Connect with us

Published

on

Flight delays in Sao Paolo, Brazil. Truckers led down unsafe routes in Richmond, Vermont. And power grid disruptions throughout Ukraine. These troubles stem from a global communication system highly reliant on GPS satellites and the signals they transmit for essential functions.

To ensure that U.S. infrastructure won’t fall apart — even if the nation’s GPS satellites are disrupted by weather, warfare or age — a startup in Boulder, Colorado called Mesa Quantum is developing chip-sized alternative technology.

Specifically, Mesa Quantum is building “chip-scale atomic clocks” and other miniaturized quantum sensors, which can measure and detect changes in the environment around a device to signal where it is in the world, where it needs to go and to keep it in sync with other systems.

These sensors can ensure clear and steady video calls regardless of the users’ location, or enable robots, underwater drones and autonomous vehicles to maneuver deftly in dense populations or around obstacles where GPS signals are weak or unavailable.

Cofounded by Mesa Quantum CEO Sristy Agrawal and CTO Wale Lawal in 2023, the company has won a $1.9 million Space Force grant to demonstrate its alternative to GPS technology in military and civilian applications.

The company has also raised about $3.7 million in a seed stage round of funding led by J2 Ventures, the Boston-based health and defense tech fund, alongside hardware investors SOSV.

J2 Ventures cofounder and managing partner, Alex Harstrick, told CNBC his fund backed Mesa Quantum in part because of the founders’ extraordinary technical background.

Agrawal recently attained a doctorate from the University of Colorado, in an elite program affiliated with the National Institute of Standards and Technology. Her research has focused on quantum information, computing and gravity.

Agrawal told CNBC that the lab below her office at the university is home to the world’s most precise clock. “Working here and interacting with all these different groups led me to appreciate what impact these technologies could have for real, not just theoretically in the future,” she said.

Her cofounder, Lawal, is a graduate of the U.S. Air Force Academy, attained his PhD at Rice University in materials science and nano-engineering, and an MBA at Harvard.

Before taking the entrepreneurial plunge, he spent years in military research organizations, developing systems for use in “GPS contested environments” such as precision-guided missiles, swarm drone technology, and the magnetic navigation systems used to guide military aircraft.

Lawal explained that military aircraft and other vehicles cannot afford to have their systems disrupted and jammed. Any disruptions could lead to “catastrophic events for warfighters” in the air and on the ground. “If unmanned aircraft lose GPS signals, which they rely on to surveil the environment and provide intelligence information to troops down range, the troops cannot complete critical missions like a search and rescue.”

Many of the GPS satellites operated by the U.S. are now aging beyond their intended lifespans.

When they met, the scientific duo quickly agreed on the burgeoning need for mass-manufacturable, and chip-scale, technology to alleviate the risks of GPS-related failures in military and commercial systems.

Harstrick said his fund hopes that Mesa Quantum will have its first demonstration of mass scale “atomic clocks” (quantum timing sensors) validated by a top-tier semiconductor manufacturing partner” in the next few years.

He’s also guessing Mesa Quantum’s sensor tech will be in demand among companies that build or operate their own data centers.

Lawal explained, “Data centers use GPS to synchronize their networks today, so that they can accurately exchange communications or share data across the cloud. Any form of disruption to that network synchronization can cause crashes — whether that’s to a financial system, a hospital system, or a social network.”

Technology to help data centers safeguard against such crashes could help them prevent data loss and improve cybersecurity, the CTO said.

No matter which private sector players eventually embrace the startup’s quantum sensors, CEO Sristy Agrawal said the U.S. government is likely to be among Mesa Quantum’s biggest early customers. “The U.S. government has established major initiatives to spur innovation in this area and is seeking to purchase a million quantum sensors each year — if they can simply be mass-produced,” she explained.

With its grant funding and seed round in place, Agrawal said, Mesa Quantum will look to grow its team in Boulder, especially hiring atomic molecular and optical physicists, engineers and manufacturing experts this year.

The longer-term vision, she said, is to “bring a suite of quantum sensors to the market that could do everything GPS-based systems are capable of today — without all of the risks and vulnerabilities.”

Continue Reading

Technology

Intel’s new CEO receives $66 million in options and stock grants on top of $1 million salary

Published

on

By

Intel's new CEO receives  million in options and stock grants on top of  million salary

Intel appoints Lip-Bu Tan as CEO.

Courtesy: Intel

New Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan will receive total compensation of $1 million in salary and about $66 million in stock options and grants vesting over the coming years, according to filing on Friday with the SEC.

Tan was named as the chief of Intel this week, spurring hopes that the chip industry veteran can turn around the struggling company. Intel shares are up nearly 20% so far in 2025, and most of those gains came this week, following Tan’s appointment. He starts next week.

Tan will receive $1 million in salary, and he is eligible for an annual bonus worth $2 million.

He will also receive stock units in a long-term equity grant valued at $14.4 million, as well as a performance grant of $17 million in Intel shares. Both grants will vest over a period of five years, although Tan won’t earn any of those shares if Intel’s stock price drops over the next three years. He can earn more stock if the company’s share price outperforms the market.

Tan will receive a package of stock options worth $9.6 million, as well as a new hire option grant worth $25 million.

In total, Tan’s compensation package has about $66 million in long-term equity awards and options in addition to salary, bonuses, and legal expenses. If Intel goes through a change of control, Tan could be eligible for accelerated vesting, according to the filing.

“Lip-Bu’s compensation reflects his experience and credentials as an accomplished technology leader with deep industry experience and is market competitive,” Intel said in an emailed comment. “The vast majority of his compensation is equity-based and tied to long-term shareholder value creation.”

Separately, Tan agreed to purchase $25 million in Intel shares and hold them in order to be eligible for the grants and bonuses.

WATCH: Cramer on new Intel CEO

Jim Cramer talks impact of Intel's new CEO announcement

Continue Reading

Technology

Buy now, pay later lender Klarna files for U.S. IPO

Published

on

By

Buy now, pay later lender Klarna files for U.S. IPO

Pedestrians walk by an advertisement for Klarna.

Daniel Harvey Gonzalez | In Pictures via Getty Images

Klarna, a provider of buy now, pay later loans filed its IPO prospectus on Friday, and plans to go public on the New York Stock Exchange under ticker symbol KLAR.

Klarna, headquartered in Sweden, hasn’t yet disclosed the number of shares to be offered or the expected price range.

The decision to go public in the U.S. deals a significant blow to European stock exchanges, which have struggled to retain homegrown tech firms. Klarna CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski had hinted for years that a U.S. listing was more likely, citing better visibility and regulatory advantages.

Klarna is continuing to rebuild after a dramatic downturn. Once a pandemic-era darling valued at $46 billion in a SoftBank-led funding round, Klarna saw its valuation slashed by 85% in 2022, plummeting to $6.7 billion in its most recent primary fundraising. However, analysts now estimate the company’s valuation in the $15 billion range, bolstered by its return to profitability in 2023.

Revenue last year increased 24% to $2.8 billion. The company’s operating loss was $121 million for the year, and adjusted operating profit was $181 million, swinging from a loss of $49 million a year earlier.

Founded in 2005, Klarna is best known for its buy now, pay later model, a service that allows consumers to split purchases into installments. The company competes with Affirm, which went public in 2021, and Afterpay, which Block acquired for $29 billion in early 2022. Klarna’s major shareholders include venture firms Sequoia Capital and Atomico, as well as SoftBank’s Vision Fund.

Continue Reading

Technology

Shares of DocuSign surge 14% on strong earnings, AI boost

Published

on

By

Shares of DocuSign surge 14% on strong earnings, AI boost

DocuSign CEO Allan Thygesen on Q4 results, launch of DocuSign IAM and growth outlook

Docusign rose more than 14% after reporting stronger-than-expected earnings after the bell Thursday.

“We’ve really stabilized and I think started to turn the corner on the core business,” CEO Allan Thygesen said Friday on CNBC’s “Squawk Box.” “We’ve become much more efficient.”

Here’s how the company performed in the fourth quarter FY2025 compared to LSEG estimates:

  • Earnings per share: 86 cents vs. 85 cents expected
  • Revenue: $776 million vs. $761 million

The earnings beat was boosted in part by the electronic signature service’s new artificial intelligence-enabled content called Docusign IAM, a platform for optimizing processes involving agreements.

“It’s tremendously valuable,” Thygesen said. “It’s opening a treasure trove of data. … We’re seeing excellent pickup.”

Looking to fiscal year 2026, Thygesen said Docusign expects IAM to account for low double digits of the total growth of the business by Q4.

Read more CNBC tech news

Thygesen said the company is also partnering with Microsoft and Google, which the company does not view as competitors because they’re “not looking to become agreement management specialists.”

Despite consumer sentiment and demand dipping across the board due to tariff uncertainty, Thygesen said the company has not seen anything yet in its transactional activity to indicate a slowdown in demand or growth.

“More and more people are going to want to sign things electronically,” Thygesen said.

The company reported subscription revenue at $757 million, marking a 9% year-over-year increase. Docusign said it expects first-quarter revenue between $745 million and $749 million and projects full-year revenue between $3.129 billion and $3.141 billion.

Docusign reported net income of $83.50 million, or 39 cents per share, compared to net income of $27.24 million, or 13 cents per share, a year ago. Fourth-quarter revenue of $776 million was up 9% from the year-ago quarter.

DocuSign went public in 2018 at a $6 billion valuation. The company’s share price soared during the pandemic as demand for remote services boomed during lockdowns and social restrictions, hitting record highs in 2021 before plummeting. Thygesen, who previously worked at Google, joined the company in September 2022 after DocuSign’s massive slide.

The stock is down more than 16% year-to-date.

Continue Reading

Trending