On a roll, Donaldson parted ways with Night Media and its CEO Reed Duchscher, Semafor reported on May 5. The Dallas-based company would "no longer be his primary talent-management agency," the report said.
Donaldson confirmed the news to Bloomberg, saying he and Duchscher still get on but that it "makes sense" to instead build a team of his own.
Influencer-economy experts are torn on whether Donaldson's move will be widely replicated.
It highlights what happens when influencers get to a stage where they believe they no longer need a buffer between them and traditional media — a dynamic that has long caused tension.
Building on borrowed territory
Nikita Walia, the founder and CEO of Blank Strategy Inc., who has worked in consumer social media since 2012, told Business Insider that Donaldson's decision was evidence "of creators not wanting to build on borrowed territory."
"They want to own their brand connections, they want to own their audience, and they want to make sure they're getting the most they can out of those relationships," she said.
Walia predicted that the future of talent agencies would depend on being able to understand this approach "instead of just being a middleman brokering deals."
Katya Varbanova, an influencer industry expert and CEO of Viral Marketing Stars, told BI that talent agencies are only useful to creators when "they have more influence than you."
"When you're MrBeast, and you are the most powerful YouTube creator, you don't really need them," she said.
Another example of this trend could be the case of Gleam Futures, the pioneering influence-management agency.
Gleam became famous for molding the careers of huge British YouTubers like Zoella, Alfie Deyes, and Jim Chapman — but recently closed its talent arm, which has run since 2010.
Writing for industry outlet The Drum, agency boss Raff McDonald wrote that Gleam was a casualty of the times, upended by creators seeking a more direct link with their audiences.
Agencies and creators, ultimately, have different priorities, Varbanova said.
A creator's focus is "making something epic," Varbanova said, while a talent agency wants to know: "How do I squeeze the most amount of money from this brand?"
This is helpful in a creator's earlier days, freeing them to put all their energy into their content while delegating the business side.
But tensions can rise if creators are constantly pushed toward brand deals they don't believe in.
Donaldson has evolved, Varbanova said, and built multiple businesses, including Feastables and MrBeast Burger. He is now a brand himself.
"He's just taking control of his brand," Varbanova said. "Ultimately, I think he is somebody who values control over money. It's actually how he's been able to grow so much — because he is such a control freak."
There are drawbacks to total control
Courtney Bagby Lupilin, the CEO and founder of Little Red Management, told BI there are drawbacks to MrBeast-style total control.
An in-house team would likely have a narrower network than a talent agency and be able to offer less support with other tasks.
The talent managers who survive will be those who foster individual relationships with all their influencer clients, Lupilin said.
"Don't just be an extension of their brand," she said. "Be a valuable resource they need on their side."
Walia argued that agencies can still be helpful in furthering an influencer's career, but they need to modernize — especially if their clients follow a similar path to Donaldson.
"The middleman relationship of a traditional talent manager doesn't quite fit the times," she said.
A car equpped with Zoox's autonomous driving technology.
Anadolu/Getty Images
Amazon-backed Zoox is under investigation following two crashes involving its self-driving tech.
The NHTSA said two motorcyclists were injured after colliding with Zoox vehicles that braked unexpectedly.
Zoox was bought by Amazon for $1.2 billion in 2020 and plans to launch a robotaxi service.
Another self-driving car company is facing an investigation over safety concerns.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said on Monday it had opened an investigation into Zoox, which was acquired by Amazon for a reported $1.2 billion in 2020, after two vehicles equipped with the company's self-driving systems collided with motorcyclists after braking unexpectedly. Reuters was first to report the news.
Both crashes resulted in minor injuries, according to the regulator, and the two Toyota Highlander SUVs involved were both operating in an autonomous driving mode in the lead-up to the collision.
Zoox is the latest company to face questions from regulators over the safety of its self-driving technology.
Tesla recalled two million vehicles late last year after the NHTSA found that the company's Autopilot system did not do enough to prevent misuse. The Elon Musk-run automaker is now facing a further investigation into whether that recall was adequate.
The company has been testing it in California, with the ambition of launching an autonomous ride-hailing service in the future.
However, no commercial release date for the vehicle has been announced, and Zoox is currently under an additional NHTSA investigation into its self-certification tests for the robotaxi model.
Zoox did not immediately respond to a request for comment made outside normal working hours.
Westchester County Executive George Latimer is giving Rep. Jamaal Bowman the fight of his political life.
John Minchillo/AP Photo; Lev Radin/Getty Images; Alyssa Powell/BI
Rep. Jamaal Bowman is in the fight of his political life ahead of the June 25 primary.
He's been outraised by George Latimer, a local politician backed by pro-Israel groups.
A Bowman loss would be the biggest setback for the left since the end of Bernie Sanders's 2020 bid.
It was a bright, chilly spring day in the coastal village of Port Chester, New York, where Rep. Jamaal Bowman and the man who could run him out of Congress — Westchester County Executive George Latimer — found themselves in the same small public park.
Local workers and labor activists were there to commemorate Worker's Memorial Day, an international day of remembrance for those who have died or been injured on the job. As Bowman delivered a booming 4-minute speech over the din of passing cars and the screeching of nearby construction, Latimer stood silently beside State Sen. Shelley Mayer, one of a litany of local politicians and Democratic Party officials who have backed the county executive over the congressman.
As a procession of speakers took turns assailing local developers and contractors for sidelining organized labor, exploiting undocumented workers, and failing to safeguard against hazardous workplace conditions, Bowman placed his arm around mine and another reporter's shoulders and brought us in.
"My opponent," Bowman whispered slowly, as Latimer stood just a few yards away, "received an award from developers."
Later that afternoon, sitting in the back hatch of his car outside a high school in Mount Vernon, the congressman suggested that Latimer is running a racist campaign against him. The county executive, whose primary slogan is "results over rhetoric," has at times sought to highlight Bowman's boisterous personal style as a distraction from the issues that the district is facing. During his current term, the congressman has had public, attention-getting spats at the Capitol with the likes of Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene, Thomas Massie, and George Santos.
"That's racist dog-whistle shit," Bowman told me. "Historically, Black men haven't been allowed to be loud, Black women either, right? Certain groups aren't allowed to be loud, we're not allowed to be outspoken, we're supposed to be quiet and thankful that the white man has even given us an opportunity to not be slaves."
Bowman speaks in Port Chester on April 25.
Bryan Metzger
"He's coming up with a rationale on identity because he doesn't have a substantive enough argument to justify [his reelection]," Latimer told me over Zoom the following week. "He's fishing for an angle here that doesn't exist."
Bowman's primary has clear national implications: He may be the single most endangered member of the progressive "Squad," along with Rep. Cori Bush of Missouri, and either of their defeats would mark the biggest electoral setback for the left since the end of Sen. Bernie Sanders's 2020 presidential campaign. Owing to Bowman's views on Israel, deep-pocketed groups — including a super PAC affiliated with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) — are expected to spend tens of millions of dollars to unseat the congressman ahead of the June 25 primary. If polling is to be believed, Bowman is already in deep trouble: an internal campaign poll showed the congressman ahead by just 1 point, while another poll commissioned by Democratic Majority for Israel showed him trailing Latimer by 17 points.
"He was recruited by AIPAC to run against us because we called for a permanent cease-fire," Bowman said of Latimer. "He's literally running on the war crimes of Benjamin Netanyahu."
Bowman at an anti-AIPAC rally in Queens, New York in March.
Selcuk Acar/Anadolu via Getty Images
But it's not just Bowman's pro-ceasefire position that has imperiled him. Since September — when he infamously pulled a fire alarm in a House office building — Bowman has faced a rolling series of controversies, particularly his dismissal of reports of sexual violence on October 7 as "propaganda" and the surfacing of his past history of dabbling in 9/11 conspiracy theories. He has since backtracked and apologized on both counts, but also insists that they aren't a big deal.
"I'm like, are y'all serious? Y'all don't have much of anything present-day, so you bring up a blog I wrote 10 years ago," Bowman said of the 9/11 conspiracy theories. "That stuff never comes up. What comes up most of all, is 'thank you for your support of Palestinians, thank you for the work you do, we hate that [Latimer's] running.'"
Bowman's belief that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza — while increasingly accepted by most of the Democratic base — has not helped his reelection prospects in a district home to an estimated 110,000 Jewish people, many of whom remain supportive of Israel and repulsed by the congressman's views. In January, Bowman lost the support of the liberal pro-Israel group J Street over his rhetoric on Israel.
But if Bowman's worried, he's not showing it. When I visited the district in late April, he told me that the campaign has felt "similar to the energy that we felt in 2020," when he first unseated longtime Democratic Rep. Eliot Engel in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.
'The fire alarm incident is troubling'
George Latimer has a deep history as an elected official in Westchester, beginning with a stint on the city council of Rye — one of the New York state's wealthiest communities — in 1987. He then served a 13-year stint in the county legislature, eight years in the state assembly, and another five in the state senate until 2017, when he defeated Republican Rob Astorino to become county executive, a position akin to that of a governor in a county of roughly one million people.
Latimer in White Plains, New York in December.
Jeenah Moon/Washington Post via Getty Images
Latimer insists that his decision to challenge Bowman was reluctant, that he saw his congressman as trying to be the "spokesperson for a national movement" rather than focusing on the needs of the district. "The elected congressman is not going to be the secretary of state," Latimer told me. In fact, the county executive largely sought to downplay the national impact he might have as a member of Congress, saying that there's "not going to be a George Latimer climate change bill" and that he "won't be there long enough to become a committee chairman, let's be honest."
Like Bowman, Latimer has a blunt and direct speaking style that sometimes leades to gaffes, such as his invocation of the racist lynching of Emmett Till when commenting on the sexual misconduct allegations against then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo in 2021. When asked about Bowman's charge of racism, Latimer pointed to his appointment of Ken Jenkins, a Black man, as his deputy county executive. "No racist person does that," he said. Latimer has also taken heat during this primary for accusing Bowman of "taking money from Hamas," an apparent reference to the fact that some organizers of a Bowman fundraising event characterized the October 7 Hamas attack as an act of resistance.
In contrast to Bowman's characterization of Latimer as merely an AIPAC recruit, the county executive said that he'd been approached as far back as the spring of 2023 about running, both by members of the Jewish community and "people in the business community who felt that [Bowman] really wasn't an advocate" for them. Latimer indicated that he would be far more of a bipartisan legislator than Bowman, throwing out the names of Republicans like Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania or Tom Kean of New Jersey as potential partners on flooding issues. "I would try, in a mature way, to have good relations with as many people as I could," he said.
"I have to tell you that the fire alarm incident is troubling," Latimer said, unprompted, during our conversation. "He pulled the alarm purposefully. It's clear, it's clear."
The congressman has long maintained that the September 30 incident, which came as House Democrats were seeking more time to review a stop-gap government funding bill before voting on it, was an accident. He has since paid a $1,000 fine, pleaded guilty to one misdemeanor count of pulling a fire alarm, and was censured by the House — including three fellow Democrats — in December. Latimer argued that the security camera footage of the incident showed that Bowman was "willing to just flat-out misrepresent what he did."
"It doesn't really come up at all. I mean, the fire alarm thing, people almost immediately knew it was BS in terms of how it was being blown up," Bowman told me. "Honestly, anyone who's going to vote against me because of that, versus my record, it's like, okay, you weren't really a supporter anyway."
Bowman's record is also a topic of contention: the congressman claims to have brought over $1 billion in federal funding back to the district. While over $40 million came in the form of so-called "earmark" funding in annual government spending bills that were directly secured by Bowman, the vast majority of that sum came from federal funding streams and grants where his involvement was far less direct, as local outlets have noted. "He hasn't delivered anything like a billion dollars to the district," said Latimer. "That's a bogus claim."
Bowman and Latimer have known each other for nearly four years, first meeting for coffee after the congressman's 2020 primary victory. But despite serving the same area, both indicated that they have little relationship with one another. "I'm not trying to be snide, I just don't see him much out in most of the Westchester community," said Latimer. "It hasn't been much of a relationship, not necessarily bad, but just hasn't existed much over the last two years, maybe more." Bowman, for his part, said Latimer's team was "always lukewarm at best, and never really reciprocated the genuine love and respect that I had for him, and all my colleagues when I engage them."
'AIPAC is not a racist organization'
It goes without saying that Israel is the defining issue of the race. Bowman's call for a cease-fire in the days after October 7 and his continued criticism of Israel — including voting against a recent tranche of military aid — enraged plenty of his constituents and helped catalyze Latimer's campaign. The congressman has frequently pointed to a March poll commissioned by the Working Families Party, a progressive group that supports Bowman, showing that 69% of the district's residents support a cease-fire.
When I asked Latimer about his own views on Israel's war in Gaza, he declined to outline the circumstances under which he may support conditioning military aid, saying that he simply trusts President Joe Biden and wants him to have the "maximum amount of flexibility" to deal with the war without congressional restrictions. "I get very frustrated when I hear people talking about what Israel is doing, what Israel is doing, what Israel is doing, and we don't talk about what Hamas has done," Latimer said. "Do I think Israel could do better? Everybody could do better."
Latimer at a menorah lighting in White Plains, New York in December.
Jeenah Moon/Washington Post via Getty Images
A central character — and boogeyman — in this primary is AIPAC, the decades-old bipartisan advocacy group whose staunchly pro-Israel positions are increasingly to the right of a Democratic Party that's grown more sympathetic toward Palestinians. Progressives frequently note that AIPAC supports Republicans who voted against certifying the 2020 election results (though plenty of other bipartisan groups and PACs do the same thing). Furthermore, AIPAC's "United Democracy Project" super PAC is sustained in large part by multimillion-dollar contributions from Republican megadonors, even as the PAC spends mostly in Democratic primaries — most often against non-white progressive candidates.
"It's an attempt by the megadonors who prop up Donald Trump and the MAGA movement to attack and defeat a handful of Black and brown progressive incumbents," Justice Democrats spokesman Usamah Adrabi told me of AIPAC, deriding Latimer as an "empty suit that is just a vessel for Republican billionaires to attack and malign Jamaal Bowman."
A little more than a third of Latimer's contributions have been routed through AIPAC, and a Working Families Party analysis provided to Business Insider shows that hundreds of thousands of dollars have flowed to the county executive's congressional campaign from donors who have given mostly to Republicans, including Donald Trump. Latimer told me that he's "always gotten support from Republican people" because of his focus on "getting things done" as an elected official. "Those donors have donated to me primarily because of my position on Israel, not because I'm pro-choice or pro-LGBTQ," he said.
"AIPAC is not a racist organization," Latimer added. "They say that, 'Oh, it goes after Black individuals.' Well, it goes after Squad members, not because they're Black, but because they've been anti-Israel in their various positions."
Latimer has reported raising $3.6 million since he launched his campaign, while Bowman has raised $2.7 million since January 2023. The county executive also boasts far more local financial support: Roughly 70% of Latimer's itemized contributions come from donors in New York state, and roughly half of them are from the district. Meanwhile, just 28.5% of Bowman's itemized contributions come from New York and just 10% come from the district, while a plurality — nearly 31% — come from California.
"He's raising [money] from interests outside the district that are clearly not local," said Latimer. "I'm getting it from people who are local, who don't like him, and want me as an alternative."
'They're not against me just because of my policies on Israel'
Part of what's made the race so contentious is the geography of the district, which spans predominantly-Black communities in the Bronx and Mount Vernon, to more Latino and mixed cities like Yonkers and New Rochelle, to predominantly white and heavily Jewish townships like Scarsdale, Rye, and Harrison. Both men have accused the other of not representing the entirety of the district, and both of them may have a point.
"The district represents the country in a couple of ways," said Bowman, who has long lived in the Bronx. "It's diverse, but it's also segregated as hell." The congressman speaks somewhat dismissively of the wealthier parts of the district that lie deeper into Westchester. "They're not against me just because of my policies on Israel," said Bowman. "I'm also pro-worker over corporations, I have bills that's about taxing the wealthy and making sure corporations pay their fair share."
"He didn't travel into Scarsdale and Harrison and get to know the people there," Latimer said of Bowman. "He focused on a few communities that he felt he could connect to, and he has his relationships there, and he ignored the rest of the district."
Latimer has his own challenges, largely stemming from the fact that he's a white man seeking to unseat a Black incumbent in a majority-minority district. Though he grew up in Mount Vernon, Latimer has long lived in Rye, and the core of his support lies in the district's more affluent communities. "I freely admit that in the Bronx, I'm going from zero to somewhere, because I haven't represented the Bronx," said Latimer. "You know, it's a learning curve."
Bowman addresses students at a high school in Mount Vernon, New York.
Bryan Metzger
But the county executive insists that it's "baloney" to say that he only represents the wealthy parts of the district, ticking off the endorsements he's garnered from Democratic committees in majority-minority communities, his support from a local bus drivers' union — "these are people who live in urban settings, and the way that I've worked with them and dealt with them is absolutely positive" — his work on a Black maternal health initiative, and the work that his county government did to repair Memorial Field, a stadium that's "primarily used by young people and African American young people in Mount Vernon."
It was at Mount Vernon High School where Bowman — a longtime educator who founded a middle school in the Bronx in 2009 — seemed especially in his element. Striding through the halls on his way to the auditorium, he remarked that the school "used to be off the chain," but that a new principal had "really turned it around" in recent years. As he addressed a room full of predominantly-Black students at a "Shark Tank"-esque career education competition, he held up his iPhone while urging them not just to get a job, but to create jobs. "Do you want to work for Apple, or do you want to build and create the next Apple, or the next company that's even better?" asked Bowman. "Do you want to have an iPhone and use it? Or do you want to create a new cellphone no one ever thought of or heard of before?"
Outside the high school, Bowman remarked that "Black women are the biggest barometer" for him when it comes to evaluating some of the missteps he's made, given that "they see me as their son or grandson."
"The biggest thing I get from them is like, stay out of trouble," said Bowman. "Because they remember the civil-rights movement, they know history, they know what happens to us when we get in these positions, and we screw it up."
Bryce Adams wears a mask in her public OnlyFans content to protect her identity.
Courtesy of Bryce Adams
OnlyFans has become a go-to platform for creators, particularly in the sphere of adult content.
Influencers have built lucrative businesses on the subscription platform.
From DMs to personalized content, here's how creators make $10,000 a month or more on OnlyFans.
The subscription website OnlyFans has become a go-to platform for creators who publish paywalled content online, particularly those in the adult industry.
There's no lack of opportunity — according to the company's latest available financial statements (for 2022), payments made through the platform increased by almost $1 billion compared to the previous year, and the number of creators using OnlyFans was close to 3.2 million.
Business Insider spoke with a number of influencers who have built successful businesses on OnlyFans, and who make $10,000 a month from it — or, in some cases, much more.
Identifying the best and most efficient ways to monetize on OnlyFans can be complex, especially for those who are unfamiliar with the service and its features.
Creator Morgan Edwards faced this issue when she first joined.
"I was absolutely in the dark," said Edwards, who uses the pseudonym "Kitty K" online. "One of the things that I did was really just sit back, observe, and sort of do what others did."
Edwards tried different approaches and eventually focused on selling personalized videos to her subscribers. She was making $60,000 a month when she spoke with Business Insider.
OnlyFans creator Jade Nicole earned over $1 million on the platform with just 1,000 fans.
Jade Nicole
Here are the top ways OnlyFans stars earn $10,000 or more per month:
Subscriptions: The most common way to start earning an income on OnlyFans is by placing content behind a paywall. OnlyFans allows users to establish their own pricing tiers for monthly subscriptions on the platform.
While some creators keep their pages free of charge, others prefer a model that is more expensive for a smaller number of fans.
Bryce Adams, a popular creator whose business made over $9 million in a year, runs three pages with different offerings, to cater to different needs.
Direct messaging: Some creators build their presence on OnlyFans based on the direct communication they establish with their fans and connecting with them on a personal level through messaging.
These types of interactions can be particularly lucrative. Pay-per-message chatting, custom content (like pay-per-view personalized videos), and tips account for over 50% of OnlyFans' revenue. For some users, chatting with creators has become a way to find an emotional connection.
"I understood that what guys wanted was a connection, so I sort of created this method of texting where I write and make videos at the same time," said Amber Sweetheart, who has 26,000 fans.
Because of the high demand for interaction from their subscribers, some creators are even turning to AI chatbots to help them out, or creating AI versions of themselves that can chat 24/7.
Personalized content: Another way for creators to build a relationship with their fans is creating bespoke content for them for a fee.
Promo "shoutouts": Creators rely on marketing tactics to get new customers, like buying and selling "shoutouts" from each other to advertise on OnlyFans and other social-media platforms.
When Riley Reid joined the platform, she enjoyed recognition from her career in the adult-movie industry and decided to help new creators on OnlyFans by providing promotional spaces on her page for a fee.
"A lot of girls just kept asking me to pay for shoutouts," Reid said.
A stock image shows somebody mopping up water in a house flooded by a storm.
Petra Richli/Getty Images
A jury awarded sisters $18 million in damages from an insurance company after their home was flooded.
The sisters sued American Reliable after being offered just $5,000 for repairs.
According to their attorney, the house was unliveable, with the heating system destroyed.
The home of two California sisters was badly flooded during a February 2019 rainstorm but when they filed a claim with their insurance company, American Reliable, they were offered just $5,000 for repairs.
Last month, a jury awarded the pair $18 million, after they took the company to court.
According to San Bernardino's The Sun newspaper, Jennifer Garnier and Angela Toft were awarded $6 million for pain and suffering and $12 million in punitive damages in a verdict reached by a San Bernardino County Jury on April 18, following a six-week trial.
The lawsuit said that the sisters' home in Pinon Hills was damaged during a large rainstorm on February 15, 2019, rendering it unliveable, as detailed in various news reports.
In a statement posted on Instagram, their attorney, Michael Hernandez of HHJ Trial Attorneys, said the damages caused electrical faults and destroyed the heating system.
The Los Angeles Times, citing Hernandez, reported that the sisters estimated they needed more than $100,000 to fix the damage.
However, the Times reported that an insurance adjuster offered just $5,000 for their claim.
According to court documents reviewed by the Times, the plaintiffs argued that American Reliable delayed their home inspection.
The Times also reported that American Reliable admitted to an oversight in October 2023 and offered the sisters $140,000.
However, Garnier and Toft decided to proceed with the trial, which ultimately resulted in a jury finding in their favor.
"We argued that when you knowingly put a family in an uninhabitable home, you can't come back later and say you are not responsible for the consequences," Hernandez said in the Instagram post.
According to the Times, the company claimed to Garnier and Toft that it only learned about the full extent of the home's damage while deliberating evidence for the trial.
The Times reported that Garnier and Toft were awarded $3 million each for emotional damages, $2 million in punitive damages from American Reliable, and $10 million in punitive damages from Global Indemnity, American Reliable's parent company.
Global Indemnity, American Reliable, and Hernandez did not immediately respond to Business Insider's requests for comment.
Last year, Business Insider reported that insurance companies are finding new ways to make money, often at their clients' expense.
The feature, written by Jathan Sadowski, a senior research fellow at Monash University, highlighted how algorithmic systems are being crafted to optimize insurance companies' profits, leveraging AI's opacity to give them plausible deniability.
This image shows a design for the Saudi Arabian city of Neom alongside an image of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the project's mastermind.
Nicolas Asfouri – Pool/Getty Images/Neom
Saudi Arabia needs foreign businesses to help it realize its Neom megacity project.
But it's facing a backlash over its human rights record.
The BBC reported that Saudi officials were given a license to use lethal force to clear land.
The images of the planned Saudi desert megacity of Neom depict a futuristic utopia.
It is billed as a paradise for foreign investors as well as the people who will live there.
But underneath the image is a far darker reality, say campaigners, which could threaten the foreign cash and expertise Saudi Arabia needs to realize its ambitions.
Last week, some of the darkness burst to the fore.
Malcolm Aw, the founder of a UK solar desalination company, told Business Insider he withdrew from a contract with Neom over concerns about the brutal treatment feared to have been meted out by Saudi officials to local people.
Though his decision took place in 2022, it was given new urgency by a whistleblower giving more detail on how Saudi officials may have acted.
The BBC, citing ex-Saudi intelligence officer Col Rabih Alenezi, said Saudi forces had clearance to kill people to clear land to build the city.
The UN human-rights agency last year found that a man was indeed killed after resisting an order to vacate his home. Three others have been sentenced to death under broad anti-terror laws.
Added to this are concerns the Saudis could use Chinese face recognition surveillance tech to monitor Neom and its residents.
The controversy is looming over a visit to Saudi Arabia this week by a UK trade delegation hoping to forge new ties, and British officials are doing their best to deflect questions about the BBC report.
Amnesty International said businesses ought to be wary of doing deals in Saudi Arabia and called for UK officials to push for an independent investigation into the Neom land clearances.
Until that can happen — which may be never — "business enterprises should consider not undertaking" Saudi projects, Dana Ahmed, Amnesty International's Middle East researcher, told Politico.
Concerns over Saudi Arabia's human rights record are nothing new. Back in 2018, Saudi ruler Mohammed bin Salman faced international uproar over the murder of dissident Jamal al-Khashoggi, which US intelligence agencies concluded that he ordered (the Saudis deny this).
Saudi Arabia has sought to improve its image under the Crown Prince's rule, granting women more freedoms, opening up the kingdom to international tourists, and engaging in a so-called "sportswashing" campaign to improve its image through involvement in international competitions.
But Saudi Arabia's brutal treatment of dissidents remains a sticking point, and periodically flare up into something that could get in the way of the dealmaking both the Saudis and their counterparts promote.
"Human rights violations reduce the appetite for foreign investment and association with the Kingdom," analysts for The Atlantic Council wrote in 2020, and little has changed since.
Neom did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.
Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff rides a Segway around one of Salesforce's earliest office spaces.
AP Photo/Ben Margot
Marc Benioff is the chief executive of cloud-based software company Salesforce.
Benioff worked at Oracle for 13 years before leaving the company to work on Salesforce full time.
Benioff has a net worth of $10.1 billion, Bloomberg estimates.
Marc Benioff has seen his company, Salesforce, through many ups and downs throughout its 25 years.
The cloud software giant's market cap has swelled to over $250 billion in 2024 and even briefly crossed the $300 billion mark. But it hasn't been immune to the struggles facing the tech industry in recent years. Salesforce announced in January that it would be cutting 700 more jobs after slashing thousands in 2023.
Benioff has outlasted multiple co-CEOs at Salesforce — including one who reportedly tried to go for the top job. He and his wife Lynne are known for donating millions to charity.
Here's how Benioff, whose estimated net worth now stands at $10.1 billion, worked his way onto the national stage.
Marc Russell Benioff, 59, was born in San Francisco on September 25th, 1964, the son of Joelle and Russell Benioff.
An image of San Francisco.
Getty Images
Benioff is something of an anomaly among Silicon Valley CEOs — he was actually born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area. He graduated from Burlingame High School in 1982, Bloomberg reported.
His father, Russell Benioff, owned a local department store in San Francisco. "I learned my work ethic from him," Benioff once said, according to SFGate.
Early on, Benioff was interested in tech and being an entrepreneur.
Benioff held numerous jobs and side hustles.
Kevin Dietsch/Staff/Getty Images.
Benioff got his first job at a jewelry store to save for his first computer. He was eventually fired for cleaning the floors with the wrong soap. While in high school, Benioff sold his software — "How To Juggle" for the TRS-80 Model 1 computer — to a computer magazine for $75.
At age 15, Benioff founded Liberty Software, a one-man company making games for the Atari 800 computer. Titles included "King Arthur's Heir," "The Nightmare," "Escape from Vulcan's Isle," and "Crypt of the Undead," Entrepreneur reported.
By age 16, Benioff was pulling in $1,500 a month — enough that he was able to pay for his own tuition at the University of Southern California.
While at USC, Benioff took a summer internship with Apple.
Apple cofounder Steve Jobs at the debut of the original Apple Macintosh.
AP Photo/Paul Sakuma
He worked as a programmer in the Macintosh division under cofounder Steve Jobs. "That summer, I discovered it was possible for an entrepreneur to encourage revolutionary ideas," Benioff would later write in his book "Behind the Cloud: The Untold Story of How Salesforce.com Went from Idea to Billion-dollar Company — and Revolutionized an Industry."
Jobs became one of Benioff's mentors. "There would be no Salesforce.com without Steve Jobs," Benioff said in 2013, according to Entrepreneur.
Benioff graduated with a B.S. in Business Administration in 1986.
Benioff delivering the keynote address during commencement at the University of California, Berkeley in 2015.
REUTERS/Noah Berger
USC named him an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters in 2014. He now sits on the University's Board of Trustees.
Benioff planned to stay in programming for the rest of his career, but a USC professor suggested he might have a mind for business. So he took a customer support role at high-flying database company Oracle right out of college, according to his "Behind the Cloud" book.
Benioff rapidly rose up the ranks at Oracle after starting in 1986.
Benioff had a meteoric rise at Oracle.
Sven Hoppe/picture alliance via Getty Images
At age 23, Benioff was named Oracle's "Rookie of the Year."
By age 26, he was named a vice president — the youngest person to attain the role in the company's history, according to his bio on Salesforce.
While at Oracle, Benioff caught the attention of its founder Larry Ellison. The two became very close, with Ellison mentoring the younger Benioff.
Benioff (left) and Larry Ellison (right).
Mike Nudelman/Business Insider
"They sailed to the Mediterranean on Ellison's yacht, visited Japan during cherry blossom season, spent Thanksgiving together, and even double-dated," according to Fortune.
After 13 years with Oracle, Benioff started itching for something new.
Benioff worked at Oracle from 1986 to 1999.
Business Insider
With Ellison's permission, Benioff took a sabbatical to travel the world. He spent part of that time studying meditation in Hawaii.
Benioff came up with the idea for Salesforce while swimming with dolphins. He soon started working on the company with a few other Oracle veterans, Entrepreneur reported.
Salesforce was a revolutionary idea in 1999.
Salesforce took the tech industry by storm when it launched.
Business Insider/Julie Bort
The big idea behind Salesforce was that while most companies — including Oracle — sold enterprise software that companies had to install on their own servers, Salesforce could let people access business software from a web browser. For the late nineties, this was revolutionary, Benioff wrote in "Behind the Cloud."
At first, Ellison was supportive of Benioff.
Ellison and Benioff's relationship has fluctuated over the years.
But things turned sour between Ellison and Benioff.
Benioff with an early Salesforce ad.
Eric Risberg/AP
Benioff found out that Oracle was working on a direct competitor to Salesforce, the Mercury News reported in 2000. Benioff tried to force his mentor to quit the company's board. Instead, Ellison forced Benioff to fire him — meaning Ellison kept his shares in Salesforce.
It kicked off an epic rivalry, with the two taking shots at each other in the press. Note the Salesforce jet shooting down the Oracle biplane in this early Salesforce ad from 2001.
The dot-com bust of the early 2000s was a difficult time for Salesforce, but the company rebounded.
Salesforce survived the dot-com bust when others didn't.
David Wong/South China Morning Post via Getty Images
"Suddenly everything around us was falling apart," Benioff's cofounder Parker Harris said, according to the Australian Financial Review. However, several clients remained, and Salesforce survived and kept growing, becoming one of the earliest and biggest companies in the modern cloud computing market.
And in June 2004, Salesforce held its IPO, raising $110 million at $11 per share.
Benioff on the day of the Salesforce IPO.
AP Photo/Paul Sakuma
That year, the company had about 767 employees.
Benioff personally donated $250 million to the University of California, San Francisco in 2010 to found UCSF Benioff Children's Hospitals.
Benioff and his wife Lynne have donated hundreds of millions over the years.
Photo by Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images
In 206, Benioff fought against proposed bills in Indiana and Georgia that would allow discrimination against gay people. He rallied other business leaders to the cause, with a positive result, according to Time.
Benioff is also a big believer in corporate philanthropy.
San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee in 2011.
Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
Under his leadership, Salesforce invented the "1-1-1" model, where the company gives 1% of employee time as volunteer hours, 1% of its profits, and 1% of its resources to charitable causes.
San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee declared March 7 "Global 1/1/1 Day" in honor of Salesforce's 15th birthday in 2014. Benioff keeps a copy of the proclamation in his office, Forbes reported.
Benioff's philanthropic efforts focus on children's health, the environment, public education, and homelessness, according to his biography on Salesforce's website.
In 2016, Benioff and his wife launched the Benioff Ocean Initiative at the University of California, Santa Barbara to study marine life.
Benioff and his wife Lynne.
Alberto E. Rodriguez / Getty
Benioff also serves on the World Economic Forum's Board of Trustees. He credits former Secretary of State Colin Powell and the Hindu guru Mata Amritanandamayi — whom he met on a trip through India — with encouraging him to put Salesforce's resources to work helping others.
And while he may not have the globetrotting playboy reputation that his mentor Ellison has, Benioff has lots of friends in the celebrity and political worlds.
Benioff has earned a reputation as one of Silicon Valley's most boisterous CEOs. He rarely appears in public without his custom cloud sneakers.
Benioff's sneakers.
Getty Images/Justin Sullivan
Over the years, Benioff has spent some of his billions on "Star Wars" desk trinkets, according to Forbes, and an extensive tech-themed shoe collection.
The Benioffs have several homes, including acres of Hawaiian land.
Waimea is home to many native Hawaiians and known for its ranching.
VW Pics/Getty Images
Over the past few years, Benioff has bought up land in an agricultural and largely native Hawaiian town called Waimea. He lives in a beachside mansion nearby. Since 2000, Benioff has bought at least 38 parcels of land in Hawaii through various LLCs and a nonprofit, NPR reported in 2024.
"This is a place that everybody loves to be. It's a magical place. It's a place that people come and transform and change, evolve. They experience God. They experience nature. They experience themselves," Benioff said about Hawaii, according to NPR.
Salesforce has swelled to a company worth more than $250 million, and its annual Dreamforce conference has ballooned to take over much of San Francisco every autumn.
Salesforce's annual Dreamforce conference is a massive event.
Robert Galbraith/Reuters
It's described as a global four-day event hosting official sessions and unofficial meetings between key players in the tech industry. Dreamforce also has a reputation for being big on social events, with acts like Metallica and Foo Fighters headlining its afterparties
The company opened Salesforce Tower, its new headquarters — and the tallest building in San Francisco — in 2018.
Salesforce Tower.
Cushman & Wakefield
Salesforce had gotten so big that in 2012, the company abandoned plans to move into a new San Francisco campus because it said it had already outgrown it. It had 9,800 employees globally that year.
Marc Benioff is distantly related to David Benioff of "Game of Thrones" fame.
David Benioff is the co-creator of "Game of Thrones."
Evan Agostini/Invision/AP
The pair share a great-grandfather, but they never met until 2015 when "Game of Thrones" premiered. David is the co-creator of the hit HBO adaption of the fantasy book series written by George R. R. Martin.
Over the last five years, Salesforce has appointed, and lost, two co-CEOs.
Former Salesforce co-CEO Keith Block.
Salesforce
Salesforce announced in 2020 that Benioff's co-CEO, Keith Block, stepped down after a year and a half. Block did not give a reason for the transition at the time but said he was excited for the future.
In 2021, Bret Taylor — who had been with the company since 2016 — was appointed to the role. Taylor announced his resignation in 2022 after a reported showdown for the sole CEO position.
In 2018, Benioff and his wife announced that they intended to purchase Time Magazine for $190 million.
Benioff implemented Salesforce strategies at Time.
Bryan Bedder/Getty Images for Time
When the acquisition went through, insiders at the company expressed their excitement for the future. Time was reportedly able to go on a hiring spree after being purchased by the Benioffs.
Salesforce acquired Slack in 2021.
The new Slack redesign with "Activity" notifications.
Slack
The acquisition of the messaging platform cost about $27.7 billion. After just over a year as CEO, Lidiane Jones left Slack for the top job at dating app Bumble. In November 2023, Salesforce exec Denise Dresser was named the CEO of Slack.
Salesforce wasn't immune to the job cuts that plagued the tech industry in 2023 and 2024.
Salesforce laid off about 7,000 employees in 2023.
Gary Hershorn / Getty Images
Salesforce kicked off 2024 by cutting about 1% of its global workforce after laying off roughly 7,000 in 2023. Benioff blamed the cuts on over-hiring during the pandemic.
He's neighbors with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.
Sam Altman (R) is the CEO and cofounder of OpenAI.
Nathan Posner/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images; Roy Rochlin/Getty Images
Slack began integrating ChatGPT — the generative AI chatbot made by OpenAI — in 2023.
During a June earnings call, Benioff said that he and Sam Altman are neighbors who've had dinner at least once to discuss artificial intelligence.
He and his wife donated $150 million to Hawaii hospitals in March 2024.
The couple have donated hundreds of millions to Hawaii hospitals.
Caleb Jones/AP
In a press release, the couple expressed their intentions to give back to the local community through experts who "deeply understand" local needs.
"We feel fortunate to have been part of the Hawaii community for many decades and to be able to support our ohana in this way. Nothing is more important than the health of our community and access to care for all who need it."
The Benioffs donated $50 million to Hilo Medical Center and $100 million to Hawaii Pacific Health in March, according to Spectrum News.
Benioff's total compensation for fiscal 2024 was $39.6 million.
Benioff has expressed support for higher taxes on the wealthy.
"Well get an economy that works for everyone when 1) create educational system that works for everyone & 2) Affordable Higher education & 3) strengthen our local K-12 public schools 4) We must focus online reskilling that brings everyone along & 5) higher ind & Crp taxes to pay for it," Benioff tweeted in June 2019.
Aaron Luque, CEO of Tesla charger installer Envirospark, told Business Insider that the company still hasn't heard from Tesla after Musk gutted the company's Supercharger division, with dozens of potential charging sites now stuck in limbo.
"There's no one remaining from the team that we worked with," said Luque. "In terms of formal communication from Tesla, we haven't received anything."
Envirospark, which has built EV charging sites for Tesla for over a decade, told BI that it has 26 projects with the company contracted or under construction.
The status of these sites remains unclear, Luque said, with some of the property owners getting in touch with Envirospark to try and get information after being unable to reach anyone at Tesla.
"We are kind of in a holding pattern," said Luque. "Everything was being quarterbacked by Tesla … we've lost that direction. So we have to wait until we get any further guidance on what the next steps are."
Luque said that the company, which just raised $50 million in investment, has done between 2,500 to 3,000 installations for Tesla over the past 10 years in the US and Canada.
Elon Musk's decision to lay off Tesla's entire Supercharger team, reportedly around 500 employees, shocked the EV industry.
The Tesla CEO also posted shortly after the layoffs that Tesla still planned to grow the network, just at a slower pace with more focus on expanding existing locations.
However, his comments have done little to quell the concerns of installers after what Luque described as a "whirlwind" few weeks.
Andres Pinter, the co-CEO of Bullet EV Charging Solutions, who previously called the layoffs a "sharp kick in the pants," told BI over email that Tesla got in touch around a week after the news of layoffs was released.
He said Tesla reassured the company that the carmaker would move forward with in-process Supercharger sites and was planning to build new ones, without providing specifics.
"It sounds like an existing Tesla team from a different department has been inserted to manage the charging division," said Pinter.
He said it was unclear whether this management move was temporary or permanent, adding that Bullet EV was now "back in the Tesla business but has a serious case of whiplash."
BP said it is eager to snap up Tesla Supercharging sites for its own charging network following the layoffs, per Bloomberg, and is "actively seeking" to hire talent to enable it to grow.
"I think it's absolutely going to be a challenge for Tesla," said Luque, adding that Musk's layoffs have sparked a talent war for ex-Tesla Supercharging staff.
Envirospark is among those now aggressively hiring former Tesla employees, with Luque describing the situation as the "single greatest talent acquisition opportunity we've ever seen."
His comments were echoed by Pinter, who described Musk's reorganization of Tesla as a "blessing in disguise" for Bullet EV Charging.
"We have already hired several members of the former Tesla charging team and are diversifying our customer base to focus more on fleet and auto dealership charging," Pinter said.
"My company is also keeping an eye out for other contractors who may be willing to sell their businesses in light of Tesla's unexpected move. Our phone has been ringing off the hook since last week," he added.
Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for comment made outside normal working hours.
In an interview with CNBC, Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum told Boeing to "get your act together."
"I think they have to put a lot of pressure in order to make sure that they deliver to the customer whatever they promised," he added.
Boeing has been struggling since the Alaska Airlines blowout in January, working to slow down production to avoid quality-control errors but causing delays to aircraft deliveries as a result.
Following Al Maktoum's comments, the president of Boeing Global, Brendan Nelson, told Sky Arabia: "We've slowed down the rate of production to make sure that we can bring strength and quality to our supply chains, to stabilize those supply chains and to fortify our production system."
But Spohr is hopeful that Boeing will be able to recover and get the business back on track.
"I am sure that Boeing will get the problems under control," he told Neue Zuercher Zeitung. "The industry needs two strong providers. Everyone has an interest in Boeing being able to build great aircraft more reliably again soon."
Boeing did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider, sent outside US working hours.
The salary increase for newly qualified solicitors is to "reward our outstanding lawyers," explained Alex Gerbi, the firm's co-managing partner in London.
It also reflects "the firm's commitment to continuing to attract the very best new talent," said Gerbi, hinting at the intensifying battle for talent brewing in London's legal industry.
Last week, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, one of five highly prestigious, corporate-focused UK law firms known as the Magic Circle, also pushed up starting salaries.
The London-based firm announced it would increase base pay for newly qualified lawyers by 20% to around $190,000 (£150,000), close to Quinn Emmanuel's salary offering before the latest hike.
The moves will likely pressure other top law firms in London, including Magic Circle members Slaughter and May, Linklaters, A&O Shearman, and Clifford Chance.
Last year, most of the firms also hiked salaries by similar levels to remain competitive with each other; however, it's a challenge for the UK-based enterprises to keep pace with the deep pockets of their US counterparts.
In 2023, Quinn Emanuel reported a 26% jump in annual revenue to more than $2 billion, according to Legal Business.
But the firm has also faced a turbulent few years. In 2022, a shake-up in leadership became the talk of legal circles when two comanaging partners were installed to serve alongside founder John Quinn — the first time in the firm's 37 years that he has shared power over the litigation giant.
"I have a growing recognition that this enterprise is huge and that I'm missing things," Quinn previously told Business Insider.
Quinn Emanuel did not immediately respond to a request for comment from BI.