Activity

Between June 2024 and October 2025, Chegg conducted four rounds of layoffs eliminating over 85% of its workforce - from 2,000+ employees to approximately 636. The cuts came as ChatGPT disrupted Chegg's homework help business, causing a 99% stock price collapse. CEO Dan Rosensweig cited 'new realities of AI' while receiving compensation including $850,000 salary and millions in stock awards during the layoffs.

After Sequoia partner Shaun Maguire posted on X in July 2025 calling NYC mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani an 'Islamist' who 'comes from a culture that lies about everything,' over 1,100 founders signed an open letter demanding Sequoia discipline him. Sequoia COO Sumaiya Balbale, a practicing Muslim, resigned in August 2025 after raising the issue internally and being told partners would not act because Maguire was exercising free speech. As managing partner, Roelof Botha publicly explained and defended the firm's decision not to discipline Maguire at TechCrunch Disrupt in October 2025, describing the approach as 'institutional neutrality' and saying Sequoia 'always honored the right to free speech of each of our individual partners.' He declined to comment on Balbale's departure.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) commenced Federal Court proceedings against Microsoft for allegedly misleading approximately 2.7 million Australian customers. Since October 2024, Microsoft told subscribers they must accept Copilot integration with higher prices ($109 to $159 AUD annually) or cancel, while failing to disclose a third option: Microsoft 365 Classic plans without Copilot at the original lower price.

Steve Wozniak was among over 850 signatories, including AI pioneers Yoshua Bengio and Geoff Hinton, calling for a pause in the development of superintelligence. The statement called for ending efforts to create AI that would surpass humans on essentially all cognitive tasks.

On October 21, 2025, Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen attended Trump's White House Diwali celebration alongside other Indian-American tech CEOs. He publicly thanked Trump, stating: 'What you're doing, Mr. President, to have peace and prosperity and investment in this country is just amazing... I would really like to thank you for your leadership.'

Ron Conway resigned from Salesforce Foundation board in October 2025 after Marc Benioff voiced support for Trump's National Guard deployments. Conway told Benioff their 'values were no longer aligned' and that he 'barely recognizes the person I have so long admired'.

The UK Competition Appeal Tribunal concluded Apple abused its dominant position by charging excessive commissions on App Store purchases between 2015 and 2024. The tribunal found Apple's commissions excessive and unfair, estimating fair fees at 17.5% for distribution and 10% for payment services versus Apple's actual rates. Damages were awarded to consumers for unlawful overcharges passed on by developers. Apple has indicated it will appeal.

Federal court ruled IBM broke ADEA by trying to shorten the deadline for suing over age discrimination. EEOC analysis showed 86% of workers considered for layoff were over 40. Over 20,000 workers age 40+ were discharged in what plaintiffs called 'standard operating procedure' for discrimination.

Revolut's full UK banking license, conditionally granted in July 2024, was delayed well beyond the typical 12-month mobilization period. The PRA and FCA expressed concerns about risk management systems, anti-money laundering controls, and cross-border payments compliance across Revolut's 40 markets. UK customers remain without FSCS deposit protection (limited to £50,000 holdings). Co-founder Nik Storonsky admitted it was 'a mistake' to prioritize growth over licensing. Revolut also topped UK fraud complaint rankings for the second consecutive year.

On October 10, 2025, Marc Benioff endorsed sending National Guard troops to San Francisco in an interview with the New York Times. On October 17, 2025, he apologized and retracted the comments after backlash from San Franciscans and local officials, helping persuade Trump to hold off on a federal surge into the city.

Nevada regulators documented nearly 800 environmental violations by the Boring Company over two years through September 2025. Violations included digging without approval, dumping untreated water onto city streets, failing to install silt fences, and illegally dumping drilling fluids into the sewer system after inspectors told them to stop. The company repeatedly violated a 2022 settlement agreement. Fines included $242,800 from Nevada and nearly $500,000 from Clark County Water Reclamation District in October 2025.

In October 2025, China's SAMR opened antitrust investigation into Qualcomm's June 2025 acquisition of Israeli automotive chipmaker Autotalks. Qualcomm completed the deal without filing merger notification despite SAMR's March 2024 written notice requiring filing. Qualcomm had initially claimed it was dropping the deal after regulatory notice, then proceeded anyway. With $17.8B China revenue (46% of total), Qualcomm faces potential penalty up to $1.8 billion. Shares fell 4% on probe announcement.

YouTube announced a feature allowing terminated creators to apply for new channels, reversing previous lifetime bans. Beneficiaries include former Trump adviser Steve Bannon, RFK Jr (now HHS head), and Dan Bongino (now FBI deputy director). Policy shift aligns with broader industry trend of rolling back content moderation.

Consumer group Which? filed class action lawsuit on behalf of 29 million UK consumers who purchased Apple and Samsung smartphones between October 2015 and January 2024. The lawsuit alleges Qualcomm abused market dominance in chipset and patent-licensing markets, forcing phone manufacturers to pay inflated fees passed to consumers. Five-week trial began October 2025 at London's Competition Appeal Tribunal. Potential average payout of £17 per device if successful. Ruling on liability expected late 2025.

Business & Human Rights Resource Centre (October 2025) and Human Rights Watch (December 2024) documented severe labor abuses at Saudi Arabia's NEOM megaproject. 53% of 34 interviewed workers experienced 5+ ILO-defined forced labor indicators including wage theft, 84-hour work weeks, recruitment fee scams, and passport confiscation. Workers died from heat exposure. An estimated 21,000 migrant workers have died across Saudi Vision 2030 projects. HRW titled its report 'Die First, and I'll Pay You Later.'

President Trump pardoned Changpeng Zhao in October 2025 following his federal conviction and prison sentence for anti-money laundering violations at Binance.

Spotify ran recruitment advertisements for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement as part of a DHS campaign. Ads reportedly began with language about 'millions of dangerous illegals.' Spotify received $74,000 from DHS for the ads. The company defended the ads as not violating advertising policies. The non-profit Indivisible Project launched a 'Spotify Unwrapped' boycott in response. Spotify stopped running the ads at end of 2025.

T-Mobile is among the corporations supporting a new $300 million ballroom that will replace the East Wing of the White House, according to a list provided by the Trump administration. The donation amount was not disclosed.

In October 2025, Match Group rolled out mandatory facial liveness verification for new Tinder users in the US. Early results showed 60%+ decrease in bad actors and 40%+ decrease in harmful behavior reports. The system uses privacy-preserving design where verification videos are deleted after processing.

In October 2025, ARM lost its lawsuit against Qualcomm after a U.S. District Court confirmed Qualcomm's jury trial victory and rejected ARM's claims that Qualcomm breached architecture license agreements. ARM had sued Qualcomm in August 2022 for breach of contract related to the Nuvia acquisition. Critics noted that now that ARM owns Ampere Computing and directly competes with its own customers, it lends credence to Qualcomm's claims of anticompetitive behavior. The lawsuit creates risk by pushing chip designers toward open-source RISC-V alternatives, creating existential threat to ARM's licensing model.

In late 2025, Jensen Huang opposed the bipartisan Guaranteeing Access and Innovation for National Artificial Intelligence (GAIN AI) Act, which would have required chipmakers to give U.S. companies first pick of chips before selling to China or foreign adversaries. The act passed the Senate in October as part of the annual Defense bill but reportedly faced resistance from the Trump White House after Huang's lobbying. Senator Warren stated Huang was 'sneaking in to meet with Senate Republicans behind closed doors as he kills the bipartisan GAIN AI Act.' Huang also advocated for federal AI regulation to preempt state laws protecting children, renters, and workers.

Court filings revealed Alphabet will contribute $22 million 'on behalf' of Trump to the Trust for the National Mall for construction of the White House State Ballroom. The contribution resulted from a settlement over Trump's lawsuit against YouTube for banning him after January 6, 2021. The $300-400 million ballroom project is funded by multiple Big Tech companies. Shortly after the settlement was disclosed, the DOJ approved Alphabet's $30B+ acquisition of cybersecurity firm Wiz.

Sam Altman's personal project World (formerly Worldcoin), which scans irises in exchange for cryptocurrency tokens, has been banned or halted in multiple countries. Kenya's High Court ruled the project collected data 'without valid consent' and 'used inducements,' ordering data deletion. Brazil, Indonesia, Philippines, and Thailand also restricted operations. In April 2026, World pivoted to US partnerships with Tinder, Zoom, and DocuSign for identity verification.

Throughout 2025, Anthropic lobbied members of Congress to vote against federal bills that would preempt states from regulating AI. Anthropic was the only major AI lab to back California's SB 53, which required transparency from leading AI labs. White House AI czar David Sacks accused Anthropic of running a 'sophisticated regulatory capture strategy based on fear-mongering'.

YouTube/Alphabet agreed to pay $24.5M to settle Trump's lawsuit over his 2021 account suspension following Jan 6. Of this, $22M goes to Trump's Trust for the National Mall for a new White House State Ballroom. Settlement negotiations included mediation at Mar-a-Lago with Sundar Pichai and Sergey Brin. Legal experts called it 'straight influence-peddling' with no legal merit.

On September 29, 2025, Vercel CEO Guillermo Rauch met with Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu during the Gaza war and posted a selfie on X. The meeting sparked employee resignations and calls from customers to boycott Vercel. Companies like Pluid and Loopify announced they would leave Vercel. Rauch later disputed the scale of the backlash.

Accenture cut its global workforce from 791,000 to 779,000 (more than 11,000 employees) between roughly June and September 2025, with layoffs continuing through November 2025, as part of an $865 million 'business optimization' restructuring program expected to save over $1 billion. On a September 26, 2025 earnings call, CEO Julie Sweet said the company's primary strategy is upskilling staff on AI, but that it is 'exiting on a compressed timeline' employees for whom reskilling is 'not a viable path' for the skills the company needs. Accenture reported $615 million in severance costs in fiscal Q4 2025 alone, with roughly $250 million more expected the following quarter. The company said it had reskilled 550,000 workers on generative AI fundamentals and grew AI/data specialists from 40,000 to 77,000, and continues hiring in the US and Europe even as it exits staff tied to AI-driven restructuring.

Lyft set ambitious goal in 2023 to reach 100 million electric vehicle rides on platform by end of 2025. On September 25, 2025, company hit that milestone 'with a few months to spare,' according to Jeremy Bird, EVP of Driver Experience. Achievement demonstrates real measurable progress toward 2030 commitment to reach 100% electric vehicles on platform, showing Lyft drivers adopting EVs faster than general population. Milestone represents significant environmental impact as rides transition from gas to electric power.

Following the Guardian's investigation revealing mass Palestinian surveillance via Azure, Microsoft ceased and disabled specified Israel Ministry of Defense subscriptions including cloud storage and AI services. Microsoft President Brad Smith stated 'We do not provide technology to facilitate mass surveillance of civilians.' This was the first known case of a US tech company withdrawing services from the Israeli military since the Gaza war began. However, Microsoft's wider relationship with the IDF remained intact, and Unit 8200 reportedly migrated the surveillance data to Amazon Web Services.

Despite years of major Democratic donations including $7M to Harris, Reed Hastings publicly endorsed Trump's executive order establishing a $100,000 fee for H-1B visa applicants. He posted on X: 'I've worked on H1-B politics for 30 years. Trump's $100K per year tax is a great solution.'