Last night and this morning, the world's largest companies | Qualcomm approached Intel about the acquisition; Volkswagen lays off employees at its headquarters in China

Qualcomm approached Intel about the acquisition. Alibaba's large language model is open to the global open source community. Huawei laptops will replace Windows with HarmonyOS. Volkswagen began laying off employees at its headquarters in China. There was a sudden change in Nike's leadership, and veteran employee Hill will serve as CEO. Qualcomm has approached Intel Corp. about the acquisition, a deal that could be a record in the chip industry. Intel, once the world's largest chipmaker, is struggling with weak sales and widening losses. The company's market capitalization is currently less than $100 billion, about half that of Qualcomm. Still, the acquisition would be the largest deal in the semiconductor market's history and could be industry-changing.

Microsoft and Constellation Energy struck a new deal Friday to power the tech giant's artificial intelligence (AI) data centers, paving the way for the restart of nuclear reactors on Three Mile Island, Pennsylvania. In March 1979, the reactor core of Unit 2 of the Three Mile Island Nuclear Power Plant partially melted down, leading to a mass evacuation, known as the Three Mile Island nuclear accident. Under the agreement, Microsoft will purchase energy from the restarted nuclear power plant to help meet its goal of using carbon-free energy to meet the power needs of its data centers.

Alibaba has opened more than 100 large language models to the global open source community and continues to focus on the field of artificial intelligence (AI). It's also the company's most extensive open source initiative to date. Alibaba said that these new open-source models are part of Alibaba Cloud's Qwen 2.5 series of large language models, covering different language, audio and visual models.

Yu Chengdong, Chairman of Huawei Device BG and Chairman of Intelligent Vehicle Solution BU, was a guest in the CCTV News Live Room on September 20 and witnessed the delivery of Huawei's Mate XT three-fold new machine with Nigmaiti, the host of the main station. In Yu Chengdong's view, choosing the Mate XT triple fold is really to put the phone and tablet in your pocket, and at the same time put the camera in your pocket. Yu Chengdong revealed that due to the impact of sanctions, the current Huawei PC may be the last batch of laptops equipped with Windows system, and there will be PC products with HarmonyOS system in the future.

Brazil's Supreme Court ordered Elon Musk's X to pay a fine of nearly $1 million a day until he blocked users from accessing the platform, which is banned by the country. The Supreme Court also accused the billionaire of using technical means to try to circumvent the authorities after X changed network providers, allowing some users to temporarily circumvent the injunction imposed on X by the Supreme Court three weeks ago. X said it had no intention of circumventing the ban and that the social platform was forced to switch network providers after closing its offices and operations in Brazil, resulting in "inadvertently and temporarily reinstating services to users in Brazil."

Warner Music said it expects more layoffs than originally expected as part of its restructuring plan. The entertainment and record label group said Thursday that it would lay off about 750 people, or 13 percent of its workforce. The company's recent forecast is to lay off 600 jobs, or 10% of its workforce. The layoffs will affect its internal ad sales operations and other support functions.

As the European car market shrinks, the Volkswagen Group may cut as many as 30,000 jobs in Germany to strengthen its competitiveness. Oliver Blume, CEO of the Volkswagen Group, believes that in the medium term, it is feasible for the Volkswagen Group to reduce the number of employees in Germany by 30,000 (about 10% of the total number of employees in Germany). However, the Volkswagen Group Works Council said the 30,000 job cuts were "baseless and nonsense." The largest layoffs in the Volkswagen Group's R&D department are likely to be the largest, with 4,000 to 6,000 of the 13,000 R&D employees in Germany losing their jobs.

Volkswagen of Germany, which aims to reduce its indirect costs by 20% within three years, began to lay off employees at its headquarters in China. Volkswagen China will reduce its headcount at the group level to the hundreds, as the company is unable to halt the continued decline in sales in its largest market. Volkswagen's premium brand, Audi, is also laying off employees separately. Volkswagen said the move was part of its global efforts to reduce costs, but declined to disclose the exact number of layoffs. Some foreign employees will be transferred back to Germany, while some middle and senior managers will be dismissed. In addition, SAIC Volkswagen is preparing to close a plant in Nanjing as early as next year.

Regarding the rumor that NIO is negotiating the acquisition of Audi's factory in Brussels, Belgium, Li Bin, chairman and CEO of NIO, Li Bin denied, "No, we have not contacted Audi. He also joked that NIO can't afford to maintain factories that Audi can't afford.

EU automakers are demanding a postponement of stricter emissions regulations. The European Automobile Manufacturers Association (ACEA) on Thursday called for an "urgent review" of the emissions regulations implemented in 2025 and the ban on new diesel locomotives in 2035. Both provisions are at the heart of the EU's Green Deal climate law, which aims to push the EU towards net-zero emissions by 2050. European automakers say falling EV sales will face "billions of euros" in fines or the prospect of significant production cuts when the EU's new carbon standards come into effect next year, adding pressure on the bloc to loosen regulations.

Johnson & Johnson has raised the settlement of thousands of lawsuits alleging cancer from its baby powder to more than $8.2 billion, after the company proposed a settlement of $6.5 billion. The decision to increase the settlement amount will bring the total amount of lawsuits that Johnson & Johnson agreed to pay or has already paid to settle baby powder-related lawsuits in excess of $13.4 billion. Settlement negotiations are ongoing. Johnson & Johnson insists that talcum powder (which has been removed from shelves) has never caused cancer. The company recently secured the consent of more than 75% of the plaintiffs in a lawsuit related to baby powder, reaching an out-of-court settlement.

Shanghai will welcome the world's first special store of Shake Shack, a world-renowned high-end casual food brand. On September 22nd and September 26th, Shake Shack will unveil two new stores in Shanghai - Shanghai Yuyuan Store and Shanghai Huiju Store, of which Shanghai Yuyuan Store will become the world's first "SHAKE SHACK scoop Ice Cream Station" specialty store. The Shanghai Huiju store will be SHAKE SHACK's 117th store in Asia and 560th in the world.

Kweichow Moutai announced on the evening of September 20 that the company intends to repurchase the company's shares through centralized bidding transactions with its own funds of not less than 3 billion yuan (inclusive) and no more than 6 billion yuan (inclusive), and the repurchase price does not exceed 1795.78 yuan / share (inclusive). The repurchased shares will be used to cancel and reduce the company's registered capital.

The abrupt leadership change of John Donahoe, the chief executive of Nike Inc., is set to retire next month, underscoring the sluggish financial performance of the world's largest sportswear maker for some time. Nike's board of directors said Thursday that veteran employee Elliott Hill will return to Nike for a top position starting Oct. 14. Hill served as President of Consumer Markets before retiring in 2020.

According to the Federation of the Switzerland Watch Industry (FH), watch exports totaled 1.95 billion Switzerland francs ($2.3 billion) in August, up 6.9% year-on-year. This figure is slightly higher than in July, but still shows a downward trend since June last year. According to the data, Switzerland's watch exports to Japan increased by more than 14%, while exports to China fell by 5.9%, reflecting the trend seen in the luxury industry.

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