Author: openjargon

• Trump's lawyers defended his $175M civil fraud bond — and Knight Specialty — in court filings.
• The filings show that Trump used cash collateral that's only semi-committed to the bond.
• His lawyers are fighting the attorney general's office over the need for Monday's surety hearing.

Lawyers for Donald Trump are defending the "respected" insurers behind his $175 million civil fraud bond in a series of new court filings.

The papers, filed in Supreme Court in Manhattan, challenge the need for next Monday's surety hearing, at which Trump's fraud trial judge and lawyers for the state attorney general's office will scrutinize both the cash and the company behind the bond.

The filings confirm that Trump has used cash, not property, to back the bond.

"The $175 million bond is collateralized by $175,304,075.95 in cash held in a Charles Schwab account pledged to KSIC, and KSIC has the right to exercise control over that account," Trump's lawyers wrote in the bond's defense.

The bond company is able to gain control of the account with two days notice, the lawyers also wrote, suggesting that Trump, and not the bank or the bond underwriters, actually controls the cash.

This wording — that the insurer "has the right to exercise control" over the money — appears to fall short of what bond writers usually demand of their cash customers.

Usually, underwriters demand an irrevocable letter of credit stating that the money is secure in a bank account and can only be withdrawn after the appeals have ended. Such letters of credit give no wiggle room — the money is "irrevocably" committed to the bond.

Attorney General Letitia James is allowed, under New York's civil practice rules, to ask for proof that Knight is financially sound and that the bond's collateral is sufficient.

The final call on whether the Knight bond sinks or swims will be up to New York Supreme Court Justice Arthur Engoron, who has set a Monday hearing on the matter.

Trump's bond was underwritten by Knight Specialty Insurance Company, based in Los Angeles, run by billionaire Trump supporter Don Hankey, a so-called king of subprime car loans.

"KSIC is a respected, well-capitalized, Delaware-domiciled insurer that has long underwritten surety bonds and other types of insurance placed around the country," Trump's lawyers wrote.

Beyond Trump's Schwab account, Knight "independently maintains more than $539 million in assets and $138 million in equity," the filings say.

Beyond that, the insurer "has access to more than $2 billion in assets and $1 billion in equity" through its parent company, Knight Insurance Company," the filings say.

Read Trump's memorandum of law in support of his $175 million bond here.

The attorneys signing the filings include Christopher Kise, Alina Habba, and Clifford Robert, who represented Trump in his 10-week civil fraud trial.

Trump needs the bond to be in place while he appeals his big loss in the case.

In January, Engoron, found him liable for a decade of defrauding banks by lying about the net worth of his assets.

Without a bond in place, state Attorney General Letitia James could immediately collect on Engoron's massive judgment against him.

Trump's portion of the penalty started out in February at $454 million but has now risen, due to the judgment's continually-accruing interest, by nearly $6 million, according to a penalty-interest calculator maintained by the Associated Press.

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• Apple's share of the global smartphone market shrank nearly 10% in the first quarter of 2024, IDC reported.
• While the iPhone maker is still a force to be reckoned with, other rivals are gaining ground.
• Here are three of Apple's biggest competitors.

Apple is no longer the undisputed top dog of the smartphone world.

So who are Apple's biggest rivals and the rising threats trying to eat its lunch?

Global shipments of iPhones contracted nearly 10% in the first quarter of the year, according to a recent report from International Data Corporation, a market research firm.

That means Samsung has overtaken Apple in global smartphone shipments.

While Apple customers have been known to show loyalty to the company, the IDC report suggests that may be changing as competition heats up.

Apple has faced flagging demand in China, one of its biggest markets, amid heightened competition from manufacturers like Huawei.

Here are the companies that are gaining ground on Apple — or overtaking it — in the smartphone wars.

Xiaomi's market share exploded.

Xiaomi is a name little known to most Americans, but don't understimate it. The Chinese company is ranked 360th on the Fortune Global 500 list — higher than Netflix, Uber, and, Capital One.

Its most recent offering, the Mi 14, debuted in October to strong demand in China. Xiaomi also makes the Redmi Note series of smartphones.

Though China is its largest market, according to Reuters, Xiaomi is only fifth in market share there, as Vivo, Huawei, Honor and Apple occupy the top four spots. But Xiaomi has established a strong presence outside of China, particularly in India.

Xiaomi does not sell its phones in the US. This is partially due to political concerns, according to IDC researcher Nabila Popal, who told Android Central in 2022 that "after what happened with Huawei," no Chinese tech company "would want to risk investing heavily in a market that can any day can simply 'ban' them."

Xiaomi also sells an electric car, launching the Speed Ultra 7, or SU7, last year — succeeding where Apple threw in the towel.

In the first quarter of 2024, shipments of Xiaomi smartphones grew 33.8%, as the company solidified its spot as the third-largest smartphone manufacturer in the world.

Transsion also had a strong start to the year.

Transsion is the company behind the Tecno, Itel, and Infinix lines of smartphones. Another Chinese manufacturer that most Americans probably won't have heard of, Transsion does particularly well in Africa, where it is the top seller with its "ultra low-end devices," according to an IDC report.

The company's presence in Africa has been bolstered by the Digital Silk Road, a component of China's Belt-and-Road development initiative, according to the Council on Foreign Relations. Its phones have multiple SIM card slots, allowing users to switch coverage easily, and were among the first to support keyboards for African languages, according to CFR.

Transsion's most recent offerings include the Tecno Phantom V, a foldable device reminiscent of Samsung's Galaxy Z.

Samsung is king.

Samsung is the most well-known iPhone competitor to North American consumers. Its offerings, including the recent Samsung Galaxy S24, are generally some of the most popular and accessible Android phones.

The South Korean company recently released the Galaxy Z Flip 5, a foldable phone that may have spurred Apple to at least explore a similar option.

Now, Samsung is working toward integrating AI into the Galaxy line.

The company is also notable for its non-smartphone offerings, including appliances and, soon, wearables like the Galaxy smart ring.

Samsung edged past Apple to take the top spot for global smartphone manufacturers, even though its shipments shrank slightly (less than 1%) in the first quarter of 2024.

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• Polling for the 2024 election has shown Biden losing ground with younger voters to Trump.
• Gen Z and Millenials sided with Biden by ~20 percentage points in 2020, but that lead may be gone.
• Younger voters are historically less likely to vote than older-aged ones.

In a presidential race expected to be as tight as ever, polling increasingly shows younger voters shifting toward former President Donald Trump. But the group has historically been fickle and difficult to get to the polls, which the Republican Party has made increasingly difficult.

A survey conducted by Marist Poll in late March showed that 2 percentage points more Gen Z and Millenial-aged voters said they'd vote for President Joe Trump over Biden in a two-person race. A recent New York Times/Siena College Poll showed a similar result, with Biden winning over 1 percentage point more of Gen Z and Trump 1 percentage point more of Millenials polled.

Gen Z and Millenial voters sided with Biden by a nearly 20-point margin in 2020, and Trump only lost five key states by less than 100,000 votes.

As a recent analysis from Split Ticket demonstrated, a pollster's methodology and how it weighs a survey's results can lead to wildly different results. For example, while a survey using live text interviews showed young voters preferring Biden over Trump by 10 percentage points, one done using an online opt-in panel resulted in Trump winning over the age group.

If results from Marist, Siena College, and others prove accurate, it'll be a massive blow to Biden's reelection chances. Still, his campaign can rest somewhat easier knowing younger voters have historically been some of the least likely to make it to the polls.

Data compiled by the University of Florida Election Lab shows that since 1986, more than 50% of voting-aged Americans between 45 and 59 and more than 64% of those 60 or older have participated in presidential elections. But over the past 34 years, voters between the ages of 18 and 29 managed to breach the 50% mark only once, in 2020.

If the younger electorate this election has become more red-leaning, it's tough to assign much credit to state-run Republican Parties. Several have passed legislation in recent years restricting which documents can be used for identification on election day, potentially hampering the influence of young voters.

For example, after turnout from voters aged 18 and 19 surged 81% between 2018 and 2022, Idaho prohibited college IDs as a form of identification at polling stations. A proposed piece of legislation in Texas in 2023 also attempted to ban polling stations on college campuses, though the bill never got past committee.

Appealing to younger voters in college towns and campuses may also take a mental adjustment from some conservative influencers and leaders, like Turning Point USA founder and executive director Charlie Kirk. In 2020, he reportedly told a group of GOP activists and donors it was "a great thing" when colleges shut down their campuses amid the pandemic as it would hurt Democrats.

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• Ukraine flew an exploding drone into a Russian tank's open hatch, a new video shows.
• It's not the first time operators have flown UAVs with such precision.
• Drones continue to terrorize both sides of the front lines, even killing high-value targets. 

A new chilling video shows a Ukrainian drone flying directly into the open command hatch of one Russia's main battle tanks before exploding and, apparently, setting off the ammo inside.

It's the latest example of how operators on both sides are flying unmanned aerial vehicles with astonishing precision and lethality, destroying everything from individual soldiers to expensive, high-value targets like top tanks.

The video was originally posted on Telegram on April 11 by the Special Operations Forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and, later, shared on X. In it, Ukrainian first-person view drones conduct several successful strikes on Russian systems and vehicles, including what experts identified as a Russian T-90M tank, a weapon Putin has called "the world's best tank."

In one particular portion of the footage, the drone flies towards the tank, navigates carefully through what appears to be a cage built on top of it and down into the tank's open hatch.

The footage then cuts to a surveillance drone's perspective of an explosion inside the tank from a likely ammunition cook off.

"FPV drone operators of the 8th Separate Regiment of the SSO inflicted significant losses on the enemy in the Donetsk direction," the Ukraine's Special Operations Forces said on Telegram.

The SSO claimed to have successfully eliminated a T-90, a T-72, and two other vehicles, as well as carried out individual attacks on Russian soldiers in trenches.

These kinds of high-precision kills are not new for Ukraine. Back in November 2023, a Ukrainian service member from the UAV unit known as the Magyar Birds with the 59th Motorized Brigade shared footage of a number of exploding FPV drones flying into the open hatches of Russian vehicles.

In that video, the voiceover says that "if a direct hit isn't working, then the mastery and experience of the pilot becomes most important," per a translation.

Drone operators have become invaluable assets for both sides of the war, as well as prime targets. In some cases, operators have been documented using their drones to target each other, hoping to take out their enemy's capabilities for flying the UAVs that have dramatically complicated battlefield maneuver and combat operations.

The recent attack on the apparent T-90M is another notable loss for the Russian army.

Back in January, Ukraine called the claim that it is "the world's best tank" into question after one of its US-made Bradley infantry fighting vehicles was able to overwhelm one with chain gun fire during combat in Stepove, a village outside Avdiivka in northeastern Ukraine.

In the video footage from the battle, the Bradley can be seen engaging in an intense fight with the T-90M, wrecking it with fire from its M242 25mm Bushmaster chain gun. After the modern main battle tank spins out of control and catches on fire, its crew abandons it, and Ukraine sends in an FPV drone to finish the job.

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• Meta's oversight board is investigating two cases of AI-generated images of female public figures.
• One case involves a pornographic deepfake of a female American figure on Facebook.
• The board will review Meta's policies on how to handle explicit AI images.

Meta's oversight board announced on Tuesday it will investigate the company's policies around explicit AI deepfakes of women.

The tech giant's board said it's looking into two specific cases, one on Instagram and one on Facebook.

One of the cases involves an AI-generated image resembling a nude female American public figure with a man groping her. The figure was named in the caption and posted in a Facebook group for AI creations.

Meta's oversight board didn't specify which female public figure was used in the AI deepfake.

The oversight board said a different user had already posted the AI-generated nude before it was shared in the Facebook group. The explicit photo was removed for violating the Bullying and Harassment policy for "derogatory sexualized photoshop or drawings."

The user who posted the photo appealed the removal, which was rejected by the automated system. The user then appealed to the Board.

Pornographic deepfakes of Taylor Swift on X caused an internet stir in January. Many of the images showed the pop star engaging in sexual acts in football stadiums.

One post uploaded by a verified user on X, formerly Twitter, attracted over 45 million views before it was taken down by moderators about 17 hours later.

The other investigation involves an AI-generated image of a nude woman that resembles a public figure from India. The content was posted on an Instagram account that only shares AI-generated images of Indian women.

In this case, Meta failed to delete the content after it was reported twice. The user appealed to the Board and Meta found its decision to keep the content was an error. It then removed the post for violating the Bullying and Harassment Community Standard.

The Board said it selected these cases to see whether Meta is effectively addressing explicit AI-generated imagery.

Politicians, public figures, and business leaders have spoken out about deepfakes and the risks they pose.

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre previously said lax enforcement of deepfakes disproportionately impacts women as well as girls "who are the overwhelming targets."

Jean-Pierre also said that while legislation should play a role in tackling this issue, social media platforms should be banning harmful AI content on their own.

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella called the nude deepfakes of Taylor Swift "alarming and terrible" and called for more protection from these images.

Forget just porn; deepfakes could also be used to influence elections. Already, AI-generated calls faking messages from President Joe Biden turned up in the primaries.

Meta's oversight board wants the public to weigh in on the two cases. It asked for comments suggesting strategies on how to address this issue and feedback on its severity.

The oversight board will deliberate on the decisions over the next few weeks before posting the outcome, it said in the announcement. While the board's recommendations aren't binding, Meta has to respond to them within 60 days.

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A battle is playing out in the Red Sea as Yemen's Houthi militia attacks commercial shipping vessels headed to the Suez Canal using weapons supplied by Iran. Now a US-led task force is fighting back. We compare the weapons and tactics and tell you who holds the power in this global conflict.

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• Worth $15.3 billion, Philip Anschutz owns AEG, the parent company of Coachella.
• In addition to entertainment, he built his fortune through commodities including oil and railroads.
• In 2019, Forbes named Anschutz the richest person in the state of Colorado.

Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, the music event currently underway in Indio, California, is owned by Philip Anschutz, an 84-year-old billionaire businessman whom The New Yorker once called "the man who owns LA." Despite living in Colorado, Anschutz is deeply embedded in California's largest city. 

With a net worth of $15.3 billion, according to Forbes, he owns Coachella through his company, the Anschutz Corporation, and one of its subsidiaries, Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG).

AEG owns several athletic teams, operates more than 90 clubs and theaters around the world, and produces or supports more than 25 music festivals. Anschutz also owns the Los Angeles Kings hockey team and previously owned one-third of the Los Angeles Lakers basketball team, as well as both teams' home arena: Crypto.com Arena, formerly known as the Staples Center.

Take a look at how the billionaire makes and spends his fortune.

Katie Warren contributed to an earlier version of this article.

Philip Anschutz, who was born in 1939 in rural Kansas, made his first large sum of money through an oil-field discovery.

Born in Russell, Kansas, Anschutz comes from a family of oil wildcatters. After earning a degree in business from the University of Kansas, he started the Anschutz Company, a private holding company, in 1965, Bloomberg reported.

By 1979, he had discovered a large oil field on the Wyoming-Utah border, which is now known as the Anschutz Ranch East oil field.

Just a few years later, in 1982, Mobil purchased half of his discovery for as much as $500 million, industry sources told The New York Times. That initial sum of money allowed Anschutz to begin making large investments in a variety of lucrative industries. 

He made investments in the railroad industry in the 1980s and '90s.

Anschutz paid $90 million for the Rio Grande Railroad in 1984 and bought the Southern Pacific Railroad for $1.8 billion four years later, Bloomberg reported. In 1995, he sold both railroads to Union Pacific in a deal that gave him $1.4 billion and let him keep the right-of-way to lay fiber-optic cable. 

By the end of the 1990s, Anschutz's fiber-optic cable lines ended up being central to Qwest Communications, which was bought by CenturyLink in 2010.

He then started investing in the entertainment business.

He created Regal Entertainment Group in 2002 by merging three bankrupt theater chains, Forbes reported. Today, what is now known as Regal Cinemas is one of America's largest movie-theater chains.

As of April 2022, Regal operates 6,787 screens in 505 theaters worldwide.

Although Anschutz sold some of his Regal shares in a 2002 public offering, he remained the majority shareholder. In 2018, Cineworld made a $3.6 billion deal to buy Regal Cinemas, Deadline reported.

In 1994, Anschutz founded AEG, which has owned major sports teams like the LA Lakers and the LA Kings.

He bought his shares of the LA Lakers in 1998 and sold his 27 percent stake in 2021, when the team was valued at $5 billion, the Los Angeles Times reported.

Other sports teams owned by AEG include the Los Angeles Galaxy soccer franchise, the Cincinnati Cyclones, the Ontario Reign, as well as German and Swedish hockey teams.

The company's live entertainment division, AEG Presents, is one of the world's largest presenters of live music and entertainment events.

The Crypto.com Arena, formerly known as the Staples Center, has a capacity of 19,000 and hosts more than 250 events each year, including NBA All-Star Games, NHL All-Star Games, and the Grammys, as well as concerts by the likes of Bruce Springsteen, U2, Prince, Beyoncé, Paul McCartney, Jay-Z, Kanye West, Adele, Taylor Swift, and Britney Spears.

Other venues under AEG ownership include the Mercedes-Benz Arena in Berlin, the O2 in London, and the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.

Beyond sports, Anschutz's company owns the wildly popular Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival.

The popular two-weekend April music festival in Indio, California, is organized by Goldenvoice, which AEG bought in 2001.

Coachella is famous for its flashy outfits and Instagram-worthy attractions, in addition to its musical performances, which in recent years have featured artists including Beyoncé, Ariana Grande, Childish Gambino, Frank Ocean, Cardi B, Kendrick Lamar, and Radiohead.

In 2023, the festival was attended by an estimated 125,000 people each day, according to The San Diego Union-Tribune.

The Colorado billionaire also owns Windstar Cruises, a boutique cruise line with just six ships.

The small luxury cruise line has received various accolades, including awards from Conde Nast Traveler and Travel + Leisure.

The entertainment mogul has also invested in the publishing business.

He founded the conservative magazine The Washington Examiner in 2005 and later bought another conservative publication, The Weekly Standard, which shut down at the end of 2018.

His assets also include at least two five-star resorts.

Anschutz owns The Broadmoor, a luxury mountain resort in Colorado Springs.

"I started coming here when I was 5," Anschutz told Forbes in 2016. "And when I was 10, I was sitting in the corner of the bar when I told my mother and father I was going to buy the Broadmoor."

He did just that in 2011.

Anschutz also owns the Sea Island resort in Georgia, which he bought in 2016.

According to The Land Report, Anschutz is the 88th-largest landowner in the US.

He owns 184,500 acres, according to the 2024 Land Report.

In 2018, Anschutz was 27th on the list.

Anschutz keeps out of the public eye, and he has been referred to as "America's most reclusive billionaire."

In 2012, writer George Parker referred to Anschutz as "America's most reclusive billionaire." 

According to the Los Angeles Times, despite Anschutz' many business dealings in the city, he does not even have a Los Angeles address.

"Philip Anschutz is sort of like the Wizard of Oz," Los Angeles economist Jack Kyser told the Los Angeles Times in 2006. "He is the man behind the curtain pulling the levers. Nobody sees him, yet he has a huge impact on Los Angeles."

Anschutz has only given two press conferences ever, according to Bloomberg.

Anschutz and his wife, Nancy, are longtime residents of Denver, Colorado.

Little is known about his life there, but Bloomberg reports that his hobbies include hunting, tennis, squash, and jogging.

Anschutz and his wife have three children. One of their daughters, Libby Anschutz, is a musician in a Denver-based band, Tracksuit Wedding. Their other daughter, Sarah Anschutz Hunt, sits on the board of trustees of the Anschutz Family Foundation, according to the foundation's official website.

Anschutz has donated millions of dollars to charities, Republican political candidates, and conservative causes.

Anschutz founded The Anschutz Foundation in 1984, which donates primarily to nonprofit organizations in Colorado.

The University of Colorado's medical school, to which Anschutz donated $120 million in 2018, bears his name. Also among his large contributions is the $5 million he donated to build a new facility for the Denver Boys and Girls club in 2012, the Denver Business Journal reported.

Anschutz is also known for supporting Republican political causes. According to Open Secrets, in 2021 and 2022, he gave $109,500 to the National Republican Congressional Committee. He has also given money to individual Republican candidates such as Kevin McCarthy and Rick Santorum.

In 2017, Anschutz faced criticism over his reported donations to anti-LGBTQ organizations, including the Alliance Defending Freedom, the National Christian Foundation, and the Family Research Council, Billboard reported. Tax filings show his foundation donated to the Alliance Defending Freedom and the National Christian Foundation as recently as 2015.

In a rare public statement on the matter in 2017, Anschutz said, "Recent claims published in the media that I am anti-LGBTQ are nothing more than fake news — it is all garbage. I unequivocally support the rights of all people without regard to sexual orientation."

AEG did not respond to a request for comment.

Now worth more than $15 billion, Anschutz is one of just two people who have made the Forbes 400 list of the richest Americans every year since the first version was published in 1982.

On the first Forbes 400 list in 1982, Anschutz, then 42 years old, was ranked the seventh-richest person in the US with an estimated net worth of over $1 billion.

Only he and William Herbert Hunt, whose wealth comes from the oil industry, have been on Forbes' 400 list since its inception, Forbes confirmed to Business Insider in 2019.

In 2022, Anschutz was ranked No. 56 on the list. Today, his personal fortune is estimated at $15.3 billion.

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• US Navy warships fired SM-3s to intercept Iranian ballistic missiles last weekend.
• Secretary of the Navy Carlos Del Toro confirmed the use of the SM-3 during a Tuesday hearing.
• It's the first time that the exo-atmospheric interceptor has been used in combat.

US Navy warships used a missile interceptor for the first time in combat over the weekend as they defended Israel from an unprecedented Iranian attack.

Secretary of the Navy Carlos Del Toro said American forces fired the Standard Missile 3, or SM-3, to engage Iranian ballistic missiles that were fired as part of the massive barrage, which included more than 300 missiles and drones launched from Tehran and its proxies.

"We've been firing SM-2s, we've been firing SM-6s, and just over the weekend, SM-3s, to actually counter the ballistic missile threat that's come from Iran," Del Toro said at a Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense hearing on Tuesday.

US officials previously said that two destroyers — the USS Arleigh Burke and USS Carney — operating in the eastern Mediterranean Sea had engaged and destroyed at least four Iranian ballistic missiles, although it was not immediately clear how the warships shot down the threats.

USNI News first reported Monday that the two ships fired between four and seven SM-3s to intercept the missiles, citing unnamed defense officials. Del Toro's comments to lawmakers appear to be the Navy's first public acknowledgement of the SM-3 employment.

The SM-3 is an element of the Navy's advanced Aegis Combat System and uses a kinetic kill vehicle to hit and destroy short- to intermediate-range ballistic missiles during the midcourse phase of flight. The SM-3 has the capacity for exo-atmospheric intercepts, meaning that it can eliminate targets beyond Earth's atmosphere, unlike the Navy's other air-defense capabilities.

"SM-3s are unique due to being the only Standard Missile designed to operate in the vacuum of space," the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank notes in its Missile Defense Project.

There are multiple SM-3 variants, which can be fired from a Navy warship's vertical launching system, and the Block I interceptors were first fielded nearly 20 years ago. Despite dozens of tests over the past two decades, the SM-3 had not been used in combat until now.

The SM-3, however, was not the only exo-atmospheric weapon to be called into action over the weekend.

Israel's Arrow 3 missile defense system, which can also eliminate enemy threats in space, was used to shoot down many of the 120 ballistic missiles that Iran lobbed at Israel on Saturday. Arrow 3 and its predecessor, Arrow 2, make up the top echelon of the country's sophisticated air-defense network.

Israeli officials have said that 99% of the threats fired by Iran and its proxies — which included one-way attack drones, cruise missiles, and ballistic missiles — were intercepted by Israel's military and its partner forces in the Middle East.

US Central Command said American forces, specifically, destroyed more than 80 drones and at least six ballistic missiles.

CENTCOM said in a Sunday statement that "Iran's continued unprecedented, malign, and reckless behavior endangers regional stability and the safety of U.S. and coalition forces."

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• Wes Moore swiftly leaned on his military training when he learned about the Key Bridge collapse.
• "You check on your people, establish accountability, and follow up," he told BI of his mindset.
• The bridge collapse has led to the temporary closure of the critical Port of Baltimore.

In late March, Gov. Wes Moore of Maryland received a call with news that seemed unthinkable.

The Francis Scott Key Bridge, one of Baltimore's vital transportation arteries, had just collapsed into the Patapsco River after being struck by a massive cargo ship.

For 47 years, the bridge stood firm as a beacon of the region's industrial roots. But after being hit, the massive steel-arched bridge splintered into pieces. And six construction workers died as a result of the collapse.

Moore, who is now navigating one of the most complicated maritime and infrastructural challenges in the country, told me that his military service prepared him for the catastrophic event.

"When I got the call, it immediately kicked you into your training," Moore said of his reaction to news of the bridge collapse. "You check on your people, establish accountability, and follow up. When we got word about everything that had happened, I got very focused and tried to figure out what needed to get done now."

Moore has stressed that in the military, everything is about accomplishing the mission at hand, irrespective of personal differences. And he has spoken at-length about how the concept of American patriotism doesn't belong to any one political party.

When discussing the bridge collapse that triggered the temporary closure of the Port of Baltimore, Moore told me that he held onto the mindset of expecting the unknown.

It's a trait that be tested in a major way in the coming weeks and months, as the first-term Democratic governor and the state's congressional delegation work to secure federal funding to rebuild the bridge.

"I joined the Army when I was 17 years old. I had no idea when I was leading soldiers in Afghanistan that it would prepare me for this moment," he said. "One thing that training taught us is that the only certainty is uncertainty."

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In today's digitally driven world, data has become the lifeblood of the healthcare and life sciences industry. From genomic sequencing data to real world patient records, data drives decision-making processes, innovation, and ultimately better health outcomes. However, the industry's complex data ecosystem, coupled with stringent regulations and privacy concerns, has historically hindered unlocking the full potential of data in healthcare and life sciences. To address these challenges and pave the way for improved business and health outcomes, many organizations are turning to cloud technologies to build a connected ecosystem.

The data dilemma

Healthcare and life sciences are data-rich domains, encompassing patient records, claims, genomic sequencing, wearable device data, medical imaging, and more. However, this abundance of data often exists in silos, scattered across disparate systems and formats. This fragmentation hampers data accessibility, interoperability, and analysis, hindering the ability to derive meaningful insights.

Moreover, regulatory requirements such as HIPAA in the United States and GDPR in Europe impose stringent standards for data security, privacy, and compliance. Ensuring adherence to these regulations adds another layer of complexity to data management processes.

Moving to the cloud

Moving data infrastructure to the cloud offers a compelling solution to many of the challenges faced by healthcare and life sciences organizations. Cloud platforms provide scalability, flexibility, and cost-effectiveness, enabling seamless integration of disparate data sources.

By centralizing data in the cloud, organizations can break down silos and foster collaboration across departments and external partners. Real-time access to unified datasets empower clinicians, researchers and administrators to make data-driven decisions with confidence.

Building a simplified data foundation to accelerate AI

While cloud migration lays the groundwork for centralized data management, establishing a simplified data foundation is essential for maximizing the value of healthcare and life sciences data. This involves standardizing data formats, harmonizing terminology, and implementing robust data governance practices.

Standardization facilitates seamless data exchange and interoperability, enabling different systems to communicate effectively. Harmonizing terminology ensures consistency in how data is labeled and interpreted, reducing the risk of errors. Moreover, implementing rigorous data governance processes ensures data quality, integrity, and compliance throughout its life cycle.

With a solid data foundation in place, organizations can leverage AI to unlock new insights and drive innovation. AI algorithms excel at analyzing large volumes of data, identifying patterns, and predicting outcomes, making them invaluable tools for diagnosis, treatment, and drug discovery.

Driving value and improving health outcomes

By harnessing the power of cloud technologies, third-party data sources, applications, and AI, healthcare and life sciences organizations can unlock tremendous value and drive tangible improvements in health outcomes.

Centralizing data in the cloud facilitates seamless access and collaboration between healthcare providers, payers, researchers, and life sciences organizations. AI algorithms analyze this data, offering insights into disease patterns, treatment effectiveness, and personalized medicine. Predictive analytics powered by AI enable early detection of diseases, optimizing preventive care strategies. Moreover, AI-driven diagnostic tools streamline medical imaging interpretation, improving accuracy and efficiency. Real-time monitoring through wearable devices combined with cloud connectivity empower patients to actively manage their health. Together, these technologies accelerate innovation, leading to more effective treatments and ultimately, healthier populations.

Accelerate your transformation

On May 16 at 11 a.m. PT / 2 p.m. ET, Snowflake will host "Accelerate Healthcare & Life Sciences," a virtual event where industry leaders will share their expertise and demonstrate how connecting data can power a host of transformation initiatives.

Click here to register for the event and learn more about how you can accelerate with Snowflake.

This post was created by Snowflake with Insider Studios.

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