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Vice Media offices display the Vice logo in Venice, California.

Mario Tama | Getty Images

Once a digital media darling, Vice Media Group on Monday filed for bankruptcy protection after years of financial troubles.

A consortium of Vice’s lenders which includes Fortress Investment, Soros Fund Management and Monroe Capital is looking to acquire the company following the filing.

The digital media trailblazer, once valued at $5.7 billion and known for sites including Vice and Motherboard, had been restructuring and cutting jobs across its global news business over recent months.

The group set to buy the company will provide $225 million in the form of a credit bid for most of Vice Media’s assets, the company announced on Monday, along with significant liabilities.

Vice is one of several digital media and technology firms forced to restructure this year amid a sluggish economy and weak advertising market. Buzzfeed last month shuttered its news division and announced substantial layoffs.

Launched in Canada in 1994 as a fringe magazine, Vice expanded around the world with youth-focused content and a prominent social media presence. It endured several years of financial troubles, however, as tech giants such as Google and Meta vacuumed up global ad spend.

To facilitate its sale, Vice filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York. If the application is approved, other parties will be able to bid for the company. Credit bids enable creditors to swap secured debt for company assets rather than pay cash.

The consortium’s bid includes a commitment of $20 million in cash to enable Vice’s operations to continue throughout the sale process. It is expected to conclude within two to three months, the company said.

Vice said its various multi-platform media brands including Vice News, Vice TV, Pulse Films, Virtue, Refinery29 and i-D, will continue to operate, while its international entities and Vice TV’s joint venture with A&E are not part of the Chapter 11 filing.

Vice Co-CEOs Bruce Dixon and Hozefa Lokhandwala said in a statement that the sale process will “strengthen the Company and position VICE for long-term growth.”

“We will have new ownership, a simplified capital structure and the ability to operate without the legacy liabilities that have been burdening our business,” they added.

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Motive, an Alphabet-backed fleet management software company, files for IPO

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Motive, an Alphabet-backed fleet management software company, files for IPO

Direxion signage at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, US, on Monday, Dec. 22, 2025. The holiday-shortened week started with gains in stocks amid a broad advance that saw a continuation of the bullish momentum on Wall Street.

Michael Nagle | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Motive, a company with software for managing corporate trucks and drivers, on Tuesday filed for an initial public offering on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol “MTVE.”

The paperwork puts Motive among a fast-growing group of tech companies looking to go public in 2026. Anthropic, OpenAI and SpaceX have all reportedly considered making their shares widely available for trading next year.

Motive is smaller, reporting a $62.7 million net loss on $115.8 million in revenue in the third quarter. The loss widened from $41.3 million in the same quarter of 2024, while revenue grew about 23% year over year. The company had almost 100,000 clients at the end of September.

Ryan Johns, Obaid Khan and Shoaib Makani started Motive in 2013, originally under the name Keep Truckin. Makani, the CEO, is Khan’s brother-in-law.

Investors include Alphabet’s GV, Base10 Partners, Greenoaks, Index Ventures, Kleiner Perkins and Scale Venture Partners.

Motive’s AI Dashcam device for detecting unsafe driving “has prevented 170,000 collisions and saved 1,500 lives on our roads,” Makani wrote in a letter to investors. Most revenue comes from subscriptions, although Motive does sell replacement hardware and professional services.

The San Francisco company changed its name to Motive in 2022, and as of Sept. 30, it employed 4,508 people. Motive employs 400 full-time data annotators who apply labels that are meant to enhance artificial intelligence models.

Motive has ongoing patent-infringement litigation with competitor Samsara, which went public in 2021 and today has a $22 billion market capitalization.

WATCH: AI IPO boom next year? The changing 2026 IPO landscape

AI IPO boom next year? The changing 2026 IPO landscape

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Why an analyst sees Meta shares getting back to record highs – plus, another tariff reprieve

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Why an analyst sees Meta shares getting back to record highs – plus, another tariff reprieve

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U.S. pushes additional tariffs on Chinese chips to June 2027

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U.S. pushes additional tariffs on Chinese chips to June 2027

A silicon wafer with chips etched into is seen as U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris tours a site where Applied Materials plans to build a research facility, in Sunnyvale, California, U.S., May 22, 2023.

Pool | Reuters

The U.S. will increase tariffs on Chinese semiconductor imports in June 2027, at a rate to be determined at least a month in advance, the Trump administration said in a Federal Register filing on Tuesday.

But in the meantime, the initial tariff rate on semiconductor imports from China will be zero for 18 months, according to the filing from the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative.

As part of an investigation that kicked off a year ago, the agency found that China is engaging in unfair trade practices in the industry.

“For decades, China has targeted the semiconductor industry for dominance and has employed increasingly aggressive and sweeping non-market policies and practices in pursuing dominance of the sector,” the office said in the filing.

The decision to delay new tariffs for at least 18 months signals that the Trump administration is seeking to cool any trade hostilities between the U.S. and China.

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Additional tariffs could also become a bargaining chip if future talks break down.

U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping reached a truce in the so-called trade war in October, as part of a deal that included the U.S. slashing some tariffs and China allowing exports of rare earth metals.

The USTR’s Tuesday filing states that tariffs will increase on June 23, 2027.

The notice is the next step in a process focusing on older chips that started during the Biden administration under Section 301 of the Trade Act.

The new 2027 date gives clarity to American firms that have said they are closely watching how U.S. tariffs could affect their businesses or supply chains.

The tariffs are separate from other duties threatened by the Trump administration on Chinese chip imports under Section 232 of the law.

EUV machines are key source of leverage for U.S. over China in AI race, says CSIS’s Gregory Allen

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