Apple has revamped its app store policies in the European Union with hopes of fending off escalating fines under the 27-nation bloc’s digital competition regulations.It’s a last-minute bid by the iPhone maker to avoid further charges following a 500 million euro ($585 million) penalty in April. The bloc’s executive Commission punished Apple for preventing app makers from pointing users to cheaper options outside its App Store, and gave it a 60-day deadline, which expired Thursday, to avoid additional, periodic fines.The changes made by Apple will make it easier for app makers to point users to better deals on digital products and options to pay for them outside of Apple’s own App Store, including other websites, apps or alternative app stores.The California company is also rolling out a two-tier system of fees to accommodate app developers that want to use alternative payments.“The European Commission is requiring Apple to make a series of additional changes to the App Store,” Apple said in a statement. “We disagree with this outcome and plan to appeal.”The commission noted Apple’s announcement and “will now assess these new business terms for DMA compliance,” referring to the EU’s Digital Markets Act. The rulebook was designed to rein in the power of big tech companies under threat of hefty fines worth up to 10% of a company’s global annual revenue.Among the DMA’s provisions are requirements that developers inform customers of cheaper purchasing options, and direct them to those offers.Apple’s restrictions preventing developers from steering users to outside payment channels had been fiercely opposed by some companies. It’s the reason, for example, Spotify removed the in-app payment option to avoid having to pay a commission of up to 30% on digital subscriptions bought through iOS.
Associated Press
Shares in Nike, Inc. (NYSE: NKE) are trading much higher this morning after the company announced its Q4 2025 results. Yet those results saw Nike post some of its worst earnings in a while, along with a warning that President Trumps tariffs would cost the company $1 billion in the near term.
Heres what you need to know about Nikes latest earnings and why the stock is up.
Nike reports a revenue decline
Yesterday, the iconic shoemaker announced its Q4 2025 and full-year fiscal 2025 earnings.
The results werent great. For fiscal 2025, Nike reported full-year revenues of $46.3 billiona 10% decline from fiscal 2024. The companys Q4 2025 revenues totaled $11.1 billiondown 12% from the same quarter a year earlier. The company also posted an earnings per share of 14 cents for its Q4. That EPS was down significantly from the 99 cents the company posted in the same quarter a year earlier.
However, perhaps most alarming was the fact that Nike confirmed it would take a $1 billion hit in its current 2026 fiscal year due to the tariffs imposed by President Trump on countries worldwide.
The two countries where Nike makes a significant amount of its goods are China and Vietnam. Earlier this year, Trump placed a 46% tariff on goods manufactured in Vietnam and a triple-digit rate on goods made in China. He later reduced both rates, temporarily, to 10% and 30% respectively.
Still, Nike chief financial officer Matt Friend said on Nikes earnings call that the tariffs currently in place will result in a new and meaningful cost to Nike, notes CNBC, adding that the company estimates that a gross incremental cost increase to Nike of approximately $1 billion.
So why are Nike shares up?
You would think that Nikes warning of up to $1 billion in tariff-related costs and its pretty dismal Q4 results would send the stock down, not up. But NKE stock is currently up, and significantly, as of the time of the writing. In premarket trading, NKE shares are currently up over 10% to $68.85.
There are a few likely reasons for this.
First is that, while Nikes Q4 wasnt anything to write home about, the company actually came in above most Wall Street estimates. Analysts had expected Nike to have a pretty poor quarter already, and indeed, as noted by CNBC, Nike had previously said its Q4 would be the low point of its turnaround.
This turnaround involves Nikes pivot to return its focus to athletes and shift away from its recent history of trying to cater to the wider lifestyle segment of the population. The turnaround was initiated after Nike brought in a new CEO, Elliott Hill, last October.
For its Q4, analysts had been expecting revenue of $10.72 billion and an EPS of 13 cents. So though Nikes Q4 results were disappointing, especially compared to earlier quarters, its actual revenue of $11.1 billion and adjusted EPS of 14 cents came in above expectationssomething investors typically reward.
But another reason the stock is likely rising in premarket trading is also related to that $1 billion hit Nike is expecting.
Though the company says it expects the 10-figure hit this financial year, CFO Matt Friend also said Nike expects to fully mitigate Trumps tariff costs over time.
Nike will mitigate these tariff costs by using a three-pronged approach:
adjusting its supply chain sources
getting its suppliers to absorb some of the costs
raising prices on U.S consumers later this year
NKE shares are still red for the year
Despite Nikes 10% price surge this morning, shares in the company are still down significantly for the year.
As of yesterdays close, Nike shares were sitting at $62.54down more than 17% for the year. However, that was still significantly above its April lows of nearly $52 per share after President Trump unleashed his Liberation Day tariffs on the world.
Over the past 12 months, Nikes shares were down more than 33% as of yesterdays close.
If a Gen Alpha tween said, Let him cook, would you know what that meant? No? AI doesnt either.
A research paper written by soon-to-be ninth grader Manisha Mehta was presented this week at the ACM Conference on Fairness, Accountability, and Transparency in Athens. The paper details how four leading AI modelsGPT-4, Claude, Gemini, and Llama 3all struggled to fully understand slang from Gen Alpha, defined as those born between 2010 and 2024.
Mehta, along with 24 of her friends (ranging in age from 11 to 14), created a dataset of 100 Gen Alpha phrases. These included expressions that can mean totally different things depending on contextfor example: “Fr fr let him cook” (encouraging) and “Let him cook lmaoo (mocking).
According to the researchers, the LLMs had trouble discerning the difference. In particular, AI struggled with identifying “masked harassment,” which is concerning given the increasing reliance on AI-powered content moderation systems.
“The findings highlight an urgent need for improved AI safety systems to better protect young users, especially given Gen Alphas tendency to avoid seeking help due to perceived adult incomprehension of their digital world,” the study reads.
It wasnt just the AI models that performed poorly; parents didnt do much better. The parent group scored 68% in basic understanding of Gen Alpha slang, nearly identical to the top-performing LLM, Claude (68.1%). While the LLMs did slightly better at identifying content and safety risks in the language, only Gen Alpha members themselves scored highly in understanding the slang, its context, and potential risks.
Its nothing new for young people to feel misunderstood by their parents, but now the gap is widening. Members of Gen Alpha, born post-iPhone and known as the iPad generation, have grown up online. Their native language, often sourced from online spaces (most notably gaming), evolves so quickly that whats popular today may disappear within a month.
Mehtas research shows that parentsand even professional moderatorsare likely to miss context shifts in comment sections. For example: OMGG you ate that up fr, versus You ate that up ig [skull]. The implications of the study suggest that parents might recognize only a third of the times their child is being bullied in comments, even if theyre closely monitoring their online activity.
Simply put, the systems meant to keep kids safe online dont speak their language.
Community members whose local Kroger stores are on the chopping block are urging the company to reconsider.
Residents in cities impacted by the grocery chain’s recent announcement of store closures, including in Abingdon, Virginia; Kingsport, Tennessee; Gassaway, West Virginia; and Charlottesville, Virginia, have started petitions in hopes of convincing the company to reverse course and keep the stores open.
In its Q1 earnings call last week, the grocery retailer announced that it would be closing 60 stores in the next 18 months. Kroger Co (NYSE: KR) expects a modest financial benefit from this decision, but community members losing their stores are concerned about these closures impact on employee livelihoods and food access.
Krogers, if you leave you are creating a huge hole in our community, one signatory commented on a petition with over 1,500 signatures. We shop with you specifically and have supported you for decades. Please dont abandon us.
Other signatories cite their positive experiences with store employees as a reason to want the stores to remain open.
Kroger has stated in its earnings call that affected employees would be offered jobs at other locations. When contacted by Fast Company, a spokesperson declined to comment more specifically on the fates of employees or on the petitions from community members.
Food workers’ union involvement
Many of these petitions have been started or are supported by United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 400 Union, a local union chapter that represents Kroger workers in six states and Washington, D.C.
Four stores whose employees are represented by the union are planned to close later this year.
Through these petitions, the union hopes to show the company that union members and affected communities are united in opposing the closures.
“Lets be clear: Kroger is abandoning our communities just so their Wall Street investors can make an extra buck, UFCW Local 400 wrote in a statement to Fast Company. We think our jobs and our access to fresh food are worth more than that and we shouldnt be paying the price for Krogers decisions.
In some areas, the union notes, the local Kroger store is the only traditional grocery store left.
The problem with food deserts
The USDA estimates that 18.8 million people6.1% of the U.S. populationlive in low-income areas more than one mile from a grocery store, or in low-access tracts more than 10 miles from a grocery store.
Studies have linked limited access to fresh and nutritious food to negative health outcomes, such as diabetes, cardiovascular issues, and obesity.
Kroger has not provided a full list of the 60 stores that will close. However, many of the doomed locations have been revealed by local media reports.
“We urge Kroger to reverse course and continue to operate these much-needed stores for the benefit of our members and the customers who depend on them, wrote UFCW Local 700.
Krogers stock price jumped from $69.43 to $72.00 between the start of its Friday Q1 earnings call and start of trade the following Monday but has since been slightly trending down.
Five years ago, I bought an e-bike. At the time, the motor-equipped two-wheelers were burdened with an iffy reputation. Was it way easier to get up a hill on one than on a bike without a battery? Absolutely. Did that mean people who rode them were lazy or even cheaters? Some cycling enthusiasts thought so.
But what if the boost provided by your e-bike motivated you to make longer trips and more of themall powered, in part, by your own pedaling? Having logged almost 10,000 miles on my Gazelle, Im certain its been a guilt-free boon to my well-being. Data backs me up.
I thought about that recently while reading about a new study conducted at MITs Media Lab. Researchers divided subjects ages 18 to 39 into three groups and had them write essays on topics drawn from the SAT questions answered by college applicants, such as Do works of art have the power to change people’s lives? One group relied entirely on unassisted brainpower to complete the essay. A second group could use a search engine. And the third could call on ChatGPT.
The study subjects wore EEG helmets that captured their brain activity as they worked. After analyzing that data, the researchers concluded that access to ChatGPT didnt just make composing an essay easier. It made it too easy, in ways that might negatively impact peoples long-term ability to think for themselves. In some cases, the ChatGPT users merely cut and pasted text the chatbot had generated; not surprisingly, they exhibited little sense of ownership over the finished product compared to those who didnt have a computerized ghost on tap.
Due to the instant availability of the response to almost any question, LLMs can possibly make a learning process feel effortless, and prevent users from attempting any independent problem solving, the researchers wrote in their report. By simplifying the process of obtaining answers, LLMs could decrease student motivation to perform independent research and generate solutions. Lack of mental stimulation could lead to a decrease in cognitive development and negatively impact memory.
The study reached those sobering conclusions in the context of young people growing up in an era of bountiful access to AI. But the alarms it set off also left me worried about the technologys impact on my own brain. I have long considered AI an e-bike for my mindsomething that speeds it through certain tasks, thereby letting it go places previously out of reach. What if its actually so detrimental to my mental acuity that I havent even noticed my critical faculties withering away?
After pondering that worst-case scenario for a while, I calmed down. Yes, consistently opting for the most expedient way to accomplish work rather than the one that produces the best results is no way to live. Sure, being overly reliant on ChatGPTor any form of generative AIhas its hazards. But Im pretty confident its possible to embrace AI without your reasoning skills atrophying.
No single task can represent all the ways people engage with AI, and the one the MIT researchers choseessay writingis particularly fraught. The best essays reflect the unique insight of a particular person: When students take the actual SAT for real, they arent even allowed to bring a highlighter, let alone a bot. We dont need EGG helmets to tell us that people who paste ChatGPTs work into an essay theyve nominally written have lost out on the learning opportunity presented by grappling with a topic, reaching conclusions, and expressing them for oneself.
However, ChatGPT and its LLM brethren also excel at plenty of jobs too mundane to feel guilty about outsourcing. Each week, for example, I ask Anthropics Claude to clean up some of the HTML required to produce this newsletter. It handles this scut work faster and more accurately than I can. Im not sure what my brain waves would reveal, but Im happy to reinvest any time not spent on production drudgery into more rewarding aspects of my job.
Much of the time, AI is most useful not as a solution but a starting point. Almost never would I ask a chatbot about factual information, get an answer, and call it a day. Theyre still too error-prone for that. Yet their ease of use makes them an inviting way to get rolling on projects. I think of them as facilitating the research before the old-school research I usually end up doing.
And sometimes, AI is a portal into adventures I might otherwise never have taken. So far in 2025, my biggest rabbit hole has been vibe codingcoming up with ideas for apps and then having an LLM craft the necessary software using programming tools I dont even understand. Being exposed to technologies such as React and TypeScript has left me wanting to learn enough about them to do serious coding on my own. If I do, AI can take credit for sparking that ambition.
Im only so Pollyanna-ish about all this. Over time, the people who see AI as an opportunity to do more thinkingnot less of itcould be a lonely minority. If so, the MIT researchers can say We told you so.
Case in point: At the same time the MIT study was in the news, word broke that VC titan Andreessen Horowitz had invested $15 million in Cluely, a truly dystopian startup whose manifesto boasts its aim of helping people use AI to cheat at everything based on the theory that the future wont reward effort. Its origin story involves cofounder and CEO Roy Lee being suspended from Columbia University after developing an app for cheating on technical employment interviews. Which makes me wonder how Lee would feel about his own candidates misleading their way into job offers.
With any luck, the future will turn out to punish Cluelys cynicism. But the companys existenceand investors willingness to shower it with moneysays worse things about humankind than about AI.
Youve been reading Plugged In, Fast Companys weekly tech newsletter from me, global technology editor Harry McCracken. If a friend or colleague forwarded this edition to youor if you’re reading it on FastCompany.comyou can check out previous issues and sign up to get it yourself every Friday morning. I love hearing from you: Ping me at hmccracken@fastcompany.com with your feedback and ideas for future newsletters. I’m also on Bluesky
Research tells us that high performers thrive on challenges. Stretch projects help ambitious teammates grow their skills, and cross-team initiatives offer greater visibility. Yet, managers are overwhelmed, often unable to curate the bespoke growth opportunities their teams desire.
As a result, seeking career growth opportunities has become the number-one reason people change jobs, according to one survey by Gallup.
If you want more out of your job, youre not alone. The good news is that opportunity is possible without plunging into a challenging job market. But its on you to do the heavy lifting.
Instead of waiting for growth opportunities to be served up, start creating them yourself. Here are three tips to get started.
Define What a Growth Opportunity Looks Like for You
The more specific you can be with the type of opportunity you desire, the more likely you are to get it. Its often helpful to work backward, first identifying the outcome you seek from a growth opportunity, and then considering the viable paths to that outcome.
Do you want to improve your technical skills to ensure you stay competitive?
Are you focused on elevating your human skills, like leadership and communication?
Is your aim to expand your visibility in the organization and develop a stronger network?
When youre clear about the endgame, youre better able to identify growth opportunities that align with your desired outcome. Youre also more confident in saying no to opportunities that dont sync up.
Spell Out the Specifics for Your Manager
Most leaders are eager to support your professional development, but they dont have the bandwidth to curate a list of just-stretch-enough options for you. Do the heavy liftingand make it easy for them to nod along.
When you make a request to your boss for organizational resources, a financial investment, or just the agreement that you can prioritize a developmental opportunity, its on you to spell it out. Whats the opportunity? Why are you asking? What do you need from your boss?
Take a look at the differences between these two requests.
Example A: Id like more professional development opportunities. Are there any conferences or trainings I can go to?
Example B: Ive shared with you my desire to move into a managerial role in the next two years. To ensure Im ready, Im making a proactive effort to develop my leadership skills. Theres a one-day conference next month specifically for leaders in our industry, called X. I would like to attend this conference to elevate my skills, network with like-minded aspiring leaders, and gain insights from other organizations in our space. The cost of attendance is Y, and Id be out of the office for a full day. Ive reviewed the agenda and identified the sessions that I believe will be the most relevant to the future of our organization. Can we discuss this at my one-on-one this week?
Example A is cordial and valid. Example B is strategic and ambitious. Connecting your goals to what the business needs adds urgency and validity to your request.
Even with a well-crafted request, the answer might be no, especially if your request involves a significant investment of organizational time or money. In that event, dont walk away defeated. Reiterate the growth youd like to achieve and why, and ask for suggestions or alternative options.
Give them time to think, be open to the paths they suggest, and know that often theyll end up saying yes to the original request if you continue to bring it up.
Cast a Wide Net
Frontline leaders are often stretched thin, managing large teams and their own mountain of deliverables. When your team is under pressure, your personal growth will not be top of mind for your (likely well-intended) leader.
To safeguard your career trajectory, cast a wide net for growth opportunities, tapping into HR, other senior leaders, and organizations outside your own. For example, if you heard a senior leader talk about an interesting project at a town hall, reach out and offer to help. If you admire the work someone else did on a particular initiative, ask how you can be a part of the next round. You know your leader, your organizations culture, and the line between self-starter and blatant disregard for the chain of command. If needed, run your reach-outs by your boss first.
In some roles, growth opportunities are truly few and far between. Look beyond your organization to challenge your brain: volunteering, industry events, and even hobby-based pursuits will wake up your mind and put you back in the drivers seat.
Waiting for a senior leader to tap you on the shoulder and dub you ready for growth opportunities can cost you years of momentum. The power is in your hands to create the opportunities you want in the job you already have.
The 1994 Frank Darabont film The Shawshank Redemption may be everyones favorite movie to catch on TNT on a rainy Saturday, but its not an obvious place to go looking for money lessons. This quiet film is a meditation on the power of hope to change liveswhich hardly seems like a message one can expect from financial professionals (ahem).
Yet, the story of Andy Dufresnes time in (and spectacular escape from) the Shawshank State Prison provides a blueprint for smart financial choices. And the story of how the film itself gained traction despite a lackluster initial reception can also teach us important money lessons.
What we see: a rock hammer and weekly correspondence
Following his wrongful conviction for murder, Andy Dufresne arrives at Shawshank to serve two consecutive life sentences. He befriends another lifer, Red, who runs an illicit smuggling business. Andy asks him to procure a rock hammer and a large Rita Hayworth poster. (The movie, of course, springs from the 1982 Stephen King novella, Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption.) Andy claims that he wants the rock hammer for carving, and he does indeed create small sculptures with it.
But thats not all he uses it for. By the end of the film, we learn that Andy has spent 19 years digging a tunnel through his wall with the hammer, using the poster to cover up his work. Despite the rock hammer being a tiny tool for work of that magnitude, Andy never gives up his slow, diligent, and methodical approach to escaping.
Andy is equally methodical in his efforts to improve the decrepit prison library. He sends weekly requests to the Maine state legislature for funds to buy used books. After years of relentless effort, Andy secures a $500 annual appropriation for the prison library, granted by the state just to shut him up.
What we learn: be methodical with whatever tools you have
Part of what makes Andy Dufresne extraordinary is his ability to take the long view. Most of his fellow inmates lose themselves in dreary thinking about their imprisonment, but Andy sees an investment opportunity. He recognizes time as a tool. He doesnt have freedom in Shawshank, but he can take advantage of time in a way people on the outside cant.
By recognizing that time works differently on the inside, Andy is able to use the very punishment hes been given as a way to maintain his hope and persist with projects.
Warning: This scene contains coarse language.
What we see: confronting Hadley and becoming Randall Stephens
A few years into his time at Shawshank, while working with a crew of inmates to tar the prison roofs, Andy overhears Captain Hadley, the brutal and vicious lead guard, complaining about having to pay taxes on a $35,000 inheritance. Andy recklessly approaches Hadley and him if he trusts his wife. Hadley responds to the impudent question by rushing Andy to the edge of the roof to toss him to his death, but Andy saves himself by saying he knows how Hadley can minimize taxes on the inheritance.
Andy becomes the unofficial CPA for the prison staff, and as the years pass, Andy also starts helping the warden launder money using his skills with accounting. He also secretly creates a fictitious identity, a businessman named Randall Stephens. When he escapes Shawshank at the films climax, he steals all of the wardens laundered money by posing as Stephens at the bank and withdrawing all of the ill-gotten gains.
What we learn: know when and how to take risks
Ignoring the advice of his inmate pals, Andy risks his life to gain leverage with Hadley. The only immediate reward is a case of cold beer for the rooftop work crew. But Andy is thinking longer-term, as he is from the very first moments of Shawshank Redemption. The risky gambit leads to work that better suits his knowledge and intelligence, providing new opportunities.
His construction of Randall Stephens is equally risky. He knows that the money he is withdrawing is laundered, that Stephens doesnt exist, and that his absence from his cell has probably already been discovered. Though Andy never broke the law before he went to prison, he does so when inhabiting the Stephens persona he invented.
But like the risk of confronting Hadley, pretending to be Stephens is calculated. Andy prepares everything he needs to pull off the ruse ahead of time, using his knowledge and intelligence to mitigate the risk.
The lesson? Risk-taking makes sense when were well-prepared and set up for success.
[Photo: Warner Bros. Entertainment]
What we see: a box-office bomb becomes universally beloved
The Shawshank Redemption famously tanked at the box office, initially earning a measly $16 million against a $25 million budget. Though it was nominated for (and lost) seven academy awards and lauded by critics, the studio had no idea how to market a character study set in a mid-century prison and audiences were apparently confused by the films (admittedly baffling) title.
Then a funny thing happened on the way to certain obscurity: The Shawshank Redemption slowly found its audience. But unlike many other box-office failures that became cult classics, this film didnt just appeal to a niche audience. Over the past 30 years, it has become recognized as one of the best movies ever made and consistently tops IMDBs list of favorite films.
Just as Andy diligently works at tunneling through his wall, building the prison library, stealing the wardens laundered money, and making himself indispensable to his best friend Red over a period of nearly two decades, the film showcasing Andys story also took its time to garner the appreciation it deserves.
What we learn: proof of concept can take time
We tend to want instant results as a culture, especially when it comes to investingand Hollywood is one of the worst offenders. If a film doesnt make major bank in its opening weekend, studios may be willing to write it off.
Frank Darabont, Tim Robbins, Morgan Freeman, and the rest of the professionals who worked on The Shawshank Redemption believed in it and gave it their all. The lackluster initial reception must have been incredibly disappointing. But the film is much more than its first three months revenue, as Shawshanks enduring popularity has proved.
Honestly, we need to increase our time horizon for all types of investments, not just Hollywood movies.
When it comes to financial investments, quick returns are typically the province of scams (like the wardens money laundering) or luck (which you cant prepare for). Andys example makes it clear that you should try to invest like the quiet, falsely convicted banker. He does his homework, invests in something he believes in, does as much preparation as possible, recognizes when to take a risk, and uses time to his advantage.
For other types of investments, from your own pursuits to building a business, take a page from the success of The Shawshank Redemption. The right combination of diligence and patience remains the most predictable investment strategy.
It can be easy for consumers to feel like we now live in a two-tier economy: one geared toward showering the wealthy with perks, extras, and exclusive access, and the other for us normies. But one place you might not expect that is at Costco.
Which might explain the mixed reaction to the recent news that, starting June 30, Costco U.S. locations that now open at 10 a.m. will open an hour earlier Sunday through Fridaybut only for certain people. Holders of its Executive Member card, which at $130 a year costs double the standard Gold Star membership fee, are allowed into the store early. (Those fees are up from $120 and $55, respectively, as of last year.) And locations that already open at 9 will now also make that first hour Executive only. (Saturdays its just for Executive members for the first half hour of operation.) All members will be welcome to shop starting at 10 a.m. Monday through Friday and Sunday, and at 9:30 a.m. Saturday, an announcement on Instagram explained.
Some responses to that post suggested that this new Executive perk came across like second-tier treatment for devoted Costco shoppers. Why reduce the value of a regular membership for US members? one asked. Extended hours should be for all members, another argued. As members we all pay to shop there, a third added. Inconveniencing your loyal customers for 30 mins to an hour is actually not cool.
It might seem counterintuitive that a brand so fundamentally tied to bargain hunting, volume discounts, and savvy shopping would have an elite membership level at all. While Costcos product mix has come to include items targeting higher-end consumersfrom fancy champagne to Rolex watches to actual gold barsthe Costco image is tied to the idea that finding a great deal is the ultimate equalizer. The appeal of, say, the chains famous $1.50 hot dog cuts across class lines (at least symbolically).
Costco has long enjoyed a broad and loyal fan base, and over the past year its reputation has seemed particularly virtuous. Its in-house Kirkland brand, already popular, has become arguably even more appealing as shoppers contend with tariff-war uncertainties. More broadly, Fast Company recently named CEO Ron Vechris Visionary of the Year for standing by diversity, equity, and inclusion policies that the company believes are good for business. As Target and other rivals have been dinged for seeming to cave to political pressure, Costco has gotten more popular. Its sales were up 8% in the most recent quarter, just shy of $61 billion and ahead of analyst estimates.
But that includes its Executive tier: It turns out that a remarkable 47% of Costco members pay extra for the black-card Executive level. This currently entails a 2% reward on qualified purchasesmeaning that its actually possible to earn back the extra fee cost if you spend enoughand discounts on some Costco services and Costco Travel deals. In addition to the exclusive shopping time, Costco is also adding a $10 credit for certain home delivery orders (a segment the chain has been pushing, including an Instacart partnership) for Executive members.
Maybe more to the point, Costco rival Sams Clubs elite tier already includes exclusive shopping time (and Costco itself actually had an earlier version of the perk that was discontinued in the peak pandemic era). And notably, Costco has said its Executive customers account for about 73% of its global sales.
In other words, given what those elite, black-card-carrying customers contribute to Costcos business, maybe they deserve more special treatment. Thats certainly how some reacted to that Instagram post announcing the new hours. Nice added benefit to those with the Executive membership, wrote one member. Hope to see more distinguishing benefits down the road. Another added: Finally, something exclusive for Executive members. Others sounded a more appreciative note. Fresh morning hot dogs, one wrote, for me and my black card! Such are the privileges of the Costco elite.
Self-driving vehicle startups have often drawn skepticism for overpromising and underdeliveringsee: Argo AI and GMs Cruise subsidiary, both now in corporate junkyardsbut in early May, one of them achieved a milestone that had long eluded the industry: delivering a truckload of cargo for a paying customer on public roadswith no human behind the wheel.
Auroras May 1 announcement that it had begun commercial deliveries for its first customers, Hirschbach Motor Lines and Uber Freight, on two autonomous semitrailer trucks between Dallas and Houston followed some eight years of work by the Pittsburgh-based firm.
Aurora reached that milestone about half a year later than it had planned last year, owing to extra time needed to complete its safety case testing and self-certification. This is a multiyear journey, says Aurora president Ossa Fisher. A few months seemed minuscule in the grand scheme of both the opportunity that lies ahead of us and what came before.
But barely two weeks after the announcement, the company was back to having safety operators sitting behind the wheels of the two trucks.
In a May 16 company blog post, CEO and chairman Chris Urmson said one of its truck-manufacturing partners, Paccar, had requested that change because of certain prototype parts in their base vehicle platform. He wrote that after much consideration, Aurora respected their request and are moving the observer, who had been riding in the back of some of our trips, from the back seat to the front seat.
[Photo: Aurora]
The International Brotherhood of Teamsters, the union that represents drivers, would prefer to keep things that wayand has been lobbying lawmakers in such states as Texas, California, and Massachusetts to codify that in regulations. Our position is that all trucks should have human operator requirements, says Teamsters spokesman Matt McQuaid.
A long road ahead
Despite the upshift-downshift progress, however, Aurora is still farther down the road than other companies in this space.
Gartner analyst Jonathan Davenport rates the company as significantly ahead of such competitors as Plus AI, which plans to inaugurate commercial service in 2027 and in early June announced plans for an initial public offering (its second attempt to do so).
Aurora staged its IPO in 2021, which has allowed a much clearer view of its financials than whats available from the likes of another company to make self-driving vehicles a commercial reality: Waymo. And those numbers show that running an autonomous-trucking company isnt cheap: In the first quarter of 2025, Aurora reported a net loss of $208 million. On its Q1 earnings call in May, company executives predicted $175 million to $185 million in quarterly expenses and revenue in the mid-single digits over the rest of 2025.
There’s a big difference between the operating cost today and the operating cost at scale, Fisher tells Fast Company. We are not making money on a per load basis today, and that’s public information.
Auroras plans include not just scaling up its fleet but also upgrading its hardwarefor instance, deploying a more compact version of its FirstLight Lidar sensor. Shrinking the sensing equipment could also help Aurora move closer to its goal of bringing its self-driving technology to passenger cars.
Chirs Urmson, CEO [Photo: Aurora]
We’ll have a next-generation of trucks in a year, she says. We’ll go to tens of trucks and hundreds of trucks and thousands of trucks. And as we reach scale, that’s whn you get the performance metrics to be highly profitable.
Davenport says the plan is indeed feasible, but has some doubts about the timeline. We’re still going to be two or three years, probably, he says. I would still classify it as probably in the development stage of R&D.
Aurora and other firms in the sector benefit from a market problem that needs solving: Traditional trucking companies can’t hire enough drivers to meet demand. But even then, Gartner forecasts that autonomous trucks will make up under 5% of truck fleets worldwide by 2029.
Either snow or rain or gloom of night
In the nearer term, Aurora aims to expand its operating design domainthe conditions under which its trucks can rollbeyond the current requirement of clear daylight. If there’s rain in the forecast, some days we don’t launch, Fisher says. We’re working very rapidly to resolve any and all weather issues and see that happening later this year.
Here, Aurora is following a common route for autonomous-vehicle projects: Start operations in ideal weather, then drive in increasingly less pleasant conditions. Waymo, for example, inaugurated service in sunny Phoenix, but when it opens for business in Washington sometime in 2026 its robotaxis will have to deal with a full spectrum of seasonal weather that, in the case of the occasional blizzard, should keep human drivers off the roads.
Unlocking commercial nighttime operationwhen a driverless truck would theoretically see its greatest advantage, by virtue of not needing to sleepis also on the to-do list for later this summer, Fisher says.
We’ve been driving in night for the last three years, she says of the firms testing. It is all about securing the evidence to close the safety case.
Auroras system already handles limited driving on surface streets to connect highways with the companys terminals. There’s a few things like turning tight corners as an 18-wheeler. That’s harder to do than exiting a highway off-ramp, says Fisher. But it’s a very solvable problem.
Other autonomous-trucking firms have opted to simplify their own operating design domain by staying off public roads. Kodiak Robotics, for example, launched self-driving commercial deliveries on private land in the oil-rich Permian Basin of Texas. Gartners Davenport also points to such closed environments as mines and ports as easier use cases for self-driving trucks. Autonomous haulage trucks in mines, for example, they’re already commonplace, he says.
Aurora, however, is not just committed to operating on public roads but planning to expand its operations outside of Texas. Well be opening up to Phoenix later this year and then, from there, expanding across the south of the United States, Fisher says.
But after 22 or so hours, a truck will have to refuel, which in the case of a truck with no driver means not any old truck stop will do. Aurora plans to build its own in Phoenix to start, after which the company plans to work with unspecified third parties on building facilities to refuel and inspect Auroras vehicles.
[Photo: Aurora]
Rules of the roads
Starting operations only in Texas has simplified Auroras regulatory operating domain, but Fisher professes confidence in Auroras ability to secure more green lights from other states, starting with New Mexico and Arizona and even California, which in April released proposed rules for heavy-duty autonomous trucks.
The more and more conversations we have, and honestly, the more miles we put on the driverless truck, the more welcoming folks are, she says. And so it looks like the tide may be changing even in California.
Fishers case for Auroras safety on the roads evokes that of Waymo. Like that Alphabet subsidiary, Auroras vehicles fuse inputs from an array of lidar, radar, and camera sensorsa distinct contrast from Tesla, which just began very limited robotaxi services in Austin relying on a no-lidar, cameras-only system.
Fisher emphasizes how each type of sensor helps provide a fuller picture: Radar excels in fog, lidar sees farther at night, cameras do better with up-close navigation. That approach to redundancy includes having two identical brains in the back of the cab plus a backup computer that can pull over the truck if the two primary computers fail.
Aurora and other autonomous-mobility developers may not have to worry about state regulations if a provision in the Trump-backed budget-reconciliation bill that would preempt state-level rules on AIand therefore on self-driving vehiclessurvives negotiations between the House and the Senate and the notable opposition of some Republicans.
Fisher, for her part, voices optimism about a federal framework that would allow verification of company safety cases by third-party auditors. Before [Transportation Secretary Sean] Duffy we thought anything at the federal level might be a decade away, she says. We’re now more optimistic that this could be a year or two away, and we would welcome that.
In any regulatory regime, Gartners Davenport emphasizes that companies have to take safety even more seriously with freight trucksstopping distances for one are 65% longer than for a passenger car. The risk associated with operating an autonomous truck is so much greater, he says. But, the analyst adds, the need for automation is also much greater than in taxis: It’s the use case that actually makes the most economic sense.
In recent decades, California residents have experienced a whiplash of weather conditions. After a few years of severe drought, heavy rains came in early 2023 that soaked the state for weeks. That rain led to mudslides, which were worsened by the fact that years of drought had dried out the soil, so it couldnt absorb the rainfall. That rain also then led to an explosion of vegetation growth, which would dry out when the next drought period hit and fuel devastating wildfires.
This rapid transition between wet and dry weather conditions is a hallmark of climate change, and its also an accelerating climate threat. This phenomenon is called precipitation whiplashes, and the forces that bring these drastic swings between drought and floods are speeding up. In a recent study, researchers say we could see an increase in precipitation whiplashes as early as 2028.
What causes precipitation whiplashes?
Weather systems are constantly swirling around our planet, like the Arctic polar vortex, a swath of cold, low-pressure air that sits at our planets poles; or the El Nio-Southern Oscillation, a cyclical climate pattern that brings a change in winds and sea surface temperatures.
Another one of these weather systems is called the Madden-Julian Oscillation, or MJO. Its a mass of clouds, rainfall, winds, and air pressure that passes over the tropics, moving eastwardly around the planet. Though its above the tropics (and can bring events like tropical cyclones), it impacts weather around the world, including global rainfall patterns, atmospheric rivers, and more.
The MJO circles the planet in periods of 30 to 90 days, and it includes two phases: a period of enhanced rainfall, and then a period of suppressed rainfall. But warming from greenhouse gases is speeding that cycle up, research has already found. In a new study from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology and published in the journal Nature Communications, researchers used advanced climate models to look more closely at how rising greenhouse gasses could exactly change the MJOs behavior.
Those models predicted a 40% increase in fast-propagating MJO events by the late 21st century, from 2064 to 2099, compared to historical data (19792014). But well start to see that frequency pick up as early as 2028, the researchers note. They also expect not only for this weather system to move faster, but for there to be an increased risk of jumping MJOsmeaning an abrupt shift in the phases between precipitationbeginning before 2030, too.
Why precipitation whiplash can be so dangerous
More frequent fast and jumping MJO events are expected to trigger disruptive weather fluctuations worldwide, the researchers writelike precipitation whiplash: rapid swings between really wet and really dry extremes. Researchers expect the precipitation impacts of these accelerated and jumping MJO events to be unprecedentedly severe.
Around the world, a few areas are expected to be hotspots for precipitation whiplash including central Africa, the Middle East, the lower part of the Yangtze River basin in China, the northern Amazon rainforest, the East Coast of the continental United States, and coastal Argentina, to name a few. These hotspots can result in various forms of cascading hazards, the researchers write, that pose unprecedented stress to ecosystem services, existing infrastructure, water and food security, and human safety.”
Those cascading hazards include events like what California has already witnessed: drought to rain to mudslides to vegetation growth to drought to wildfires. And as MJO events accelerate because of climate change, that will also significantly shorten response times against compound hazards, study author Cheng Tat-Fan says in a statement, catching societies off guard unless adaptation measures are in place.
The impacts of precipitation whiplash, then, should be considered when it comes to future infrastructure, urban planning, and agricultural practices, the researchers say. Fortunately, these fast-propagating MJOs can be a bit more predictable. But still, researchers need to improve their forecast models to better understand this weather behavior. If they do, and if they could then forecast these extremes four to five weeks in advance, that could improve disaster preparedness and save lives.
