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    Shopper turnout hit record high over Black Friday weekend, retail trade group says

    The group said 196.7 million shoppers turned out from Thanksgiving Day to Cyber Monday.
    That topped the turnout of 179 million during last year’s holiday weekend, it said.
    The NRF, which began tracking the figure in 2017, had forecast a turnout of 166.3 million for this year.

    A record number of holiday shoppers – 196.7 million – flocked back to stores and hunted for deals from Thanksgiving Day to Cyber Monday, according to a survey by the National Retail Federation, which tracks the figure for in-person and online shopping.
    The trade group did not estimate spending over the weekend, but said Tuesday that sales for the overall holiday shopping season are on track to meet its forecast. It anticipates that holiday sales will rise by 6% to 8% from last year to between $942.6 billion and $960.4 billion. Some of that increase will come from nearly four-decade high inflation.

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    The National Retail Federation defines the holiday season as November 1 through December 31. The sales forecast excludes spending at automobile dealers, gasoline stations and restaurants.
    Shoppers spent an average of about $325 on holiday-related purchases over the weekend. That’s higher than last year’s average of $301.
    NRF CEO Matt Shay said the weekend’s biggest takeaways are that Americans are eager to shop in-person again and that they’re hungry for big bargains. More than 122.7 million people visited brick-and-mortar stores over the weekend, a jump of 17% from 2021.

    A customer searches for shoe products inside a Macy’s store during Black Friday sales on November 25, 2022 in Jersey City, New Jersey.
    Kena Betancur | Getty Images

    As inflation hits Americans’ wallets, he said, promotions have become a important motivator.
    “Consumers are out shopping, but they’re out shopping when they see deals and when they get the promotions that meet what it is they’re looking for, and so you can get them engaged, but you’ve got to deliver value and price,” he said on a call with reporters.

    Retailers have nevertheless been cautious about their holiday outlooks, particularly as families feel the pinch of inflation. Walmart has spoken about customers skipping over discretionary items and trading down to cheaper proteins like hot dogs and peanut butter. Target cut its forecast for the holiday quarter. And Best Buy said customers have had a higher interest in shopping during sales events.
    So far, though, figures from Adobe Analytics showed that online spending hit record highs on key days during the holiday shopping weekend. Black Friday sales rose 2.3% to hit $9.12 billion and Cyber Monday sales rose 5.8% to $11.3 billion, according to the company, which tracks sales on retailers’ websites.
    On average, consumers said in the NRF survey that they are about halfway done with holiday shopping. That means retailers can expect more purchases in the weeks ahead, Shay said.
    NRF said Tuesday that its tally of shoppers over the holiday weekend topped last year’s turnout of 179 million during the same period last year. The group, which began tracking the figure in 2017, had forecast a turnout of 166.3 million for this year.
    A bigger turnout and record spending this holiday season could be a result of a variety of factors. It could indicate that consumers are willing to buy − but only if items are on deep discount. It could also signal a return to the pre-pandemic timetable of holiday shopping, with people concentrating their gift-buying around Black Friday and in the final sprint before Christmas Day.
    Or it could portend a more challenging 2023. If Americans are funding shopping spree by slashing savings rates and tallying up big balances on credit cards or through ‘Buy Now Pay Later,’ that could leave them with less to spend in the months ahead.
    The National Retail Federation, a major trade group, has taken a bullish stance on consumer spending — saying a strong job market has encouraged Americans to keep spending.
    Shay also shook off concerns about a recession on Tuesday, but acknowledged another risk for retailers: the threat of a railway strike. While retailers may have most of their holiday merchandise, he said a work stoppage could be a blow to consumer confidence.
    “We think that the holiday season would be the worst possible time,” he said.

    −CNBC’s Annie Palmer contributed to this report.

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    Jim Cramer says he likes stocks in these 4 industries over tech right now

    Monday – Friday, 6:00 – 7:00 PM ET

    CNBC’s Jim Cramer on Tuesday offered investors a list of industries they should eye over tech when managing their portfolios.
    His advice echoes his urging last month for investors to buy recession-resilient stocks rather than stick with struggling tech companies.

    CNBC’s Jim Cramer on Tuesday offered investors a list of industries they should eye over tech when managing their portfolios.
    Here is his list:

    Industrials
    Foods
    Pharmaceuticals
    Oils 

    “Why rubberneck when you can invest in stocks of companies that have a lot going for them? I think that’s much better than sifting through the wreckage of tech simply because their stocks are down a great deal,” he said.
    Tech stocks have been battered this year by persistent inflation, the Federal Reserve’s interest rate increases, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Covid lockdowns in China. 
    While some tech firms remain profitable and their stock looks like bargains, investors are better off positioning themselves elsewhere, according to Cramer. His advice on Tuesday echoes his urging last month for investors to buy recession-resilient stocks rather than stick with struggling tech companies.
    “Their stocks are down so much that people figure, ‘Well, they can’t possibly go any lower.’ But that’s not true. It can always go lower until it gets to zero,” he said.
    He added that while it’s true that the stocks have come down enough that owning them isn’t as risky as it would’ve been earlier this year, tech companies need to reevaluate their priorities before their stocks can start to recover.

    “They won’t truly be de-risked until management decides to pivot from a growth at all costs mindset … to a profitability at some costs mindset,” Cramer said.

    Jim Cramer’s Guide to Investing

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    Tesla is still dominant, but its U.S. market share is eroding as cheaper EVs arrive

    Tesla is still the top-selling electric vehicle brand in the U.S., but its dominance is eroding as more affordable models proliferate.
    S&P Global Mobility reports Tesla’s market share of new registered electric vehicles in the U.S. stood at 65% through the third quarter, down from 71% last year.
    The firm forecasts Tesla’s market share will decline to less than 20% by 2025.

    A Tesla Model 3 vehicle is on display at the Tesla auto store on September 22, 2022 in Santa Monica, California. Tesla is recalling over 1 million vehicles in the U.S. because the windows can pinch a person’s fingers while being rolled up.
    Allison Dinner | Getty Images

    Tesla is still the top-selling electric vehicle brand in the U.S., but its dominance is eroding as rivals offer a growing number of more affordable models, according to a report Tuesday by S&P Global Mobility.
    The data firm found that Tesla’s market share of new registered electric vehicles in the U.S. stood at 65% through the third quarter, down from 71% last year and 79% in 2020. S&P forecasts Tesla’s EV market share will decline to less than 20% by 2025, with the number of EV models expected to grow from 48 today to 159 by then.

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    12 hours ago

    A drop in Tesla’s U.S. market share was expected, but the rate of the decline could be concerning for investors in Elon Musk’s autos and energy company. As Musk focuses attention on fixing his recently acquired social media company, Twitter, Tesla shares closed down by about a point to $180 on Tuesday. Tesla’s stock has declined by almost half year to date.
    S&P reported that Tesla is slowly losing its stranglehold on the U.S. EV market to fully electric models that are now available in price ranges below $50,000, where “Tesla does not yet truly compete.” Tesla’s entry-level Model 3 starts at about $48,200 with shipping fees, but the vehicles typically retail for higher prices with options.
    “Tesla’s position is changing as new, more affordable options arrive, offering equal or better technology and production build,” S&P said in the report. “Given that consumer choice and consumer interest in EVs are growing, Tesla’s ability to retain a dominant market share will be challenged going forward.”
    The new data follows a Reuters report Monday that Tesla is developing a revamped version of its entry-level Model 3 aimed at cutting production costs and reducing the components and complexity in the interior.
    During the company’s third-quarter earnings call in October, Musk said Tesla was finally working on a new, more affordable model that he first teased in 2020.

    “We don’t want to talk exact dates, but this is the primary focus of our new vehicle development team, obviously,” he said, adding that Tesla had completed “the engineering for Cybertruck and for Semi.”
    He described the future vehicle as something “smaller,” that will “exceed the production of all our other vehicles combined.”
    Stephanie Brinley, associate director of AutoIntelligence for S&P Global Mobility, noted that Tesla’s unit sales are expected to increase in coming years despite the decline in its market share.
    Tesla’s current leadership in EVs is over a relatively insignificant market. Despite the amount of attention surrounding EVs, sales of all-electric and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles — which include electric motors as well as an internal combustion engine — remain miniscule.
    Of the 10.22 million vehicles registered in the U.S. through the third quarter, roughly 525,000, or 5.1%, were all-electric models. That’s up from 334,000, or 2.8%, through the third quarter of 2021, according to S&P.
    The majority of the EVs registered through September — or nearly 340,000 — were Teslas, according to S&P. The remaining vehicles were divided, very unevenly, among 46 other nameplates.
    But Tesla’s success in the market as well as government incentives have all but forced traditional automakers to make an effort in the growing EV segment.
    The Ford Mustang Mach-E, ranked third in EV registrations, is the only non-Tesla vehicle in the top five rankings, S&P said. Those EVs were followed by the Chevrolet Bolt and Bolt EUV, Hyundai Ioniq 5, Kia EV6, Volkswagen ID.4 and Nissan Leaf.
    S&P noted that the growth in EVs is largely coming from current owners of Toyota and Honda vehicles. Both of the automakers are well-known for fuel-efficient vehicles but have been slow to transition to all-electric models.
    To help curb carbon and other emissions from traditional gas-powered vehicles, several states and the federal government are encouraging the transition to fully electric vehicles with incentives such as tax breaks.
    Transportation is responsible for 25% of carbon emissions from human activity globally, according to estimates by the nonprofit International Council on Clean Transportation.

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    ‘Glass Onion’ could have made $200 million, but Netflix only let it play in theaters for a week

    Netflix’s may have left tens of millions of dollars in ticket sales on the table after only releasing Rian Johnson’s “Glass Onion” in theaters for one week.
    The sequel to Johnson’s popular “Knives Out” opened in nearly 700 theaters, the largest release of any Netflix original film to date.
    It snared an estimated $13 million to $15 million during a five-day stretch, but box office analysts think it could have made closer to $60 million with a wider release.

    Daniel Craig returns as Benoit Blanc in “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Story.”

    Netflix probably left hundreds of millions of dollars on the table by not keeping Rian Johnson’s “Glass Onion” in theaters.
    The sequel to Johnson’s critically acclaimed “Knives Out” opened in nearly 700 theaters, the largest release of any Netflix original film to date, last Wednesday ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday weekend. “Glass Onion” leaves theaters Tuesday. It will arrive on Netflix Dec. 23.

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    The movie snared an estimated $13 million to $15 million during the five-day stretch, a solid opening for a film released in only a limited number of theaters.
    Box office analysts, however, say that figure could have been much higher if Netflix had opted for a traditional wide release of 2,000 to 4,000 theaters. The truncated run for “Glass Onion” also prompted industry insiders to again question the streamer’s theatrical release strategy. Netflix has backtracked on its previous policies, including by introducing an ad-supported subscription option, leading many to wonder whether the company should rethink its resistance to the traditional Hollywood movie release model as it looks for new ways to grow revenue.
    “With a traditional wide release, premium screen spread, and full marketing campaign, I think ‘Glass Onion’ could have generated at least $50 million to $60 million to lead the entire market,” said Shawn Robbins, chief analyst at BoxOffice.com.
    Instead, Disney and Marvel Studio’s “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” continued to lead the box office, tallying $45.9 million in domestic ticket sales during the regular three-day weekend and $64 million for the five-day holiday period.
    Netflix declined to provide box office receipts for the film, breaking with standard procedures other studios adhere to each weekend, so it is unclear what “Glass Onion” generated in ticket sales Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

    But in 2019, “Knives Out” snared $312 million globally on a budget of just $40 million. The first film’s performance at the box office has provoked questions about why Netflix has limited the release of “Glass Onion” to just one week in a limited number of theaters. After all, the streamer reportedly shelled out $400 million for the rights to two sequels.
    Box office analysts predicted the film could have hauled in more than $200 million in ticket sales before the end of its run if it had been given a wider global release.
    “This is exactly the kind of movie adults want to see in theaters right now,” said Robbins. “The family element made ‘Knives Out’ a perfect Thanksgiving release for audiences across the country three years ago. Daniel Craig’s return as Benoit Blanc, Rian Johnson’s sharp storytelling, and another round of positive reviews for ‘Glass Onion’ are building on the excellent goodwill from the prior film as this semi-sequel reaps some rewards, but it arguably could have achieved even more.”
    Word of mouth was a huge factor in the success of “Knives Out,” as evidenced by the film’s low drop in ticket sales from week to week after its opening. Typically, films will see weekend sales drop by 50% or more in each week after its opening. But “Knives Out” ticket sales declines remained consistently under 40% until Christmas, when sales got a 50% boost, and then only fell between 10% and 30% weekly until February.
    This indicates that audiences were talking about the film and encouraging others to go out and see it, leading to a strong hold in ticket sales.
    “Glass Onion” earned a 93% “Fresh” rating on Rotten Tomatoes from 238 reviews and an audience score of 92%, suggesting that it too could have generated the same kind of word of mouth.
    Some executives within Netflix reportedly lobbied co-CEO Ted Sarandos earlier this year to consider longer stints in theaters and wider releases for some films, but Sarandos nixed the idea. Top brass at the company have said repeatedly that the future of entertainment is streaming.
    The company’s strategy in the past with limited theatrical releases — such as with Martin Scorsese’s “The Irishman” — has been to build buzz for subscribers before the film arrives on its service. That’s the play here, too, the company said during last quarter’s earnings video.
    “We’re in the business of entertaining our members with Netflix movies on Netflix,” Sarandos said during the call.
    He said that Netflix has brought films to festivals and has given them limited runs in theaters because filmmakers have demanded it.
    “There [are] all kinds of debates all the time, back and forth, but there’s no question internally that we make our movies for our members and we really want them to watch them on Netflix,” he said.
    Netflix declined to comment further.
    While Sarandos and co-CEO Reed Hastings have remained adamant that subscribers don’t want Netflix content in theaters, some Wall Street analysts don’t think that’s the case.
    “Subscribers don’t care at all,” said Michael Pachter, analyst at Wedbush. “The talent, on the other hand, cares a lot. … The talent needs that to help negotiate future deals, and thrives on the prestige of awards nominations.”
    “Netflix did not do this for the money,” he added. “They did it because of pressure from the talent.”
    To others, like streaming expert Dan Rayburn, Netflix’s cross-platform promotion of putting “Glass Onion” in theaters for a week to tease its release on the streamer a month later “makes a lot of sense.”
    The streaming giant would have also had to shell out more in marketing costs to promote the film over time. Additionally, Netflix’s business model relies on new films and TV shows to decrease subscriber churn and lure in new audiences to its platform. The fact that “Glass Onion” drew patrons to theaters is a sign to Netflix that there is demand for the film and it will likely perform well once it debuts on the streaming service.
    Still, it’s hard for investors to see all the money left on the table — especially when Netflix continues to spend heavily on content as subscriber numbers slow.
    In recent years, the streamer has spent big on flashy, blockbuster-style action movies like “The Gray Man” and “Red Notice,” which cost the company $200 million each. The films are the first steps in bids to spark event-level franchises. But they’re costly, and it’s unclear how positive they have been for Netflix’s bottom line.
    Unlike rival studios Universal and Disney, Netflix doesn’t have a wide breadth of sources to generate revenue. Its only option, until recently, for recouping its spending has been through subscription growth. The company is hoping its ad-tier will help generate more funds to subsidize its $17 billion annual spending on content.
    Box office analysts and Wall Street see theatrical releases as a smart way for Netflix to market its content and spark revenue growth.
    “Here’s hoping ‘Knives Out 3’ is given the chance to build further on this watershed moment of cooperation between Netflix and theatrical exhibitors,” Robbins said. “It would be a win-win for the entire industry.” 
    Disclosure: Comcast is the parent company of NBCUniversal and CNBC. NBCUniversal owns Rotten Tomatoes.

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    AMC Networks plans significant layoffs as CEO steps down after less than three months

    AMC Networks told employees in a memo Tuesday it is planning significant layoffs.
    The plans come as CEO Christina Spade is leaving the company after taking on the role in September.
    The company said its board is finalizing its decision for her replacement.

    Christina Spade attends The Hollywood Reporter, SAG-AFTRA and Heineken Celebrate Emmy Award Contenders at Annual Nominees Night on September 10, 2022 in West Hollywood, California.
    Michael Kovac | The Hollywood Reporter | Getty Images

    AMC Networks told its employees Tuesday that it is planning significant layoffs, according to people familiar with the matter and a memo obtained by CNBC.
    The memo, sent by AMC Networks Chairman James Dolan, came shortly after the company announced that CEO Christina Spade stepped down from her role less than three months after being promoted to the position. The layoffs are expected to happen in the coming days and amount to about 20% of its U.S. staff, said one of the people, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the matter.

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    AMC Networks had more than 1,700 full-time employees and 287 part-time employees as of the end of last year.
    Spade’s departure and the layoffs come as AMC and the Dolan family contend with the best way to move the company forward as it deals with cord-cutting and a toughening ad market, said the people. The company is likely looking at an internal candidate for CEO, they added.
    Earlier this fall, Spade held an off-site meeting with employees in which she noted layoffs wouldn’t take place until next year and the company would hire a consulting firm to further assess the business, the people said. However, shortly afterward, the company told employees it wouldn’t bring in a consulting firm and layoffs appeared to be imminent, the people said.
    AMC Networks derives more than half of its revenue from the linear TV bundle, which has been bleeding customers as they opt for streaming services. Quarterly revenue had fallen 16% to $682 million in the period ended Sept. 30.
    In Tuesday’s memo, Dolan called it a “confusing and uncertain time” for the TV industry.

    “It was our belief that cord cutting losses would be offset by gains in streaming,” he wrote. “This has not been the case. We are primarily a content company and the mechanisms for the monetization of content are in disarray.”
    AMC Networks shares were down more than 4% Tuesday.
    The company said in a statement that its board is finalizing its decision for Spade’s replacement.
    “We thank Christina for her contributions to the company in her CEO role and her earlier CFO role, and we wish her well in her future endeavors,” Dolan said in the statement. AMC Networks is controlled by Dolan and his family, which also owns Madison Square Garden Entertainment.
    Spade joined AMC Networks in 2021 as chief financial officer and a few months later was promoted to the dual role of chief operating officer and CFO. In August, less than a year later, the company announced she would take over as CEO.
    The company, whose properties include its namesake cable network IFC, said in a regulatory filing Tuesday that Spade will receive her severance payment in accordance with her Aug. 4 employment agreement, which said she’d be eligible for it if terminated without “cause” or if she resigned for “good reason.”
    Spade, an industry veteran who previously held top positions at ViacomCBS, CBS Corp. and Showtime, replaced interim CEO Matt Blank at AMC Networks.
    Blank, the former chairman of Showtime, had taken over in 2021 after Josh Sapan left the company following a 26-year run that saw the network transform into a hitmaker with series such as “Mad Men” and “The Walking Dead.” AMC Networks recently announced further spinoffs of the original “The Walking Dead” series after it ended its run this fall, and has been releasing new shows based on late horror writer Anne Rice’s novels.
    In recent years, AMC Networks has been seen as an acquisition target for larger media companies. In addition to its successful run of TV shows, it has niche streaming services such as AMC+ and the horror-focused Shudder.
    The company said its paid streaming subscribers grew 44% from the prior year to 11.1 million as of Sept. 30.
    AMC has also been eyed by NBCUniversal’s Peacock, which has approached various smaller streaming services about bundling their content, CNBC previously reported.
    The Wall Street Journal earlier reported that layoffs would take place.
    Read Dolan’s memo below:

    AMC Networks Community:As I am sure you are aware our industry has been under pressure from growing subscriber losses. This is primarily due to “cord cutting.” At the same time we have seen the rise of direct to consumer streaming apps including our own AMC+. It was our belief that cord cutting losses would be offset by gains in streaming. This has not been the case. We are primarily a content company and the mechanisms for the monetization of content are in disarray.It is for that reason that myself and the Board of Directors of AMC Networks have concluded that we as a company need to conserve our resources at this time. We have directed the executive leadership of AMC Networks to undergo significant cutbacks in operations. These will include a large-scale layoff as well as cuts to every operating area of AMC Networks. We of course realize that this will cause significant concern and anxiety for our employees and those who rely on AMC Networks for their livelihood. We do not take this lightly. We will take every step possible to minimize the impact of these actions on our community. However, it is imperative that we begin immediately with this new course of action.The Dolan Family and the Board of AMC Networks have great pride in the company and products that you have created. This is a confusing and uncertain time in our industry. We are confident that AMC Networks will come through this even stronger. Your executive leadership will follow up with details shortly. We wish only the best for everyone in the AMC Networks community.Sincerely, James Dolan

    Disclosure: Comcast’s NBCUniversal is CNBC’s parent company.

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    Shares of Lordstown Motors rise as company begins electric truck deliveries

    Lordstown said it has started shipping its Endurance EV pickup to customers.
    The company said regulators approved the vehicle for sale in the U.S., a key milestone for Lordstown.
    The company is building an initial batch of 500 trucks for customers as it seeks automaker partners.

    Lordstown Motors gave rides in prototypes of its upcoming electric Endurance pickup truck on June 21, 2021 as part of its “Lordstown Week” event.
    Michael Wayland / CNBC

    Electric truck startup Lordstown Motors said Tuesday it began shipping its pickup truck to customers after receiving final regulatory approval to sell the vehicle in the United States.
    Lordstown’s shares were up more than 3% in morning trading.

    In a key milestone for the company, Lordstown said its Endurance was certified for sale by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the California Air Resources Board following a successful series of tests, including crash testing. It’s now shipping the first of an initial batch of 500 trucks to customers.
    The Endurance is an electric pickup truck designed for commercial fleet use.
    Lordstown had previously said it plans to ramp up Endurance production slowly in a bid to conserve cash. The company said the cost of building the Endurance is “materially higher” than the truck’s selling price and will be until the company achieves larger economies of scale. On Nov. 8, Lordstown said it expects to make about 30 trucks by year-end. It plans to complete the remainder of that first batch of 500 by the end of June 2023.
    The Endurance is being built by Foxconn in the Ohio factory that the Taiwanese contract manufacturer bought from Lordstown earlier this year. Lordstown is actively seeking automaker partners to help develop and produce the Endurance.
    As of the end of the third quarter, Lordstown had about $204 million in cash.

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    Microsoft, Activision-Blizzard and the future of gaming

    The highest-grossing film of the year so far, “Top Gun: Maverick”, took $1bn in its first month. The biggest game, “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II”, took the same amount in just ten days. Spurred on by the pandemic, which saw video-game spending increase by nearly a quarter in 2020, the games industry will be worth more than $170bn this year in worldwide revenues, some five times as much as the global box office.Gaming’s ballooning value is attracting the attention of regulators. In January Microsoft, which makes the Xbox console, agreed to buy Activision-Blizzard, the publisher of titles including the “Call of Duty” franchise, for $69bn. It is the biggest acquisition in Microsoft’s history and by far the biggest in that of the games industry. Regulators from 16 territories have investigated the deal. In the past two months Britain’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) and the European Commission have scrutinised it in detail; America’s Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is expected to make a decision imminently. If any of those three mega-regulators says no, it could be game over.Trustbusters’ immediate concern is the console market. For two decades Sony and Nintendo have had the upper hand in the “console wars”, even as supply-chain problems have inhibited sales of Sony’s latest PlayStation (see chart). Nonetheless, Sony worries that gamers might desert the PlayStation if Microsoft made “Call of Duty” exclusive to Xbox. Some 45% of PlayStation owners play the game, according to MIDiA Research, a data firm.Sony’s complaint seems a bit rich. “None of the console players are in a position to preach on exclusivity,” says George Jijiashvili of Omdia, a research company, who notes that Sony has kept PlayStation games such as “Uncharted” and “God of War” off the Xbox. Microsoft in any case says that keeping “Call of Duty” on the PlayStation, where it rakes in hundreds of millions of dollars a year, is “a commercial imperative for…the economics of the transaction”. Earlier this month it offered Sony a ten-year deal to keep “Call of Duty” on the platform. Phil Spencer, who runs the Xbox business, later told the Verge, an online publication, More

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    Amazon used AWS on a satellite in orbit to speed up data analysis in ‘first-of-its kind’ experiment

    Amazon’s cloud computing division successfully ran a software suite on a satellite in orbit, the company announced Tuesday.
    AWS, or Amazon Web Services, used prototype software on a satellite to analyze imagery.
    The software automatically reviewed images to decide which were the most useful to send back down to the ground, and also reduced the size of images.

    An image captured by the ION Elysian Eleonara satellite in January 2022.

    Amazon’s cloud computing division successfully ran a software suite on a satellite in orbit, in a “first-of-its-kind” experiment, the company announced Tuesday.
    AWS, or Amazon Web Services, conducted the prototype satellite software demonstration through partnerships with Italian company D-Orbit and Swedish venture Unibap. The experiment was conducted over the past 10 months in low Earth orbit, using a D-Orbit satellite as the test platform.

    The success of the AWS demo has implications across the space industry, as spacecraft – meaning anything from space stations to satellites – face a bottleneck in both data storage and communications while in orbit.
    A “downlink,” the process of transferring data from orbit, requires a spacecraft connect to a ground station, with limitations such as the speed of the connection, or the time window in which the spacecraft is above the ground station.
    AWS’ software automatically reviewed images to decide which were the most useful to send to the ground. It also reduced the size of images by up to 42%.
    “We demonstrated the capability to increase the [satellite’s] productivity,” AWS vice president Max Peterson told CNBC.

    Sign up here to receive weekly editions of CNBC’s Investing in Space newsletter.

    Peterson added that the experiment also showed that AWS can help companies perform “insight operations on the satellite, instead of having to wait until you can downlink back to Earth.”

    “We can train models to recognize practically anything … [giving] the ability to both improve the utilization of a really expensive asset in space, and be able to take huge amounts of data and get insights and translate it into action faster,” Peterson said.
    AWS has steadily built out its Aerospace and Satellite Solutions unit since its establishment in 2020, with the company providing cloud services to a variety of customers and partners across the space sector.

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