The data infrastructure and operations company showed it also has a sense of humor after its CEO and HR chief resigned amid fallout from a kiss-cam moment that captured them hugging during a Coldplay concert. The company posted a video of actress Gwyneth Paltrow, the ex wife of Coldplay singer Chris Martin, addressing the company’s most common questions.
Astronomer showed it also has a sense of humor after its CEO and HR chief resigned amid fallout from a kiss-cam moment that captured them hugging during a Coldplay concert.
The data infrastructure and operations company posted a video late Friday of actress Gwyneth Paltrow, who said she was hired on a “very temporary basis” to speak on behalf of the more than 300 employees at Astronomer.
“Astronomer has gotten a lot of questions over the last few days, and they wanted me to answer the most common ones,” she said.
The first question was shown in text on screen as, ‘OMG! What the actual f,’ to which Paltrow enthusiastically replied, “Yes, Astronomer is the best place to run Apache Airflow unifying the experience of running data, ML, and AI pipelines at scale! We’ve been thrilled so many people have a newfound interest in data workflow automation!”
The other common question shown on screen was, “How is your social media team holding,” prompting Paltrow to respond by saying, “Yes, there is still room available at our Beyond Analytics event in September.”
The video came at the end of a tumultuous period for Astronomer. The once-obscure company went viral after Coldplay singer Chris Martin, who was previously married to Paltrow, spotted the company’s Andy Byron and Kristin Cabot hugging during a kiss-cam moment at a concert and said they are “having an affair or they’re just very shy.”
Byron, who is married, and Cabot, attempted to hide from the cameras. They have since resigned from their respective roles as CEO and HR chief.
“The events of the past few days have received a level of media attention that few companies—let alone startups in our small corner of the data and AI world—ever encounter,” he wrote on LinkedIn. “The spotlight has been unusual and surreal for our team and, while I would never have wished for it to happen like this, Astronomer is now a household name.”
Meanwhile, Paltrow also sought to help steer the public away from the scandal in her video for Astronomer on Friday.
“We will now be returning to what we do best: delivering game-changing results for our customers,” she said cheerfully. “Thank you for your interest in Astronomy.”
Recent studies show that unemployment rates for men aged 22 to 27 with or without college degrees are nearly identical. Younger generations are also finding it harder than in previous years to secure jobs, so they are turning to content creation. Fortune talks to a professor about how to build a successful career as a content creator without a traditional college path.
When Gen Alpha dreams about the future, fewer and fewer are imagining the white lab coat or briefcase wishes of their parents. Instead, they see ring lights and “Get Ready With Me” videos.
In fact, the top two career aspirations among Gen Alpha across the U.S. are YouTuber and TikTok creator, according to a 2024 Whop survey. And many young people are already turning their dreams into reality, including 19-year-old Katie Fang.
The recent high school graduate boasts 6.4 million followers on TikTok and is most known for her popular videos showcasing how she starts her mornings, as well as showcasing brand-deal trips and her recent move to New York City from Vancouver, Canada.
Even though she’s already seemingly gotten a jump-start on her career, Fang is set to attend New York University in the fall, where she will focus on upgrading her digital marketing skills. Fang told Fortune that pursuing a college education will help her think more critically and creatively, especially when crafting content and understanding how platforms like TikTok’s algorithm work.
“I think I’ve always known that I was going to stay in school. I never really took a break—I was online for two years, so it kind of felt like I wasn’t in school, but I was,” Fang told Fortune. “I wanted to go to NYU for the longest time. Just because I started social media, and it became my full-time career, doesn’t mean that dream ever faded.”
Fang’s long-term goal is to start a business after college and to continue to build a personal brand.
“I think the most important thing is just don’t rush to have it all figured out, because especially when you’re so young, you’re not going to know everything,” Fang said.
Since starting her TikTok account in Canada, Fang hasn’t earned revenue directly from her videos. Instead, the majority of her income comes from brand partnerships with companies like Glow Recipe, The Ordinary, and Kosas.
“What I enjoy most is probably how creative everything is,” Fang said. “It’s crazy how you can make the most random video that makes no sense, and that ends up being the one that gets millions of views.”
Fang is just one example of how young people have been able to turn a passion project into a runaway for a high-paying career, where they are their boss.
This comes as a growing number of Gen Zs are questioning the value of a degree to begin with. Recent data shows the unemployment rate for men aged 22 to 27 is almost the same regardless of whether they have a college degree.
Gen Alpha and Gen Z want to follow in the footsteps of MrBeast
The mastermind behind these social phenomena is 27-year-old Jimmy Donaldson, better known as MrBeast, who also holds the crown as the most-subscribed creator on the platform.
A self-made YouTuber whose net worth now exceeds $1 billion, Donaldson began creating and sharing content at just 13 years old. He later dropped out of East Carolina University in 2016 after just a few weeks of courses to pursue content creation full time. Since its launch in 2012, MrBeast’s channel has skyrocketed in popularity thanks to breakout hits like “Squid Game in Real Life,” which racked up over 845 million views.
In a recent episode of The Diary of a CEOpodcast, Donaldson told host Steven Bartlett that he discovered his motivation to pursue content creation on YouTube when he found out creators were making a high income a year. Growing up without much financial stability, he was driven by a desire to support his mother and family.
“This is what I love doing, I’ve never had as much joy doing something as I do this,” Donaldson said. “I just never give up. There’s no world where I would ever quit. When I was 11, I just said I’m going to be a YouTuber, and I’m going to die trying, and I meant it. Even if there were no one still watching my videos to this day, I would still be going. I’m just the most competitive, stubborn person you’ll ever meet.”
At first, Donaldson’s mother did not want her son to pursue a career in social media because she wanted him to be successful and encouraged him to pursue a college degree instead.
“When people tell me I can’t do something, it makes me want to do more,” Donaldson said. “If you tell me I shouldn’t do something, that’s fine, but if you tell me I can’t, then everything in my body just wants to go.”
Donaldson is not alone in using social media as a source of income and as a career. According to social commerce platform Whop, 42% of US teens are actively earning money online through their digital channels.
Another content creator who did not go through the traditional college pathway is Olajide Olayinka Williams, better known as KSI. He is a 32-year-old British influencer, professional boxer, musician, and entrepreneur. He also founded businesses such as Prime Hydration, Lunchly, and Misfits Boxing, and has a net worth of $100 million.
Joining YouTube in 2009 and initially posting videos of himself playing games, Williams built a following of over 50 million across all his platforms. Unlike his peers, Williams decided not to pursue college at all in favor of his blossoming content creation career — in part after realizing how much he was earning before attending university.
“I remember I asked a teacher, this is how I made this month, it was about £1,500, and I remember him telling me ‘that’s more than I make’,” Williams told the BBC in 2020. “I looked at it and I thought, that’s it, YouTube is the one, it is the goldmine. I need to push and push because I know I can become something and make my parents proud.”
How to be a successful content creator without a college degree
It’s becoming easier than ever to start a career as a content creator and make a living without a college degree. After all, all you need is a phone to get started.
Successful content creators who didn’t go through a traditional educational pathway all share a common trait: building a community so highly engaged that they can rely on their continued support for exposure, said University of Southern California communication professor Freddy Nager.
“It’s important that you try to cultivate your fan base. Otherwise, the only way to reach your own followers is to boost your posts and buy ads,” Nager told Fortune. “A lot of people didn’t become creators to spend money. They wanted to make money, but the platforms want to make money.”
Many creators build their email lists so they can directly notify followers when a new video is released, often encouraging them to watch and leave a comment. He also suggested that creators interact with followers in the comment section, something that is favorable to algorithms.
“You want your users to comment on your posts, because if they do, it means they really care,” Nager said. “Now, the comment could be negative. They could hate your video. Nonetheless, the algorithm reads it that if you’re willing to take the time to comment on the video, not just liking it. So this means that your content must provoke comments. Sadly, that means that a lot of influencers become controversial on purpose.”
This type of collaboration is a key strategy for building influence and trust without a degree requirement. Nager also advised new creators to partner with others, regardless of their fame, emphasizing that exposure to each other’s audiences helps both grow.
In addition, he said that to stand out, creators need two key traits: personality and perspective. They must be relatable yet aspirational, offering a unique voice and sharing their human side to form real connections. Otherwise, they risk being replaced by generic content.
While a formal education isn’t required to break into the industry, Nager said, it offers key advantages.
“I think you need an education to learn from your mistakes, without suffering. We can all learn from suffering, but let’s avoid it. Let’s learn how to analyze data,” he explained.
And while ultimately content creators can and have succeeded without degrees, Nager said more education can also expand one’s worldview and creativity outside of your path.
“Can you be educated without college? Possibly, if you love to read,” he said. “But college lets you explore courses outside your field—take astronomy if you’re a writer, or music if you’re a scientist. It doesn’t mean that you’re going to become a musical expert, but something about music may change the way that you think about chemistry and performance.”
The electric car maker informed California that it will operate a limited public taxi service. But it’s not legally allowed to do this with self-driving cars.
Financial Times is reporting that $1 billion worth of NVIDIA AI chips were smuggled into China in the three months after the Trump administration tightened semiconductor export controls. Citing sales contracts, company documents and people with direct knowledge, the publication says that a thriving black market arose for American semiconductors. Products sold included NVIDIA's top‑tier B200 chips, which have become the silicon of choice for American big tech when training AI models. Sale of these chips to China is banned by the United States.
With journalists on the ground in China, Financial Times reports on a veritable web of third‑party data center operators, middlemen and purportedly smuggled ready‑built racks that have all materialized to meet the demand for NVIDIA's most powerful chips. Along with the B200, the H100 and H200 are also restricted yet highly sought after. All of these are far more capable than the weaker H20 chip, which was designed to comply with export restrictions for sale to China, though even that model has faced on and off export bans.
NVIDIA, for its part, told Financial Times it has “no evidence of any AI chip diversion” and that “trying to cobble together data centers from smuggled products is a losing proposition, both technically and economically.” NVIDIA explained, “Data centers require service and support, which we provide only to authorized NVIDIA products.”
Images produced by Financial Times show boxes of server racks emblazoned with company logos such as Supermicro and ASUS being advertised on social media in China. Those companies deny any knowledge of how their products ended up on the Chinese black market, and Financial Times is not alleging any such involvement.
Reporting suggests that some Southeast Asian countries have become hubs for Chinese groups to obtain restricted chips. Having these server racks shipped to Thailand or Malaysia may circumvent US export controls. The US Department of Commerce is reportedly considering increasing export controls on advanced AI chips to these countries.
The demand for these products is without question, and as one Chinese distributor told Financial Times, “History has proven many times before that given the huge profit, arbitrators will always find a way.”
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/1-billion-of-nvidia-ai-chips-were-reportedly-sold-in-china-despite-us-bans-143119762.html?src=rss
FILE - President and CEO of Nvidia Corporation Jensen Huang delivers a speech during the Computex 2025 exhibition in Taipei, Taiwan, Monday, May 19, 2025. (AP Photo/Chiang Ying-ying, File)
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Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan sent a memo to employees Thursday informing them of significant ongoing layoffs and other cost-cutting measures. The company has struggled to maintain a competitive edge amid ongoing financial losses and strategic setbacks in the AI and semiconductor markets.
“There are no more blank checks,” Tan wrote in a memo to employees, published by Reuters. “Every investment must make economic sense. We will build what our customers need, when they need it, and earn their trust through consistent execution.”
The memo directly addresses …
A reduction of about 15% (over 25,000 jobs) via layoffs and attrition
Operational streamlining to “drive greater efficiency and increase accountability at every level”
Cancellation of new factory projects in Germany and Poland, and a slowdown in Ohio facility construction, adjusting spending to actual market demand
Relocation of manufacturing operations from Costa Rica to Asia, while maintaining select engineering functions in Costa Rica
“We are making hard but necessary decisions to streamline the organization, drive greater efficiency, and increase accountability at every level of the company,” wrote the CEO, who took over in March.
Intel’s stock jumped early in 2025 as optimism built around new leadership, but shares fell over 9% after Thursday’s Q2 earnings and layoff announcement, threatening to erase most yearly gains.
Intel has lost ground to Nvidia in the AI sector and to AMD in the traditional computing market. Unlike other Silicon Valley giants, it doesn’t have booming AI or cloud businesses to offset its losses.
Microsoft, IBM, and Google have also shed thousands of workers this year. CEOs, including Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg and Microsoft’s Satya Nadella, have said they are cutting staff to streamline operations and free up capital to invest billions in AI.
For this story, Fortune used generative AI to help with an initial draft. An editor verified the accuracy of the information before publishing.
Federal regulators on Thursday approved Paramount’s $8 billion merger with Skydance, clearing the way to close a deal that combined Hollywood glitz with political intrigue.
The stamp of approval from the Federal Communications Commission comes after months of turmoil revolving around President Donald Trump’s legal battle with “60 Minutes,” the crown jewel of Paramount-owned broadcast network CBS. With the specter of the Trump administration potentially blocking the hard-fought deal with Skydance, Paramount earlier this month agreed to pay a $16 million settlement with the president.
Critics of the settlement lambasted it as a veiled bribe to appease Trump, amid rising alarm over editorial independence overall. Further outrage also emerged after CBS said it was canceling Stephen Colbert’s “Late Show” just days after the comedian sharply criticized the parent company’s settlement on air. Paramount cited financial reasons, but big names both within and outside the company have questioned those motives.
In a statement accompanying the deal’s approval, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr hailed the merger as an opportunity to bring more balance to “once-storied” CBS.
“Americans no longer trust the legacy national news media to report fully, accurately, and fairly. It is time for a change,” Carr said.
While seeking approval, Skydance management assured regulators that it will carefully watch for any perceived biased at CBS News and hire an ombudsman to review any complaints about fairness. In a Tuesday filing, the company’s general counsel maintained that New Paramount will embody “a diversity of viewpoints across the political and ideological spectrum” — and also noted that it plans to take a “comprehensive review” of CBS to make “any necessary changes.”
The FCC approved the merger by a 2-1 vote, and the regulator who opposed it expressed disdain for how it all came together.
“After months of cowardly capitulation to this administration, Paramount finally got what it wanted,” FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez said in a statement. “Unfortunately, it is the American public who will ultimately pay the price for its actions.” Gomez was appointed by former President Joe Biden.
Paramount and Skydance have said they wanted to seal the deal by this September, and now appear to be on a path to make it happen by then, if not sooner.
Over the past year the merger has periodically looked like it might fall apart as the two sides haggled over terms. But the two companies finally struck an accord that valued the combined company at $28 billion, with a consortium led by the family of Skydance founder David Ellison and RedBird Capital agreeing to invest $8 billion.
Signaling a shakeup would accompany the changing of the guard, Ellison stressed the need to transition into a “tech hybrid” to stay competitive in today’s entertainment landscape. That includes plans to “rebuild” the Paramount+ streaming service, among wider efforts to expand direct-to-consumer offerings in a world with more entertainment options and shorter attention spans.
Ellison, who is poised to become CEO of the restructured Paramount, is the son of Larry Ellison, technology titan and co-founder of Oracle. Besides possessing an estimated $288 billion fortune, Larry Ellison has been described as a friend by Trump.
While Paramount sweated out regulatory approval of the merger, one of TV’s best-known and longest-running programs turned into a political hot potato when Trump sued CBS over the handling of a “60 Minutes” interview with his Democratic Party opponent in last year’s presidential election, Kamala Harris. Trump accused “60 Minutes” of editing the interview in a deceptive way designed to help Harris win the election. After initially demanding $10 billion in damages, Trump upped the ante to $20 billion while asserting he had suffered “mental anguish.”
The case quickly became a closely-watched test of whether a corporation would back its journalists and stand up to Trump. Editing for brevity’s sake is commonplace in TV journalism and CBS argued Trump’s claims had no merit. But reports of company executives exploring a potential settlement with Trump later piled up, particularly after Carr — appointed to lead the FCC by Trump — launched an investigation earlier this year.
By the start of July, Paramount agreed to pay Trump $16 million. The company said the money would go to Trump’s future presidential library and to pay his legal fees, but maintained that it was not apologizing or expressing regret for the story.
The settlement triggered an outcry among critics who pilloried Paramount for backing down from the legal fight to increase the chances of closing the Skydance deal. U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass, said that the deal “could be bribery in plain sight” — and called for an investigation and new rules to restrict donations to presidential libraries.
Concerns about editorial independence at CBS had piled up even in the months before the deal was announced — with Paramount overseeing “60 Minutes” stories in new ways, as well as journalists at the network expressing frustrations about the changes on an award-winning program that has been a weekly staple for nearly 57 years
In April, then-executive producer of “60 Minutes” Bill Owens resigned — noting that it had “become clear that I would not be allowed to run the show as I have always run it.” Another domino fell in May when CBS News CEO Wendy McMahon also stepped down, citing disagreements with the company “on the path forward,” amid speculation of Paramount nearing a settlement with Trump. CBS has since appointed Tanya Simon as the top producer at “60 Minutes” — elevating a respected insider in a move that could be viewed as a way to calm nerves leading up to the changes that Skydance’s Ellison is expected to make.
Hulk Hogan’s Real American Beer was bidding to buy Hooters before his death. It’s now unclear if that offer will continue. Hogan died Thursday, reportedly of cardiac arrest.
The death of Hulk Hogan (real name Terry Bollea) Thursday marked the end of an era in the wrestling world, but it could put the future of a national restaurant chain at risk as well.
Bollea’s Real American Beer brand had launched a bid to acquire Hooters just last month. After initially bidding only for the company’s intellectual property, it expanded that bid to acquire all of Hooters of America, including the over 400 locations across the world.
Hooters filed for bankruptcy in June, abruptly closing dozens of locations. Management at the time said the company wasn’t “going anywhere” and that “by optimizing our business in support of our long-term goals, Hooters will be well-positioned to continue our iconic legacy under a pure franchise business model.”
That didn’t stop bidders from emerging. Real American Beer found itself in competition with a proposal led by Hooters Inc., which oversees some franchised Hooters locations. The company’s cofounder was a part of that group.
“Real American’s bid is different,” the company said at the time of its bid. “It’s about rebuilding Hooters from the ground up, with a fresh operational model, new revenue streams (merchandise, partnerships, experience-first locations), and a cultural strategy designed to reengage diners in their 20s and 30s. This isn’t about preserving nostalgia. It’s about unlocking Hooters’ next chapter, with real investment, real leadership, and a real plan to win.”
Great American Beer did not reply to Fortune‘s request for comment about the state of the acquisition offer following Hogan’s death.
If the bid is approved, Great American Beer would need to launch a separate entity to own Hooters, since liquor laws in the U.S. prohibit alcohol brands from owning restaurants.
Hooters and Hogan’s beer have a history, however. The chain was one of the first to agree to serve the lager last June.
YouTube sold to Google in 2006 for $1.65 billion, with cofounders Chad Hurley and Steven Chen splitting over $650 million worth of stock shares. And while their wealth increased exponentially with the acquisition, estimates put today’s value of YouTube at $550 billion—a 333x increase. Few could imagine YouTube’s eventual media dominance at the time, making it a classic example of the high-stakes decisions founders must weigh.
YouTube may have started as a site to share home videos, but now it’s one of the most powerful platforms in the world: From entertainment to advertising, it’s spawned billion-dollar careers and birthed a global creator economy, turning individuals like MrBeast into household names.
But when its founders sold the popular video platform to Google for $1.65 billion in fall 2006, not even they could have predicted just how massive it would become—or how much more they could have made.
At the time of sale, each cofounder—Chad Hurley, Steven Chen and Jawed Karim—received millions of dollars worth of stock: Hurley, YouTube’s CEO at the time, received shares worth some $345 million by the time the Securities and Exchange Commission documents were released a few months later, according to The New York Times. Chen its CTO received some $326 million worth and Jawed Karim, who left the venture early to go back to school, got $64 million worth.
“This is great,” Hurley said in a video posted when the sale was announced. “Two kings have gotten together. The king of search, the king of video have gotten together. We’re going to have it our way.”
YouTube’s sale price to Google is just a fraction of its estimated $550 billion value today, according to a MoffettNathanson research note reported by Variety. That’s a 333x increase (unadjusted for inflation) from nearly two decades prior. While it’s difficult to pinpoint exactly, had Hurley and Chen received the same percentage of the sale today as they did in 2006, each could have walked away with more than $100 billion each.
Hindsight is 20/20 when it comes to selling
Last year, YouTube brought in some $54.2 billion in revenue, and this year, it is expected to surpass Disney to become the largest media company by revenue in the world, Variety reported. YouTube’s record-setting successes highlight how Google was able to overcome issues that the video platform’s founders struggled with early on—including operating losses and copyright lawsuits—and its paid off dividends.
But YouTube’s masterminds are far from the only business leaders that have seen their company soar after exchanging ownership.
During the first two weeks of Apple’s existence, the company’s lesser-known third cofounder Ronald Wayne checked out and sold his 10% stake—netting him $800 at the time, plus $1,500 to forfeit any claim to the company for good. However, his 10% share could now be worth between $75 billion and $300 billion, thanks to the company’s now $3.2 trillion market cap.
These stories also exist outside of tech. For example, the founder of iconic pasta brand Chef Boyardee sold the company in 1946 for $6 million. Over the decades, the company exponentially grew its operations, expanding to multiple lines of canned and microwavable goods. And just this year, the brand, including its over 500-person strong factory, was sold to private equity for $600 million—a 10,000% increase in value.
And in the case of Chef Boyardee and YouTube, it’s unclear whether such massive growth would have been achieved without the backing of larger corporate owners. For the founders, it means weighing up selling early and leaving future billions on the table—or holding on and risking the company never reaching its full potential.
YouTube’s cofounders could all be part of the billionaire club alongside Google's Sundar Pichai had they kept the business—it’s grown some 333x since they cashed out.
A study by the AFL-CIO finds CEOs in the S&P 500 made 285 times more than their employees last year. The largest pay disparity was at Starbucks, where CEO Brian Niccol made 6,666 times as much as the median worker. As CEOs saw 7% raises, the average worker’s paycheck went up just 3%.
It’s a good time to be a CEO. A new study by the AFL-CIO found the average corporate leader saw their compensation increase by $1.24 million last year. On average, the federation of unions says, CEOs at the nation’s largest companies made 285 times what the average worker did. A year ago, that ratio was 268:1.
“The median employee would have had to start working in 1740 to earn what the average CEO received in 2024,” the organization wrote in its 2025 Executive Paywatch study.
CEO pay at S&P 500 companies increased 7% in 2024 over the prior year, with the average S&P 500 leader earning $18.9 million, the highest amount on record. (The previous high was set in 2021, coming in at $18.3 million.) In the past decade, CEOs in the S&P 500 have seen their salaries go up by an average of $6.5 million. Workers last year saw an average 3% raise, the organization says.
Among S&P 500 companies, the largest disparity between CEO and median worker pay was at Starbucks. While the average worker took home $14,674, according to the study, CEO Brian Niccol received $97.8 million in total compensation. That works out to 6,666 times more than workers and comes as the coffee-shop employees seek to form a union.
Axon Enterprise CEO Patrick Smith topped the pay list overall, though, with the CEO of the Taser manufacturer receiving compensation of $164.5 million in 2024 – a ratio of 801:1.
The report highlighted the Trump tax cut package in its report, noting that the average CEO would receive a tax cut of nearly $490,000 due to the extension of Trump’s 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. Workers will see their tax bill go down an average of $765.
Starbucks CEO Brian Niccol looks on during the Golden Bear Pro-Am prior to the Memorial Tournament presented by Workday 2025 at Muirfield Village Golf Club on May 28, 2025 in Dublin, Ohio.
Red Lobster, the iconic seafood chain, is charting a new course under the leadership of CEO Damola Adamolekun after making its way out of bankruptcy. In an interview with Good Morning America on Thursday, the 36-year-old chief executive addressed two questions lingering on the minds of loyal guests and industry watchers alike: Will the beloved Endless Shrimp deal return, and how will looming U.S. tariffs on imported seafood impact diners? His answers signal a reset for the troubled restaurant brand, focused on financial stability, customer experience, and menu innovation.
Endless shrimp promotion: officially retired
For years, the Ultimate Endless Shrimp promotion was a staple at Red Lobster, drawing crowds with the promise of limitless seafood at a set price. But as the company navigated severe financial headwinds, it became clear the beloved deal was more curse than blessing. Adamolekun stated unequivocally, “We don’t have any plans to bring it back,” all but closing the door on an offer that, while popular, ultimately helped sink Red Lobster’s bottom line.
The all-you-can-eat shrimp program, initially launched as a limited-time offer, was made a permanent fixture in recent years. Far from boosting profits, the promotion instead triggered multimillion-dollar losses due to customers out-eating the chain’s margins. Bankruptcy filings revealed the deal alone was responsible for a loss of $11 million, accelerating Red Lobster’s financial unraveling in 2023 and 2024. “We listen intently to customer comments and try to react really quickly to deliver people what they want,” Adamolekun explained. “But you also have to make sure you’re running a profitable business.”
Red Lobster has shifted its strategy to focus on value in more sustainable forms: introducing appetizer deals, weekday happy hours, and a three-course “shrimp sensation” menu offered at select locations. While Adamolekun hasn’t completely ruled out creative promotions in the distant future, diners hoping for the Endless Shrimp’s return shouldn’t hold their breath.
Adamolekun has prioritized innovation and agility, though, including extensive outreach to customers via social media, and a notable responsiveness from the chain to their feedback. Since emerging from bankruptcy, the company has overhauled its menu—streamlining offerings by 20% while adding new items like Lobster Pappardelle Pasta, Bacon-Wrapped Sea Scallops, and revitalizing favorites including hush puppies and popcorn shrimp. Within days of receiving requests for bolder flavors, Red Lobster added new spicy, Old Bay Parmesan, and Cajun sausage options to the menu. “We want to be exciting, relevant and compelling for our guests,” Adamolekun said.
Red Lobster addresses new tariffs
This summer’s scheduled U.S. tariffs on imported seafood have sparked concern that seafood lovers could soon see restaurant bills soar. Adamolekun was quick to calm those fears in his GMA interview, stressing that almost 90% of Red Lobster’s key seafood—lobster and crab—comes from North America and Canada. These sources are largely exempt from new tariffs under agreements like USMCA.
While some shrimp and other products are still imported and thus subject to tariffs, Adamolekun underscored, “We do import products as well — so on those products we’ll pay a tariff like everybody else. That impacts our business, and our intention is not to pass that through. We’re not intending to do any more price increases for the rest of the year, regardless of what happens with tariffs”.
Adamolekun’s leadership approach
Red Lobster’s turnaround has not gone unnoticed, with improved customer feedback and returning foot traffic since the restructuring. The company’s multiyear plan includes further renovations of its restaurants to create a more vibrant, inviting atmosphere—an appeal especially aimed at younger diners looking for experience as much as a meal.
After turbulent years, Adamolekun’s approach reflects both hard business lessons and a renewed commitment to guest satisfaction. The days of bottomless shrimp may be over, but under new leadership, the seafood chain is betting that menu innovation, value deals, and responsive service can once again make Red Lobster a place to celebrate.
Volkswagen Group CEO Oliver Blume is prepared to invest a minimum $10 billion in the United States in the hopes of securing a like-for-like reduction in its tariff bill. On Friday the world’s second-largest carmaker by vehicle sales slashed its 2025 guidance for revenue, margins and cash citing Q2 headwinds from U.S. import duties totalling roughly $1.4 billion. Once the company knows what tariffs are agreed between the Trump administration and the European Union, VW aims to enter into bilateral talks directly with White House to seek carve-outs.
Oliver Blume wants to make a deal. The CEO of Volkswagen Group, the world’s second-largest carmaker, is prepared to put a minimum of $10 billion on the table in exchange for lower tariffs levied by the Trump administration.
Under the proposal, for every dollar that Volkswagen invests, it would like to receive in return an equal amount offset against its tariff bill. The VW boss is only waiting on the European Commission to reach a deal on behalf of the entire EU so he then knows what precise rates he can expect on goods exported to the U.S. market.
“Every company has got a special situation in the U.S., and therefor I think it should be possible to add a specific deal on company level,” Blume said on Friday, after revealing his company just paid $1.4 billion to the U.S. customs authorities. “We can offer huge investments.”
Volkswagen already operates a U.S. assembly plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee, where it builds the Atlas SUV and ID.4 electric crossover. It is currently investing $2 billion in a new site in Blythewood, South Carolina, where it plans a new family of electrified vehicles under the resurrected Scout brand first launched by defunct manufacturer International Harvester. VW could not confirm whether this figure was included in the $10 billion.
Typically, trade policy falls under the responsibility of Congress. But the White House capitalized on a legal loophole to seize control over tariff rates by declaring the import of foreign-built passenger cars to pose a demonstrable risk to national security. His administration argues the U.S. must rebuild a domestic manufacturing base gutted by the offshoring of jobs abroad that can ward off potential military threats
Bilateral deals could prove costly in the long run
A special quid-pro-quo exemption or carve-out negotiated bilaterally between a corporation and a federal government is not typical under the rules governing World Trade Organization members like the United States.
Thanks to the two previous U.S. administrations, the WTO’s ability to settle and enforce trade disputes has been neutralized when its highest court—known as the Appellate Body—was effectively dismantled. At the end of 2019, Trump blocked appointments needed to achieve a quorum in a tactic that was later adopted by President Biden as well.
Irrespective of the legal issue, the idea that corporations could sidestep their national governments by lining up, one after the other, to each strike their own special deal with the White House has experts concerned that the rules of trade could end up becoming permanently chaotic.
“This is a new development that is anything but positive, since it introduces unpredictability. In the long run it could prove very expensive when it comes to overall prosperity,” says Julian Hinz, a director of the Trade Research Center at Germany’s Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW).
The White House could not be reached immediately by Fortune for comment.
Guidance cut
“The great thing about the rules-based system is that they were valid for everyone—you didn’t have to negotiate with every conceivable economic actor,” the global trade economist told Fortune. “It might offer a temporary advantage over your competitors, but it’s extremely myopic.”
Earlier on Friday the company behind VW, Audi, and Porsche slashed its 2025 guidance across the board, reducing expectations for everything from its annual sales revenue and it operating margin through to even how much cash it has at year-end.
And the chief culprit, according to Volkswagen Group, is the 27.5% duty levied by the president on all vehicles and car parts entering the United States. The gross sum from tariffs is estimated to wipe a full two percentage points off its operating margin should they remain at current levels.
Once planned mitigation efforts are factored in this would result in a 4% operating profit margin. In a more optimistic scenario based on tariffs of just 10%, it expects that number to hit 5%. Previously it had guided for a range of 5.5% to 6.5% versus 5.9% in 2024.
Its tariff bill to the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol ballooned from €100 million ($117 million) in the first three months of this year to €1.2 billion in the second quarter alone. That means the $1.4 billion in equivalent U.S. currency it paid exceeds the $1.1 billion that Detroit rival General Motors paid during the past three months.
Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichaihas officially joined the billionaire ranks, reaching a net worth of $1.1 billion largely through long-term compensation and a 0.02% stake in the $2.3 trillion company. While far behind Big Tech founders in wealth, Pichai’s stake has been boosted by Alphabet’s AI-fueled rally—even as he regularly sells shares under prescheduled trading plans, demonstrating a disciplined and well-known approach amid booming investor enthusiasm.
Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai has joined the glamorous ranks of the world’s billionaires, after the tech giant’s class A share price bubbled up 13% over the past month.
Pichai’s net worth has hit $1.1 billion, the Bloomberg Billionaires Index recorded, courtesy of significant cash reserves and the CEO’s 0.02% stake in the company with a market cap of more than $2.3 trillion.
Unlike many of his Magnificent Seven peers, the Big Tech boss didn’t found the company which has afforded him a 10-figure fortune. Compared with contemporaries like Nvidia’s Jensen Huang, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg, or Tesla cofounder Elon Musk, Pichai’s net worth is considerably lower given the fact he hasn’t held a significant sum of shares since the early days of the company.
Pichai’s path to billionaire status has also been altered by the fact that he has sold shares in Alphabet which were awarded to him as part of his compensation package.
For example, Pichai has sold a reported $650 million in Google-owner Alphabet stock over the past decade he has served as CEO—sales that today would have amounted to more than $1 billion in gains, winning him a net worth of some $2.5 billion per Bloomberg’s index.
For example, in June Pichai offloaded some 33,000 class C Alphabet shares for a price of approximately $169 apiece, totaling some $5.5 million in sales.
But at the time of writing, those shares sit at a little over $193—which would have resulted in a value of more than $6.4 million.
Google declined to comment.
Advance planning
But the CEOs of the world’s largest companies are not playing the highs and lows of their company’s share prices the way retail investors or Wall Street analysts may be.
Many of Pichai’s recent sales have been pursuant to Rule 10b5-1, which allows stock sales to be set up in advance by officers of publicly listed companies to avoid any accusations of insider trading.
The rule has a number of stipulations, chief among them that a formula (not a person) determines the number, price, and date of the trade. A third party who cannot be influenced by the client must also be employed to conduct the sales.
Pichai’s sales on July 16 and June 4 of this year were both pursuant to 10b5-1, for example, as were sales made in previous years.
This tactic will be of no surprise to Wall Street watchers.Fortune reported last summer that Nvidia’s CEO, Jensen Huang, for example, was offloading $14 million in stock on a near-daily basis, all pursuant to the same regulation.
At the time, James Reda, managing director at Chicago-based consultancy Gallagher’s HR and compensation practice, said moves for such executives make absolute sense: “Ultimately, if you don’t sell the stock you’re gonna have to be like Elon Musk and some others that are putting stock up for collateral and getting these humongous loans.
“That just makes everybody more leveraged, why do that? Peel off a little stock on a regular basis and sell it.”
The AI billionaires
While Alphabet beat market expectations this week with its second quarter results, the majority of the rally behind the company at the moment comes from (no surprise) AI.
Pichai isn’t alone in thanking artificial intelligence for his good fortune. Last year the world’s richest, from Musk and Zuckerberg to Oracle’s Larry Ellison, added $585 billion to their fortunes largely thanks to the technology.
On the company’s earnings call Wednesday, the phrase “AI” was used some 90 times. Alphabet reported revenues up 14% year over year to $96.4 billion, confirming Google Search, YouTube ads, Google subscriptions, and Google Cloud all delivered double-digit growth in Q2.
A key concern for investors—particularly when looking at the market leaders in the AI race—will be whether companies can keep the talent to stay ahead of competitors. OpenAI, for example, has lost some of its staff to Meta’s newly created AI unit.
Pichai shrugged off such fears, telling investors on the call: “We’ve gone through these moments before. We have obviously always deeply invested in talent, including in AI talent, for well over a decade now. I think we have an extraordinary both breadth and depth of the talent.
“In my experience, the top people look for a combination of—they want to really be at the frontier driving progress, and so the mission and how state-of-the-art your work is matters, so that’s super important to them, access to compute resources, and access to your peers, working with the best people in the industry,” he added. “I think we are pretty competitive on all those fronts.”
Good morning. Traditionally, many CFOs viewed marketing as a cost center, but more are now seeing it as a growth accelerator.
AT&T (No. 37 on the Fortune 500) illustrates how finance and marketing can work together to support business expansion. I sat down with Pascal Desroches, AT&T’s senior EVP and CFO, and Kellyn Smith Kenny, chief marketing and growth officer, to learn more.
CFOs often have a reputation for saying “no” to new marketing ideas, but Desroches has taken a different approach in his career.
“You can’t be in an organization where everybody’s terrified of the CFO—it just doesn’t work,” he told me. Desroches recalled advice from his mentor, the late media executive Dick Parsons: “As executives, we have to leave our door open, even for bad news, because it gives us an opportunity to problem-solve.”
Kenny agreed. “I’m working with Pascal to massively overhaul and transform the digital experience for customers,” she said. “None of that would be possible if Pascal was just saying, ‘No,’” she quipped. Desroches approaches every conversation, decision, and investment with an enterprise mindset—how do we help the company succeed? “But he also holds people accountable, which is exactly what you need your CFO to do,” Kenny added.
A focus on the customer
Desroches credits his customer-focused perspective to his 20 years in the media industry prior to becoming CFO of AT&T in 2021. Understanding and marketing to consumers was essential, he said.
AT&T’s marketing team provides insights that shape new products and services. Increasingly, customers prefer a single provider for wireless and broadband, Desroches said. “Kellyn and her team championed this, and our investments reflect their feedback,” he said.
Kenny works closely with both Desroches and is a direct report to AT&T CEO John Stankey, solving problems for each business unit within budget, he explained. “Her ability to deliver results within financial constraints has been incredibly impressive to watch,” Desroches noted.
Before joining AT&T in 2020, Kenny served as global CMO at Hilton and held senior roles at Uber, Capital One, and Microsoft. “In my bones and in my DNA, I’m always thinking about how any marketing investment will drive the company’s financial performance,” she said.
Shared metrics for growth
Research backs the CFO–CMO collaboration. A recent McKinseyanalysis of Fortune 500 executive teams, based on publicly available data, found that companies with a single growth-focused executive, like a CMO, grow up to 2.3 times faster. Successful marketing teams use shared KPIs to demonstrate financial impact, making it easier for CFOs to support new initiatives.
One of Desroches and Kenny’s joint projects—the AT&T Guarantee, introduced in January—promises reliable connectivity, fair deals, and prompt service. If AT&T falls short, it takes corrective action, such as bill credits.
“We anticipated a certain amount of credits, but the actual need has been lower,” Kenny said. She and Desroches credit AT&T employees for reducing outages and keeping customer wait times under five minutes.
Since launching the AT&T Guarantee, the company has seen higher net promoter scores (NPS) following network disruptions. Finance and marketing teams jointly track NPS, “brand love,” and the share of customers who bundle multiple services. Other shared metrics include customer lifetime value, average revenue per account, and churn—which is decreasing among customers who’ve experienced issues, Kenny said.
AT&T also reported on Wednesday that it added 401,000 net postpaid phone connections in Q2, reflecting strong customer growth.
A finance person sitting at your leadership team table, “who is fluent in the practice of marketing and growth, goes a long way,” Kenny said.
In today’s CEO Daily: Diane Brady gets some perspective from a Trump associate on why the president is so exorcized about Jeffrey Epstein.
The big story: Trump humiliates Powell.
The markets: Down across the board.
Analyst notes from EY-Parthenon on Fed independence, ING on home sales, and Wedbush on Tesla.
Plus: All the news and watercooler chat from Fortune.
Good morning. I once asked Donald Trump if he had ever turned down an offer to put his name on a product. His answer: coffins.
It didn’t matter that these were gorgeous, high-end coffins, he explained. He didn’t want his name associated with death. There was nothing aspirational or success-oriented about that. Coffins, he told me, were “off-brand.”
This was in 2007, a year when Trump had his own brand of vodka, steaks, water, furniture, shirts, suits, and ties, alongside the hotels, casinos, golf courses, modeling agency, educational company, and other ventures bearing his name. While the future president may have been battling critics over his net worth and decision to let Miss USA Tara Conner retain her crown if she entered rehab, he was still a media celebrity who was much in demand.
I was interviewing him at Trump Tower on a day when he was giving $10,000 to Wesley Autrey, a construction worker who had jumped on a subway track to save a man’s life. “In life, you have fighters and nonfighters. You have winners and losers,” Trump told me. “I am both a fighter and a winner.”
I thought of that this week after speaking to someone in Trump’s circle about the president’s desire to distance himself from any mention of his name next to Jeffrey Epstein. This associate framed the issue as one of personal branding. It didn’t matter if Trump’s association with Epstein was before the financier was accused of sex trafficking, this person argued. “Epstein will forever be a loser in people’s minds and Donald Trump doesn’t hang out with losers,” they said. “It’s off-brand.”
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