• Microsoft's Build developer conference kicked off Monday with a slew of agentic AI updates.
• Microsoft's CTO said there's been an "explosion" of people using agents over the last year, with daily active users doubling.
• The keynote included new agentic features in GitHub, Microsoft 365 Copilot, and appearances from Sam Altman and Elon Musk.

It was all about agentic AI at Microsoft's big developer event on Monday.

"The thing that we've seen over the past year is just sort of an explosion of agents," Microsoft CTO and executive vice president of AI, Kevin Scott, said during the company's Build conference.

Scott added that the number of daily active users of the various AI agents that Microsoft has visibility into "more than doubled" since Microsoft's Build event last year.

CEOs and executives across the tech industry have heralded 2025 as the year of agentic AI, and the Microsoft executive took some time to define what Microsoft means by the term.

Scott described the AI agents Microsoft is building as "a thing that a human being is able to delegate tasks to." AI agents are still in their early days, and Scott said there's still a bit of a "capability overhang with reasoning" at the moment, but they will continue to improve. As that happens over the next year, he said AI agents will get more powerful and cheaper to operate.

'The next big step forward'

Microsoft made a slew of announcements about AI updates and partnerships related to agentic AI during its opening keynote at Build.

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said that the company is working to create a host of tools to help build an open, "agentic web" at scale, including cloud computing tools available through its Microsoft Azure platform. The company demoed multiple new AI features available in Windows, Office, Azure, and other platforms throughout the keynote.

Showcasing Microsoft's new Azure SRE agent for site reliability engineering, which will be embedded in GitHub Copilot, Nadella said agents are all about having a reliable AI "peer" that you can delegate complex tasks to and trust to help remove "pain points" for developers, such as getting woken up in the middle of the night to deal with a website issue.

"This is the next big step forward, which is a full coding agent, built right into GitHub, taking Copilot from being a pair programmer to a peer programmer," Nadella said. "You can assign issues to Copilot, bug fixes, new features, code maintenance, and it'll complete these tasks autonomously."

Microsoft also flexed its reach with virtual appearances from a who's who of AI CEOs, including OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Tesla and xAI CEO Elon Musk, and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang.

Altman made a live appearance virtually to talk about the evolution of agentic AI and the recent launch of Codex, the AI startup's new agent designed to assist programmers with writing code, fixing bugs, and running tests. Altman described Codex as "true software engineering task delegation."

"We've been talking about someday we'd get to a real agentic coding experience, and it's kind of wild to me that it's finally here," Altman said. "I think this is one of the biggest changes to programming that I've ever seen."

"This idea that you now have a real virtual teammate that you can assign work to, that you can say, 'Hey, go off and do some of the stuff you were just doing and increasingly more advanced things,' you know at some point saying, 'I've got a big idea, go off and work for a couple of days and do it,'" the OpenAI CEO added.

The productivity gains can also be significant, Altman said.

"It was amazing to watch over the last few months as we were working on Codex internally — you know there's always a few people who are the early adopters — and how quickly the people who were just using Codex all day changed their workflow and just the incredible amount they were able to do relative to someone else was quite interesting," he said.

Microsoft announced plans to expand the AI models available through Azure to integrate xAI's Grok 3 and Grok 3 Mini. In a pre-recorded clip, Musk, who once interned at Microsoft, talked with Nadella about his first experiences using Microsoft software as well as Grok's capabilities.

Microsoft also introduced "Copilot Tuning" to create agents using company data. The announcement confirmed Business Insider's reporting from last week that Microsoft was planning to debut a new Copilot designed to "rapidly channel an organization's knowledge into a Copilot that can 'talk,' 'think,' and 'work' like the tenant itself," according to an internal memo. That project was previously called Tenant Copilot internally, the company has since confirmed.

In Satya Nadella's closing comments, the Microsoft CEO said the company is trying to apply AI across the "full stack" of software development and agentic web products, including Microsoft 365 Teams, Copilot Studio, and more.

"Ultimately, though, all of this is about creating opportunity to fuel your ambition," the Microsoft CEO said, pointing to a father who used Foundry to speed the diagnosis of a rare disease affecting his son and a startup in South America that created an app to gamify wellness.

• Google CEO Sundar Pichai said, "all of us are going to do well" when it comes to the AI race.
• He said he met with Elon Musk and thinks his ability to build future technologies is "unparalleled."
• Pichai said success in AI will depend on innovation and execution, which is driven by top talent.

The launch of ChatGPT set off a race among Big Tech companies and startups to scale AI, but Google CEO Sundar Pichai doesn't see it as a situation where only one player wins.

"I think all of us are going to do well in this scenario," Pichai said during an episode of the "All-In Podcast," published Friday.

Podcast host David Friedberg agreed with Pichai and said there seems to be a misconception that there's one winner "and everyone else is a loser." Friedberg said AI is introducing "an entirely new world" that's bigger than that.

Pichai's comments came after former Googler and Podcast host David Friedberg asked for his thoughts on rival companies like Microsoft, xAI, OpenAI, and Meta and their leaders. The Google CEO acknowledged that "by definition, it's a very impressive group."

"I think maybe only one of them has invited me to a dance, not the others," Pichai said, referencing Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella's comments that the "new Bing" will make Google "come out and show that they can dance."

Pichai added that he spent time with Elon Musk about two weeks ago and described the billionaire's ability to build future technologies as "unparalleled." He said that while there is competition among the companies discussed, there is also respect and partnerships.

Pichai said that AI offers a much larger "opportunity landscape" than any previous technology combined. He added that there may be companies that enter the playing field that haven't been established yet. Pichai raised the point that when the internet came out in 1983, Google hadn't even been launched as a company yet. Now, it's become the dominant search engine.

"There are companies we don't even know, haven't been started yet, their names aren't known," Pichai said, adding that those "might be extraordinarily big winners" when it comes to AI.

Pichai said that the companies that end up doing well will be those that are able to "innovate and execute with the best talent." That is what will be the driver for success, Pichai said.

Google is actively investing in that belief. Last year, the tech giant reportedly spent $2.7 billion on a deal largely intended to get AI scientist and startup founder Noam Shazeer back at the company. Other companies are following the same path: OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has directly called candidates to persuade them to join his startup.

OpenAI also poached dozens of Googlers last year, and Zuckerberg has reportedly written personal emails to AI researchers at Google's DeepMind as a recruitment attempt. Even if Pichai is right that there's room for multiple companies to win the AI race, the competition hasn't shown signs of letting up anytime soon.

Google declined a request to comment from Business Insider.

• Dropbox's VP of product and growth, Morgan Brown, advises job seekers to put their work on display.
• Brown said anyone can build products with the amount of free tools and online courses now available.
• Brown took 20 years to finish his degree and worked his way up the career ladder by teaching himself.

Like many tech execs, Dropbox's VP of product and growth agrees that job seekers should still learn basic technical skills — but his No. 1 piece of advice is to "show your work."

Morgan Brown told Business Insider that it's about showcasing your capabilities, rather than showing how you arrived at an answer.

"Publish your stuff, publish your thinking," Brown said in an interview. "Build the apps, build the websites."

Brown said he would give that advice at any time, but it's especially relevant in the age of AI. In a time where there's an abundance of free tools and online courses, Brown said there's nothing stopping job seekers from building products on their own. All candidates need to get started is a phone and internet access, Brown said.

"There are so many opportunities to kind of, like, show what you have to offer right now without kind of any credential necessary other than just your work," Brown said.

The Dropbox product exec said that when he suggests building a product, people sometimes say that they don't know enough or don't have good ideas. That shouldn't be a deterrent, Brown said.

"First of all, no one's paying any attention," Brown said, adding that you can "learn by doing" and eventually create a body of work to point to that some people will end up noticing.

Brown said his advice comes from the perspective of someone who isn't a "classically trained product manager." Despite spending years in product management at Facebook, Instagram, and Shopify, the now Dropbox VP didn't have a typical start to the realm of Big Tech. In fact, he didn't finish his college degree until a few years ago.

"I was a biology major, you know, I failed out of college. It took me 20 years to get my degree," Brown said.

After dropping out of school, Brown started his first job in data operations at a startup in the midst of the dot-com boom. It was a time before the rise of APIs, and the bulk of his work started with typing information from physical newspapers. He said search engine optimization had recently emerged, and he had to figure out how to get web traffic.

"I basically was a self-taught digital marketer, fully based on like what kind of impact we could have," Brown said. "And then from there I went to digital marketing."

In addition to learning how to generate traffic, Brown ended up teaching himself how to create a website and blog, and eventually how to build products. While Brown said he's grateful for the experience and where it led him, he said he learned what he knows now "at the school of hard knocks" and experienced "a lot of failure along the way."

He went from publishing his thoughts online to co-authoring a published book called "Hacking Growth," a guide for driving growth. He said putting his work out there led people to find him and ultimately created opportunities.

"There's nothing stopping anyone from publishing and showing their work," Brown said. "And I think more people that do that, that's where good stuff happens."

• Google CEO Sundar Pichai was asked about his biggest regret with the company.
• He said Google debated acquiring Netflix "super intensely" at some point.
• Pichai also highlighted Google's achievements in research as a source of pride.

Sundar Pichai said he still wonders about some decisions Google has made — one of them being that the company never acquired Netflix.

The Google CEO gave a wide-ranging interview on the "All-In Podcast," which posted Friday. At the end of the talk, host David Friedberg, a former Googler himself, asked Pichai about his proudest moments — and biggest regret.

"We debated Netflix at some point, super intensely inside," Pichai said.

Pichai, who has been with the company since 2004 and became CEO about 10 years ago, said that acquisitions like Netflix were "debated hard" and the company "came close" to a deal. He later clarified that the decision against an acquisition was not a "regret," though.

In 2014, UK-based technology research firm CCS Insight predicted that Google would acquire Netflix in 2015, but there weren't widespread reports about acquisition discussions.

Since kicking off its global expansion in 2016, Netflix has been at the forefront of the entertainment industry and has hit over 300 million subscribers. While Google has entered the television space with its smart TV platform, Google TV, and its internet-based live streaming service, YouTube TV, it never fully broke into the traditional streaming space like Netflix.

Google has a long history of eating up the competition through high-profile acquisitions, but Netflix stands as one of the biggest names the tech giant has revealed it considered buying. Over the years, Google has successfully acquired a number of companies that have become central to its product line like Waze, Wiz, Nest, Fitbit, Android Inc., and YouTube.

Pichai added in the interview that he's proud of the fact that Google has pushed the boundaries of technology. He said there aren't many companies winning Nobel Prizes and conducting research and development that leads to the creation of businesses.

In 2024, Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis and director John Jumper won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for developing AlphaFold, an AI system that predicts the 3D structure of proteins. The tech giant also has departments like Google Research, which has invested in a wide range of topics and turned its findings into real-world products like wildfire detection and flood forecasting technology.

"I think we've done an extraordinary job at that, and we aspire to do that," Pichai said in the podcast, adding that it's a unique aspect of Google.

• Irene Ham purchased $62,250 in inventory for her new Korean skincare brand when the Liberation Day tariffs hit.
• She didn't end up being subject to the tariffs, but she had to pause her skin cleanser product.
• Ham learned valuable lessons about owning a business as she navigates a challenging launch period.

30-year-old Irene Ham had just poured $62,250 of savings into inventory for her new Korean cosmetics brand when President Donald Trump's Liberation Day tariffs were announced on April 2.

The shipment had been ordered but hadn't arrived yet. She said her heart sank when she heard the news.

"When the tariffs hit, it obviously was such an emotional piece of news for me," Ham, who recently launched Poom Cosmetics after working on it for two years, told Business Insider.

Ham said she had ordered the bare minimum the South Korean factory would allow — and even that pushed her financial limits. Then came the news of a 10% baseline tariff and a 25% "reciprocal" tariff, which she said would have made it impossible for her to move forward with her business. Ham was facing the possibility of over $21,000 in added expenses for the inventory shipment from South Korea. On top of that, her product packaging was sourced from China, which was set to be affected by a 54% tariff rate.

Because she paid customs before the tariffs went into effect, Ham avoided having to pay the tariffs on the South Korea shipment. However, she said the ongoing tariff uncertainty has led to setbacks.

She decided to pause launching a new face cleanser product line due to "unforeseen costs," though she had already finalized the formula, approved it, and completed the packaging design with her manufacturer.

Ham said she's been told she picked the "worst time" to start a business. Along with tariffs, the looming possibility of a TikTok ban poses a threat to her marketing efforts as she's built a following on the app by documenting her entrepreneurial venture.

Despite the challenges, Ham said that after reading up about the tariffs and learning they could be used as a negotiation tactic, she realized the situation wasn't all doom and gloom.

"I think if I started a business when it was all easy, everything was in my favor, then I don't think I would have the resilience to make it last," Ham said. "So, a part of me is actually a little thankful that it's the worst time to start."

The art of the pivot

Ham said she initially panicked about the newly announced tariff rates. But then she realized that she wouldn't necessarily have to raise her prices by 25% overall. The cost to manufacture her foundation would end up raising the price by $3 or $4 per bottle.

"So, adding that to the price instead of making it a huge astronomical number increase," Ham said, adding that it was more manageable.

Ham also realized that she could survive without getting packaging materials like boxes and logo stickers from China, so she started looking into US-based suppliers like Uline and Sticker Mule, which didn't increase their prices.

While that meant her products don't look as refined or custom-made as originally planned, she said sacrifices were needed if she didn't want customers to pay even more.

There was even a perk from making the switch. Ham said the turnaround time is faster, and there's no bulk order requirement.

Getting more confident in negotiating

As a result of navigating the tariff impact, Ham told BI that she's gained more confidence negotiating with manufacturers, particularly on the minimum order quantities.

Ham said some factories require 5,000 to 10,000 units per shade per product, which leads to a high order quantity and overall price.

"In future orders, I plan to negotiate that down to a number that feels fair for both me and the manufacturer," Ham said.

The next time she negotiates a new order, she'll be able to test her theory — that manufacturers could be more understanding and open to negotiating, given the changes happening in the US.

Keeping costs down

After initially thinking she had to pay thousands of dollars extra after spending her savings on her first batch of inventory, Ham said she's learned to cut expenses wherever she can.

"I've been very lean on my startup costs because of the tariffs," Ham said, adding that she's looking for ways to keep healthy product margins so she can "better absorb future curveballs."

For example, Ham said she has to pay for her Shopify account every month if she wants to have a preorder app. She decided that she just doesn't want those expenses to go up.

Now, whenever she feels tempted to spend more on custom packaging or other extras, she asks herself if it will lead to more sales or if it's merely a "vanity metric."

That mindset helps her make more cost-effective decisions, she said.

• Tesla Cybertrucks escorted President Trump through Doha after his arrival to Qatar.
• The President was also welcomed into the country by fighter jets.
• Trump arrived to Qatar on Wednesday as part of the first overseas trip of his second term.

At least two Tesla Cybertrucks led the way for President Donald Trump after his arrival in Qatar.

The bright red trucks — along with a red Audi — guided the president's usual motorcade through Doha. The vehicles appear to belong to the Lekhwiya, Qatar's special forces for internal security.

Elon Musk responded to a video of the motorcade on X and wrote "Cybertrucks escorting @POTUS!"

It's not Trump's first time being spotted with a Tesla. In March, he bought a red Model S sedan after Musk brought a selection of the EVs to the White House for a demonstration.

The president was escorted into the country by fighter jets and welcomed with a red carpet after landing. The visit took place after several news outlets reported on Qatar's plans to gift the president a luxury 747-8 jet, which Trump would make his new Air Force One.

Trump's arrival in Qatar is one of three stops on the first overseas trip of his second term. The trip is aimed at making business deals, along with addressing diplomatic issues like Iran's nuclear program and Israel's hostage crisis. Each of the Middle Eastern nations on his itinerary have also recently struck business deals with The Trump Organization.

Trump landed on Tuesday in Saudi Arabia, which the White House has said will invest $600 billion in the U.S. (though the actual amount could be much lower). On Wednesday, Qatar's state carrier Qatar Airways signed a deal to purchase 160 Boeing jets worth $200 billion. Trump is also expected to visit the United Arab Emirates during the trip.

"The Gulf Nations are at the forefront of creating a stable, peaceful, prosperous Middle East," Trump said.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, and other prominent American CEOs attended a US-Saudi investment forum on Tuesday.

Tesla and the White House did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

• Morgan Brown has worked through multiple tech revolutions at Facebook, Instagram, and Shopify.
• The Dropbox VP of product and growth suggested that product managers understand technical basics.
• He also said product managers should spend time learning the new tools and adapt to a faster pace.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Morgan Brown, Dropbox's VP of product and growth for AI products. The following has been edited for length and clarity.

We're sitting at a really interesting time.

My first job was at a tech startup in 1999 during the dot-com boom, and the world was changing incredibly fast. I've lived through a couple of these iterations — the big mobile revolution with the iPhone, then web 2.0.

The AI revolution seems like it's going to dwarf all of those, and it creates an opportunity for product managers to focus more on the unique attributes of creativity and innovation.

I've worked in product management at Facebook, Instagram, Shopify, and now Dropbox. This is my advice for product managers to level up their careers in the AI age.

Spend time with the new tools

I think all product managers and business leaders should be spending a lot of time with new tools, whether you call it vibe coding or vibe marketing.

There's never been a better time for product managers to test new ideas. Rather than having to write a doc, you can build an app. You can prototype something really quickly to validate some assumptions and learn what may or may not work.

Most product managers didn't previously have access to moving out of that conceptual realm into the physical reality of what these ideas actually look and feel like. Now, there's a new opportunity to accelerate how they think about developing their taste, developing their craft, and understanding what makes sense in physical products.

Use AI as a thought partner

I don't think the highest and best use of AI is using AI to do something for you. I think it's really about how AI can be a thought and collaboration partner. There are a bunch of different ways that it can just augment the human capability of innovation and creative ideas.

I try to use it in a way that pushes my immediate thinking capacity in my daily life. For example, if we're looking at how we can make our product more differentiated, I might feed it some ways that we're thinking about it and ask it to think of five more ways. I also try to have a council of LLMs as opposed to one, whether it's Dropbox's Dash or Claude, or ChatGPT.

I think of these tools as ways to unlock more of that, and I think that's really the most exciting opportunity. It's about how you make that deep work time more productive with a thought partner who can help you expand your thinking.

Understand the basics

It's really important to have a basic understanding of the domain you're operating in.

Understanding how different components of a technical stack interoperate at a system level really helps you understand what's possible. And I think the people who understand those the most deeply find the most interesting opportunities to bring new value and new product ideas to market.

I also think being able to speak the language and having an understanding of the system will always be important. If we take everything as a black box, then we lack the understanding of what's possible if we had a deeper insight into how it actually works.

Adapt to the pace

Another thing product managers should do is realize how fast things are changing. At tech companies, most people operate in six-month performance cycles, quarterly roadmaps, and bi-weekly status updates.

Today, that's just not tenable. So I think product managers need to really understand the speed at which things are moving. Then, they need to think about how to create learning opportunities, systems, and behaviors to keep up with that.

I think that's how you augment your skills, whether it's through AI, reworking how your team works, or reworking how a road map three months from now will be totally obsolete with some startup that launches tomorrow.

Make time for the "deep work"

When you talk to a product manager team and they say 40% of their time is spent on project management, that's not where you want them. You want them focused on the "deep work," which they can do more of if they automate the busy work.

You can't really think about how something might work as a product in between Slack pings. You really need to sit down for a couple of hours, map some stuff out, and play with the problem space. Creating that distraction-free time to do that expansive thinking and then converging on a few ideas is the type of work that most companies would die to have more of.

• Rivian opened its first concept experience in Manhattan's Meatpacking District.
• The space had a relaxing, laid-back, and earthy atmosphere.
• I also tried an "adventure drive" to The Met Cloisters, which customers can now sign up for quarterly.

Rivian's first-ever concept experience takes its luxurious boho vibe to another level.

Located under the High Line, the store revolves around themes that roll out annually, with the current one being "Adventure Is In Us."

That theme is on display in the store's design and also embedded in new offerings like "adventure drives," which I got to try out for myself. The program allows customers to sign up quarterly for small group drives to local day trip spots like the Met Cloisters or Storm King Art Center. The space will also continue to offer standard demo drives.

Rivian's director of regional marketing, Sara Webster Wylie, told BI that the concept experience is designed to broaden the brand's reach. While Rivian scores highly in customer satisfaction among its current owners, it's still in the process of gaining wider recognition as an EV maker.

A Rivian spokesperson told BI that the Brooklyn space typically draws visitors who are already familiar with the brand. The new space, which launched in 2023 as a showroom and is centered in a tourist hub, has the potential to introduce more people to the brand.

Similar to its Brooklyn showroom, Rivian is also trying to embed the local community into its concept experience. The company said that the new space will also host events like community gatherings and panel conversations.

The space had a "soft" open on May 2, and it hosted a series of events the weekend after. I went to its first launch event on Friday, which included breakfast, a sustainable activity, and an adventure ride to The Met Cloisters.

Keep reading to see what it was like.

I arrived at Rivian's concept space on a gloomy Friday morning.

The concept space is located right around the High Line park on 461 W 14th Street. While the area is usually a hot spot for tourists, the vibes that day were dark and gloomy in the city.

Rivian's warm, laid-back atmosphere made the rainy day feel like part of the experience.

Rivian's floor-to-ceiling windows and warm design made the space feel like a green oasis on a rainy day.

The design felt like an amplified version of the Rivian showroom in Brooklyn.

Rivian's Brooklyn showroom had similar design aspects, like ambient lighting, wood accents, and greenery. However, the concept space felt like a more refined version. It was slightly less colorful and busy, leaning more into a luxurious and minimalist vibe.

The space itself was impressive.

The Brooklyn showroom had a more neighborhood, small-town feel, while this space felt a bit more expansive and showy.

I helped myself to an Apollo bagel and fruit.

Apollo Bagels is currently one of the hot bagel spots in New York City. It didn't disappoint.

Rivian also had coffee, orange juice, Boxed Water, and a small assortment of pastries that looked delicious.

There was also a coffee station.

The automaker offered hot tea, hot chocolate, lattes, cappuccinos, and cortados.

Rivian said that it expanded food and beverage service for visitors, including coffee from local purveyor Don Carvajal, and tea from Harney & Sons.

There were three Rivians stationed in the store.

Rivian had the storm blue R1S in the front of the space, the glacier white R1T in the middle, and the Rivian blue R1S in the back of the space.

The adventure theme was highlighted throughout the space.

There were camping stations and accessories strategically placed throughout the store.

My favorite part of the location was the sound immersion room.

Rivian had a sound immersion room with a video display on the wall that showed different city landscapes and other scenes.

Wylie said that the experience is designed to immerse visitors in a sensory experience. The website describes it as more of a "playground" than a "showroom." Visitors can drink coffee or tea, explore displays, step into a sound immersion room, and discover new experiences through the adventure ride.

"Ultimately, we want to inspire a sense of adventure in anyone who visits," Wylie said.

I stayed in the sound immersion room for about 10 minutes. It was very relaxing.

The pillows and seats were comfortable, and the room was dimly lit and cozy. As someone who pays for meditation classes in the city, it was nice to experience a similar experience at no cost.

The space had child-friendly activities, like Rivian's Brooklyn showroom.

Similar to Rivian's Brooklyn location, which had a lot of kid-friendly characteristics, the concept experience had kids' books and interactive activities, like listening to sounds and touching the material of the cars.

There was an emphasis on EV education, especially related to charging.

Rivian's Brooklyn showroom featured plenty of text and wall displays explaining EV ownership, but the concept space seemed to take the educational aspect a step further. It had simplified graphics to engage an audience that may be less familiar with EV ownership.

Rivian partnered with a plastic-recycling company, allowing visitors to make keychains out of recycled plastic.

Rivian stationed a waste design studio called Are You Mad at the space. The studio showed attendees how plastic is turned into other materials and had a table for making keychains.

I'm not particularly artistic, and my keychain did fall apart shortly after I finished (my fault), but I found the process surprisingly cathartic.

Rivian had a digital display showing the stories of owners.

The regional marketing director told me that Rivian added sensory elements to the space to connect visitors to the brand on a deeper level. That includes digital displays to listen to owner stories and sound experiences for kids to guess sounds around the city.

I listened to a local vegan restaurant owner share their Rivian experience.

I had actually heard about the restaurant, so it was cool to see the brand spotlight the owners. It felt like a genuine — and successful — effort to connect with the local community.

There were lots of interactive activities throughout the store.

This photo shows an interactive experience that allowed visitors to vote for their favorite color with cork balls. It was one of several creative interactive elements placed throughout the store.

You could map out what an upstate trip would look like.

The display allowed users to choose preselected choices, including Arcadia National Park, Montauk, the Outer Banks, or their own pick. I chose Mauntauk, and it showed me how long it would take from the Meatpacking District concept space and the charging hubs along the way.

I went on an adventure drive

I opted not to drive in the rain, so one of the employees took the wheel. It's not necessarily easy to go on a roughly hourlong drive with people you just met, but the employees were down-to-earth and easy to get along with.

It was my first time spending extended time in a car in months, and it felt like I was on a road trip.

Rivian's director of regional marketing told me its vehicles were designed to feel like you're in a living room — and that's what it felt like

Rivian's vehicles have a modern and comfortable feel, with functional features like floor storage and ample space between the seats and the cabin. They also have a minimalist aesthetic, and materials like vegan leather add to the soft and earthy vibe.

A tour guide took the launch event attendees on a private tour of the museum.

The tour lasted about 45 minutes.

It was a peaceful break from the city.

The Met Cloisters were a nice break from the city, and the ability to go with a car made the experience feel easy and comfortable instead of stressful with planning.

I decided to try the backseat on the way back to the concept store. It was comfortable and spacious, but I felt a bit car sick.

I get carsick from time to time, and I did feel a bit nauseous on the way back.

I loved that Rivian made the city a focal part of the experience, but also made it feel like an escape.

While living and touring New York City can be exciting, it can also feel overstimulating. I admired Rivian's ability to curate a space that highlighted aspects of city living and connected with the local community and lifestyle while also offering a break from some of the parts of it that can feel overwhelming.

I thought the "adventure drives" offering was also a clever move. While standard demo drives can be cool to experience, most people aren't likely to sign up for one unless they're actively shopping for a car, especially if the brand isn't widely popular.

I also thought it was a smart way to show a wider aspect of ownership. By offering an opportunity to explore outside the streets of New York, customers may be more incentivized to experience the brand for a longer duration and get a real taste of ownership.

Many people, like myself, enjoy a break from the city from time to time. Taking an SUV to a more secluded area definitely captured that sense of escape — and the rain added to the feeling of adventure.

• Google's VP of search experience and the cofounder of Google Lens has advice for pitching management on ideas.
• Rajan Patel told BI you should know what problems the world — and your manager — need solving.
• He also suggests seeking feedback from people your manager trusts and backing up your idea with data.

As VP of search experience at Google and the cofounder of some of its most popular products, Rajan Patel knows a thing or two about pitching ideas to the higher-ups.

Patel was one of the creators of Google Lens, a tool launched in 2017 that's become a popular way for people to find answers to what they're looking at by snapping a photo of it. It now has 25 billion search queries every month and just underwent its latest update called "AI Mode" in Google Labs, allowing users to get AI responses with links to their photo searches.

Patel also led the development of other major tools, including Google Podcasts and Google Flu Trends. Now, he leads the engineering teams in Google Search, including Discover, Image Search, Lens, and Autocomplete.

But before those products could see the light of day, there was the task of pitching them. And while not everyone is pitching tech products, getting ideas in front of management is a task many of us have to do at some point in our careers, if not regularly.

In an interview with Business Insider, Patel shared five things that employees should do when pitching management.

1. Understand the problems around you

Patel said those who push the needle on what's possible within Google Search have a "deep connection to solving problems." In order to figure out what problems the people around us need solved, you need to be plugged in to what's going on around you, he said.

"You have to be able to absorb information from all around, not just your company, but from what's going on in the industry," Patel told BI, adding that you need to "deeply understand" the types of problems your product area and team are trying to solve.

Patel said it's important to always be learning, listening, and understanding. Those observations should then be incorporated into the ideas you develop.

The ability to search using your natural voice while using your phone, for example, is a feature that lots of people would find helpful.

2. Know your manager's priorities

Once you're tapped into what the people and industries around you care about, it's worth thinking about the problems that align with your manager, Patel said. When pitching an idea to them, Patel said you should make sure your idea addresses one of their priorities.

"Understand what problems your manager is looking to solve. What matters most to them," Patel said.

That means knowing whether your manager is focused on growth, cost reduction, innovation, or something else. Patel also suggested using the language that your manager uses when pitching the idea.

3. Do your research

Patel said you want your idea to be an easy "yes."

To do so, you'll want to show your manager that you've thought through the cost and practicalities of what it would take to move forward. That may include investing in resources, deprioritizing other projects, or something else. The bottom line is you want your manager to know you've thought through the idea, the Google VP said.

"Convince them that tradeoffs are worthwhile," Patel said.

You should also present your idea with data that backs up your idea, he added, such as from a "small test you ran." The data should be new information that your manager wasn't already aware of.

4. Get feedback from others

Patel suggested getting feedback from people your manager trusts before presenting an idea. Patel said that a manager's first instinct may be to ask you to get feedback from others, so having that done already can help provide credibility.

Patel added that one of the benefits of creating a product within the company you work at is being able to leverage the network around you, Patel said.

"One of the cool things about getting to work at Google is there's so many brilliant people here doing incredible things," Patel said. "It turns out I have colleagues that have won Nobel Prizes."

Taking any learnings that come from soundboarding your idea off your network and applying the feedback can make your pitch stronger.

5. Chase your passions

Many entrepreneurs who are passionate about an idea go off to start their own business, but Patel said he was interested in developing products within Google. In his case, he said it made sense to stay within the tech giant to carry out his vision.

Patel said he doesn't recommend the same path for everybody, but he does suggest working in an area that you feel passionate about.

"You will do really great work if you do work in an area that you're super passionate about," Patel said, adding that "you're only going to put in the work if you're really dedicated to it and if you love it."

Patel, who received a Ph.D in biostatistics and neuroimaging prior to working at Google, said that advice also applies to what you decide to study in college or grad school. He said if you work on something you're passionate about, you'll be "very likely to succeed."

• Tesla canceled its range extender — and it's one of many Cybertruck promises the company hasn't delivered.
• The EV truck is also more expensive, with the cheapest version of the Cybertruck starting at $69,990.
• Other features that didn't make it into the final vehicle include crab walking and floating.

The Cybertruck has changed a lot since Elon Musk first unveiled it in 2019.

Tesla's first pickup, which finally launched in November 2023, has had a rocky rollout, with multiple recalls and early challenges in scaling up production.

The Cybertrucks for sale right now have less range and a far higher price tag than Musk initially predicted, with the cheapest model available costing nearly $70,000, compared to the $39,900 that Musk promised.

Here are some of the Cybertruck features that Musk has talked about over the years that failed to materialize.

1. A $39,900 price tag

When Musk first unveiled the Cybertruck in 2019, he said the cheapest version would cost $39,900, with more advanced variants costing $49,900 and $77,000.

But that didn't work out. In 2023, Tesla shipped a $120,000 Foundation Series version of the Cybertruck and said its cheapest model would actually cost $60,990 and would arrive in 2025. Tesla recently released its Long Range version of the Cybertruck, which has a $69,990 price tag. The Cyberbeast, its most expensive version, cost around $100,000.

The price hike disappointed many Tesla fans, and made the Cybertruck something of a status car when it first arrived. Now that the market has become more saturated and the truck has been targeted by political backlash, some consider the EV overpriced.

2. 500-mile range

Musk also said in 2019 that the most advanced tri-motor version of the Cybertruck would have a 500-mile range.

That would have made it one of the longest-range EVs on the market, but it was a promise Tesla didn't deliver on.

The automaker advertises the $69,990 Long Range Cybertruck as having an estimated 350 miles of range, with the roughly $100,000 "Cyberbeast" clocking in at 301 miles.

Tesla previously had plans to offer a $16,000 "range extender." The battery pack would sit in the truck bed of the vehicle and increase the vehicle's range to over 470 miles. In October, Tesla reduced the range to 445 miles and delayed it from early to mid-2025.

In early May, Tesla canceled the product and refunded pre-orders.

3. Cyberquad

Musk ended the 2019 Cybertruck event with a surprise unveiling of the "Cyberquad," a Tesla quad bike.

The billionaire wrote at the time on X that the Cyberquad would be a two-seater ATV that would be released at the same time as the truck.

Tesla did release a $1,900 kids version of the Cyberquad, which now costs $1,650 and previously faced a recall, but the full-size quad bike is yet to materialize.

4. The Cybertruck functioning as a boat

One of the most eye-catching promises Musk made about the Cybertruck is that it would be able to float and serve as a boat for short periods.

The Tesla CEO wrote on X that the pickup would be waterproof enough to "cross rivers, lakes, & even seas that aren't too choppy."

Although the Cybertruck has a "wade mode" that allows drivers to drive through 30 inches of water for a limited time, it's far from sea-worthy.

Musk appears to have not given up on this feature, however, posting on X last December that Tesla would release another upgrade that would allow the Cybertruck to "traverse at least 100m of water as a boat."

He reiterated its potential in April when responding to a video on X of a Cybertruck driving in a lake.

5. Crab walking

In 2021, Musk wrote on X that the initial production run of Cybertrucks would have four motors, one for each wheel, allowing it to turn 360 degrees like a tank and move diagonally like a crab.

But this feature never made it off the Tesla drawing board. Cybertruck lead engineer Wes Morrill said in April that Tesla experimented with the feature but couldn't find a practical use for it.

"We played with this in development, but no matter what we tried, it was a clunky/awkward experience with no real use case," he wrote in a post on X.

Tesla did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider, sent outside normal working hours.

• Tesla has canceled its Cybertruck range extender, which was set for a mid-2025 release.
• The optional battery pack would've extended the distance it could drive before needing to recharge.
• Tesla's decision follows previous delays and a reduction in initial range estimates.

RIP, Cybertruck range extender.

Cybertruck owners no longer have the option to pay $16,000 more for an accessory to extend their vehicle's range.

A Tesla customer service representative confirmed to Business Insider on Thursday that Tesla was no longer selling the Cybertruck range extender and that customers who had previously deposited $2,000 to reserve the accessory were refunded. Electrek previously reported the news.

The add-on battery pack was initially marketed as arriving in mid-2025. The battery would have taken up one-third of the Cybertruck's bed.

With the battery pack, Tesla said the dual-motor variant would achieve about 445 miles of range, and the range of the tri-motor "Cyberbeast" top-of-the-line variant would be extended over 415 miles. The cancellation comes after Tesla delayed the Cybertruck range extender in October and reduced its initial range estimate by 25 miles. Speculation about further delays began last month when the automaker removed the battery pack from the Cybertruck online configurator.

The battery pack would have helped the electric vehicle deliver specs closer to what Tesla and CEO Elon Musk initially advertised to customers. When the automaker announced the electric pickup truck in 2019, it said the highest-end model would deliver over 500 miles of range and cost $77,000, with cheaper versions priced at $39,900 and $49,900.

That didn't happen. The Cybertruck went on to launch with an advertised range between 301 and 318 miles and at prices tens of thousands of dollars more, with the $120,000 Foundation Series shipping first in 2023 and the lowest-cost version starting at $60,990.

Musk also previously said that the Cybertruck could temporarily function as a boat, with the ability to "cross rivers, lakes, & even seas that aren't too choppy." While the vehicle can drive through roughly 30 inches of water for a limited time, the boat functionality didn't materialize. Musk has since said Tesla would release an update that allows it to "traverse at least 100m of water as a boat." He replied in April to a video posted on X of a Tesla crossing through a lake, saying: "With a little work, it should be able to cross some open water."

The range extender's cancellation is the latest setback for the vehicle. As some owners grapple with anti-Tesla vandalism and harassment on the road amid protests critical of Musk, the vehicle has struggled with sales. A March 20 recall filing disclosed that Tesla delivered fewer than 50,000 Cybertrucks, and workers have also told BI that the automaker scaled back production of the pickup truck.

Do you have a story about putting down a deposit for the Cybertruck range extender? Contact this reporter via email at [email protected] or via secure messaging platform Signal at aalt.19.

• LinkedIn launched an AI-powered job search to improve role discovery for users.
• Over 50% of job seekers miss opportunities due to unclear search filters, the company said.
• The AI tool allows users to describe their ideal job and offers more personalized results.

It's hard to pinpoint the most painful part of the job hunt — the whole process can feel pretty agonizing.

I remember dreading searching for jobs when I graduated from college. I knew what my interests were and had an idea of where I wanted to end up, but I wasn't quite sure where to begin my search.

To help remedy some of the challenges that come with job hunting, LinkedIn launched a new feature on Wednesday that allows users to find available jobs by describing what they want in the search bar.

The career platform said in an announcement of the feature on Wednesday that more than 50% of job seekers miss out on relevant opportunities because they don't know which filters to apply. Additionally, two-thirds of professionals find it difficult to know which titles to search for, the company said in an announcement.

The AI-powered search is designed to understand the user's intent and provide "precise end-aligned results," the announcement said.

"Our new AI-powered job search flips the script: you can now simply express what you want in your own words," Tomer Cohen, chief Product Officer at LinkedIn, wrote in a post announcing the new tool.

I tried out the tool at LinkedIn's launch event on Tuesday. My biggest takeaway is that I wish I had access to it when I was looking for a job after college.

It makes job hunting feel more approachable

I enjoyed using the new feature because it allowed me to take control of the job search instead of trying to guess what aligns with company-created titles. That alone made the job-hunting process feel more approachable.

Instead of searching for broad roles like "entry-level marketing" and then searching for an industry in the filters, the new feature lets users get more specific. Now, users can type something like, "I want to work in marketing in the video game industry but I have no experience," and the search will come up with more targeted results related to video gaming.

The new AI-powered search isn't entirely revolutionary. Previously, users could use filters to narrow their search. Last year, LinkedIn also announced its conversational job search to premium members, which helped translate queries. However, a LinkedIn spokesperson told Business Insider that the technology was "old" and "limited by taxonomies and standardized titles."

"We learned what queries members liked to use and updated the technology, creating a better, more robust experience," the spokesperson said. "We found our members really engaged with conversational search, so we made the technology even better."

The new AI-powered search recognizes nuances in phrasing and intent, the spokesperson told BI. Users can say things like "I want to use my marketing skills to solve climate change" or "I want to use my engineering skills to take me to Mars."

The search then comes up with relevant roles, even if the exact words don't appear in the job posting, the spokesperson said.

It's especially helpful for those who don't know where to start

If you've been an English teacher for 10 years and you're looking for a teaching job at a new school, "English teacher" might suffice as a keyword in the search bar. With the previous version of LinkedIn job searches, users could have also refined the search by selecting their ideal location and pay range in the filters.

The pathway may not be so clear for recent grads or job seekers looking for a career pivot. I'm 26, so many of my friends know they want a career change, but they don't know what's next or how to find it. I could see this being particularly helpful for job seekers who need a starting point to brainstorm possible career paths.

For example, someone who wants to pivot from working in a cybersecurity department at a tech company to a dedicated cybersecurity firm can tailor their search. Similarly, a lawyer looking for a role in a niche area like mining can specify that interest.

Applicants may also want to hedge their job search on limited experience, with searches such as, "I want to work in sales, but I only have customer service experience. Show me opportunities that use both skill sets."

Based on what I've tried so far, it seems like the roles that surfaced were relevant to my search.

For example, I typed in "I want to work in journalism but have no formal writing experience" and found a number of positions I would have been interested at the start of my career.

Many of the roles that surfaced also had a fairly low number of applicants, around 100 or lower, which felt more accessible than some of the high-applicant postings that I used to see.

• New LinkedIn data reveals construction is the fastest-growing industry for new college graduates.
• Other skilled trades are also rising, with utilities in second place, and oil, gas, and mining in third.
• LinkedIn's head of economics said a slowdown in hiring is expected to hit the construction industry.

Don't be surprised if you start seeing "day-in-the-life" videos of construction workers pop up on your feed — the industry is having a moment.

LinkedIn released data on Wednesday that reveals construction is the fastest-growing industry for new college grads. Other skilled trades are also on the rise among entry-level workers, with utilities coming in second place and oil, gas, and mining in third.

"Construction is topping the list," LinkedIn head of economics Kory Kantenga shared at a company event on Tuesday. "Construction has had a really good few years."

Kantenga said that momentum in construction is driven by the Inflation Reduction Act. The IRA provides tax incentives for clean energy and energy-efficient investments, which could lead to more projects. The initiative also resulted in improved wages for clean energy workers.

Growth in the industry is also a result of high interest rates for mortgages, which has led to fewer people selling their houses, and increased interest in building homes, Kantenga said.

Growth in oil, gas, and mining among entry-level workers is likely tied to migration toward the Sunbelt, specifically Texas, Kantenga said.

"As the nation's top oil producer, Texas has drawn many entry-level workers since the pandemic, thanks to its lack of state income tax, lower cost of living, and milder weather compared to northern coastal regions," Kantenga said.

New opportunities in skilled trade industries may also be a result of the AI boom. Efforts to develop AI have led to increased demand for energy infrastructure and policies.

Google recently wrote in a blog post that there's a "demand for trade skills that can construct electrical infrastructure." The tech giant announced in the post that it would support an effort to train 100,000 electrical workers and 30,000 apprentices in the US.

"A shortage of electrical workers may constrain America's ability to build the infrastructure needed to support AI, advanced manufacturing and a shift to clean energy," the announcement said.

While college degrees aren't required to work in many skilled-trade industries, a job in construction or mining doesn't necessarily mean working in a position on the ground. For example, those graduating with law degrees might not be considering construction, but there are also opportunities for legal roles in the field, Kantenga said.

"There's actually a lot of due diligence that happens in construction with contracts," Kantenga said, adding that there "might be council opportunities at big construction firms" or due diligence jobs at legal firms.

Just because construction is trending now doesn't mean that the career path will stay that way long term. Kantenga said at the event that some slowdown is expected in the industry if Canada is placed under import restrictions.

"We in America do not have enough lumber to build the houses that we want to build," Kantenga said, adding that new trade barriers on softwood lumber from Canada would be a headwind for the industry.

While job seekers may not be able to control the obstacles industries face, Kentanga said it's important for job seekers to know the challenges of the industry they're entering and have a targeted approach.

• I visited a Rivian and Tesla showroom in New York City, and the vibes felt completely different.
• Rivian seemed likely to appeal to environmentally friendly, family-oriented, and outdoorsy buyers.
• Tesla had a museum-like feel and seemed to target tech-forward consumers with a futuristic vision.

Rivian and Tesla are two of the most popular EV makers in the US, but after visiting their New York City showrooms, it became clear to me that the brands are taking very different approaches to their in-store experience.

After seeing a recent TikTok trend about Tesla owners ditching their cars for Rivians amid political backlash toward Elon Musk, I expected to observe more interchangeable aspects between the two brands. After visiting their showrooms, though, it feels like their brand identities have little in common aside from selling EVs.

Neither showroom offered a traditional car dealership experience. The sales staff took a low-pressure approach, and the spaces seemed to be designed to immerse customers in the brand experience rather than being geared exclusively around closing deals.

Rivian's space seemed to target environmentally friendly and outdoorsy family buyers, with employees highlighting products like camping tools, flashlights, and speakers. The space also seemed to be actively embedded in the community through partnerships with local organizations and artisan shops.

Meanwhile, Tesla's showroom, located in Manhattan's upscale Meatpacking District, sold a vision of what the future could look like with displays of its Full Self-Driving tech and humanoid robots. The space had more of a sci-fi museum feel and encouraged customers to experience the company's innovations firsthand.

Both brands have famously loyal fan bases, sell top-of-the-line EVs, and are making moves to launch more affordable models. Rivian and Tesla have some of the highest customer satisfaction ratings, according to Consumer Reports' 2025 Automotive Report Card, despite the vehicle brands being rated as among the least reliable.

Scroll on to see photos from my showroom visits that highlight how differently the two brands approach connecting with potential customers.

I started with a visit to Rivian's Brooklyn showroom on a Wednesday afternoon.

Rivian is renovating its Meatpacking District space, so I toured the showroom on 366 Wythe Ave in Brooklyn. It's an open space with a garage door entrance and front door.

It had two EVs featured in the store.

Rivian had a Tri-Motor R1S SUV and a Tri-Motor R1T truck at its Brooklyn store.

Rivian had Boxed Water in a basket at the door.

It's an eco-friendly choice — but also an expensive one.

It kind of felt like the EV version of a Patagonia store — the vibes were upscale and granola.

The employees were friendly and laid-back. The showroom didn't have a traditional office space for employees, just casual seating and some longer desks.

The decor was colorful, outdoorsy, and relaxed.

There were white shade lamps hanging down from the ceiling, large leafy plants placed throughout the store, and lots of funky patterns, like stripes and checkers in different colors.

A Rivian spokesperson told me visitors often choose to hang out a while, and I could see why.

There seemed to be no shortage of lounge seating.

The massive L couch in the middle of the store was a highlight.

Next to it was a neon green circle cushion and two padded chairs with wooden side tables. The area was large and included orange, red, blue, and green accents.

A Rivian spokesperson told me that the store is designed for families.

A station with blocks and toys was on the table in front of the couch. The store also showed off accessories like a camping bag tucked in the car.

The posters were informative and accessible. They explained what EV ownership is like and what the brand offers.

The spokesperson said that people generally come in wanting to buy a Rivian or to learn more about EVs. They often have questions about charging, she said.

She also told me that the location hosts events and programs to welcome owners and locals into the space.

A Rivian spokesperson said that the company makes an effort to be a part of the local community. In March, it hosted an event with Roseate and the Billion Oyster Project that included a panel conversation, networking, and test drives of its vehicles.

This Sunday, it's hosting a Mother's Day flower crown-making event. A Rosie Day, a local children's programmer, is coming to the space to teach attendees how to create flower crowns, the spokesperson said.

The store had a merchandise section with locally sourced reusable bags

Rivian featured a table with ANYBAG bags. According to its website, the brand repurposes single-use plastic bags and handcrafts them in Manhattan by New Yorkers.

A Rivian employee took me on a test drive.

I had the option of driving or being driven. I chose to be driven. The experience was very tech-forward and smooth. The digital screen has a cartoon-like representation of the vehicle.

I didn't see too many customers during my visit.

I spent about an hour at the store, and there weren't too many visitors. The spokesperson told me that the store gets most of its traffic on the weekends, but there are still walk-ins and demo drive sign-ups during the week.

I went to Tesla's showroom in the Meatpacking District the next day.

The showroom was located at 860 Washington Street in the heart of the Meatpacking District.

The first thing I noticed was a cleaning staff dusting off surfaces and cleaning the space.

When I arrived, an employee was cleaning the windows at the entrance. Throughout my time at the showroom, the cleaning staff was dusting off counters and walls.

There was a steady flow of visitors from the moment I arrived until I left.

On a Thursday afternoon, Tesla had a handful of visitors come in and out of the showroom.

A sales employee at the store told me that on the weekends, they do about 200 test rides in a day, and most of them are with the Cybertruck.

The store's design was tech-forward, sleek, and futuristic.

The store mostly featured a monochromatic palette of Black, white, silver, and gray. There was an occasional tint of red or blue from the posters on the wall, the Tesla logo in the entrance, or the car lights.

There were seating options, but it didn't have the same relaxed hangout vibe as Rivian.

There were some seating options at Tesla's showroom, but the layout mainly provided standing space.

The space was child-friendly but didn't appear to be designed specifically for families.

There doesn't seem to be a shortage of children excited about the Cybertruck. However, the space didn't feel as set up to cater to families with children in the way Rivian seemed to be.

Tesla had some interactive elements in the space.

Similar to Rivian, Tesla displayed an EV charger on the wall.

The wall posters were more show than tell.

The Tesla wall art was more minimalistic than Rivian, and seemed to be more aesthetically driven than educational.

Instead of including explanatory graphics and text about EV charging, Tesla had photos of its core products and light descriptions with more of an advertisement feel.

The Cybertruck was a focal point.

Despite recent backlash surrounding the Cybertruck, it seemed to be the showroom's main attraction and was located at the front of the entrance. Many of the visitors who came to the showroom seemed to be there for the Cybertruck.

The space also showed off Tesla's tech.

Tesla had key pieces of its autonomous driving tech on display. The Full Self-Driving computer and Autopilot Cameras were featured in a clear glass box next to the window, making it feel like a museum.

Tesla's Optimus humanoid robot was on display.

Tesla also had a humanoid robot facing the window in the center of the space. The company isn't selling the robots, which are still in development.

The staff seemed used to tourists popping in and taking photos.

While the employees were friendly, they gave me space to walk around on my own and didn't ask me any questions about my plans for purchasing a vehicle.

I was offered an espresso while I waited for my test ride.

I declined a beverage, but it made the experience feel more luxurious.

I rode in a Cybertruck. The test drive felt more like a tech demo, while Rivian was more focused on providing information.

The sales employee showed me how the digital screen worked and then took me on the drive. He started the drive off by showing off Tesla's Full Self-Driving technology, which costs extra and is currently in beta. The car drove to the Shake Shack a few minutes away.

Then, the employee showed me how fast the Cybertruck could accelerate. Depending on the model, Tesla says it can accelerate from 0 to 60 miles per hour in 2.6 to 6.2 seconds. However, because of the area we were in, we couldn't accelerate at the maximum rate.

Still, it was the fastest I've ever accelerated in a vehicle.

Tesla also had a merch section, but it was centered on its most popular products and less wilderness-focused.

While Rivian sold outdoorsy clothing and reusable bags from local vendors, Tesla's merchandise section was about the Tesla brand. It featured hats with logos, key cards and fobs, and collectible mini items like the Cybertruck.

I was surprised at how normal — and popular — this showroom seemed, given the recent rise in anti-Tesla sentiment.

One of the employees told me that foot traffic to the store hadn't really changed. I asked the employee about one of the recent protests at the store on Earth Day, and he said a very small number of people showed up. He said protesters usually take their pictures and leave, and it's not as crazy as it might seem online.

To sum it up: I enjoyed both experiences.

Looking back at both of my experiences, Rivian seemed to target a more down-to-earth, environmentally friendly crowd. The brand emphasized outdoor adventures and informed customers about EV ownership.

Tesla, on the other hand, came across as a brand that didn't need much introduction or explaining. Its showroom felt more like a space for people who know the name and wanted to experience the tech in person, perhaps to get a closer look at the Cybertruck's angular design. While I don't feel like I need all the cutting-edge tech that Tesla offers — and I'm not in the market for a new car — it was cool to see in person and try out.

I liked the design elements of both showrooms. Rivian's boho vibe was relaxing, while Tesla's product lineup was impressive.

I didn't walk away with a favorite, but I can see how EV shoppers might identify with one brand more than the other. After all, they're each taking very different approaches.

• OpenAI says its nonprofit will remain in control.
• The company is in the process of transforming its structure as it looks to better position itself to raise more money to train its AI.
• Its latest plan will satisfy requirements accompanying recent investments by SoftBank and other investors, a person familiar with the matter told Business Insider.

OpenAI appears to have decided that transferring control away from its nonprofit isn't worth the hassle after all.

The AI giant on Monday announced that its nonprofit would remain in control of its for-profit division, which is responsible for its money-making chatbot ChatGPT and other products, even after the subsidiary transforms into a public benefit corporation.

"We made the decision for the nonprofit to retain control of OpenAI after hearing from civic leaders and engaging in constructive dialogue with the offices of the Attorney General of Delaware and the Attorney General of California," the company wrote in a blog post published to its website.

OpenAI started nearly a decade ago as a nonprofit research organization focused on the safe development of AI. In 2019, it announced it would transition to a "capped-profit model" and added a for-profit arm to help raise funds for its mission.

In September, less than a year after CEO Sam Altman was temporarily ousted as CEO before his return several days later, the company officially announced it planned to move to a for-profit business model. Altman previously said the decision to do so came down to funding. The CEO said the company needed more capital to scale AI models, which can cost billions to train, and a nonprofit simply couldn't attract it.

"Instead of our current complex capped-profit structure — which made sense when it looked like there might be one dominant AGI effort but doesn't in a world of many great AGI companies — we are moving to a normal capital structure where everyone has stock," Altman wrote in a letter to employees and investors on Monday. "This is not a sale, but a change of structure to something simpler."

Reversing course and leaving the nonprofit in control

OpenAI's road to becoming a for-profit company outside the control of its nonprofit was shaping up to be fairly rocky, prior to Monday's backtracking.

To change its structure so that its nonprofit entity was no longer calling the shots for its for-profit division, OpenAI would have needed to convert its assets, determine Altman and other investors' equity, redefine the governance structure of the for-profit entity and the nonprofit, and change its certificate of incorporation and structure under Delaware law.

In addition to legal headaches, OpenAI's earlier announcement that it planned to become a more traditional for-profit company was also met with a wave of public criticism, perhaps most vocally from its billionaire cofounder, Elon Musk, who is no longer involved at OpenAI. The Tesla CEO, who created a rival AI company, xAI, after leaving OpenAI's board, filed multiple lawsuits against the company in an attempt to halt the planned governance changes.

Mark Zuckerberg's Meta, which competes with OpenAI, also spoke out against the startup's transition plans. Meta accused OpenAI of "taking advantage" of its status as a nonprofit to raise money, and asked the California attorney general to stop OpenAI from becoming a for-profit company in a December letter.

OpenAI's decision to keep its nonprofit in control comes after it announced in March that it had closed the largest private tech funding round on record at $40 billion, bringing the company's valuation to $300 billion. OpenAI reportedly had a clause in its investor agreement for the funding round that said if it didn't complete its transition to a for-profit company within the next two years, investors could ask for their money back.

A person familiar with the matter told Business Insider that OpenAI's transition will satisfy the requirements accompanying the investments made by SoftBank and other investors, which require OpenAI to complete its corporate transition within a set timeframe.

You can read Altman's full letter to OpenAI employees and investors discussing the planned changes below:

Sam Altman's letter to employees

OpenAI is not a normal company and never will be.

Our mission is to ensure that artificial general intelligence (AGI) benefits all of humanity.

When we started OpenAI, we did not have a detailed sense for how we were going to accomplish our mission. We started out staring at each other around a kitchen table, wondering what research we should do. Back then, we did not contemplate products, a business model. We could not contemplate the direct benefits of AI being used for medical advice, learning, productivity, and much more, or the needs for hundreds of billions of dollars of compute to train models and serve users.

We did not really know how AGI was going to get built, or used. A lot of people could imagine an oracle that could tell scientists and presidents what to do, and although it could be incredibly dangerous, maybe those few people could be trusted with it.

A lot of people around OpenAI in the early days thought AI should only be in the hands of a few trusted people who could "handle it".

We now see a way for AGI to directly empower everyone as the most capable tool in human history. If we can do this, we believe people will build incredible things for each other and continue to drive society and quality of life forward. It will of course not be all used for good, but we trust humanity and think the good will outweigh the bad by orders of magnitude.

We are committed to this path of democratic AI. We want to put incredible tools in the hands of everyone. We are amazed and delighted by what they are creating with our tools, and how much they want to use them. We want to open source very capable models. We want to give our users a great deal of freedom in how we let them use our tools within broad boundaries, even if we don't always share the same moral framework, and to let our users make decisions about the behavior of ChatGPT.

We believe this is the best path forward—AGI should enable all of humanity to benefit each other. We realize some people have very different opinions.

We want to build a brain for the world and make it super easy for people to use for whatever they want (subject to few restrictions; freedom shouldn't impinge on other people's freedom, for example).

People are using ChatGPT to increase their productivity as scientists, coders, and much more⁠. People are using ChatGPT to solve serious healthcare challenges they are facing and learn more than ever before. People are using ChatGPT to get advice about how to handle difficult situations. We are very proud to offer a service that is doing so much for so many people; it is the one of most direct fulfillments of our mission we can imagine.

But they want to use it much more; we currently cannot supply nearly as much AI as the world wants and we have to put usage limits on our systems and run them slowly. As the systems become more capable, they will want to use it even more, for even more wonderful things.

We had no idea this was going to be the state of the world when we launched our research lab almost a decade ago. But now that we see this picture, we are thrilled.

It is time for us to evolve our structure. There are three things we want to accomplish:

• We want to be able to operate and get resources in such a way that we can make our services broadly available to all of humanity, which currently requires hundreds of billions of dollars and may eventually require trillions of dollars. We believe this is the best way for us to fulfill our mission and to get people to create massive benefits for each other with these new tools.
• We want our nonprofit to be the largest and most effective nonprofit in history that will be focused on using AI to enable the highest-leverage outcomes for people.
• We want to deliver beneficial AGI. This includes contributing to the shape of safety and alignment; we are proud of our track record with the systems we have launched, the alignment research we have done, processes like red teaming, and transparency into model behavior with innovations like the model spec⁠. AI accelerates, our commitment to safety grows stronger. We want to make sure democratic AI wins over authoritarian AI.

We made the decision for the nonprofit to stay in control after hearing from civic leaders and having discussions with the offices of the Attorneys General of California and Delaware. We look forward to advancing the details of this plan in continued conversation with them, Microsoft, and our newly appointed nonprofit commissioners.

OpenAI was founded as a nonprofit, is today a nonprofit that oversees and controls the for-profit, and going forward will remain a nonprofit that oversees and controls the for-profit. That will not change.

The for-profit LLC under the nonprofit will transition to a Public Benefit Corporation (PBC) with the same mission. PBCs have become the standard for-profit structure for other AGI labs like Anthropic and X.ai, as well as many purpose driven companies like Patagonia. We think it makes sense for us, too.

Instead of our current complex capped-profit structure—which made sense when it looked like there might be one dominant AGI effort but doesn't in a world of many great AGI companies—we are moving to a normal capital structure where everyone has stock. This is not a sale, but a change of structure to something simpler.

The nonprofit will continue to control the PBC, and will become a big shareholder in the PBC, in an amount supported by independent financial advisors, giving the nonprofit resources to support programs so AI can benefit many different communities, consistent with the mission. And as the PBC grows, the nonprofit's resources will grow, so it can do even more. We're excited to soon get recommendations from our nonprofit commission on how we can help make sure AI benefits everyone—not just a few. Their ideas will focus on how our nonprofit work can support a more democratic AI future, and have real impact in areas like health, education, public services, and scientific discovery.

We believe this sets us up to continue to make rapid, safe progress and to put great AI in the hands of everyone. Creating AGI is our brick in the path of human progress; we can't wait to see what bricks you will add next.

Sam Altman
May 2025

• Salesforce is launching AI tools to up-skill employees and help them transition internally.
• Salesforce piloted its Career Connect service last year and 28% of users applied for jobs on the platform.
• The company is investing in AI career coaches in preparation of major workforce changes due to AI.

Brooke Grant was working as a change manager at Salesforce when the company's internal AI Career Agent pinged her on Slack to suggest an open role in sales enablement.

"It said, 'this is your career path,' but you also have these skills that are very interchangeable to these other paths," Grant said in an interview with Business Insider.

While Grant didn't have any sales experience, she had been skilling up in sales, AI, and customer success for a few months leading up to the opportunity. She said the platform, which highlighted her transferable skills, gave her the confidence to go for it.

Grant received the Slack notification for the open role in February, and by March, she started the new role.

While many companies are chasing productivity gains, Salesforce is taking a broader approach to AI adoption by investing in internal AI career tools to help employees pivot to new roles and skill up.

Last year, Salesforce launched Career Connect, an AI-powered internal talent marketplace. Once users create a profile, the platform infers skills based on their job history and helps employees create personalized career paths based on their skills and goals, Salesforce told BI. The tool also helps Salesforce track trending skills so it can invest in targeted training, the company told BI.

The platform is also available in Slack through a version called Career Agent. Employees can go back and forth with the tool to get actionable insight on reaching their career goals. Salesforce told BI that employees can ask the agent about open career opportunities or how to develop a skill. The AI-powered tool recommends courses, relevant contacts, and job opportunities based on the user's interests.

Salesforce filled half its roles internally in Q1

Salesforce piloted Career Connect last year with 1,200 employees across its customer success, employee success, and business technology teams. The company said 74% of employees were active on the platform, logging in multiple times throughout the three-month pilot. Just under 40% of participants enrolled in courses and training that were suggested to them, the company said.

Grant isn't the only employee who found success with Salesforce's AI career coaches. In the first three months of the pilot, 28% of participants applied for jobs through Career Connect, and over 90% of the roles filled by participants were discovered using the platform, the company said.

Salesforce president and chief people officer Nathalie Scardino also said in a press briefing that with Career Agent, the company was able to fill half of its roles with internal applications in the first quarter of 2025.

Some of the career transitions employees made were more unconventional. Salesforce executive Lori Castillo Martinez told Business Insider in an interview that one employee recently used Career Connect to transition to a cybersecurity role after spending 19 years as a program manager in human resources. Martinez said the platform connected the employee to a mentoring program with someone from the cybersecurity team, which encouraged him to pursue the role.

"I hadn't even thought about cybersecurity as a pathway for some of our HR program managers," Martinez said.

Preparing for transformation

Salesforce is pushing these efforts as the company has already seen changes to its workforce as a result of AI. Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff previously announced a 2025 hiring freeze on engineers following a 30% productivity increase from new tools.

Recent data also indicates that workforce transformation will evolve further in the coming years. Salesforce released the findings of a research study on Monday that surveyed 200 chief people officers, chief human resources officers, and other global HR leaders.

The study revealed that CHROs expect to redeploy 23% of the workforce into new teams or roles in the next two years. While 61% of the workforce is expected to stay in their positions, the roles are expected to change. About 80% of CHROs surveyed are either planning to reskill employees for roles with better future opportunities.

"Every industry must redesign jobs, reskill and redeploy talent — and every employee will need to learn new human, agent and business skills to thrive in the digital labor revolution," Scardino said in a statement.

• Andy Jassy said keeping a strong culture isn't a given and identified 2 issues that needed to be tackled.
• Jassy said remote work stifles innovation and gets in the way of culture being taught.
• Management layers are another key area that Amazon is seeking to reduce.

Andy Jassy said he thinks Amazon has a strong company culture, but staying that way isn't a given as the company expands and parts of the business evolve.

"You have to keep working on strengthening the parts of your culture that you see being stretched if you want to keep being successful culturally," Jassy said on Tuesday during a speaking event at the Harvard Business Review Leadership Summit.

In an effort to restore Amazon's strong sense of culture, the company rolled out several changes, including a 5-day return to office. The CEO said the company pinpointed two problem areas it needed to tackle: remote work and bureaucracy.

Culture can't be taught remotely

Jassy said many of the company's inventions have emerged from "messy, wandering meetings," where things may not initially click, but employees stick around to work it out on a whiteboard or revisit the problem and solve it later on.

Since bringing employees back to the office three days a week, Jassy said the company observed an improvement in collaboration and creative problem-solving.

"What you find is people riff on top of each other's ideas better if they're together," Jassy said. "Turns out, sometimes it's actually useful to interrupt each other, because you get to a faster spot, more quickly, you feel that energy."

Jassy said when employees work remotely, they tend to move on to the next task after their meeting ends, and "you just don't find that type of invention together."

As Amazon works to overhaul its organizational structure, Jassy said that culture isn't something that can be instilled from a distance.

"When you're in a meeting together, and you're watching the body language and you're watching people's expressions, you internalize the culture much better," Jassy said.

Jassy added that teaching is much more effective if you can walk over to someone after a meeting and add context or reassurance about what took place. For example, if it was a challenging topic, Jassy said he might tell a colleague, "Don't be surprised that that was a hard meeting. This is a really difficult topic." Or, he might say, for the next meeting, "think about these three things."

Limiting 'pre-meetings for the pre-meetings'

Amazon has a concept of one-way and two-way door decisions. Jassy said the "overwhelming majority of decisions" Amazon makes are two-way door decisions, which the company has said should require minimal executive oversight. However, Jassy said it wants those decisions to be made by the people who are doing the work.

Jassy said as the company has gotten larger, it's ended up with increasing layers of management. While many added processes were meant to bring organization, they've led to a place where there's "a pre-meeting for the pre-meeting for the decision," Jassy said. When it comes to actually making those decisions, employees may also feel like they lack ownership of them, Jassy said.

"That's what we'd like to try and limit," Jassy said. "We really want our owners doing the real work, to own the two-way door decisions and to be able to move quickly and autonomously."

The decision to increase the ratio of individual contributors to managers by 15% is part of that effort, Jassy said. The plan also includes directives for managers to take on more direct reports, slow down on senior-level hiring, and enact pay cuts for some employees.

"We want to flatten our organizations, to move faster and to drive more ownership," Jassy said.

Amazon did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

• VC cofounder Jeff Rosenthal said "breakup risk between partners" is a top concern for investors.
• He said he and his cofounder tested their business compatibility by writing to each other "like pen pals."
• He also suggests speaking to a partner's former employees and partners to understand how they work.

Venture capital firms weigh various factors when evaluating a company — and relationship red flags can be a dealbreaker for some.

VC cofounder Jeff Rosenthal said in an interview with Business Insider that "breakup risk between partners" is a top concern for institutional investors. It's "the thing" they drill into the most, Rosenthal said, the cofounder of CIV, an investment platform that backs and builds tech companies like The Nuclear Company and Verse.

"We like to think about partnerships and ventures on 10 to 20 year time horizons," Rosenthal said. "So picking the right people to build with is likely the most important decision you will make in your career."

In 2016, the National Bureau of Economic Research surveyed 885 people from 681 venture capital firms and found that the "management/founding team" ranked as the top factor in investment decisions. It was cited by 95% of firms as an important consideration, with 47% naming it as the most important factor.

In creating CIV, Rosenthal teamed up with his best friend, Patrick Maloney, and longtime investor Abhijoy Mitra. While he and Maloney had been close for more than a decade, Rosenthal said that their friendship alone wasn't a reason to start a business together.

Rosenthal said he and Maloney tested their compatibility by outlining their vision for the business, and they did it all in writing.

"We wrote each other back and forth like pen pals to make sure that nothing was lost in translation," Rosenthal said, adding that when you write things down, "you can be crystal clear."

Rosenthal said they asked each other questions, including what time they plan to arrive and leave the office, and what they expect for the organization.

"We wanted to make sure that we were aligned in our vision for the type of business we would build, the type of culture we wanted, our expectations of each other," Rosenthal said. "And we didn't wanna leave anything unsaid."

Some of that discussion extended into what they wanted for their future. Rosenthal said they wanted to understand how they envisioned their lives at 80 years old when they look back at their friendships, families, and the people they built their business with.

Rosenthal said one of their collaborators said success looks like "hanging out at each other's children's weddings."

"Which we love," Rosenthal said. "Like, that's exactly the way that we like to build."

Rosenthal said it's important to take the process of choosing a business partner "really seriously." Beyond writing back and forth, the cofounder said it's also important to talk to a potential partner's former employers, employees, and business partners. Talking to those people will help you understand exactly how someone operates and determine if you're compatible as business partners.

"It's worth doing the extra step," Rosenthal said. "And you don't have to do it secretly."

When it came to bringing on Mitra as a cofounder, Rosenthal and Maloney spent time working with him and assessing how the three of them collaborated. Rosenthal said Mitra was an "operating partner and close collaborator" for roughly 18 months before joining as a cofounder. During that time, he was CIV's no. 1 resource in designing its investment process and investment committee structure.

The time gave the three of them the opportunity to "get to know each other beyond our social relationship" and figure out whether they worked well together and aligned in terms of values, culture, and priorities.

"It became clear that our combined strengths formed a powerful synergy, leading to his joining us as a co-founder," Rosenthal said.

• Andy Jassy has 6 tips for big companies that want to feel more like a startup.
• The Amazon CEO emphasizes solving customer problems and increasing employee ownership of employees.
• He also said speed, scrappiness, and willingness to take risks are key to operating like a startup.

Andy Jassy is set on reshaping Amazon into a startup-like structure, despite the tech giant employing over one million people globally.

"We want to flatten our organizations, to move faster and to drive more ownership," the Amazon CEO said Tuesday during the Harvard Business Review Leadership Summit.

Jassy said that when companies scale, there are "all sorts of ways" they can start to slow down. In an effort to emulate the workflow of a startup, Amazon plans to increase the ratio of individual contributors to managers by 15%, and has also mandated a 5-day return to office to help drive innovation.

Amazon isn't necessarily looking to revert to its venture-backed days, but it's on a mission to regain some of the agility it had early on. Jassy said these are the six things big companies should do to feel like a startup.

1. Seek solutions to real customer problems

Jassy said that while a lot of tech companies "fall in love with technology" and build interesting products, they fail to solve "anything remarkable."

Meanwhile, startups are on a mission to solve customer problems, the Amazon's CEO said. With limited time and funding available, founders need to be laser-focused on building a product that will make a lasting impact on their target market.

"That's what we got to make sure we spend our time on," Jassy said.

The CEO added that even in times of tariff uncertainty and geopolitical risk, Amazon has continued to tell itself that it's "here to make customers' lives easier and better." The CEO said all of Amazon's businesses have areas that can be improved for customers, and that's what it's trying to stay focused on.

2. Hire a lot of builders

A strong culture of innovation is often a distinguishing factor of a startup. Jassy said that companies need to have a disproportionate number of builders, which he defines as people who like to invent products. Those people "dissect the customer experience," figure out where there are gaps, and then recreate the product, he said.

Jassy said the process of building often begins with listening to what customers are struggling with.

"If you're listening to them and you understand the need, then you can invent on their behalf," Jassy said.

The demand for innovation is part of the reason Amazon enacted a five-day return-to-office policy. Jassy said that "invention is stronger" when employees can work together in person.

3. Think like an owner

Jassy said companies that want to operate like startups also need owners. That means people "who really feel accountable," the CEO said.

"You need people to think about, what would I do if this were my money? What would I do if I owned all the resources?" Jassy said.

Jassy said the company's effort to flatten its workforce is about making employees return to that ownership mindset.

4. Move quick

Amazon has been on a mission to slash its bureaucratic practices, whether through a "no bureaucracy" email alias or by reducing management layers.

"As you get bigger, especially as you have a lot of managers, they keep layering in processes, and pretty soon you have process upon process upon process," Jassy said. "That really slows people down so they can't get the real work done."

In his former role when he was managing Amazon Web Services, Jassy said he spoke to a lot of CEOs who would tell him they were too large to move quickly.

Jassy said he believes speed is a "leadership decision." However, if companies want to move fast, Jassy said they need to figure out what's slowing them down and get rid of those barriers.

5. 'Be scrappy'

Jassy said that companies can't assign 50 to 100 people for every new project that needs to be completed. When Amazon started its computing service, it had 13 people, Jassy said.

"You can get going with a small number of people and build something that people actually find resonant," Jassy said, adding that companies can "keep iterating from there."

6. Take risks

When companies expand, they often become increasingly risk-averse, Jassy said. The CEO said that highly driven, Type A personalities can fall into the mindset of playing it safe. Those types of people, whom Amazon often hires, aren't used to failure and worry about being "ostracized if they get it wrong," Jassy said.

Jassy said the "only way" to create something unique is to do something different than what others have done.

"And you have to be willing to take risk and be willing to fail sometimes," the CEO said.

Amazon did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

• Mesa Police in Arizona were investigating arson at a Tesla dealership on Monday morning.
• It's the latest in a series of incidents that took place after Elon Musk became involved with DOGE.
• Reports of arson, graffiti, and Molotov cocktails span at least a dozen states.

Tesla vandalism hasn't run its course quite yet, despite Elon Musk's announcement that he'll be stepping back from DOGE starting next month.

The Mesa Police Department in Arizona told Business Insider it's working with federal partners to investigate a fire at a Tesla Service center Monday morning. Mesa Police later identified the suspect and arrested 35-year-old Ian Moses, "booking him into jail for arson of a structure and property," police said in a statement.

The report adds Arizona to a growing list of states that have seen vandalism incidents aimed at the automaker since Musk became involved with the Trump Administration.

Incidents of reported vandalism at Tesla locations date back to January and gained momentum through February and March when Tesla boycott movements sprang into action.

Here's a running list of states affected by attacks at Tesla locations. Tesla did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

Oregon

Police officers responded to a report of Molotov cocktails being thrown at a dealership in Salem on January 20. They returned to the location after bullets seemed to be fired into a building and a vehicle at the dealership.

Adam Matthew Lansky pleaded not guilty to charges related to throwing Molotov cocktails at a Tesla location in Salem. Lansky was charged with attempted arson and possession of Molotov cocktails, the Statesman Journal reported.

Lansky's attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Tigard Police wrote in a statement last month that officers were investigating two incidents that occurred in March involving gunfire. Police said on March 13, more than a dozen shots were fired at a Tesla dealership around 4:15 a.m. The gunfire caused "extensive damage to cars and showroom windows."

A similar incident occurred on the morning of March 6. Police said in a press release that at least seven shots were fired. The gunfire damaged at least three cars and also shattered windows. One bullet went through a building wall and into a computer monitor, the press release said.

Colorado

Police in Loveland, Colorado, said in a statement that an ignited incendiary device was thrown at a Tesla dealership on March 7, and it landed between two vehicles.

"Several people inside, who were cleaning the building, were put at risk; however, our responding officer quickly extinguished the fire, preventing further harm," The Loveland Police Department said in a statement. "The building and several vehicles were also damaged by rocks during this same time."

Police arrested Cooper Jo Frederick, a 24-year-old Fort Collins resident, on March 13 on felony charges related to explosives and arson. Frederick's attorney did not respond to a request for comment.

In addition to facing five state charges, Attorney General Pam Bondi has said the Department of Justice will seek a 20-year prison sentence for his attack on Tesla.

The statement said the arrest was made following "repeated criminal acts at the Loveland Tesla." Lucy Grace Nelson was also arrested in February on state and federal charges related to throwing Molotov cocktails at the location. Nelson pleaded not guilty to federal charges on March 11, according to court documents. The federal trial is set for August 4.

Massachusetts

Dedham Police Department said it was notified on March 11 that three Tesla vehicles were vandalized overnight at a Tesla service center, according to a statement posted on X.

Dedham Police Department said in a press release that the incident involved spray-painted graffiti on two Tesla Cybertrucks. The statement said both of the truck's tires were damaged, as well as the tires on a Tesla Model S.

Dedham Police said in the statement that the graffiti on the vehicles matched the spray paint also found on the building door on February 26.

Also last month, seven Tesla Superchargers caught on fire in Littleton, a small Massachusetts town. Littleton Police Deputy Chief Jeff Patterson told BI at the time that the charging stations were the only ones in town, and none were usable after the vandalism.

Tesla's charging account on X responded to a post about the incident and said the charging posts and wiring would be replaced in under 48 hours.

Washington

Washington has seen a number of incidents involving Tesla locations, including at dealerships, charging centers, and on the street. Last month, four Cybertrucks in a Seattle Tesla lot were damaged by fire, Seattle Police Department told BI at the time.

Six vehicles were spray-painted with swastikas and profane messages directed at Musk at a dealership in Lynwood, the local Police Department confirmed with BI. Police told BI the FBI has taken over the investigation, and it is ongoing.

FBI Seattle also said in a press release that someone started a fire at a Tesla Supercharger station in Lacey on April 8 at about 1:30 a.m. The fire resulted in significant damage to the station and the surrounding area, the FBI said in a press release.

Missouri

At around 11:16 p.m. on March 17, a Kansas City police officer observed smoke coming from a Cybertruck parked in the local Tesla Center parking lot, the DOJ said in a statement. The officer also observed a Molotov cocktail "near the burning Cybertruck," according to the statement.

The fire spread to a second Cybertruck in the lot, and the Kansas City Fire Department extinguished the fire, the statement said. The Cybertrucks had sale prices of $105,485 and $107,485, the statement said. Two charging stations, each worth about $550, were also damaged by the fire, the statement said.

Kansas City resident Owen McIntire, 19, was charged with one count of unlawful possession of an unregistered destructive device and one count of malicious damage by fire of property used in interstate commerce. His attorney did not respond to a request for comment.

California

In early morning on March 17, deputies from the North Coastal Sheriff's Station were on patrol when they observed vandalism at the Tesla dealership on Encinitas Boulevard, the San Diego County sheriff's office said in a statement.

Law enforcement found multiple cars and windows of the building spray-painted with swastikas and "profanity," the statement said. The sheriff's office told BI that no suspects have been identified.

Idaho

On April 2, 16 Cybertrucks were vandalized overnight at a Tesla dealership, the Meridian Police Department said in a statement shared with BI. The unknown person also damaged the building with red spraypaint of the word "Nazi," the statement said. The police Department said the estimated damage is around $114,000.

The Meridian Police Department said in the statement that the FBI was notified, and the investigation is ongoing. Officials told BI that there is no update on the incident.

Texas

Austin Police Department told BI that "incendiary" devices were found at a Tesla dealership in Austin on March 24.

The Austin Police Department previously said that officers responded to a call about suspicious devices around 8:04 a.m. After arriving at the scene and locating the devices, the department's bomb squad was called to investigate further.

"The devices, which were determined to be incendiary, were taken into police custody without incident," the APD told BI.

New York

On April 22, New York Police Department officers responded to a demonstration around noon at Tesla's location on 860 Washington Street, police told BI.

Tesla's dealership in the Meatpacking district of Manhattan was spray painted with profane messages about DOGE and the words "We do not consent" written across the store's windows, AMNY reported.

The demonstration ended at about 12:30 p.m., and two individuals were taken into custody with multiple charges, including graffiti, the NYPD told BI.

Nevada

On March 18, Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department found five Teslas damaged and the word "resist" spray-painted across the storefront of a Tesla dealership. Police said the suspect was seen on camera shooting the vehicles and placing a Molotov cocktail inside them to start a fire.

The LVMPD arrested 36-year-old suspect Paul Hyon Kim on March 26 on suspicion of being involved in a Tesla vandalism incident on March 18. LVMPD Assistant Sheriff Dori Koren said "a preliminary assessment" of Kim's social media "indicates some very loose but self-proclaimed ties" to some communist and pro-Palestine groups.

Kim's attorney told BI he pleaded not guilty at his arraignment and plea hearing on April 15. His trial is set for June 17.

South Carolina

The Justice Department wrote in a statement that the North Charleston Police Department and Fire Department responded to arson reports at a Tesla charging station on March 7.

Witnesses reported that a man spray-painted "Long Live Ukraine" along with profane messages about Trump at a parking spot, the statement said. The suspect also threw five incendiary explosive devices at the Tesla chargers, the statement said.

Daniel Clarke-Pounder, 24, was identified as a suspect and arrested on March 13. He was arraigned in federal court a day later, the statement said. Clarke-Pounder entered a not-guilty plea on April 23, ABC 13 reported. His attorney did not respond to a request for comment.

Have you been targeted by Tesla vandalism or harassment? We want to hear from you. Reach out to the reporter via email at [email protected] or secure messaging platform Signal at aalt.19.