Samsung
Samsung's newly-announced foldable phone, the Galaxy Z Flip.
Good morning! This is the tech news you need to know this Wednesday.
- Samsung announced multiple new products during its big Unpacked event, from a new foldable phone, the Galaxy Z Flip, to the $1,400 Galaxy S20 Ultra with 100x zoom. The Korean tech giant announced no fewer than five major new devices during the event, including the company's best shot at Apple's AirPods.
- The FTC is looking into "hundreds" of potential anticompetitive acquisitions made by Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, and Google-parent Alphabet as it ramps up antitrust inquiries. It's looking to find out if the companies bought up potential competitors before the deals were big enough to warrant scrutiny.
- Airbnb reportedly lost $322 million in the first 9 months of 2019, and it could mean a bumpier path to going public. The Wall Street Journal reported that Airbnb lost $322 million, which could worry investors wary of IPOs from money-losing businesses.
- Leaked documents reportedly show the CIA secretly bought an encryption company and used it to spy on clients - while turning a profit. The CIA secretly listened in on communications by spies, diplomats, military officials, calling it "the intelligence coup of the century."
- SoftBank just made $12 billion after Sprint's stock rocketed 70%. The Uber and WeWork investor owns nearly 85% of the wireless carrier's shares, which soared after a judge approved Sprint's merger with T-Mobile.
- Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey says the company will build support for a more remote workforce as concentrating employees in San Francisco 'is not serving us any longer'. The majority of Twitter will still be at its Bay Area HQ, but Jack Dorsey said he wants to build a company "not entirely dependent on San Francisco."
- NASA says SpaceX is just a 'load' of paperwork away from launching its first astronauts. The target launch date is May 7. The NASA astronauts flying SpaceX's Crew Dragon spaceship will likely become the first people to fly a commercial spacecraft by the end of June.
- Robot analysts are better than humans at picking stocks, a new study found. Researchers at the University of Indiana found that robots made more profitable investment decisions than people.
- Facebook and Intel have withdrawn from Mobile World Congress in Barcelona due to coronavirus concerns. According to BBC News, MWC's organizer, the GSMA trade body, is privately mulling canceling the event entirely.
- Donald Trump made a special sign to show reporters that the initials of the 4 most valuable stocks spell MAGA. The sign alluded to a recent achievement made by Google's parent company Alphabet, which hit a $1 trillion market cap in January.
Have an Amazon Alexa device? Now you can hear 10 Things in Tech each morning. Just search for "Business Insider" in your Alexa's flash briefing settings. You can also subscribe to this newsletter here - just tick "10 Things in Tech You Need to Know."