Raphael Stevens

In this articleBCBoat maker Brunswick will have low inventory by the end of 2021 as it continues seeing strong revenue growth and consumer demand, Brunswick CEO David Foulkes told CNBC on Friday.While Foulkes said he expects Brunswick to meet its production forecast for 2021, he noted that the company is still recovering from pandemic-induced supply chain disruptions and labor shortages. “We’re producing as much as we can, but we will still be in a very low inventory situation by the time we get through this year,” Foulkes said on CNBC’s “Power Lunch.” He said it will probably take more than two years to meet retail demand and backfill the industry pipeline at current production rates.”We ended last year with unusually low inventory levels, and we’re obviously a very seasonal business so we’re producing pretty constantly through the year, but we need inventory to meet the needs of the peak selling season, which is really now for the Northern markets,” the executive explained. “So this is more about an inventory haul that was created last year in combination with just tremendous levels of retail demand.” He said Brunswick is being “creative” to get the labor it needs and is producing “very efficiently and very effectively” to deal with the various disruptions.Foulkes said Brunswick is seeing strong revenue growth, with overall company revenues up by more than 40% in the first quarter. He noted that its engine business now accounts for more than 45% of the U.S. market. The boat maker is the largest recreational marine company in the world, with 17 brands, including Mercury Marine, Boston Whaler and Freedom Boat Club.Boat sales soared last year during the pandemic as many Americans adapted to flexible work environments that allowed people to spend extra time outdoors, and demand has continued to climb in the first half of 2021. Sales of boats, marine products and services in the U.S. reached a 13-year high in 2020 to $47 billion, an increase of 9% from the previous year, according to the National Marine Manufacturers Association. Dealerships have since been struggling to maintain inventory, with manufacturers expanding production capacity to meet consumer demand. More

U.S. Air Force 1st Lt. Allyson Black (R), a registered nurse, cares for COVID-19 patients in a makeshift ICU (Intensive Care Unit) at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center on January 21, 2021 in Torrance, California.Mario Tama | Getty ImagesMore than 4,100 people have been hospitalized or died with Covid-19 in the U.S. even though they’ve been fully vaccinated, according to new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.So far, at least 750 fully vaccinated people have died after contracting Covid, but the CDC noted that 142 of those fatalities were asymptomatic or unrelated to Covid-19, according to data as of Monday that was released Friday.The CDC received 3,907 reports of people who have been hospitalized with breakthrough Covid infections, despite being fully vaccinated. Of those, more than 1,000 of those patients were asymptomatic or their hospitalizations weren’t related to Covid-19, the CDC said.”To be expected,” Dr. Paul Offit, a top advisor to the Food and Drug Administration on children’s vaccines told CNBC. “The vaccines aren’t 100% effective, even against severe disease. Very small percentage of the 600,000 deaths.”Breakthrough cases are Covid-19 infections that bypass vaccine protection. They are very rare and many are asymptomatic. The vaccines are highly effective but don’t block every infection. Pfizer and Moderna’s phase three clinical studies found that their two-dose regimens were 95% and 94% effective at blocking Covid-19, respectively, while Johnson & Johnson’s one-shot vaccine was found to be 66% effective in its studies. All three, however, have been found to be extremely effective in preventing people from getting severely sick from Covid.The CDC doesn’t count every breakthrough case. It stopped counting all breakthrough cases May 1 and now only tallies those that lead to hospitalization or death, a move the agency was criticized for by health experts.Most Americans have received at least one shot of the two currently authorized mRNA vaccines. The U.S. has administered 178.3 million shots and fully vaccinated 46% of its population.”You are just as likely to be killed by a meteorite as die from Covid after a vaccine,” Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious disease expert at the University of California San Francisco, told CNBC. “In the big scheme of things, the vaccines are tremendously powerful.”Efficacy rates decrease slightly for variants like alpha and delta, with studies indicating 88% efficacy against the delta strain after two doses of the Pfizer vaccine. It was unclear if any of the reported breakthrough cases were caused by variants.In Israel and the United Kingdom, concerns about the delta variant are rising after growing reports of breakthrough infections.Even with 80% of adults vaccinated, Chezy Levy, director-general of Israel’s Health Ministry, said the delta variant is responsible for 70% of new infections in the country. Levy also said that one-third of those new infections were in vaccinated individuals.In the U.K., Public Health England released a report that found 26 out of 73 deaths caused by the delta variant occurred in fully vaccinated people from June 8 to June 14. Most of the deaths occurred in unvaccinated individuals.”Determination of whether hospitalizations and deaths are more represented in immunocompromised patients and the type of vaccine received will be important for future guidance,” Chin-Hong said.On June 7, the CDC received reports of 3,459 breakthrough cases that led to hospitalization or death. On June 18, that number was updated to 3,729, an increase of 270 cases. Today, the number stands at 4,115.An overwhelming majority, 76%, of the hospitalizations and deaths from breakthrough cases occurred in people over the age of 65.”We do not have the years and years of data we have for vaccines against other airborne pathogens — and therefore it is really essential that the CDC provides up to date reporting on breakthrough cases,” David Edwards, aerosol scientist and Harvard University professor, told CNBC.The CDC says its numbers are “likely an undercount” of all Covid infections in vaccinated people because the data relies on passive and voluntary reporting.– CNBC’s Berkeley Lovelace Jr. contributed to this report. More

People wear face masks in Central Park on April 10, 2021 in New York City.Noam Galai | Getty ImagesThe World Health Organization on Friday urged fully vaccinated people to continue to wear masks, social distance and practice other Covid-19 pandemic safety measures as the highly contagious delta variant spreads rapidly across the globe.”People cannot feel safe just because they had the two doses. They still need to protect themselves,” Dr. Mariangela Simao, WHO assistant director-general for access to medicines and health products, said during a news briefing from the agency’s Geneva headquarters.”Vaccine alone won’t stop community transmission,” Simao added. “People need to continue to use masks consistently, be in ventilated spaces, hand hygiene … the physical distance, avoid crowding. This still continues to be extremely important, even if you’re vaccinated when you have a community transmission ongoing.”The health organization’s comments come as some countries, including the United States, have largely done away with masks and pandemic-related restrictions as the Covid vaccines have helped drive down the number of new infections and deaths.The number of new infections in the U.S. has held steady over the last week at an average of 11,659 new cases per day, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. Still, new infections have been plummeting over the last several months.WHO officials said they are asking fully vaccinated people to continue to “play it safe” because a large portion of the world remains unvaccinated and highly contagious variants, like delta, are spreading in many countries, spurring outbreaks.The Wall Street Journal reported Friday that about half of adults infected in an outbreak of the delta variant in Israel were fully vaccinated with the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, prompting the government there to reimpose an indoor mask requirement and other measures.”Yes, you can reduce some measures and different countries have different recommendations in that regard. But there’s still the need for caution,” Dr. Bruce Aylward, a senior advisor to the WHO’s director-general, said at the briefing. “As we are seeing, there are new variants emerging.”The WHO said last week that delta is becoming the dominant variant of the disease worldwide.WHO officials have said the variant, first found in India but now in at least 92 countries, is the fastest and fittest coronavirus strain yet, and it will “pick off” the most vulnerable people, especially in places with low Covid vaccination rates.They said there were reports that the delta variant also causes more severe symptoms, but that more research is needed to confirm those conclusions. Still, there are signs the delta strain could provoke different symptoms than other variants.It has the potential “to be more lethal because it’s more efficient in the way it transmits between humans and it will eventually find those vulnerable individuals who will become severely ill, have to be hospitalized and potentially die,” Dr. Mike Ryan, executive director of the WHO’s health emergencies program, said Monday.In the U.S., President Joe Biden said Covid deaths nationwide will continue to rise due to the spread of the “dangerous” delta variant, calling it a “serious concern.”He warned that Americans who are still unvaccinated are especially at risk.”Six hundred thousand-plus Americans have died, and with this delta variant you know there’s going to be others as well. You know it’s going to happen. We’ve got to get young people vaccinated,” Biden said Thursday at a community center in Raleigh, North Carolina More

Starship prototype rocket SN15 stands on the company’s launchpad in Boca Chica, Texas.SpaceXElon Musk’s SpaceX is “shooting for July” to launch the first orbital spaceflight of its Starship rocket, company president Gwynne Shotwell said Friday.”I’m hoping we make it, but we all know that this is difficult,” Shotwell said, speaking at the National Space Society’s virtual International Space Development conference.”We are really on the cusp of flying that system, or at least attempting the first orbital flight of that system, really in the very near term,” Shotwell added.SpaceX has conducted multiple short test flights of Starship prototypes over the past year, but reaching orbit represents the next step in testing the rocket. The company in May revealed its plan for the flight, which would launch from the company’s facility in Texas and aim to splash down off the coast of Hawaii.Starship prototypes stand at about 160 feet tall, or around the size of a 16-story building, and are built of stainless steel – representing the early version of the rocket that Musk unveiled in 2019. The rocket initially launches on a “Super Heavy” booster, which makes up the bottom half of the rocket and stands about 230 feet tall. Together, Starship and Super Heavy will be nearly 400 feet tall when stacked for the launch.The company is developing Starship to launch cargo and people on missions to the moon and Mars.While SpaceX’s fleet of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets are partially reusable, Musk’s goal is to make Starship fully reusable — envisioning a rocket that is more akin to a commercial airplane, with short turnaround times between flights where the only major cost is fuel.”I don’t think that people really have even comprehended what that system is going to do,” Shotwell said.She emphasized that Musk “feels in a huge hurry” to develop Starship and create “a sustaining capability that will take people to the Moon and Mars.””That means it’s not one ship every two years, right? We have to be able to fly dozens of ships during the timeframe when you can get people to Mars,” Shotwell added.Become a smarter investor with CNBC Pro.Get stock picks, analyst calls, exclusive interviews and access to CNBC TV. Sign up to start a free trial today. More

Sir Richard Branson, left, and CEO Michael Colglazier celebrate the company’s third spaceflight test on May 22, 2021.Virgin GalacticJeff Bezos plans to launch himself to the edge of space on July 20, but fellow billionaire Sir Richard Branson might still try to fly with Virgin Galactic first.Virgin Galactic leadership previously stated the company would conduct three more spaceflights to complete development testing of spacecraft VSS Unity. The company is working to begin flying paying passengers in early 2022, having completed a successful mission last month with just two pilotsUnder that plan, the first of those next three flights would carry four passengers to test the spacecraft’s cabin, the second would be with Branson, and the third would fly members of the Italian Air Force for professional astronaut training.But a report earlier this month by a blogger based in Mojave, California – where Virgin Galactic manufactures its vehicles – said the company is considering reorganizing its flight schedule to launch Branson next, instead of second. The report came shortly after Bezos announced he would fly on Blue Origin’s first passenger spaceflight, planned to launch on July 20 – suggesting Branson may yet try to beat Bezos by personally flying to space over the July 4 weekend.Jeff Bezos walks out to where the New Shepard capsule landed in the Texas desert after a test flight in April 2021.Blue OriginVirgin Galactic has not confirmed or denied it is considering a reorganization of its spaceflight schedule, which CEO Michael Colglazier emphasized in an interview with CNBC.”I know there’s a lot of interest and speculation out there but we have not announced either the date nor the people that would be on those,” Colglazier said. “We have three more flights in our test flight program and we’re on that path and we’re going to continue on that path.”Branson’s Virgin Galactic, founded in 2004, and Bezos’ Blue Origin, founded in 2000, are competing to take passengers on short flights to the edge of space, a sector known as suborbital tourism. The companies’ spacecraft reach an altitude of about 80 kilometers to 100 kilometers (or about 260,000 to 330,000 feet), spending a few minutes floating in microgravity.Shares of Virgin Galactic jumped more than 30% in trading on Friday, after announcing the FAA granted the company the license it needs to fly passengers on future spaceflights.”The flight test program shifts now from … some of the technical aspects – that we were continuing to prove out for ourselves and for the FAA – and we’re now shifting to the cabin experience,” Colglazier. “The first of these [next three spaceflights] we said would have four mission specialists, the second as well, and then one followed by the Italian astronauts.”Turnaround timeVirgin Galactic’s spacecraft Unity prepares for flight.Virgin GalacticColglazier emphasized that “the May 22 flight was very successful for us” and, with the FAA’s approval now in hand, Virgin Galactic is turning its “attention to clarifying when we’ll be ready for our next spaceflight.”While Virgin Galactic hopes to eventually have multiple spacecraft flying each week, currently the company’s VSS Unity spacecraft is the only one operational in its fleet – making turnaround time a key factor if Branson wants to launch before July 20.More than two years ago, when Virgin Galactic flew its first and second spaceflights, it took the company 71 days to turn around the spacecraft between the launches.Getting the next spaceflight launched by the July 4 weekend requires preparing the spacecraft in just 43 days. But a turnaround time of 71 days would mean Virgin Galactic’s next spaceflight launches on Aug. 1, a couple weeks after Bezos plans to fly.However, Virgin Galactic has launched rocket-powered test flights more rapidly before. As the company was ramping up testing in 2018, it launched VSS Unity on three increasingly high altitude rocket-powered flights as it got closer to reaching space. Those three rocket-powered flights – launched on April 5, May 29, and July 26 in 2018 – saw the company turn around VSS Unity in 54 days and 58 days, respectively.Launching before July 20 would require Virgin Galactic prepare VSS Unity in 58 days or less – in essence, as quickly as it ever has before.For now, Colglazier said Virgin Galactic is “just not at a point” to talk about timing of the next spaceflight.”We approach this very methodically, with safety as the first consideration, and when we have all those boxes checked and all the steps in place – that’s when we can move forward and announce,” Colglazier said.Become a smarter investor with CNBC Pro.Get stock picks, analyst calls, exclusive interviews and access to CNBC TV. Sign up to start a free trial today. More

In this articleABI-BEOutgoing Anheuser-Busch InBev CEO Carlos Brito told CNBC on Friday that people have been eager to return to pre-pandemic drinking routines as coronavirus vaccinations picked up across the U.S. and bars and restaurants faced fewer restrictions.”Once vaccines were being rolled out, we saw some states ahead of others and we saw how consumers were reacting to this new normal,” Brito told “Squawk Box.”  “And we saw that a lot of the new normal was just like the old normal in that people were dying to go back to old habits.”Brito — who steps down July 1 after 15 years leading the world’s largest beer brewer — said AB InBev adjusted its supply chain to produce a more “normal balance” of bottles and draft beer, anticipating that home consumption would take a less prominent role.The home had became the “hub” for living, entertainment and working all at once during the pandemic, Brito noted, commending the company for how it responded to that change.”Our guys in supply chain, sales had to be very agile, very flexible,” Brito said. “There was a big shift in dislocation among channels, packaging, brands because consumers couldn’t buy in pubs and restaurants so they had to resort to grocery stores, and they found their way to loved products.”AB InBev shares are now up about 50% in the past 12 months and more than 7% year to date.The Bud Light brewer also has seen the emergence of what Brito dubbed a “fourth category” of drinks that covers the intersection of wine, beer and cocktail beverages. Ready-to-drink cocktails is the fastest-growing alcohol category, with beverage companies and industry experts predicting further growth.”It’s an amazing category. It’s growing. It goes to specific consumer needs of lower calories, lower carbs, gluten free, in many instances, more co-ed,” Brito said. “It’s something that’s great for us because it’s very profitable.”Beer consumption has been declining in recent years as consumers either opt for substitutes such as hard seltzer and canned cocktails or choose to drink less or not at all. AB InBev has added new products, such as Bud Light Seltzer, to adapt to changing tastes.Michel Doukeris, who serves as the head of the company’s North American business, will take the reins from Brito. During Brito’s leadership, he led the acquisitions of Anheuser-Busch and SABMiller, which revolutionized the company’s global scale and cut costs along the way. More

In this articleSPCEVSS Unity is released from carrier aircraft VMS Eve during the launch of its third spaceflight on May 22, 2021.Virgin GalacticVirgin Galactic announced on Friday that the Federal Aviation Administration granted the company the license it needs to fly passengers on future spaceflights, a key hurdle as the venture completes development testing.”The commercial license that we have had in place since 2016 remains in place, but is now cleared to allow us to carry commercial passengers when we’re ready to do so,” Virgin Galactic CEO Michael Colglazier told CNBC. “This is obviously an exciting milestone and a huge compliment to the team.”While the FAA previously gave Virgin Galactic a launch license to conduct spaceflights, the license expansion allows the company to fly what the regulator calls “spaceflight participants.” The company completed a 29 element verification and validation program for the FAA, clearing the final two FAA milestones with its most recent spaceflight test in May. Colglazier noted the two last milestones were specific to the spacecraft’s flight control systems and inertial navigation systems.Virgin Galactic’s stock jumped 12% in premarket trading following the announcement. Shares rose above $40 a share this week, after a tumultuous start to the year that saw the stock climb above $60 in February and then plummet to a low near $15 last month before rebounding.Notably, Virgin Galactic chief astronaut trainer Beth Moses is the only non-pilot to fly on one of the company’s spaceflights. To date, five Virgin Galactic employees, including four pilots, have become FAA-recognized astronauts – as the U.S. officially views an altitude of 80 kilometers (or about 50 miles) as the boundary to space.Virgin Galactic’s spacecraft Unity is designed to hold up to six passengers along with the two pilots. The company has about 600 reservations for tickets on future flights, sold at prices between $200,000 and $250,000 each.Next spaceflights TBDWith three spaceflights tests completed to date over the last two years, Virgin Galactic now has three more spaceflight tests planned before it completes development. The company previously announced its next spaceflight would carry four passengers to test the spacecraft’s cabin, its second would fly founder Sir Richard Branson and the third will carry members of the Italian Air Force for professional astronaut training.Sir Richard Branson, left, and CEO Michael Colglazier celebrate the company’s third spaceflight test on May 22, 2021.Virgin GalacticHowever, a report earlier this month by a blogger based in Mojave, California – where Virgin Galactic manufactures its vehicles – said the company is considering reorganizing its flight schedule to launch Branson next over the July 4 weekend. The report came shortly after Jeff Bezos announced he would fly on Blue Origin’s first passenger spaceflight, planned to launch on July 20 – suggesting Branson may yet try to beat Bezos to personally flying to space.Colglazier said the FAA approval means “the flight test program shifts now” to demonstrating “the cabin experience” of the spacecraft.”I know there’s a lot of interest and speculation out there but we have not announced either the date nor the people that would be on those,” Colglazier said. “We approach this very methodically, with safety as the first consideration, and when we have all those boxes checked and all the steps in place – that’s when we can move forward and announce.”Development delays have pushed back the company’s promised beginning of commercial service from mid-2020 to early 2022.Become a smarter investor with CNBC Pro.Get stock picks, analyst calls, exclusive interviews and access to CNBC TV. Sign up to start a free trial today. More