today: • NIKKEI 225 increased 497.75 points or 0.72% to 69,902.25 • Shanghai increased 16.184 points or 0.40% to 4,108.076 • Hang Seng decreased 181.79 points or -0.74% to 24,312.16 • ASX 200 increased 48.60 points or 0.54% to 8,966.30 • SENSEX increased 347.14 points or 0.45% to 77,155.62 • Nifty50 increased 96.55 points or 0.40% to 24,085.70 The major Asian currency markets had a mixed day today: • AUDUSD increased 0.00043 or 0.06% to 0.70715 • NZDUSD decreased 0.00165 or -0.28% to 0.58155 • USDJPY decreased 0.215 or -0.13%…
Get ready to break some bread in Texas this summer. Several Panera Bread locations that abruptly shuttered last year in the wake of a high-profile franchise dispute will soon reopen their doors, the new owner has confirmed with Fast Company. The Houston-area restaurants have been dark since August 2025, when their previous owner—ordered by a judge to stop using the Panera name—closed them down and sought Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Hamra Enterprises, a family-owned franchise that already owns dozens of Panera Bread locations across the Southeast, purchased the seven restaurants in a November 2025 bankruptcy sale, as Fast Company previously…
Want more housing market stories from Lance Lambert’s ResiClub in your inbox? Subscribe to the ResiClub newsletter. In today’s article, we’ll share the full results from the latest TurboHome-ResiClub Housing Sentiment Survey for Q2 2026. To conduct the survey, ResiClub partnered with TurboHome, a digital platform that combines expert local agents with AI tools to help homebuyers save on transaction costs. In total, 430 U.S. adults participated in the TurboHome-ResiClub Housing Sentiment Survey between April 21 and May 21, 2026. This marks the third time we’ve run this particular survey, with the previous surveys conducted in Q1 2025 and Q3…
What kind of pool-cleaning gear does $14.2 million buy? According to the Department of the Interior, who oversaw recent renovations to the Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool, it’ll get you “high-tech nanobubble ozone technology,” which may or may not be as impressive as it sounds. It also apparently buys a whole lot of bleach. On Tuesday morning, workers in neon vests knelt along the reflecting pool, dumping hydrogen peroxide in the algae-filled water. The sight might have been questionable any other time, but it was more so given that Trump’s recent renovations to the Washington, D.C. landmark—which began in April—had been…
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang — whose work helped propel artificial intelligence — stressed in an Associated Press interview Tuesday that society needs to change with the advent of AI, arguing that a fuller embrace of the technology would improve people’s lives.Huang has been optimistic about AI’s potential to rapidly transform society, creating faster economic growth and more scientific breakthroughs. But as the head of a computer chip company now developing AI systems, he and others are confronting a public increasingly concerned about the potential harm the technology might bring. Huang has felt obligated to respond to critics who warn of…
The marketing pitch for enterprise AI’s autonomous agents has started to sound almost like a fairy tale: Hand one a task or objective, walk away, and it figures out the rest. It runs on its own, reasons through changing conditions, adapts as circumstances evolve, and delivers results before you think to ask. The promise of software that functions like a digital colleague has been seductive. Amazon Web Services has an even more ambitious version of that vision in store. At AWS Summit on Wednesday, the company unveiled new agentic AI capabilities for its platform, aimed at everyday enterprise operations. The…
Iran will immediately take steps to reopen the Strait of Hormuz once a tentative deal with the U.S. to end the war is signed and will be allowed to sell its oil without restrictions, according to leaked copies of an interim agreement that officials say broadly matches the document.The accord, due to be formally signed in a ceremony in Switzerland on Friday, lays out that the U.S. would secure at least $300 billion to rebuild Iran after the war and work to end all American and United Nations sanctions imposed on Tehran if a final agreement addressing Iran’s nuclear program…
Electric SUV maker Rivian Automotive (Nasdaq: RIVN) has cut hundreds of jobs as it seeks to achieve profitability, the company confirmed. The layoffs come just days after the automaker launched its new R2 mid-size SUVs to the public. Here’s what you need to know about Rivian’s layoffs and how the company’s stock price has reacted. What’s happened? Yesterday, Rivian confirmed it was initiating another round of job cuts. The last time the EV maker initiated mass layoffs was in October, when it laid off more than 600 workers following the Trump administration’s elimination of the $7,500 electric vehicle credit. At…