A parcel is prepared for shipment at Amazon’s warehouse in Hemel Hempstead, England.
Getty Images
Amazon warehouse workers could soon be joined by a couple new co-workers: Ernie and Bert.
Those are the names of the new robots Amazon is testing with the goal of reducing strenuous movements for workers.
While the introduction of robots to the workplace often raises questions about whether human jobs will be replaced, Amazon argues they simply allow workers to focus on tasks that most need their attention while minimizing their potential for injury. Amazon said it’s added over a million jobs around the world since it began using robotics in its facilities in 2012.
In May, Amazon announced a goal of reducing recordable incident rates by 50% by 2025. It plans to invest over $300 million into safety projects this year.
Amazon described in a blog post Sunday four robots it’s testing to move items across its fulfillment centers and closer to workers.
Ernie helps remove items from a robotic shelf so employees don’t have to. The process doesn’t save time, Amazon said in the post, but testing has so far indicated it could make work safer for employees.
Bert is one of Amazon’s first Autonomous Mobile Robots (AMRs), made to navigate facilities independently, even while workers are moving around. Unlike other robots, Bert would not need to remain in a restricted space, meaning workers could ask it to take items across a facility. Amazon said Bert could eventually move heavier items.
Scooter and Kermit are two other AMRs under development that transport carts. Amazon said these types of robots could take over workers’ tasks of moving empty packages across facilities so they can focus on activities requiring critical thinking skills and reduce physically strenuous work.
Kermit, which follows magnetic tape to move empty totes, is further along in development, Amazon said, and will be introduced in at least a dozen North American sites this year. Amazon said it plans to deploy Scooter in at least one facility this year.
Signage outside the Micron offices in San Jose, California, on Dec. 17, 2024.
David Paul Morris | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Micron shares popped 6% in extended trading Thursday after the company reported second-quarter results that beat analysts’ estimates and offered better-than-expected guidance.
Here’s how the company did:
Earnings per share: $1.56, adjusted vs. $1.42 expected by LSEG
Revenue: $8.05 billion vs. $7.89 billion expected by LSEG
Revenue increased 38% from $5.82 billion during the same period in 2024, Micron said in a press release. The memory and storage solutions company reported net income of $1.58 billion, or $1.41 per share, up from $793 million, or 71 cents per share, in the year-ago quarter.
Data center revenue tripled, the company said.
Revenue for the fiscal third quarter will be about $8.8 billion, Micron said, topping the $8.5 billion average analyst estimate, according to LSEG. Adjusted earnings will be roughly $1.57 a share, the company said, beating the $1.47 average estimate.
Prior to Thursday’s close, Micron shares were up 22% for the year, while the Nasdaq is down more than 8%.
Micron will host its quarterly call with investors at 4:30 p.m. ET.
Appetite for ether ETFs has been tepid since their launch last July, but that could change if some of the regulatory wrinkles holding them back get “resolved,” according to Robert Mitchnick, head of digital assets at BlackRock.
There’s a widely held view that the success of ether ETFs has been “meh” compared to the explosive growth in funds tracking bitcoin, Mitchnick said at the Digital Asset Summit in New York City Thursday. Though he sees that as a “misconception,” he acknowledged that the inability to earn a staking yield on the funds is likely one thing holding them back.
“There’s obviously a next phase in the potential evolution of [ether ETFs],” he said. “An ETF, it’s turned out, has been a really, really compelling vehicle through which to hold bitcoin for lots of different investor types. There’s no question it’s less perfect for ETH today without staking. A staking yield is a meaningful part of how you can generate investment return in this space, and all the [ether] ETFs at launch did not have staking.”
Staking is a way for investors to earn passive yield on their cryptocurrency holdings by locking tokens up on the network for a period of time. It allows investors to put their crypto to work if they’re not planning to sell it anytime soon.
But Mitchnick doesn’t expect a simple fix.
“It’s not a particularly easy problem,” he explained. “It’s not as simple as … a new administration just green-lighting something and then boom, we’re all good, off to the races. There are a lot of fairly complex challenges that have to be figured out, but if that can get figured out, then it’s going to be sort of a step change upward in terms of what we see the activity around those products is.”
The Securities and Exchange Commission has historically viewed some staking services as potential unregistered securities offerings under the Howey Test – which is used to determine whether an asset is an investment contract and therefore, a security. But a more crypto friendly SEC is moving swiftly to reverse the damage done to the industry under the previous regime. Its newly formed crypto task force is scheduled to kick off a roundtable series Friday focused on defining the security status of digital assets.
Ether has been one of the most beaten up cryptocurrencies in recent months. It’s down more than 40% year to date as it has struggled with conflicting and difficult-to-comprehend narratives, weaker revenue since its last big technical upgrade and increasing competition from Solana. Standard Chartered this week slashed its price target on the coin by more than half.
Mitchnick said the negativity is “overdone.”
“ETH … at the second grade level is easier to define … but at the 10th grade level is a lot harder,” he said. “Second grade level: it’s a technology innovation story. … Beyond that, it does get a little more vast, a little more complicated. It’s about being a bet on blockchain adoption and innovation. That’s part of the thesis as we communicate it to clients.”
“There are three [use cases] that we focus on that have a lot of resonance with our client base: it’s a bet to some extent on tokenization, on stablecoin adoption, and on decentralized financing,” he added. “It does take a fair bit of education, and we’ve been on that journey, but it’s going to take more time.”
BlackRock is the issuer of the iShares Ethereum Trust ETF. It also has a tokenized money market fund, known as BUIDL, which it initially launched a year ago on Ethereum and has since expanded to several other networks including Aptos and Polygon.
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A Tesla Cybertruck is parked in front of the White House in Washington, U.S., March 11, 2025.
Kevin Lamarque | Reuters
Tesla is recalling more than 46,000 of its Cybertrucks due to a cosmetic exterior trim panel that it said can “delaminate and detach from the vehicle,” potentially becoming a road hazard and “increasing the risk of a crash.”
The recall covers an exterior part of the vehicle, known as a cant rail, and it will affect all Cybertruck vehicles manufactured from November 2023 to February 2025, Tesla wrote in a filing to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
The Cybertrucks’ recall comes at an already-challenging time for the embattled EV maker, whose value has dropped by more than 40% as CEO Elon Musk continues his role as a top advisor in the Trump administration.
Owners of affected vehicles can take their Cybertrucks to Tesla’s service department for free replacement of the cant rail, the company wrote in its filing.
Both Tesla and The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Following the recall filing, The Information reported that the company plans to introduce a new innovation to the Cybertruck’s battery this year that would “sharply decrease battery manufacturing costs,” citing a senior executive.