National Basketball Association superstar Russell Westbrook is taking a shot off the court at simplifying funeral planning with artificial intelligence.

The famed Denver Nuggets point guard on Wednesday announced the launch of Eazewell, a startup that uses AI technology to streamline the process for coordinating funerals. Westbrook founded the venture with former Charlotte Hornets star Kemba Walker and childhood friend Donnell Beverly Jr., who serves as president of Russell Westbrook Enterprises and CEO and co-founder of Eazewell.

“My whole career, on and off the court, has been about stepping up decisively in the moments that matter most,” Westbrook wrote in a statement to CNBC. Westbrook and the Nuggets are currently facing the Oklahoma City Thunder in the NBA Western Conference semifinals. “Eazewell is exactly that — a decisive solution to a very real problem.”

The Los Angeles-based company uses AI to curate funeral options catered to each user’s budgets and preferences. The platform assists with paperwork, budget planning, invitations and overlooked tasks such as canceling a deceased loved one’s utility bills and social media accounts. Eazewell currently has 11 employees and has already tested its beta platform with more than 1,000 families. 

Eazewell has not disclosed funding but has revenue agreements with partner services. The startup is also working on partnerships with finance and life insurance companies in the space. The service is free to use and does not have an ads component “at this stage,” a company spokesperson said.

“We’re trying to take the weight off people’s shoulders as much as we can, and make this process so much easier for people,” Walker told CNBC in a phone interview. Walker played college basketball with Beverly at the University of Connecticut.

Learning from an early loss

Eazewell traces its origins to Westbrook and Beverly’s high school days, when their friend and basketball teammate Khelcey Barrs III passed away unexpectedly from an enlarged heart. Westbrook commemorates Barrs to this day by wearing a bracelet with the initials “KB3” in every NBA game he plays and on his signature Jordan Why Not Zer0.6 “Khelcey Barrs” shoe.

“It’s a reminder that life can change in an instant,” Westbrook said. “You don’t get to choose the moment, but you do get to choose how you respond.”

The experience left a lasting effect on the two friends, Beverly said, but it wasn’t until the death of Beverly’s parents that he experienced funeral planning hurdles firsthand. Beverly said the experience was “messy” and “grueling.”

Disillusioned and frustrated by the process after the death of his mother and father in 2016 and 2023, respectively, Beverly turned to his close friends to come up with the solution that became Eazewell.

“It just seems like the perfect time to really turn our shared pain into purpose,” Beverly said.

One of Eazewell’s most innovative features is its voice-activated AI agent that can gather cost quotes and call funeral homes on a user’s behalf.

Recent advancements in AI have only recently made it possible to automate tasks and create agents that can manage these jobs in an empathetic and compassionate manner, said Viviane Ghaderi, Eazewell’s tech chief and a former Amazon executive.

Stephen Stokols, an Eazewell investor and CEO of Tru Skye Ventures, an early-stage sports technology and wellness venture firm, said these “transformational” AI advancements helping bring the funeral industry out of the “dark ages” initially drew him to the project.

Walker said he hopes Eazewell can offer users the tools to navigate a topic that is not taught in school or early life.

“We know how important it is to have someone by your side to help with the details that come after a loss,” Westbrook said.

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Uber reported first-quarter results Wednesday that beat analysts’ expectations for earnings, but fell shy of anticipated revenue growth for the quarter. Shares fell about 5% following the report.

Here’s how Uber did versus analysts’ estimates compiled by LSEG:

• Earnings per share: 83 cents vs. 50 cents expected.
• Revenue: $11.53 billion vs. $11.62 billion expected.

Revenue at the ride-sharing company grew about 14% in the first three months of 2025, up from $10.13 billion during the same period in 2024.

The company also reported net income of around $1.78 billion or 83 cents per share during the first three months of 2025, up from a net loss of $654 million, or a loss of 32-cent loss per share, during the first quarter of 2024.

Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi and CFO ‭Prashanth Mahendra-Rajah said they expect gross bookings to reach between $45.75 billion and $47.25 billion during the current quarter, with EBITDA in the range of $2.02 billion to $2.12 billion for that period.

In April, the Federal Trade Commission sued Uber and accused the company of “deceptive billing and cancellation practices” around its subscription service called Uber One.

“It’s a bit of a head-scratcher for us,” Khosrowshahi told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on Wednesday.

He said 60% of the company’s gross bookings in its Uber Eats business come from Uber One members, and that the subscription service is growing quickly.

“The suit alleges that some people don’t realize that they’re signing up or cancellations are difficult, but I’d encourage you to go experience it yourself,” Khosrowshahi said. “It’s very, very simple. You take a couple of steps to be able to cancel if you want.”

Uber’s largest business segments, which include its ride-hailing business and food and grocery delivery service, saw bookings increase year-over-year.

Here are the key segment numbers:

• Mobility (gross bookings): $21.18 billion, up 13% year over year
• Delivery (gross bookings): $20.38 billion, up 15% year over year

The company also said its “monthly active platform consumers,” had grown to 170 million, up 14% from the first quarter of last year. Users booked around 3.04 billion “trips” during the first quarter of 2025, up 18% from the first quarter of 2024.

Khosrowshahi also said the company views autonomous vehicles, or AV technology, as “the single greatest opportunity ahead for Uber.”

Uber allows app users to book robotaxi rides in some U.S. markets, or order food for delivery via autonomous vehicle in others.

Khosrowshahi said Uber reached an “annual run-rate” of 1.5 million autonomous vehicle trips.

In March, the company began to offer users in Austin, Texas the option to hail a robotaxi from its partner, Alphabet-owned Waymo exclusively via the Uber platform.

Khosrowshahi said the Waymo Austin launch “exceeded” Uber’s expectations and around 100 Waymo vehicles operating in Austin are now‬‭ “busier than over 99% of all drivers” in Austin as far as completed trips per day.

Besides its Waymo partnership, Uber has also agreed to work with Volkswagen, Avride, May Mobility, and the autonomous trucking company Aurora for autonomous ride-hailing and freight services in the U.S. Uber has additional partnerships with AV companies internationally including with WeRide, Pony.AI and Momenta.

“Supported by the consistent strength of our core business, we continue to build towards the future, including five new autonomous vehicle announcements in just the last week,” Khosrowshahi said in a release.

Executives are scheduled to discuss Uber’s first-quarter results and plans during an earnings call Wednesday at 8:00 a.m. EDT.

Uncertainty — that was the theme during earnings season for the world’s biggest semiconductor firms which are unclear on demand for their products as a result of changing U.S. tariff policy and export restrictions that have been place on China.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs took effect in April though they were paused shortly after. The White House also exempted certain tech products such as smartphones and chips. However, the U.S. is investigating imports of semiconductor technology which could come under new duties.

Meanwhile, Washington last month added more semiconductor products from Nvidia and AMD to a list of items that are restricted for export to China, building on Biden-era curbs.

The changing tariff and China policy has caused consternation among executives at the world’s largest chip companies with visible impacts on their busiensses already.

AMD on Tuesday said that it expects $1.5 billion in lost revenue thorugh the end of its fiscal year as a result of AI chip export curbs to China, despite topping earnings estimates for the first quarter.

Super Micro issued disappointing guidance on Tuesday citing tariff and macroeconomic uncertainty. The company said it would not provide guidance for its fiscal year 2026 until “visibility” becomes clearer. The stock fell 4% in premarket trade.

And Marvell said on Tuesday that it is postponing its previously scheduled investor day from June 10 to a “future date in calendar 2026.” Shares of the firm fell 4.4% in premarket trade.

“We have decided to postpone our investor day given the current uncertain macroeconomic environment,” Matt Murphy, CEO of Marvell, said in a statement.

Semiconductor stocks have been under pressure this year amid the growing macroeconomic uncertainty and trade policies from the U.S. There is also concern about the demand for AI products even as technology giants like Microsoft and Amazon continue to commit billions of dollars to build data centers.

The VanEck Semiconductor ETF, a basket of chip stocks, is down nearly 12% this year.

And it’s not just U.S. companies that are feeling the heat. Samsung said last month that “demand volatiltiy is expected to be quite high” as a result of tariff policy changes and macroeconomic uncertainty.

“Due to the rapid changes in policies and geopolitical tensions among major countries, it’s difficult to accurately predict the business impact of tariffs and countermeasures,” a Samsung executive said on the earnings call.

“There are a lot of uncertainties ahead of us.”

Samsung is one of the world’s largest memory chipmakers.

“The semiconductor sector is grappling with a complex mix of demand signals and geopolitical headwinds,” Ben Barringer, global technology analyst at Quilter Cheviot, told CNBC by email.

Barringer said that Marvell’s decision to postpone its investor day “adds a layer of uncertainty at a time when clarity is in short supply,” while Super Micro’s weak outlook also “raised eyebrows.”

“With macro uncertainty and export restrictions still looming large, the path ahead for chipmakers remains bumpy, even as underlying demand holds up in certain areas,” Barringer added.

For the last few years, Washington under both Biden and Trump, have looked to use export restrictions to restrict China’s access to American technology in areas such as AI and semiconductors. This has prompted Chinese firms to ramp up focus on homegrown technology with companies like Huawei looking to create viable competing products to the likes of Nvidia.

Chinese companies such as DeepSeek and Alibaba have also been able to launch high-performing AI models.

Nvidia’s Huang said there is competition in AI right now but American firms should be able to compete with China.

“The United States has to recognize that we are not the only country in that race, that we have competitors. We are confident people, we are a confident country we have confident companies, we are not afraid of a race. We look forward to a race. Just let us go race,” Huang told CNBC.

“And so I think that now is the time when the United States needs to realize that we need to put the pedal to the metal … we’ve just got to go for it. Waiting around, talking about it, trying to hold people back is not necessarily the best move. The best move is let American do American, let us go after it and win it.”