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<ul><li><strong>The Indian government has called it a historic move.<br /></strong></li><li><strong>State-owned <keyword id="71137" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Diesel-Locomotive-Works">Diesel Locomotive Works</keyword> has converted two WDG3A Diesel Locos into a twin electric WAGC3 locomotive of 10,000 horsepower. <br /></strong></li><li><strong>The launch of the <keyword id="930179" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="electric-locomotive">electric locomotive</keyword> comes just days after PM Modi unveiled the Delhi-Varanasi Vande Bharat express. </strong></li></ul>India Prime Minister Narendra Modi today flagged off the first electric engine converted from diesel locomotive in Varanasi today, making India the world’s first country to achieve the same. <br /><br />The new electric engine was a project undertaken by Diesel Locomotive Works based out of Varanasi.<br /><br /> The DLW converted two WDG3A Diesel Locos into a twin electric WAGC3 locomotive of 10,000 horsepower. According to official statements, the government has called it a ‘complete Make in India’ initiative which will result in less greenhouse gas emissions while also making way for better efficient locomotives. <br /><br />This comes in just days after PM Modi unveiled the Delhi-Varanasi Vande Bharat express ‘Train 18’, which <a href="https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/a-day-after-launch-vande-bharat-express-breaks-down-while-returning-from-varanasi-1457476-2019-02-16">broke down</a> on its first commercial run. <br /><br />The project which started work on December 22, 2017 was <a href="https://www.financialexpress.com/infrastructure/railways/indian-railways-leads-world-by-example-pm-modi-flags-off-1st-ever-diesel-to-electric-conversion-locomotive/1491851/">reportedly </a>completed in a record duration of 69 days. <br /><br />In 2016, the Indian Railways had launched Mission Electrification on November 3, 2016. <br /><br />As part of Mission Electrification, in the recent past 10 different electrification projects covering 2516 route kilometer at a cost of about Rs 2797 crores. have been finalized in a short duration, according to official statements.<br /><br /><strong>See Also:</strong><br /><a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/seats-available-in-indian-railways-group-c-and-group-d-jobs-are-down-the-most/articleshow/67619669.cms">In charts: How Indian Railways has cut the number of employees in the last decade</a><br /><br /><a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/indian-railways-hooks-up-with-isro-satellites-to-live-track-trains/articleshow/67566131.cms">Indian Railways hooks up with ISRO satellites to live track trains</a><br /><br /><a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/indian-railways-comes-up-with-ai-enabled-robot-ustaad-designed-to-boost-safety-in-trains/articleshow/67281709.cms">Indian railways comes up with AI enabled robot ‘USTAAD’ — designed to boost safety in trains</a><br />

India is the first to convert a diesel locomotive to electric

<ul class="summary-list"><li><keyword id="4581" type="CITY" weightage="60" keywordseo="general-motors">General Motors</keyword> is partnering with <keyword id="171946" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="Navistar">Navistar</keyword> to provide fuel cell technology to its electric semi-trucks.</li><li>OneH2 will provide the hydrogen production, and J.B. Hunt will pilot the vehicles.</li><li><keyword id="6372405" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="gm">GM</keyword>'s previous deal with <keyword id="1192755" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Nikola">Nikola</keyword> has been scaled back, but isn't completely off the table yet. </li></ul><p>General Motors will provide its fuel cell technology to Navistar for the creation of its zero-emissions semi-truck, the companies said Wednesday.</p><p><a href="https://www.navistar.com/navistar/">Navistar</a>, an Illinois-based truck maker, will use GM's "<a href="https://media.gm.com/media/us/en/gm/news.detail.html/content/Pages/news/us/en/2021/jan/0127-navistar.html">Hydrotec fuel cell power cubes</a>" in production of its semis. Two cubes, both containing 300-plus hydrogen fuel cells, will power each of the long-haul vehicles, which will be commercially available in 2024, <a href="https://news.navistar.com/2021-01-27-Navistar-Collaborates-with-General-Motors-And-OneH2-To-Launch-Hydrogen-Truck-Ecosystem">the company said</a>.</p><p>OneH2, a North Carolina-based hydrogen fuel supplier, is joining the deal and providing the hydrogen production, storage, delivery, and safety for the trucks, and J.B. Hunt has agreed to initially pilot them.  </p><p>Persio Lisboa, Navistar's president and chief executive, said hydrogen fuel cells offer "great promise" for the long range and fast refueling required for heavy duty trucks. </p><p>"We are excited to provide customers with added flexibility through a new hydrogen truck ecosystem that combines our vehicles with the <keyword id="880852" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="hydrogen-fuel-cell">hydrogen fuel cell</keyword> technology of General Motors and the modular, mobile and scalable hydrogen production and fueling capabilities of OneH2," Lisboa said. </p><p><em><strong>Read more:</strong> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/gm-planning-ev-surge-tesla-has-nothing-to-worry-about-2021-1?r=nd-sub">Wall Street is finally rewarding GM's electric-vehicle surge - but Tesla has nothing to worry about</a></em></p><div type="image" title="Screen Shot 2021 01 27 at 9.46.07 AM" height="666" width="888" msid="80485006" hostid="261"></div><p>GM has partnered with other automakers to supply its fuel cell technology, prior to the Navistar deal.  The partnerships include Army, Honda, and Liebherr-Aerospace, according to <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/27/general-motors-partners-with-navistar-to-supply-fuel-cell-technology-for-new-semitruck.html">CNBC</a>.</p><p>The Navistar deal comes months after a $2 billion deal with electric-vehicle startup Nikola was largely <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/30/business/gm-nikola-electric-trucks.html">scaled back</a> after Nikola faced <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nikola-trevor-milton-controversies-gm-general-motors-deal-hindenberg-explained-2020-10">several controversies</a>. A GM spokesperson <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/27/general-motors-partners-with-navistar-to-supply-fuel-cell-technology-for-new-semitruck.html#:~:text=GM%20will%20supply%20Navistar%20with,Hydrotec%E2%80%9D%20fuel%2Dcell%20technology.">told CNBC</a>that negotiations are still ongoing for parts of its nonbinding deal with Nikola, which expires at the end of 2021. </p><p>GM's Hydrotec fuel cell power cubes can be rapidly refueled and carry heavy cargo because of the system's ability to store electrons, the company explained in its statement. The technology is a zero-emissions alternative to diesel truck engines, and is compact and easy to package. GM said the fuel cells can be used for marine, earth-moving and mining equipment, locomotives, and power generators.</p>

GM inked a new electric truck deal as its Nikola partnership sits in limbo

<ul class="summary-list"><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/2022-hummer-ev-edition-1-coolest-features-gmc-electric-pickup-2020-10">General Motors relaunched the controversial Hummer brand this past week</a>, reviving a paramilitary nameplate once synonymous with testosterone swagger and defiant gas-guzzling, but as an all-electric pickup under <keyword id="6356217" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="GMC">GMC</keyword> division.</li><li><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/11/AR2008071102535.html">I begged GM to save Hummer back in 2008,</a> lost the case, and was completely surprised when the brand staged a dramatic comeback with an entirely new mojo.</li><li><keyword id="6372405" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="gm">GM</keyword> isn't noted for brilliant marketing moves, but bringing back Hummer as a halo platform for the company's <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/gms-new-ultium-battery-is-for-electric-car-gearheads-2020-3">Ultium battery technology</a> is a stroke of genius.</li></ul><p>A decade ago, the Hummer fell <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/rise-and-fall-of-hummer-recession-general-motors-bankruptcy-arnold-schwarzenegger-2020-2">victim to the financial crisis and General Motors' 2009 federal bailout and subsequent bankruptcy</a>. "New GM" decided that a hulking paramilitary brand that sold fewer than 100,000 vehicles in its best year wasn't worth continued manufacturing and marketing support.</p><p><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/11/AR2008071102535.html">At the time, I disagreed.</a> I argued, romantically, that "GM desperately needs an obnoxious, attention-grabbing brand to keep from turning into a dreary shadow of its former self." And the country itself needed the Hummer, I wrote, "to remind us of what has always made our automobiles stand out, from the tail fin 1950s to the muscle car 1960s and '70s: swagger."</p><p>I concluded that "Americans don't just drive their cars — they proclaim something about themselves by driving them."</p><p>You can't win 'em all. Although as the reveal this past week of the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/gm-why-electric-car-skeptics-should-buy-hummer-ev-2020-10">new GMC Hummer all-electric truck</a> demonstrated, some brands are actually, well, forever.</p><h2>A powerful nameplate</h2><div type="image" title="Hummer H1" height="1080" width="1920" msid="78983744" hostid="261"></div><p>Such is the power of the Hummer nameplate. What was a stand-alone GM division in 2008, the result of GM buying the moniker from AM General Corp. in 1999 (AM General had created the US military's HUMVEE), is now a sub-brand of GMC, akin to the luxurious Denali and off-road AT4 designations.</p><p>The move was brilliant. Hummer had a basically terrible reputation among the environmentally-conscious crowd, and that was more than a decade before the Green New Deal and Tesla's takeover of the EV market.</p><p>The reputation wasn't entirely deserved. Yes, the Hummer was a rolling ad for American exceptionalism and chugged fuel like a thirsty bull in the desert. But in its more hardcore trim levels, it was an absurdly robust and well-built vehicle.</p><p>One could buy an H1 as a zombie-apocalypse conveyance and feel pretty confident that the money was well spent. A Hummer was possibly the last vehicle anyone would have to buy: Amortize the environmental impact over a few decades, maybe a century, and you could come out way ahead of a Prius.</p><p>That didn't matter to GM's leadership, post-Chapter 11. In those days, the company was streamlining itself to have just four brands: Chevy, GMC, Buick, and Cadillac — and Buick barely made the cut, with GM saving it mainly because of its long and successful history in China, the world's largest growth market, then as now.</p><p>In fact, GM tried to sell Hummer to the Chinese, but the deal fell through. So the brand went into limbo, awaiting its resurrection.</p><h2>Hummer and rumors of Hummers</h2><div type="image" title="2022 GMC HUMMER EV 010" height="1667" width="2500" msid="78983746" hostid="261"></div><p>The rumors about an electric Hummer only started percolating about a year ago, but once the mill started churning, it started to look very good for Hummer 2.0. Why? Because GM had an utterly unique opportunity: revive a great brand that people were <em>still</em> interested in, but without the baggage of macho preening and sordid plumes of tailpipe emissions.</p><p>It worked like a charm. As soon as the GMC Hummer was teased, enthusiasm exploded. It helped that GM also saw the brand as a way to support, in dramatic fashion, the Ultium battery technology is unveiled in early 2020, not to mention beat the <keyword id="8304544" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="tesla-cybertruck">Tesla Cybertruck</keyword> to market by years. </p><p>If anything, the GMC Hummer is even more over-the-top than its controversial predecessor. The powertrain is rated at a near-comical 1,000 horsepower, and torque is a claimed 11,500 pound-feet, which makes a striking headline for a pickup that dreams of towing locomotives but, it's a figure that under some debate. The 0-60 mph time is a supercar-quick three seconds. The truck can also execute groovy maneuvers, like a sideways "crab walk," useful when dueling with difficult offroad situations.</p><p>So who buys this thing, priced as it is for launch at north of $110,000?</p><h2>Not your father's Hummer</h2><div type="image" title="2022 GMC HUMMER EV 038" height="1437" width="2500" msid="78983749" hostid="261"></div><p>Nobody, really. The new Hummer is what the old Hummer never quite managed to be: a halo vehicle for GM's transformation to an electric automaker. The old Hummer was for dudes (usually dudes) who, for whatever reason, wanted to be like Arnold Schwarzenegger. It was, despite its combat lineage, a cartoon car.</p><p>But the new GMC Hummer is virtue amplified by the resonance of a brand deftly inverted. It isn't your father's Hummer, and how!</p><p>Few customers will buy it, even at lower prices (it starts at $80,000, a figure that most backwoods warriors would find excessive when they have many superb four-wheel-drive pickups to choose from that cost much less).</p><p>But who cares? The truck should be the star of the auto-show circuit, when and if auto shows ever come back, there are likely to be plenty of amped-up TV commercial sports during various Big Games (when those come back in force), and the vehicle is going to make little kids and grownups alike perform impromptu jigs when they spot it in the wild. </p><p>Prepare yourselves for the GMC Hummer owners club and for lots of YouTubed Hummer rallies (when rallies come back).</p><p>I can honestly say <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SHLmoswkkAQ">I sort of saw this coming</a>, although I'd mostly consigned Hummer to the junkyard of automotive history until early this year. The electric-pickup action, I assumed, would wait for the Ford F-150 EV, and who wouldn't want to take a test drive in a Cybertruck?</p><p>Hummer lost its thunder in the late 2010s. But boy, does it ever have the lightning back!</p>

GM's revival of the Hummer as an all-electric halo car is a stroke of marketing genius

<p>Happy Friday and welcome back to Business Insider's weekly roundup of all things A to B. I'm senior editor Alex Davies, back on BI's <keyword id="34991" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="100" keywordseo="transportation">transportation</keyword> desk after a six-year hiatus. A whole lot changed in that interim: Wall Street has decided that <keyword id="107096" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="Tesla">Tesla</keyword> is worth more than most of its competitors combined. The COVID-19 pandemic has ruptured supply chains and taken a hatchet to the airline industry. Regulators around the world have gotten deadly serious about stamping out gas- and diesel-powered locomotion. My adopted home of California has transformed from sunny wonderland <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com.au/10000-lightning-strikes-spark-major-fires-in-california-2020-8">to smokey hellscape</a>.</p><p>Still, looking just at this week's news, I'm struck by how many of the grand themes of this space have held true. The mainstream auto industry's grappling with how, and whether, to buy into an electric-car game that <keyword id="6355315" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="elon-musk">Elon Musk</keyword> dominates. <keyword id="1042120" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Uber">Uber</keyword> and <keyword id="6362418" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="lyft">Lyft</keyword> are fighting with regulators over how to pay and treat their drivers. Self-driving cars threaten to upend the status quo — whenever they arrive. </p><p>Before we get going, <a href="http://newsletter.businessinsider.com/join/4np/shiftinggears">don't forget to sign up here to get this sent straight to your inbox every week.</a></p><p>Now let's dive in. </p><h2><strong>GM doubles down on a risky, EV-focused strategy. </strong></h2><p>Of the Detroit Big Three, <keyword id="4581" type="CITY" weightage="60" keywordseo="general-motors">General Motors</keyword> has been the most bullish, and aggressive, on the electrification front. It plans to spend more than $20 billion on electric and autonomous vehicles by 2025, with more than 20 battery-powered rides due out in the next three years. CEO Mary Barra is so into the shift, she didn't rule out changing GM's name to reflect its newfound love for EVs. How does Ultium Motors sound?</p><p>Branding aside, analysts say this strategy is full of risks. Get <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/gm-electric-car-strategy-a-risky-bet-experts-say-2020-8">the full scoop</a>. </p><h2><strong>American airports rebuild themselves for the age of coronavirus</strong></h2><p>Beyond the financial battering they've taken — along with airlines and manufacturers like Boeing — airports now face the challenge of adapting themselves to a highly contagious virus that's not going away anytime soon. Fortunately, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/companies-helping-us-airports-manage-crowds-rental-cars-travel-2020-8">these three companies are around to help</a> with everything from rejiggering signage to managing long lines to solving the parking problem. These sorts of moves will be vital as travel starts to pick back up, especially heading into the holiday season.</p><h2>Uber and Lyft avoid a California shutdown — for now</h2><p>The latest round in the never-ending fight that pits America's ride-hailing siblings against America's many regulators took place in California this week. The companies had threatened to stop ride-hail service in the Golden State as early as Thursday, but <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/uber-lyft-no-shutdown-california-emergency-stay-court-drivers-contractors-2020-8">got an emergency stay in their appeal of a court ruling</a> that said they must treat drivers as employees, not contractors. </p><p>That battle's postponed until an October hearing, but the two companies are hardly in vacation mode. The pandemic has been especially rough on Lyft, which lacks the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/uber-eats-3-reasons-uber-will-beat-lyft-long-run-2020-8">three key advantages helping Uber hobble through the pain</a> — advantages that could keep paying off even after COVID-19's long gone. Meanwhile, the future hasn't stopped its approach, and one analyst told us why he thinks autonomous vehicles could boost the ride-hail stalwarts in the early years <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/uber-and-lyft-face-long-term-threat-from-amazon-tesla-2020-8">but hurt them in the long run</a>. <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/uber-and-lyft-face-long-term-threat-from-amazon-tesla-2020-8"></a></p><h2><strong>Everything else: </strong></h2><ul><li>We review the Polestar 2, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/polestar-2-review-price-ev-volvo-tesla-specs-horsepower-electric-2020-8">the luxury EV that solves the worst part about driving a Tesla</a></li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-cracks-down-shipping-usps-needed-revenue-2020-8">Amazon's crackdown on sellers outside its shipping network</a> could be yet another blow to the USPS</li><li>Airlines won't stop adjusting their flight schedules — <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/airline-schedule-changes-how-to-make-free-changes-get-refunds-2020-8">making it way easier for you to change your plans or get a refund</a></li><li>Chinese Tesla rival <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nio-china-tesla-rival-lease-batteries-separate-from-car-sales-2020-8">Nio wants to lower the price of owning an EV</a> by selling cars and leasing their batteries</li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/airbus-moving-forward-with-long-range-a321xlr-production-report-says-2020-8">Airbus' new long-range single-aisle jet</a> is the perfect plane for airlines post-pandemic</li><li>Boeing may be dropping the 'Max' from the name of its troubled jet, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/boeing-737-max-name-change-rebrand-2020-8">calling the latest version the 737-8</a></li></ul>

Insider Transportation: GM's risky battery bet, Uber avoids a shutdown, airports adapt to the age of coronavirus, and more

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="https://secure.gettyimages.com/SubscriptionDownload/Download/2793947">Mike Simons / Getty Images</a></span></p></div><p></p></div></div></p><ul><li><strong><strong><a href="https://markets.businessinsider.com/stocks/ge-stock">General Electric</a> shares slumped more than 6% after JPMorgan downgraded the name to "underweight" and cut its price target from $6 to $5.</strong></strong></li><li><strong><strong>Analyst Stephen Tusa made the call as investors are "underestimating the severity of challenges and underlying risks at GE."</strong></strong></li><li><strong><strong>GE's large debt pile and weak cash flows could leave it "vulnerable to liquidity issues" if a recession hits.</strong></strong></li><li><strong><strong><a href="https://markets.businessinsider.com/stocks/ge-stock?utm_source=markets&amp;utm_medium=ingest">Watch General Electric trade live</a>.</strong></strong></li></ul><p>General Electric shares slid more than 6% after JPMorgan downgraded the industrial titan from "neutral" to "underweight" and cut its 12-month price target from $6 to $5.</p><p>GE's large debt pile, challenging markets, and increased competition have helped to wipe more than $200 billion off the industrial giant's market valuation in less than three years. In December, JPMorgan analyst Stephen Tusa sparked a brief rebound in its shares when he upgraded them to "neutral."</p><p>Tusa has now reversed the move, saying "many investors are underestimating the severity of the challenges and underlying risks at GE, while overestimating the value of small positives." Combined with a 38% rise in GE's stock price this year and big question marks over the company's debt pile and free cash flow (FCF), he determined a downgrade was justified.</p><p>"[Wall] Street is significantly overprojecting the bounce in FCF in the coming years," he wrote, arguing the company's struggling power and renewables division will soak up "material cash for the foreseeable future." </p><p>Tusa added the fundamentals of GE's aviation business are "weaker than meet the eye," and the company's debt pile leaves it "vulnerable to liquidity issues" in an economic downturn. "We see a real bear case in potential recession for a materially lower equity value" given the group's high leverage and entitlements such as pensions, he added.</p><p>In its latest outlook, <a href="https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/general-electric-stock-price-burn-up-to-2-billion-cash-this-year-2019-3-1028030287">GE warned that it could burn up to $2 billion of cash in 2019</a>, but guided towards positive free cash flows in 2020 and 2021. However, Tusa expects this year's outflow to be "close to a recurring run rate" rather than a one-off due to divestiture headwinds, excess working capital, restructuring and pension costs, taxes, and declines in renewable volumes in 2021.</p><p>GE has tried to improve its cash flows and reduce its debt pile through disposals. For example, it <a href="https://www.ge.com/reports/next-stop-wabtec-ge-completes-spin-off-merger-transportation-unit/">recently merged its locomotive and mining equipment division with transportation group Wabtec</a> in exchange for about $2.9 billion in cash plus shares, and <a href="https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/danaher-corporation-general-electric-to-sell-biopharma-unit-for-214-billion-2019-2-1027979957">agreed to an all-cash deal worth more than $21 billion</a> for the bulk of its life sciences business with science and tech conglomerate Danaher.</p><p>Earlier this year, <a href="https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/general-electric-stock-price-dash-for-cash-steals-value-shareholders-2019-1-1027906352">Tusa criticized the surge of disposals</a> as a "transfer of asset value away from the equity holder-more of a salvage situation than about equity value creation." </p><p>In October, <a href="https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/general-electric-john-flannery-removed-as-ceo-2018-10-1027578526">GE removed John Flannery as CEO</a> after little more than a year in the role. It also announced a $23 billion goodwill impairment charge to its struggling power business, and warned it would fall short of its full-year earnings guidance. The company also <a href="https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/general-electric-dividend-cut-earnings-miss-power-business-reorganization-2018-10-1027670275">slashed its dividend from $0.12 to a penny in a bid to improve cash flow</a>.</p><p class="tagline">Get the latest General Electric stock price<a href="http://markets.businessinsider.com/stock/GE-Quote"> here.</a></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/doomsday-prepper-million-dollar-condo-converted-missile-silo-2019-3">Take a look inside a $3 million doomsday condo that can sustain 75 people for 5 years</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div>

JPMORGAN: Investors are 'underestimating the severity of challenges and underlying risks' at General Electric

<p><strong><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Thomson Reuters</span></p><p class="caption">General Electric Chairman and CEO Immelt and staff leave after a meeting with French President at the Elysee Palace in Paris</p></div><p></p></div></div></strong></p><ul><li><strong><a href="http://markets.businessinsider.com/stocks/ge-stock">General Electric</a> will be replaced by <a href="http://markets.businessinsider.com/stocks/wba-stock">Wallgreens Boots Alliance</a> in the Dow Jones Industrial Average.</strong></li><li><strong>Shares of embattled GE fell about 1.6% overnight following the announcement, while Walgreens rose 3%.</strong></li><li><strong>The change will make the index more representative of the economy, S&amp;P Dow Jones Indices said.</strong></li><li><strong><a href="http://markets.businessinsider.com/stocks/ge-stock">Follow GE's stock price here</a> - and follow Walgreens' here. </strong></li></ul><p>Shares of <a href="http://markets.businessinsider.com/stocks/ge-stock">General Electric</a>, an original <a href="http://markets.businessinsider.com/index/dow_jones">Dow Jones Industrial Average</a> member, sank about 1.7% ahead of Wednesday's opening bell after the announcement it will be replaced by Walgreens Boots Alliance in the blue chip stock index.</p><p>Walgreens, which merged with the Swiss-British Alliance Boots pharmacy in 2014, gained about 3% on the announcement.</p><p>GE, founded by Thomas Edison in 1892, was the most valuable public company upon its <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/dow-original-companies-2016-12">inclusion in the index</a> by Charles Dow on its creation in 1896. But the broad decline of the industrial sector and a foray into financial services decimated by the global financial crisis of 2008 led to the company being the sixth-smallest upon the announcement from S&amp;P Dow Jones Indices on Tuesday.</p><p>The shakeup will make the 122-year-old index more representative of the economy, the company said.</p><p>"The U.S. economy has changed," said David Blitzer, the S&amp;P Dow Jones Indices managing director and chairman of its index committee, in a press release. "Consumer, finance, health care and technology companies are more prominent today and the relative importance of industrial companies is less. Walgreens is a national retail drug store chain offering prescription and non-prescription drugs, related health services and general goods."</p><p>"With its addition, the DJIA will be more representative of the consumer and health care sectors of the U.S. economy," Blitzer added. "Today's change to the DJIA will make the index a better measure of the economy and the stock market."</p><p>GE's stock price has fallen nearly 80% from its highs in 2000, <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/ge-loses-dow-replaced-by-walgreens-2018-6">Reuters reported</a>. Last month, newly installed CEO John Flannery warned that the company's once-dependable dividend may be in jeopardy in 2019. As the company sells off assets, including locomotive and power-plant manufacturing units, there have also been calls to even more significantly break up the company from activist investors.</p><p>To be sure, there are beacons of light in GE's otherwise grim outlook. Its <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/general-electric-earnings-beat-boost-from-aviation-and-healthcare-businesses-2018-4"><span>aviation, transportation and healthcare businesses helped the company beat Wall Street estimates </span></a>on its most recent quarterly earnings report in April.</p><p>"We are focused on executing against the plan we've laid out to improve GE's performance," the company said in a statement. "Today's announcement does nothing to change those commitments or our focus in creating in a stronger, simpler GE."</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><a href="http://markets.businessinsider.com/stocks/ge-stock"></a><p class="source"><span><a href="http://markets.businessinsider.com/stocks/ge-stock">Markets Insider</a></span></p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p class="tagline">Get the latest General Electric stock price<a href="http://markets.businessinsider.com/stock/GE-Quote"> here.</a></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/sara-blakely-spanx-ceo-offers-advice-redefine-failure-retail-2016-7">Learning to celebrate failure at a young age led to this billionaire's success</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div>

General Electric sinks after being booted from the Dow

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="https://secure.gettyimages.com/SubscriptionDownload/Download/2793947">Mike Simons / Getty Images</a></span></p></div><p></p></div></div></p><ul><li><strong>General Electric's stock dropped as much as 7.1% on Monday after the company outlined its turnaround plan.</strong></li><li><strong>The company's earlier announcement that it would cut its dividend sent shares higher initially, but the stock dropped into negative territory once details around the restructuring emerged.</strong></li><li><strong>GE is looking for a shot in the arm, having fallen 35% year-to-date through the end of last week.</strong></li></ul><p><br /><a href="http://markets.businessinsider.com/stock/GE-Quote">General Electric</a>'s plan to reconfigure its flailing business is being met with skepticism by investors.</p><p>The company's stock dropped as much as 7.1% on Monday after it <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/ge-slashes-its-divided-by-50-2017-11">l</a>aid out a corporate restructuring plan and trimmed full-year 2018 guidance.</p><p>GE outlined turnaround measures in an investor presentation, and they included:</p><ul><li>Focusing on power, aviation and healthcare equipment while exiting legacy businesses like lighting and locomotives</li><li>Trimming the size of the company's board</li><li>Revamping the company's compensation program</li><li><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/ge-slashes-its-divided-by-50-2017-11" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Slashing the company's dividend</a> in half, to $0.12 a share</li></ul><p>And a turnaround is certainly needed. Even before Monday's drop, the stock had fallen 35% year-to-date, wiping out more than $100 billion in market value over the period. It's been a sore spot for the Dow Jones Industrial Average, the 30-company index that counts GE as its worst-performing stock in 2017.</p><p>Based on their reaction on Monday, investors are waiting to see how these changes trickle down to the bottom line before building positions.</p><p>It was a turbulent morning overall for GE shares, which actually rallied on initial reports that the company was cutting its dividend. It's possible that investors were thinking that GE would take the money used on dividends and reinvest it into core businesses - a <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/ge-stock-price-general-electric-cut-dividend-2017-11" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">practice they've been rewarding</a> since the start of 2016.</p><p>But a couple hours later, once GE chief executive officer John Flannery laid out the rest of the details outlined above and announced the cut to 2018 guidance, the shares took a sharp downward turn. </p><p>Gautam Khanna, an analyst at Cowen who has a market perform - or neutral - rating on GE, called the message conveyed by the company "underwhelming." He is particularly worried about the company's cash flow throw 2018, despite the scaling-back of the dividend.</p><p>Stifel analyst Robert McCarthy was nonplussed by much of what GE laid out, saying that the dividend cut was expected, as was the company's exit from several key verticals. He too reiterated his hold rating.</p><p>In an interesting twist of fate, traders betting against GE missed out on the opportunity to reap huge profits from the stock drop. Short sellers - or those wagering on a share decline - trimmed their position by $44 million in the two months leading up to Monday's decline, according to data compiled by financial-analytics provider <a href="https://www.s3partners.net/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">S3 Partners</a>.</p><p>They do, however, still have about $100 million held short. So going forward, it'll be important to keep an eye on how that level changes, to gauge sentiment shifts in GE's stock.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="http://markets.businessinsider.com/stock/GE-Quote">Markets Insider</a></span></p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p class="tagline">Get the latest General Electric stock price<a href="http://markets.businessinsider.com/stock/GE-Quote"> here.</a></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/brian-levitt-oppenheimerfunds-tech-stocks-not-expensive-2017-10">Red-hot tech stocks aren't as expensive as they look</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div>

General Electric's turnaround plan has investors dumping the stock

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Michel Roccati, 30, got a spinal implant to help him walk again after a traumatic injury.</li><li>He's the first person to walk with a severed spine, even though he still cannot feel his legs.</li></ul><p>Two years after his spine was completely severed in a motorcycle accident in 2017, Michel Roccati was able to walk, cycle, and climb the stairs with the help of a tablet-controlled device, he told the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-60258620">BBC</a>.</p><p>Roccati, now 30, was one of three paralyzed men to test a prototype of a spinal implant modified to help them move their limbs. Researchers in Lausanne, Switzerland, developed and tested the device, and they published the results of the ongoing clinical trial in <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-021-01663-5">Nature Medicine</a> Monday.</p><p>All three individuals who got the implant were able to stand and move their legs hours after surgery, researchers told <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/implanted-spinal-stimulation-device-allows-patients-stand-walk-swim-rcna15132">NBC</a>. It took a few days for them to use a walker rather than full-body support, but with months of therapy and practice in the lab, they've been able to regain some mobility in the real world.</p><p>Although the device is not a cure for spinal injuries, it's allowed nine people with spinal injuries to walk again, neuroscientist and device co-developer Prof Grégoire Courtine told the BBC. Most of them use it for rehabilitation rather than walking around town — but the program includes a command for standing up and getting a drink at a bar.</p><p>For Roccati, the success was unprecedented. No one with a completely severed spinal cord has been able to walk freely, and he's now able to use his device to exercise his muscles on a daily basis.</p><p>"I stand up, walk where I want to, I can walk the stairs — it's almost a normal life," Roccati told the BBC.</p><h2><strong>The device sends electrical pulses to Roccati's spine</strong></h2><p>Roccati told the BBC he lived an active lifestyle before the accident and would often box, run, and do fitness training. His doctors said his resolve to stay active was helpful in his rehabilitation, and he could "use this technology to progress and be better and better," Prof Jocelyne Bloch from the Lausanne University Hospital told the outlet.</p><p>Doctors have used spinal cord stimulation to treat chronic pain since the 1960s, according to a 2019 <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-02306-z">Nature News</a> feature about the technology. Researchers began looking into similar treatments to restore locomotion after spinal injury a bit later on.</p><p>The device itself is a soft, flat electrode positioned between the spinal nerves and the vertebrae. Instead of targeting nerves associated with chronic pain, the Lausanne scientists modified the technology to send electric signals to the areas of the spine that control movement.</p><p>The user can then control their movements via tablet or smartphone using a software that delivers specific electric signals for requested actions, like taking a step or kicking the legs for swimming.</p>

A paralyzed man whose spine was severed in a motorbike crash is walking again thanks to electrodes implanted in his spine

The life-changing power of the strike: How 500,000 workers refused to work in 2023 — and won big

<p class="drop-cap">Make no little plans," goes an often-quoted cliché in city planning. "They have no magic to stir men's blood." That's from the grandiloquent planner of Chicago, Daniel Burnham, who had a typical late-1800s propensity for wide Paris-style boulevards and white, neoclassical buildings — a prototypical think-about-the-Roman-Empire guy. Even so, Burnham had a point. In citymaking, small plans are for suckers and grifters. For proof, click through the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/images-new-city-northern-california-could-look-solano-county-flannery-2023-9">renderings for California Forever</a>, the recently revealed proposal to turn 55,000 acres of drought-prone Northern California hillside into a glorious city of the future. It <em>looks</em> like a big plan. So far, it isn't.</p><p>Right now, California Forever is just a website with some ideology and a handful of hopeful sketches with a faintly socialist-utopian flair. The money behind it, though, is real — $800 million from a conclave of tech and tech-adjacent billionaires who for years have been secretly buying rural land in Solano County, between Travis Air Force Base and the Sacramento River. And they would've gotten away with it, too, if it hadn't been for the meddling kids at the New York Times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/25/business/land-purchases-solano-county.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">unmasking</a> last month the venture capitalists Marc Andreessen, Chris Dixon, and Michael Moritz; philanthropist Laurene Powell Jobs; the Stripe-founding Collison brothers; and others. They've all heaped money onto something called Flannery Associates and its leader, a Peter Thiel-quoting former Goldman high flyer named <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/meet-the-wall-st-cheat-sheet-top-3-traders-under-30-2010-5#jan-sramek--emerging-markets-trader-at-goldman-sachs-1">Jan Sramek</a>. Now Sramek is <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/solano-county-flannery-associates-city-of-yesterday-silicon-valley-billionaires-2023-9">making the media rounds</a> more openly, as well as courting the political and landholding forces in Solano.</p><p>Put aside your feelings about <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/silicon-valley-elite-seasteads-floating-city-pandemic-2020-6">billionaires pitching</a> <a href="https://ciceroinstitute.org/charter-cities/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">private libertarian paradises</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/uber-exec-private-charter-city-silicon-valley-techies-2020-6">away from us hoi polloi</a> (which: barf). What the company says it wants to build says a lot about how rich people think cities work — what cities are. They're mostly wrong.</p><h2><strong>Cities of the future of the past</strong></h2><p>The California Forever art illustrations show at a place that'll look startlingly familiar. "We think that there's so much wisdom in how we built cities and towns over the last hundreds of thousands of years in some places," Sramek said in an appearance on a <a href="https://www.kqed.org/forum/2010101894493/utopia-or-sprawl-tech-group-pushes-plans-for-new-solano-county-city" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Bay Area public affairs radio show</a> earlier this week. "The plans that people put forward will be very inspired by those great old American neighborhoods that someone who was born 100 years ago will recognize."</p><p>If you were hoping that, given a chance to design a greenfield urban enclave, a bunch of secretive billionaires might cough up a zombie- and climate-proof arcology or a neon-lit anime downtown with a space elevator station, you're out of luck. California's highly aggressive species of NIMBYs share with rich would-be homeowners from Silicon Valley an affinity for traditionalism — artisanal neighborhood character, but with higher R-value on the insulation. Hence the renders: Euro-style houses on a hillside angled out over the water, a bucolic row of two- and three-story rowhouses from the 19th century on a tree-lined street full of kids playing, a verdant plaza surrounded by cafes and restaurants with plenty of outdoor seating. You know: nice.</p><p>I started out by talking about Daniel Burnham, but when it comes to a pitch like California Forever, the better big name from urban planning's deep history is Ebenezer Howard. Inspired by a utopian, socialist novel called <em>Looking Backward</em>, Howard in 1898 pitched a new way to build cities that would counteract the polluted, unequal, brutal places getting extruded by capitalism and the industrial revolution. His "garden city" was a self-contained town with all the amenities and light industry it'd need for economic productivity, surrounded by a "green belt" of agriculture to feed its populace, profit from the surplus, and offer natural, open space for recreation. The green belt would also constrain every city's tendency to sprawl into a Los Angeles.</p><p>A few places actually tried to build them — England and Japan had a few, and some sprung up around New York and Philadelphia. They didn't work at all. In reality, builders left too much room between houses. Industry moved to rural areas, and big-ticket jobs moved to urban downtowns. Commuter railways and then the automobile turned garden cities into bedroom communities, which then used zoning, banking, and a bunch of other sneaky tricks to make sure only rich, white people could afford to live in them. In other words: suburbs. Think of the hours-long commutes as cosmic justice.</p><p>In the 1990s, American architects and planners tried it again and made some of the same mistakes. A gloss on the nostalgic idea of small-townish homes centered on a shopping street and transit hub expressed itself in Seaside, Florida — best known for playing the role of the fake town in "The Truman Show." Point is, the garden city remains a dream honored more in the breach — in pitches like the one for California Forever. It tends to turn into something else once ground gets broken.</p><h2><strong>What's not on the map</strong></h2><p>In the images of Foreverville I see the following types of transportation: bicycles, kayaks and canoes, and a train that appears to stop next to the sidewalks of a downtown where ten- or 12-story buildings snuggle shoulder-to-shoulder.</p><p>I get that these are just renderings in a proposal, so I forgive the fact that the train arrives through some kind of tunnel and doesn't seem to have a power source — no locomotive, no overhead power lines. I'll tell you, in municipal politics, putting an electrified third rail through downtown is a real third rail. As far as I can tell the only rail track running through the land in question is a largely abandoned spur that the nearby <a href="https://www.wrm.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Western Railway Museum</a> sometimes runs restored cars on for visitors. (This is a goddamn delight, by the way.)</p><p>Anyway, you'll notice something missing from the renderings: Cars. The streets in which kids play are empty of them. The plaza has no parking. A crowded street fair amid multistory buildings shows happy people walking in the middle of the street, the sidewalks full of stalls selling…well, you can't see what they're selling. Scented candles, is my guess.</p><p>Now, it's not impossible to have a city that isn't car-based. In fact, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/san-francisco-doom-loop-fix-american-city-housing-transit-2023-7">I recommend</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/road-rage-speeding-driving-traffic-large-expensive-cars-suv-2022-5">it</a>. After all, before about 1940, none of them were. But these days it takes some planning. Gloriously car-free or car-light places like <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/sep/18/paradise-life-spanish-city-banned-cars-pontevedra" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Pontevedra in Spain</a> also have transit and services baked into the city form; <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/pedestrians-take-to-streets-of-paris-for-day-without-cars-2021-9">Paris' "fifteen minute city,"</a> with jobs and shops within that striking range of homes, relies on saturation by rail transit. And right now, a big residential development called <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/living-in-a-new-car-free-community-near-phoenix-culdesac-2023-8">Culdesac</a>, in Tempe, doesn't allow cars or on-street parking. Of course, Culdesac is centered on a light rail station, and it only has 700 apartments — not tens of thousands.</p><p>The only thing that really connects Foreverville's footprint to the rest of the world is California State Route 12, a narrow asphalt ribbon that the locals sometimes call "Blood Alley." California Forever's plan promises to improve and widen the 12 so that the new population doesn't clog the thing up. (Spoiler: Widening a highway literally <a href="https://www.nber.org/papers/w15376" target="_blank" rel="noopener">never reduces congestion</a>.) So how will people get to and from Foreverville? How will people get around once there? How will the walkable neighborhoods connect to each other? Robot buses? The lack of cars seem like an implicit promise that Foreverville can't keep.</p><h2><strong>The walk of life</strong></h2><p>The California Forever website promises "homes, shopping, dining, and schools all within walking distance." That seems to recognize that when it comes to cities, "density" cannot simply mean "maximum people per unit space," especially when the only thing that links them all together is car infrastructure like streets and freeways. That's not walkable. That's — well, that's Los Angeles again.</p><p>No, the kind of density that makes cities walkable, lovable, and less likely to burn down the planet, requires density of use — short blocks, lots of different kinds of buildings providing lots of different kinds of service, open space, and interconnections to other uses and cities via transit. It's not clear from the renders and statement of purpose that California Forever has any of these things other than the open-space thing.</p><p>More than that, it's not clear what the city will actually <em>do</em>. A functioning city provides a context for systems to allow people of different backgrounds and classes to mix, to enjoy recreation and each other, to earn money, and to make and move the things that let other people do the same. So what companies will rent the 8th, 9th, and 10th floor office space in the downtown towers? What commercial work will go on, besides latte art, yoga studios, and bike shops? Will the city have lawyers? Banks? Cabinetmakers? Welders? Hardware stores? Artist studios? Comic book stores? The only job anyone seems to be doing in the California Forever renders is installing solar panels, which I fully support, but I do wonder where those hard-hatted solar installers park their F-150s, or live. </p><p>California Forever isn't pitching a city. It's pitching <em>houses</em>. Now, look, California needs those. The state's housing shortage is egregious. But building new homes on greenfield land, far from jobs or services, is terrible, too. And while the website promises "new employers" and "thousands of permanent, good-paying local jobs," it does not specify <em>where</em> those things will be relative to the hillside homes or the rowhouses, or if those working-class amenities will even be in the new town at all.</p><h2><strong>Main Street Electrical Parade</strong></h2><p>When a city doesn't perform all the functions of a city — when it is merely city-esque — things get real weird, real fast. The "row house" render on the web site shows a bunch of different architectural styles, from Edwardian and Victorian to sort of arts-and-craftsy. But in real life, presumably all these houses will be built at the same time. If they're sharing walls, they're likely to be all one building. </p><p>Maybe the façade won't look variegated at all — the built version could have the shared mansards and unitary faces of Hausmannian Paris or John Nash's London. Nothing wrong with that! But one of the keys to the success of those buildings was that once developers agreed to maintain those facades, they were allowed to do pretty much what they wanted with the building behind them.</p><p>Alternatively, the builders will add old-timey fronts to make the building <em>look</em> like it's composed of multiple structures built at the turn of the century. It'll be a condo complex hidden in a show building, like the ride part of Pirates of the Caribbean at Disneyland. Or instead of row houses, they'll end up building townhouses with a few feet of clearance between them, as is more and more common in typical California residential developments. None of the space- and energy-efficiency of rows, with all the lack of privacy.</p><p>The same goes for the plaza. It's uncanny. If one of the cafes serves Italian or Korean food, it won't be because that part of town used to be where the Italian or Korean families lived. There was no town; it has no used-to-be. Somewhere in the presumably libertarian homeowner's agreement, the plaza is going to be listed as a Mandatory Enjoyment Zone, with rules for what kinds of signage a Starbucks is allowed to have (instead of keeping rents low enough for a local coffee entrepreneur to pull a latte). The idealized shopping districts of the mid-20th century planned communities mutated into basic malls; that's what's going on here, decades later. This is generative placemaking, the urban design equivalent of a large language model cribbing from all the existing ideas about cities and running them through the tautologitron. Make a city that looks like cities look like!</p><p>"Authenticity" has never meant much in a city, and it means even less in the post-postmodern era. But still, these renderings cross a border between architecture and Imagineering. It's not an accident that one of the most famous rich people to ever want to build a city from scratch was Walt Disney. California Forever isn't promising Main St; it's promising "Main Street."</p><h2><strong>The city and the city</strong></h2><p>The urbanists on California Forever's team certainly understand these potential shortcomings. The project's director of planning, Gabriel Metcalf, is a respected urban planner who used to run the Bay Area's pro-housing smart growth and urban advocacy group SPUR. Also on the team is BH Bronson Johnson, the planner behind Sidewalk, the abortive attempt of Google's holding company Alphabet to build a <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/alphabet-sidewalk-labs-abandons-project-for-quayside-toronto-neighborhood-2020-5">new city neighborhood in Toronto</a>. That didn't happen, but the walkability and densified city stuff was smart.</p><p>But even if they get everything right about the plans and designs for Foreverville, it still faces heavy odds. The team is already dealing with significant local resistance and the need for a whole election's worth of new land use laws. Once they get past all that, even builders with the best of urbanist intentions often fail. Just about 60 miles southeast of the California Forever site is a residential development called Mountain House. In the planning stages, its leaders said all the right stuff — different housing forms, walkability, diverse uses, smart growth. But none of that happened. It's just a development with boulevards.</p><p>That suburban form — single-family homes set way back from wide, curving streets that lead to eight-lane, high-speed roads, freeways, and Targets — is a default. It's what plans like California Forever look like when brick starts getting laid. "There's just such a momentum and it's so much easier to deliver that," says Dan Parolek, the architect behind Culdesac. Counties don't have the expertise to lay out anything other than homes, boulevards, and Walmarts. Builders do urban infill or suburban planned housing. "Trying to get a builder or developer to build something more urban in a historically suburban or rural environment is really, really hard," he says.</p><p>A survey that California Forever sent to current Solano residents asked how they'd feel about tens of millions of dollars in new tax revenue (presumably the property taxes on new homes), millions of new olive and oak trees, protection for open space, thousands of jobs, a performing arts center, minor league baseball, and other fun stuff. People like fun stuff; approvals hovered around 60% for it all. It seems like huge change. But a plan that's really just imagineered houses is actually little, in the Burnham sense. Unambitious, unsuited for the new world. Which means it's worth remembering the rest of what Burnham said, the part of the quote most people leave out: Little plans, he said, "probably will not themselves be realized." They tend not to happen at all — at least, not the way their investors pitched them.</p><p><em><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/author/adam-rogers">Adam Rogers</a> is a senior tech correspondent at Insider, covering science, technology, and our weird future. He reports on <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/ai-chatbots-chatgpt-google-bard-microsoft-bing-break-internet-search-2023-2">online</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/ai-chatbots-chatgpt-google-bard-microsoft-bing-break-internet-search-2023-2">search</a>, how <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/road-rage-speeding-driving-traffic-large-expensive-cars-suv-2022-5">technology</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/led-city-streetlights-turning-purple-broken-tech-danger-2022-11">changes the way we live</a>, and what <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-twitter-fail-collective-superintelligence-2022-11">technology entrepreneurs' priorities</a> mean for <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/tech-job-site-blind-anxiety-burnout-recession-stock-crash-2022-5">society</a>.</em></p>

I looked at the plans for the new city proposed by Silicon Valley elites. They're really terrible.

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>AP</span></p><p class="caption">High-tech!</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><ul><li><strong>Union Pacific is using a Big Data technology to ensure that its trains operate safety and efficiently.</strong></li><li><strong>The system is called Machine Vision.</strong></li><li><strong>It's one of several high-tech innovations the western freight carrier is undertaking.</strong></li></ul><p><br />Someday soon, all our cars will be powered by electricity and drive themselves. Except not yet. Someday soon, airplanes will run on electricity and fly themselves. Except not yet.</p><p>We're making widespread assumptions about how technology will transform road and air travel, but for the most part, cars run on gas and have humans behind the wheel. Planes continue to require pilots.</p><p>But what about railroads? A system that was around when planes were a figment of the imagination and cars were called "horses" has arguably taken greater advantage of laser-radar, sensors, big data, and sophisticated programming that all other forms of modern transport.</p><p>OK, we're not necessarily talking about Amtrak or the New York City Subway, both of which are in serious need of upgrades. We're dealing here with freight rail: the movement of massive amounts of goods via railcars that are pulled by huge diesel locomotives through some of America's most empty and picturesque landscapes.</p><p>The dominant freight rail company in the US West is Union Pacific. Headquartered in Omaha, Nebraska, the firm dates to 1862. But its venerable age doesn't mean it isn't relentlessly innovating.</p><h2>Railroads are the opposite of Rustbelt</h2><p>"We're the opposite of the rustbelt industry," said the company's Vice-President and Chief Technology Officer, Lynden <span>Tennison. </span></p><p><span><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Union Pacific</span></p><p class="caption">A Machine Vision image.</p></div><p></p></div></div></span></p><p><span>Tennison has been with Union Pacific since 2005, so he's executive tenure has coincided with the advent of the Internet of Things - and there aren't many things that are thingier than a 4,400-horsepower diesel-electric locomotive pulling a long train of cars through Colorado or Utah.</span></p><p><span>In an interview with Business Insider, Tennison discussed one of Union Pacific's more ambitious forays into using the latest tech to improve service, safety, and business.</span></p><p>It's called Machine Vision, and Union Pacific developed the system in its own research-and-development lab. In a nutshell, at three locations - <span>North Platte, Nebraska; Loveland, Iowa; and Stuttgart, Arkansas - using what Tennison described as a portal, the company can remotely scan a mile-long train moving at 70 mph. </span></p><p><span>"The system's robotic eyesight captures 50,000 photos per second, which are then strung together to form uninterrupted 3D images of the train," Union Pacific said in a statement. Lasers, radars, and sensors are also involved, and each portal site has its own trackside data center.</span></p><p><span>"We c</span>apture a massive amount of information," Tennison said. "On a 100-car train, a few secs yields 30 gigabytes of data and 15 billion."</p><h2>Riding the rails to big data</h2><p>All of that information is then crunched so that in near-real time Union Pacific staffers can look for defects. If they find any, they can flag them for future, scheduled inspections that are required by regulators, or prepare a repair for a stop down the line, saving valuable downtime that would otherwise be spent waiting for parts to arrive.</p><p>The result is that rail operations are safer and Union Pacific's rolling stock keeps rolling, keeping the business on track and making sure that customers are served.</p><p>Machine Vision is just one example of how the freight company, with its expertise in logistics and ability to apply innovations at scale, is leveraging big data-technology in ways that airlines and car companies can only dream of. According to Tennison, Union Pacific plans to expand Machine Vision to 13 portals in total.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Union Pacfiic</span></p><p class="caption">A UP train passing through a Machine Vision portal.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>Other initiatives include putting the type of track-inspection technology that usually requires specialized locomotives on trains that are plying freight routes every day, greatly increasing the company's ability to monitor its rail network for trouble.</p><p>This all obviously requires software and engineering talent - something that Union Pacific isn't content to leave to Silicon Valley. </p><p>"We're aggressive about recruiting top-tier talent," Tennison said. The company looks to colleges such as Georgia Tech and Carnegie Mellon to tempt science and engineering graduates to take a look at working in the rail industry. </p><p>"They're surprised at the complexity of the problems," Tennison said, adding that Union Pacific's tech-trained employees will be well compensated. Not incidentally, they'll enjoy the lower cost of living in places like Omaha.</p><p>But perhaps most importantly, they won't vanish into a tech colossus. </p><p>"You're not a little cog in a big wheel," Tennison said. "You're part of the wheel."</p>     <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-tesla-semi-truck-electric-18-wheeler-rig-tech-driving-road-2017-11">Watch Elon Musk show off Tesla's first electric semi - which can go from 0-60 mph in five seconds</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div>

A Union Pacific exec told us why railroads are more high-tech than cars or planes

<p><strong><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Reuters/Alwyn Scott</span></p><p class="caption">General Electric Chief Executive Officer John Flannery presents the company's new strategy and financial targets to investors at a meeting in New York.</p></div><p></p></div></div></strong></p><ul><li><strong><a href="http://markets.businessinsider.com/stocks/ge-stock">General Electric</a>'s dividend is at risk unless two things happen, according to a note by Cowen analyst Gautam Khanna. </strong></li><li><strong>GE has had a rough go of things lately, including a restructuring, dividend slash, and SEC investigation.</strong></li><li><strong>Shares have fallen more than 50% in the past year. </strong></li><li><strong><a href="http://markets.businessinsider.com/stocks/ge-stock">Watch GE stock trade in real time here</a>. </strong></li></ul><p>General Electric's dividend is at risk unless at least one of two things happen, according to Cowen analyst Gautam Khanna. </p><p>Shares have cratered more than 56% over the past year, and it seems like there's no relief in sight.</p><p>Back in November, the industrial giant <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/ge-stock-price-general-electric-turnaround-plan-investors-not-sold-2017-11">announced a turnaround plan</a> that received a tepid reception on Wall Street. The company said it planned to exit legacy businesses like lighting and locomotives to focus on power, aviation, and healthcare equipment. It also announced it was cutting its dividend in half and restructuring its board and compensation programs.</p><p>And in late February, GE confirmed it would <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/general-electric-stock-price-restating-2-years-of-earnings-2018-2">restate its earnings </a>for 2016 and 2017. The US Securities and Exchange Commission had investigated the company for its accounting of contract assets, which are receivables of revenues that the company recognizes before the cash is actually paid to GE. </p><p>Those contract assets are one of two areas of particular concern to Khanna, who projects first-quarter earnings $0.08 a share, which is below the Wall Street consensus of $0.12.</p><p>"This lower, truer EPS base partly explains why we don't believe <strong>the $0.48/year dividend is safe unless "contract assets" convert to cash on a net basis, and/or the Power market rebounds sharply and soon,"</strong> he wrote. </p><p>He added that his EPS projection could be "even lower if contract assets, a $0.30 plus to C18 EPS, wane."</p><p>And his expectations for those assets aren't bullish. "We assume that GE won't recognize sizable, favorable "contract asset" marks in Q1," Khanna said. </p><p>He reiterated the second main risk to GE's 3.69% dividend yield is if "power fails to recover." <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/electricity-demand-dropping-power-industry-negative-impact-2017-12">Demand for electricity has dropped of late</a>, a headwind for the power industry. </p><p>GE shares are down 27% this year. </p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><a href="http://markets.businessinsider.com/stocks/ge-stock"></a><p class="source"><span>Markets Insider</span></p></div><p></p></div></div></p>      <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/wall-street-bull-explains-trade-war-trade-war-fears-overblown-2018-4">Wall Street's biggest bull explains why trade war fears are way overblown</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div>

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