HashiCorp shares jumped almost 20% on Tuesday following a media report claiming IBM was in talks to acquire the cloud software maker.

Developers use HashiCorp’s software to set up and manage infrastructure in public clouds that companies such as Amazon and Microsoft operate. Organizations also pay HashiCorp for managing security credentials.

Citing unnamed sources, The Wall Street Journal said a deal could materialize in the next few days.

HashiCorp and IBM representatives both told CNBC they do not comment on market rumors or speculation.

Founded in 2012, HashiCorp went public on Nasdaq in 2021. The company generated a net loss of nearly $191 million on $583 million in revenue in the fiscal year ending Jan. 31, according to its annual report. In December, Mitchell Hashimoto, co-founder of HashiCorp, whose family name is reflected in the company name, announced that he was leaving.

Revenue jumped almost 23% during that period, compared with 2% for IBM in 2023. IBM executives pointed to a difficult economic climate during a conference call with analysts in January. The hardware, software and consulting provider reports earnings on Wednesday.

Cisco held $9 million in HashiCorp shares at the end of March, according to a regulatory filing. Cisco held early acquisition talks with HashiCorp, according to a 2019 report.

IBM shares slipped after publication of the Wall Street Journal article but quickly recovered, ending Tursday’s trading session flat.

Read the full Wall Street Journal report here.

Tesla is eliminating around 12% of its workforce at a factory in Austin, Texas, as part of a broader restructuring the company announced last week.

According to a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act letter on Tuesday, the layoffs affect 2,688 employees at the facility in Travis County. In 2021, Tesla CEO Elon Musk moved the company’s corporate headquarters to Austin from Palo Alto, California.

Musk said in an internal memo last week that Tesla was cutting more than 10% of its global headcount as the electric vehicle maker reckons with flagging sales and increased competition. He didn’t say which departments or locations would be most impacted.

“As we prepare the company for our next phase of growth, it is extremely important to look at every aspect of the company for cost reductions and increasing productivity,” he wrote. A subsequent WARN notice filed in New York indicated that 285 of positions were being eliminated at a factory in Buffalo.

Tesla employed 140,473 people as of December, according to filings.

Tesla officially opened its Texas EV and battery factory in April 2022, with a “cyber rodeo” party. The company now manufactures some of its Model Y crossover utility vehicles in Austin, and has started to build its Cybertruck there.

Musk later called the Austin factory, and another assembly plant in Germany, “gigantic money furnaces,” in an interview with Tesla Owners Silicon Valley, a fan club that promotes Tesla vehicles.

According to filings with the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation revealed, Tesla was planning to spend upward of $770 million last year on the construction of expanded facilities in Austin, including for battery cell testing and manufacturing, cathode and drive unit manufacturing, and a die shop, among other things.

Tuesday’s WARN filing said that “none of the employees are represented by a union and none of the employees have bumping rights,” or the right of more senior workers to replace those with less seniority.

Executives are expected to discuss the restructuring on the company’s quarterly earnings call at 5:30 p.m. ET.

WATCH: Tesla set to report earnings

Tesla is set to report first-quarter earnings after the bell on Tuesday.

Here is what analysts are expecting, according to LSEG:

• Earnings per share: 51 cents
• Revenue: $22.15 billion

Wall Street is projecting revenue will drop 5.1% from $23.33 billion a year earlier, which would mark the first year-over-year drop in sales since 2020, when the Covid-19 pandemic disrupted production.

Tesla shares have plummeted 42% this year on concerns about weak deliveries, competition in China and the company’s ongoing price cuts. Earlier this month, Tesla reported an 8.5% year-over-year decline in vehicle deliveries for the first quarter.

Elon Musk’s electric vehicle company is now facing heightened competition worldwide, with fully electric cars still in demand but sales growth in the segment slowing. Tesla and key rivals have been slashing EV prices, on and off for months, to try to spur demand.

Tesla embarked on a massive restructuring this month with two executives, Drew Baglino and Rohan Patel, resigning. Musk said last week in a companywide memo that the automaker was cutting more than 10% of its global workforce.

The layoffs and resignations followed a Reuters report that said Tesla would scrap plans to make a low-cost electric car in the near future, and instead focus on self-driving technology. While Musk initially balked at the report, he later said in a post on social media site X that Tesla would go “balls to the wall for autonomy.”

Musk has promised investors and customers a self-driving vehicle for years, but never delivered.

He is now saying there will be an unveiling of a Tesla robotaxi on Aug. 8, 2024. Unveiling events do not mean a vehicle is ready to be produced. For example, Tesla first unveiled a new version of its Roadster in December 2017, and has yet to produce the car.

Shareholders submitted and voted on questions for Tesla executives to answer ahead of Tuesday’s call. Submissions included a request for a “realistic timeline for launching a revenue-generating robotaxi network,” and a progress update on a “cheaper next-generation vehicle.”

A livestream of the earnings call is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. ET.

WATCH: The fact that Musk was right about EVs doesn’t mean he’s going to be right now