Here's What Apple CEO Tim Cook Had To Say About Hurricane Harvey

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Apple CEO TIm Cook addressed the effects of Hurricane Harvey in an email to employees on Wednesday afternoon and said that the company had helped raise more than $3 million for relief efforts.

“Because Texas is home to more than 8,700 of our coworkers, the storm’s impact is felt by all of us,” he wrote in a message obtained by BuzzFeed News, adding that the iPhone maker has a global crisis management team on the ground that is helping to move some employees and their families.

Cook noted that he was in Austin last week, a day before Harvey hit the Texas shore, and asked the employees donate food and supplies at Apple's Austin campus. Apple also allowed customers to donate to the American Red Cross through its App Store, with the company matching employee donations two-for-one. So far Apple users have raised more than $1 million dollars, while the company has pledged $2 million.

Another technology leader, Facebook, took a different approach in soliciting donations from users for Hurricane Harvey, routing donations made through the social networking platform to the Center for Disaster Philanthropy, a lesser-known organization that BuzzFeed News examined on Tuesday. Facebook had previously partnered with the American Red Cross for disaster fundraising efforts.

Cook said he hoped that some of Apple's Houston area stores would be back in operation on Thursday.

“Though our stores in the Houston area are still closed today, we’re working hard to get as many as possible open tomorrow to serve people who have been impacted by the storm,” he wrote. “Our teams are eager to help with problems large and small, and they know there are lots of people in that area who need it.”

Here is Cook's email in its entirety:

Team,

As you know, Hurricane Harvey is having a devastating impact on Texas and Louisiana. Our thoughts are with our employees in the storm zone and the millions of people whose lives have been disrupted by rain, wind and floods. I want to update you on some of the things Apple has been doing to help, and ways that you can get involved.

On the ground, Apple’s global crisis management team is working to support our employees directly affected by the flooding in Texas. The team is in close contact with Apple employees in the Houston area, and they’re actively doing everything they can to assist, including moving some employees and their families to safety. Apple employees in the Houston area have generously been helping people displaced by the flooding by opening their homes to team members and their families, and in some cases, assisting in rescue operations. We’re also proud that the US Coast Guard is using Apple products in those efforts, with nearly two dozen USCG helicopters specially equipped with iPads to help coordinate search and rescue teams.

As Harvey was making landfall, we put in motion critical donation programs. Apple is making it easy for customers to donate directly to the American Red Cross through the App Store, iTunes and apple.com, and we’re matching employee donations two-for-one. Thanks to your generosity and that of our users, Apple has helped raise more than $1 million in just the past few days. That’s in addition to the $2 million Apple pledged to the Red Cross over the weekend.

Though our stores in the Houston area are still closed today, we’re working hard to get as many as possible open tomorrow to serve people who have been impacted by the storm. Our teams are eager to help with problems large and small, and they know there are lots of people in that area who need it.

I was in Austin the day before Harvey came ashore, and the team was already bracing for the storm and the long recovery. Today that work continues. At our Austin campuses, we are kicking off a donation drive in partnership with the Central Texas Food Bank and Caffè Macs to collect food, diapers and personal hygiene items — all things that are critical in the aftermath of a storm of this magnitude.

Because Texas is home to more than 8,700 of our coworkers, the storm’s impact is felt by all of us. There’s still much to do, and Apple is committed to help.

Tim

Quelle: <a href="Here's What Apple CEO Tim Cook Had To Say About Hurricane Harvey“>BuzzFeed

Investor Lawsuit Against Former Uber CEO Sent To Arbitration

Adnan Abidi / Reuters

A Delaware judge on Wednesday told former Uber Technologies chief executive Travis Kalanick and one of the company’s largest investors to hash out their differences behind closed doors, sending a lawsuit against the tech billionaire to arbitration.

Earlier this month, Benchmark — a storied venture capital outfit that has invested in the likes of eBay, Twitter and Snapchat — filed its suit against Kalanick, accusing him of fraud and alleging that he had attempted to interfere with Uber’s search for a new CEO. After Kalanick and Benchmark spent the last few weeks sniping at each other in court filings and elected new CEO Dara Khosrowshahi on Monday, lawyers for both sides appeared in Delaware to argue in front of Judge Samuel Glasscock in the state’s Court of Chancery.

The judge’s decision is a victory for Kalanick, who may now be able to keep the case out of the public eye and avoid depositions. It’s been a horrendous year for the Uber cofounder and former CEO, who was forced to resign in June after employee complaints, press reports and two internal investigations revealed sexual harassment, discrimination and executive misbehavior at the ride-hailing giant.

“Mr. Kalanick is pleased that the court has ruled in his favor today and remains confident that he will prevail in the arbitration process,” a Kalanick spokesperson said in a statement. “Benchmark's false allegations are wholly without merit and have unnecessarily harmed Uber and its shareholders.”

An Uber spokesperson declined to comment. A spokesperson for Benchmark did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Kalanick still remains on Uber’s board, which also includes Benchmark partner Matt Cohler. The former CEO also currently controls two other unoccupied board seats, which were granted to him in a 2016 decision that Benchmark is disputing in the suit.

In its lawsuit, Benchmark alleged that Kalanick had withheld crucial information about the business from investors while he was CEO and argued that he should be stripped of the board seats granted to him. Benchmark, citing press reports, also claimed that Kalanick was interfering with the company’s CEO selection process in hopes of working his way back into the top job at Uber, which was recently valued by investors at $69 billion. Benchmark’s lawyers had asked the judge to temporarily restrict Kalanick from any business matters, while they proceeded with their lawsuit, which ultimately sought to completely remove Kalanick from the board.

Judge Glascock declined Benchmark’s request and ordered both sides to engage a third-party mediator to sort out their differences. The judge also did not grant Benchmark’s request to freeze Kalanick from current business affairs, though an arbiter could still decide on the issue.

While some Uber executives and investors have distanced themselves from Benchmark’s dispute with Kalanick, others dove head first into the fray. Shervin Pishevar, an early Uber investor and a personal friend of Kalanick’s, wrote several letters to Uber’s board, offered to partially buy out Benchmark’s Uber stake and attempted to intervene in the lawsuit itself when his initial overtures were ignored. On Wednesday morning, Pishevar released a verbose and vociferous statement regarding Benchmark’s lawsuit against Kalanick, which Forbes said he initially penned to inspire Kalanick’s legal team last week.

“Let just cause give pause to those who would ever dream of ever emulating the shameful shenanigans of these sanctimonious hypocrites who fling filings and letters de haut en bas: when it is we who have the higher moral ground and or letters and filings will rain down upon their platforms, exposing them as bitterly barren barons of moral turpitude,” Pishevar wrote.

Meanwhile, at an all-hands meeting held on Wednesday morning, Kalanick and other board members put on a united front to introduce Uber employees to Khosrowshahi for the first time. Kalanick took the stage to a standing ovation and reportedly teared up in his first meeting with employees since he resigned in June.

Khosrowshahi was interviewed by Uber board member Arianna Huffington; the two discussed how to change Uber’s notoriously aggressive work culture, his plans to find a chairman to lead Uber’s divisive board, the possibility of an IPO in the next three years and the leaks that have resulted from clashes between the company’s leaders.

Huffington also asked Khosrowshahi about the possibility that Expedia CFO Mark Okerstrom will follow Khosrowshahi to Uber, which Khosrowshahi reminded her on stage wasn’t public information yet. A spokesperson for Expedia told BuzzFeed News that the company has ”no indication he is leaving Expedia.” Khosrowshahi said his replacement at Expedia could be announced as soon as today.

According to Uber’s communications team’s Twitter account, Khosrowshahi’s first words to Uber’s staff were a blend of praise for Kalanick and promises of better management to come.

“This company has to change,” he said. “What got us here is not what’s going to get us to the next level.”

Quelle: <a href="Investor Lawsuit Against Former Uber CEO Sent To Arbitration“>BuzzFeed

13 Hard Words We Learned From This Uber Investor's Letter

Shervin Pishevar

Patricia De Melo Moreira / AFP / Getty Images

Shervin Pishevar is a technology investor who was an early backer of Uber. He also writes letters. Lately, he has been spilling ink on one topic in particular: an ongoing legal battle between the Uber cofounder Travis Kalanick and the venture capital firm Benchmark for control of the ride-hail behemoth.

Pishevar's latest missive, released on Wednesday, surpasses all his others in style and diction. There's a rich tradition of investors firing off pointed dispatches, though most practitioners of the form work for Wall Street hedge funds. Pishevar, with Benchmark as his subject, manages to infuse the genre not only with venom but also with some particularly obstreperous difficult hard words and phrases.

Here's Pishevar:

@EricNewcomer / Twitter / Via Twitter: @EricNewcomer

Let's take a look at what we've learned. All definitions are from Merriam-Webster online.

1. “We find ourselves swimming in the crucible of one of the grandest business and moral battles of our generation…”

Crucible:

2: a severe test

3: a place or situation in which concentrated forces interact to cause or influence change or development

2. “…and find strength in each stroke of our proverbial digital pens, that we wrote with the indelible, eternal and permanent ink of righteousness.”

Indelible:

1 a: that cannot be removed, washed away, or erased; b: making marks that cannot easily be removed

2 a: lasting; b: unforgettable, memorable

3. “We write with the souls of thousands of lives saved, the lives of millions of jobs created liberating multitudes of drivers from the shackles of servitude to iniquitous taxi cartels…”

Iniquitous, or characterized by iniquity:

1: gross injustice

2: a wicked act or thing

4. “…of corrupt cabals that choked cities with their pollution of air and morals.”

Cabal:

1: the contrived schemes of a group of persons secretly united in a plot (as to overturn a government); also: a group engaged in such schemes

5. “Their allegiance was met by this unholy alliance of perfidious…”

Perfidious, or characterized by perfidy:

1: the quality or state of being faithless or disloyal

6. “…greed devolving rapidly into the audacity of vituperative…”

Vituperative:

uttering or given to censure : containing or characterized by verbal abuse

7. “…unparalleled predatory rapacity.”

Rapacity, or the quality of being rapacious:

1: excessively grasping or covetous

2: living on prey

8. “Let us strike tomorrow with the full and fulsome courage of our convictions.”

Fulsome:

1 a: characterized by abundance; b: generous in amount, extent, or spirit; c: being full and well developed

2: aesthetically, morally, or generally offensive

3: exceeding the bounds of good taste

4: excessively complimentary or flattering

9. “Let our just cause give pause to those who would ever dream of ever emulating the shameful shenanigans of these sanctimonious hypocrites…”

Sanctimonious:

1: hypocritically pious or devout

10. “…who fling filings and letters de haut en bas.”

De haut en bas (French):

: of superiority : of or with condescension

11. “It is we who have the higher moral ground and our letters and filing will hail down upon their platforms, exposing them as bitterly barren barons…”

Barren:

1: not reproducing: such as a: incapable of producing offspring — used especially of females or matings; b: not yet or not recently pregnant; c: of plants: habitually failing to fruit barren apple trees

2: not productive: such as a: producing little or no vegetation; b: producing inferior crops; c: unproductive of results or gain

12. “…of moral turpitude.”

Turpitude:

inherent baseness : depravity

13. “And as the summer sets, we let us be steward of truth who in unison proclaim: fiat justitia ruat caelum.”

Fiat justitia ruat caelum (Latin):

let justice be done, though the heavens fall

Quelle: <a href="13 Hard Words We Learned From This Uber Investor's Letter“>BuzzFeed