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German Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD,l.), and Ola Källenius, Chairman of the Board of Management of Mercedes-Benz AG, visit the Mercedes stand during the opening of the IAA.

Sven Hoppe | Picture Alliance | Getty Images

Munich, GERMANY — The IAA Mobility motor show is taking place in Munich, Germany this week, and there is no shortage of cars on display.

The theme was electrification, with major players like BMW and Mercedes showing off their electric vehicle offerings. A large number Chinese players from Xpeng to BYD were also in attendance, as they set sights on international expansion.

Here’s a look at some of the cars on display in Munich.

BMW Vision Neue Klasse

BMW revealed the BMW Vision Neue Klasse, a concept electric vehicle that will underpin its foray into battery-powered cars.

Arjun Kharpal | CNBC

The BMW Vision Neue Klasse is the German giant’s concept model built on an architecture that will underpin the company’s electric cars over the coming years.

The first cars built on the Neue Klasse architecture are set to enter production in 2025.

The concept vehicle has a glass roof, and BMW said the design embodies classic brand elements that fans know. The company has also focused heavily on the technology inside the vehicle.

Mercedes-Benz Concept CLA Class

The Mercedes-Benz Concept CLA Class was unveiled at IAA Mobility 2023 in Munich, Germany. The platform will underpin the German automaker’s push into electric cars.

Mercedes-Benz

The Mercedes-Benz Concept CLA Class is built on a new architecture from the German titan, as it pushes into electric vehicles.

The range will comprise a total of four new models — a four-door coupé, an estate, and two sports utility vehicles.

Mercedes claims the model will have a range of 750 kilometres (466 miles) on a single charge.

Mercedes-Benz Vision One Eleven

The Mercedes-Benz Vision One Eleven on display at the IAA Mobility show in Munich, Germany.

Arjun Kharpal | CNBC

Announced in June, the Vision One Eleven is an extravagant car from Mercedes-Benz that was on display.

Just a concept, the car was designed to be all-electric and is inspired by the C 111 experimental vehicles from the 1960s and 70s.

Leapmotor C10

Chinese EV maker Leapmotor launched its first car for the international markets called the C10.

Arjun Kharpal | CNBC

There was a big Chinese presence at IAA, and Hangzhou-headquartered Leapmotor announced plans to bring its C10 sports utility vehicle — or SUV — to European markets next year.

“All of Leapmotor’s subsequent products will be designed and developed with a global mindset and adhere to global standards,” Leapmotor CEO Zhu Jiangming said at a press conference on Monday.

BYD Seal

BYD launched the BYD Seal in Europe at the IAA auto show in Munich, Germany. The electric sedan has a starting price of 44,900 euros ($48,479).

Arjun Kharpal | CNBC

Another Chinese carmaker, Warren Buffett-backed BYD launched its Seal electric sedan for Europe on Monday, for a starting price of 44,900 euros ($47,992). 

BYD says the car has a range of up to 570 on a single charge. BYD is one of China’s biggest electric carmakers and has been aggressively expanding overseas.

Opel Experimental 

The Opel Experimental concept

Arjun Kharpal | CNBC

Stellantis-owned Opel debuted its Experimental concept car in Munich after the official launch in July.

The futuristic looking vehicle was designed “to provide a tangible vision of where the Opel brand is heading,” the company said in a press release.

Lucid Air Midnight Dream Edition

The Lucid Air Midnight Dream Edition.

Lucid

The Lucid Air Midnight Dream Edition is a limited-production version of Lucid’s Air electric sedan.

Lucid said the car has a range of 799 kilometers on a single charge. The seats have a massage function, while the car boasts a spacious interior.

The car will only be available in Europe.

Volkswagen ID. GTI Concept 

The all-electric Volkswagen ID GTI Concept car on display at the IAA Mobility 2023 show in Munich, Germany.

Arjun Kharpal | CNBC

Volkswagen’s ID. GTI Concept car was designed to show off what the German automaker will do with GTI versions of its ID electric cars.

It’s part of a major push by Volkswagen into the electric car sector. The company said at the IAA Mobility show that it will launch 11 new all-electric models by 2027.

Porsche Mission X

The Porsche Mission X on display at the IAA Mobility 2023 show in Munich, Germany.

Arjun Kharpal | CNBC

The Porsche Mission X is a concept electric “hypercar,” as the company describes it.

It was first announced in June, but displayed at IAA. The model’s doors open upwards. Porsche calls the vehicle “a technology beacon for the sports car of the future,” and says it “picks up the torch of iconic sports cars of decades past: like the 959, the Carrera GT and the 918 Spyder before it.”

MG Cyberster

The MG Cyberster on display at the IAA Mobility 2023 show in Munich, Germany.

Arjun Kharpal | CNBC

The MG Cyberster was first featured at the Shanghai Auto Show earlier this year, but was brought to the IAA Mobility for its European debut.

It is built on an electric car architecture that MG claims will allow a vehicle to travel 800 kilometers or 500 miles on a single battery charge.

MG said it draws upon the brand’s classic design, but has features like a gaming cockpit and 5G connectivity.

Lego Lamborghini Sián FKP 37

A Lego version of the Lamborghini Sián FKP 37 on display at IAA Mobility 2023 in Munich, Germany.

Arjun Kharpal | CNBC

While technically not a real car, there was also a Lego model of the Lamborghini Sián FKP 37 on show at IAA Mobility.

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Uber delivery chief Gore-Coty is leaving after almost 13 years at ride-hailing company

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Uber delivery chief Gore-Coty is leaving after almost 13 years at ride-hailing company

Courtesy: Uber Eats

Uber said Monday that Pierre-Dimitri Gore-Coty, one of the company’s longest-tenured top executives and the head of is delivery business is leaving after almost 13 years.

Gore-Coty joined Uber as a general manager in France in 2012, and worked his way up to become vice president of mobility for the Europe and Middle East region four years later, according to his LinkedIn profile. He was named senior vice president of delivery in 2021.

“It’s hard to imagine Uber without Pierre, because there hasn’t been much Uber without Pierre,” CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said in a statement that was part of a regulatory filing. “As one of our first employees, he was a driving force behind our global Mobility expansion and stepped up to run Uber Eats just weeks before the first Covid lockdowns.”

The company didn’t say what Gore-Coty plans to do next.

Uber also said that Andrew Macdonald, the company’s senior vice president of mobility and business operations, will become chief operating officer, reporting to Khosrowshahi. Macdonald, 41, will oversee the company’s global mobility, delivery and autonomous businesses in addition to “key cross-platform functions like membership, customer support, safety, and more,” the filing said.

Gore-Coty is one of 11 people listed on Uber’s executive team page. Macdonald is the only one who has worked at the company longer. He joined in May 2012, four months before Gore-Coty, according to LinkedIn.

“These last nearly 13 years have been the ride of a lifetime,” Gore-Coty said in the statement. “It was a true team effort, and I’m so proud of what we’ve built and the impact we’ve had on daily life in cities around the world.”

Uber shares were little changed in extended trading after closing on Monday at $83.64. The stock is up 39% this year, while the Nasdaq is about flat.

Last month, the company reported first-quarter results that beat on earnings but missed on revenue. A month earlier, the Federal Trade Commission sued Uber, alleging that the company engaged in “deceptive billing and cancellation practices” related to its Uber One subscription service.

In an interview with CNBC’s “Squawk Box,” Khosrowshahi characterized the lawsuit as “a bit of a head-scratcher for us.”

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Applied Digital shares rip 40% higher on CoreWeave AI lease agreement

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Applied Digital shares rip 40% higher on CoreWeave AI lease agreement

Vcg | Visual China Group | Getty Images

Shares of Applied Digital rose more than 40% after the company said it signed two long-term lease agreements with CoreWeave for artificial intelligence data centers.

Nvidia-backed CoreWeave climbed more than 7% following the announcement.

Financial terms of the two agreements were not provided, but Applied Digital said it expects $7 billion in total revenue during the approximately 15-year period.

“Through these newly signed long-term leases with CoreWeave, we are taking a step forward in our strategic expansion into advanced compute infrastructure,” said Applied Digital CEO Wes Cummins in a release announcing the news.

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CoreWeave will provide AI and high-performance computing infrastructure for the Applied Digital data center campus in Ellendale, North Dakota, according to the release.

Applied Digital will provide 250 megawatts of critical IT load for CoreWeave. The campus is designed to host 400 MW of load.

CoreWeave shares have been on a tear over the past couple of weeks, setting a record high of $130.76 on May 29. The company, which rents AI servers powered by Nvidia chips, started trading at $39 on March 28.

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Amazon’s pricing controls may be anticompetitive, German regulator warns

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Amazon's pricing controls may be anticompetitive, German regulator warns

Packages with the logo of Amazon are transported at a packing station of a redistribution center of Amazon in Horn-Bad Meinberg, western Germany, on Dec. 9, 2024.

Ina Fassbender | Afp | Getty Images

German antitrust regulators warned Amazon on Monday that the company’s pricing mechanisms for third-party sellers could run afoul of competition laws.

The Federal Cartel Office said in its preliminary assessment that Amazon’s pricing controls limit the visibility of merchants’ products and, “based on non-transparent marketplace rules,” interfere with their freedom to set prices.

Amazon uses algorithms and statistical models to calculate certain price caps for products, the Cartel Office said. Products that are flagged as having “prices that are too high” or “prices that are not competitive” can then be demoted in search results, excluded from advertising or removed from the buy box, they added.

The buy box is the listing that pops up first when a visitor clicks on a particular product, and the one that gets purchased when a shopper taps “Add to Cart.”

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“Competition in online retail in Germany is largely determined by Amazon’s rules for the trading platform,” Federal Cartel Office President Andreas Mundt said in a statement. “Since Amazon competes directly with other marketplace retailers on its platform, influencing competitors’ pricing, even in the form of price caps, is fundamentally questionable from a competition perspective.”

Amazon’s pricing practices not only threaten sellers’ businesses, but could also harm other retailers by deterring them from offering lower prices, the Cartel Office said.

An Amazon spokesperson said the company strongly disagrees with the Cartel Office’s preliminary findings. They added that any changes to Amazon’s pricing mechanisms would be “bad for customers and selling partners.”

“If Amazon is prevented from helping people find competitively priced offers, it will lead to a bad shopping experience for them, as we’d need to promote uncompetitive or even abusive pricing in our store,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “This would mislead customers into thinking they’re getting good value when, in reality, they’re not.”

Amazon can provide feedback to the Cartel Office on its preliminary assessment before it reaches a final decision.

Amazon in 2022 reached a deal with European Union antitrust regulators who were investigating its use of seller data and buy box practices. As part of the settlement, Amazon agreed to display a second buy box on products sold in Europe when there is a second competing offer that’s different on price or delivery.

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission is also probing Amazon’s use of pricing algorithms on its sprawling third-party marketplace as part of a wide-ranging antitrust lawsuit filed in 2023. Amazon has said the FTC’s complaint is “wrong on the facts and the law.”

The case is set to go to trial in October 2026.

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