RANKED: Top 20 Automakers by Battery Metals Spending
The global passenger EV market grew 18% YoY in 2025, pushing battery capacity deployment past 1 TWh for the first time. Raw‑material costs for lithium, graphite, nickel, cobalt and manganese reached $15.6 billion, an 11% rise over 2024 but still half of the 2022 peak. BYD’s in‑house LFP strategy kept its material cost per EV at $247, far below Tesla ($1,082), Volkswagen ($1,624) and General Motors ($1,664). Volkswagen emerged as the world’s biggest spender on battery metals, while Toyota’s hybrid focus kept its average spend at just $185 per vehicle.
Urbanrise Launches “Welcome to the Celebrity Life” Campaign for Whispers of Sky
Urbanrise, a leading South Indian developer, unveiled the “Welcome to the Celebrity Life” advertising campaign for its new luxury project Whispers of Sky in Chennai. The campaign, created by Dentsu Creative, stars designer Gauri Khan in two films directed by...
Microsoft Says Anthropic’s Products Remain Available to Customers After Pentagon Blacklist
Microsoft announced it will continue offering Anthropic’s AI models across its consumer and enterprise platforms, including Microsoft 365, GitHub Copilot, and the AI Foundry, while barring only the Department of War. The Pentagon has labeled Anthropic a supply‑chain risk, prompting the...
Royal Caribbean Group Proposes Ship Repair Yard for Panama's Pacific Coast
Royal Caribbean Group has presented Panama’s president with a proposal to build a 400‑meter, 130,000‑ton floating dry dock on the Pacific coast near Puerto Armuelles. The facility, slated for operation by 2031, would service the cruise line’s largest ships and...
'Signing Is the Easy Part': How Airwallex Turned Sport Into a Global Growth Engine
Airwallex has expanded its sports sponsorship from a single global deal to a portfolio that includes McLaren F1, Arsenal FC, the San Francisco Giants, and regional teams in Australia and New Zealand. The company says the partnerships are already boosting brand trust,...
The Board Changes. The Logic Doesn’t
Strategic decision‑making in games and business follows identical logical rules. The author outlines five principles—evaluating decisions rather than outcomes, acting under uncertainty, building positional strength before chasing wins, updating models faster than ego, and thinking in sequences—that translate from chess,...
Data Quality Automation Startup Validio Raises $30M
Validio, a Stockholm‑based data‑quality automation startup, secured $30 million in Series A funding, bringing its total capital to $47 million after an 800 % ARR surge last year. The round was led by Plural with participation from Lakestar, J12 and several angels. Validio’s AI‑driven...
14 Companies Lauded for Their Innovative HR Solutions in Malaysia and Singapore
The HR Vendors of the Year 2025 recognized fourteen firms across Malaysia and Singapore for breakthrough HR solutions. Info‑Tech captured gold in both markets, while BIPO Service Malaysia and Mercer took silver and bronze respectively. Finalists showcased a range of tools...
American Express Hits Full Throttle On Fan Experience At Melbourne GP
American Express returns for a second year as the official payments partner of the Formula 1 Australian Grand Prix, unveiling an upgraded Amex Lounge and a suite of new fan experiences. The lounge now showcases premium food and beverage partners such...
Nicholas R. Bell to Lead Toronto’s Royal Ontario Museum
The Royal Ontario Museum has appointed Nicholas R. Bell as its new director and CEO, effective July 6. Bell comes from a successful tenure at Calgary’s Glenbow Museum, where he launched a $250 million renovation campaign and created an endowment for free...
AI Voice Start-Up Elevenlabs Shifts to Australia
AI voice startup Elevenlabs has appointed former Conversant Media executive Michael Costa as its go‑to‑market director for Australia and New Zealand. Costa, who has held senior roles at Salesforce, Twilio and Mixpanel, will lead the company’s expansion despite still being based...
Visa Taps Veteran Leonardo Collado to Lead Pismo’s Global Growth
Visa has appointed senior vice president Leonardo J. Collado as general manager of Pismo, effective April 1. Collado, who oversees value‑added services for Latin America and the Caribbean, brings 25 years of payments experience to the role. The move follows...
PregaNews Film Encourages Conversations Around Postpartum Depression This Women’s Day
India’s leading pregnancy detection brand PregaNews has launched a digital film ahead of International Women’s Day to spark open conversations about postpartum depression. The short film highlights how many new mothers silently endure emotional and physical strain, normalising these challenges...
Cancer Medtech Tops up Series B to $28 Million
Sydney‑based Lumonus secured an additional $3 million, raising its Series B to $28 million. The AI‑powered platform automates radiation‑oncology workflows, already supporting over 280,000 cancer treatments and 75,000 treatment plans across the US, Australia and Europe. Funds will expand U.S. go‑to‑market teams, boost...
Video of the Week: Asia Pacific’s Talent Test - Staffing Growth in a Constrained Labour Market
Asia‑Pacific airlines face a decade‑long talent crunch as passenger traffic surges, requiring over 400,000 additional aviation professionals by the mid‑2030s. The shortage spans pilots, engineers, cabin crew and digital specialists, creating a structural mismatch between demand and supply. Recruitment struggles...
Audit Readiness Assessments Demystified: Importance and Relevance for Your Business
Audit readiness assessments are proactive reviews that verify an organization’s controls, policies, and evidence before an official audit. By mapping controls to frameworks such as SOC 2, ISO 27001, HIPAA, or PCI DSS, firms can pinpoint gaps, assign ownership, and remediate issues early....
Sanctions and Financial Repression
The interview with Oleg Itskhoki examines how Russia employed financial repression in 2022 to weather the largest post‑war sanctions package. By banning cash withdrawals and obligating exporters to surrender foreign‑currency earnings, Moscow halted a ruble freefall and stabilized its fiscal...
Asian Development Bank Giving Central Asia Lots of Attention
The Asian Development Bank announced a $5.4 billion financing plan for Kazakhstan, a $1.1 billion package for Tajikistan, and a $2.5 billion commitment to Azerbaijan, all aimed at strengthening the Middle Corridor trade route. The bank also launched a technical assistance program to...
Mammoth Energy Services Inc (TUSK) Q4 2025 Earnings Call Transcript
Mammoth Energy Services reported $16.4 million revenue in Q2 2025 but posted a $35.7 million GAAP net loss, driven largely by a $31.7 million non‑cash impairment on its Northern White Sand mine. The quarter featured three major portfolio moves: a $108.7 million sale of infrastructure...
‘Better Value Than LinkedIn Ads’: Tech Firm Octave Bets Big On F1 Partnership With VCARB
Global tech firm Octave has signed a three‑year sponsorship with the Visa Cash App Racing Bulls F1 team, launching the deal at the Australian Grand Prix. The partnership aligns Octave’s asset‑lifecycle intelligence platform with the high‑pressure environment of Formula 1, positioning...
Retail and Grocery Brands Dominate ChatGPT Ads
OpenAI’s ChatGPT has entered its fourth week of serving contextual ads, with Sensor Tower reporting that retail and grocery promotions dominate the ad inventory. Over a two‑week sample, more than 100 distinct brand ads appeared, outpacing other categories such as...
Inside ‘AutoBait’: DoubleVerify Exposes AI Slop Factory Sucking Ad Budgets
DoubleVerify’s Fraud Lab has uncovered AutoBait, a coordinated network of more than 200 AI‑generated lifestyle sites that churn out clickbait articles and hyper‑realistic images to harvest advertising revenue. The operation delivers tens of millions of ad impressions each month, with...
3 New Ways Salesforce Meets You in Slack
Salesforce has launched three Slack‑native features—Slackbot, Activity Timeline, and Agentforce Sales—to embed CRM data directly into Slack conversations. Slackbot delivers AI‑driven answers from Salesforce records, Activity Timeline streams emails, calls and tasks into the chat view, and Agentforce autonomously monitors...
TikTok Ad Campaigns Drive Movie Ticket Purchases
TikTok released data, in partnership with measurement firm Samba, linking ad exposure to real‑world movie ticket purchases across 38 U.S. campaigns from early 2023 to mid‑2025. The analysis shows a median 172% lift in purchase rates for exposed audiences, with...
The SOC Analyst Role Is Going Up (And It Was Never Going Away)
Enterprise Security Operations Centers face overwhelming alert volumes—averaging 4,484 alerts daily, with 67% never investigated. Autonomous triage platforms such as D3 Security's Morpheus use AI to ingest, investigate, and respond to 100% of alerts, cutting false‑positive handling by 99% and...
PBM Reforms May Open a New Era for Group Health Plan Sponsors
The Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2026 (CAA 2026) introduces sweeping federal regulation of pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) for employer‑sponsored group health plans. It mandates full 100 percent rebate pass‑through and detailed compensation disclosure, with semi‑annual reporting requirements taking effect for calendar‑year plans...
W. P. Carey Names Co-Heads of North American Investments
W.P. Carey promoted Zachary Pasanen and Tyler Swann to co‑heads of North American investments, giving them responsibility for sourcing, underwriting and structuring sale‑leaseback and build‑to‑suit transactions. Both will continue reporting to Gino Sabatini and remain focused on long‑term net‑lease deals....
HAT Bolsters A/NZ Enterprise Security Distie Portfolio with Tufin
Tufin has appointed HAT Distribution as its official distributor for Australia and New Zealand, expanding the vendor's footprint in the region. The partnership stresses technical enablement and architectural alignment rather than a purely transactional sales model. HAT will embed Tufin’s policy‑management...
The Referral Advantage: Turning Employees Into Your Best Hiring Source
Employee referral programs remain dramatically under‑utilized, representing just 7.5% of hires in 2025 despite their proven advantages. Referred candidates typically deliver higher quality, faster time‑to‑hire, stronger cultural fit, and longer tenure, while lowering overall cost‑per‑hire. The article outlines eight core...
High-Performance Envelope Encryption at Ariso.ai with Vault
Ariso.ai integrated HashiCorp Vault’s Transit engine to secure its multi‑tenant AI assistant, Ari, using envelope encryption across 21 database tables. A single master key with context‑based derivation provides organization, user, and session isolation while eliminating key sprawl. DEK caching yields...
From Billing to Strategy: Elevating the Patient Financial Experience
Patient financial experience has shifted from a back‑office billing function to a strategic, end‑to‑end service that directly impacts revenue integrity and brand trust. Research shows that transparent cost estimates and digital, omni‑channel payment options improve patient engagement, reduce disputes, and...
Asia Deals Aim for First-in-Class Biology, with at Least Four Deals for New Targets
Asian biotech firms outside China announced 72 deals in 2024‑25, emphasizing first‑in‑class assets over me‑better or me‑too programs. At least four transactions involve novel targets such as CNTN4, GPR52, MTARC1 and OK‑1, spanning new modalities and indications. Global pharmaceutical companies...
In Trump’s Precarious World, NZ Will Need All the Middle-Sized Friends It Can Get
New Zealand faces a shifting global order as Donald Trump’s America‑first agenda threatens the rules‑based system the country has long relied on. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney’s call for middle powers to devise practical “workarounds” highlights the urgency for smaller...
Why Private Credit Panic Likely Won't Spread To Real Estate Debt
Investors are reassessing risk in the $2 trillion private‑credit market as AI‑related corporate loans face heightened scrutiny, while debt secured by real‑estate assets remains comparatively stable. BridgeInvest and other lenders emphasize the tangible collateral of data‑center and multifamily loans, which cushions...
ScanSource Appoints Mark Morgan as President of Specialty Technologies
ScanSource announced Mark Morgan as President of Specialty Technologies, reinforcing its focus on converged solutions for channel partners. Morgan, with nearly two decades at the firm, has steered the company from a hardware distributor to a cloud‑centric, services‑oriented player. He...
L.E.K. Brand Heat Index Shows Which Shoe Brands Are Top of Mind
L.E.K. Consulting’s 2026 Brand Heat Index, based on a survey of nearly 5,000 U.S. consumers, shows Nike retaining the top spot in athletic footwear for both men and women. Hoka and On Running are closing the gap, especially among female...
GCC Banks Show Resilience Amid Regional Conflict
GCC banks have shown resilience as the region endures fresh hostilities between Israel, the United States and Iran. Central Bank of the UAE reported banking assets above AED 5.42 trillion with a 17 % capital adequacy ratio and 146.6 % liquidity coverage ratio, both...
Agency Market Phones It In, Rate Refis Slow in February
Agency mortgage market showed tepid activity in February, with rate‑refinance volumes remaining sluggish. GSE credit‑risk‑transfer (CRT) issuance fell to its lowest level since 2013, while overall loan originations modestly increased across most product lines. Delinquency rates at large servicers rose...
EY Launches Agentic Sales Orchestration Platform with Snowflake and Canva
EY announced the launch of EY.ai Agentic for Sales, an AI‑driven sales orchestration platform built with Snowflake’s data cloud and Canva’s design automation. The solution integrates real‑time data intelligence, automated content generation, and EY’s consulting frameworks to streamline prospecting, outreach,...
Courts Signal Path for Manufacturers to Reap Billions in IEEPA Tariff Refunds
The U.S. Court of International Trade ruled that all importers of record subject to IEEPA duties are eligible for refunds after the Supreme Court struck down those tariffs. Courts have ordered Customs to begin issuing refunds, and more than 900...
Casavogue Celebrates 54 Years with Anniversary Savings
Casavogue, Montreal’s flagship high‑end furniture showroom, marks its 54th anniversary with a $500 discount for every $3,000 spent on sofas, bedroom and dining sets. The promotion runs across a curated selection of premium collections, encouraging customers to refresh core home...
The Renminbi Is Winning over Africa—But Can It Rival the Dollar?
The US dollar still dominates Africa’s trade, finance and debt, but China’s renminbi is gaining traction. African policymakers have launched the Pan‑African Payment and Settlement System (PAPSS) to enable local‑currency cross‑border payments, yet adoption remains modest. Since 2024, renminbi usage...
First Nations Coalition Says Indigenous Equity Key to Faster Mining Approvals in Canada
The First Nations Major Projects Coalition (FNMPC) is championing Indigenous equity ownership as a catalyst for faster mining and energy project approvals across Canada. By providing technical, regulatory and financial support, the coalition helps First Nations move from consultation to...
Walmart Canada Kicks Off Sponsorship with Canada Soccer to Bring Canadians Closer to the Game
Walmart Canada announced a multi‑year sponsorship with Canada Soccer and the Canadian Premier League, aiming to make the sport more accessible nationwide. The partnership features forward Jonathan David as Walmart’s official ambassador and includes grassroots initiatives, match‑day activations, and fan‑engagement offers....
Brilliant Earth Group, Inc. Q4 2025 Earnings Call Summary
Brilliant Earth reported record Q4 net sales, propelled by a 34% year‑over‑year jump in fine‑jewelry bookings that now represent 23% of its mix. The company’s premium brand and data‑driven pricing engine helped preserve mid‑50s% gross margins despite gold up 67%...
Bragg Gaming to Release Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2025 Results on March 19
Bragg Gaming Group announced it will publish its fourth‑quarter and full‑year 2025 financial results on March 19, 2026, ahead of the market open. The release will be accompanied by a live conference call at 8:30 a.m. ET, led by CEO Matevž...
Greenidge Generation Reports Preliminary Financial and Operating Results for the Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2025
Greenidge Generation Holdings announced preliminary Q4 and full‑year 2025 results, highlighting a dramatic reduction in senior unsecured debt to $39 million and securing 100 MW of non‑curtailable power for future AI/HPC datacenters. The company obtained a five‑year Title V air‑permit renewal for its...
How to Run an Instagram Account Performance Review that Actually Leads to Growth
Most Instagram monthly reports focus on vanity metrics like reach and follower count, which do not drive growth. The article proposes a five‑step performance review that centers on actionable signals such as saves‑to‑reach ratio, profile visits, and story completion. Using...
US Reportedly Considering Sweeping New Chip Export Controls
U.S. Commerce Department is drafting rules that would require government approval for any export of AI‑focused semiconductors such as those made by AMD and Nvidia. The proposal differentiates review intensity based on order size, with small shipments getting a basic...
ShinyHunters Claims Woflow Breach: What It Means for SaaS Supply Chain Security
ShinyHunters claims to have breached Woflow, a SaaS vendor serving large enterprises such as Uber, DoorDash, and Walmart, highlighting a shift toward upstream supply‑chain attacks. The alleged breach, though unconfirmed, follows a pattern of targeting integration‑heavy providers to gain downstream...