Tesla CEO Elon Musk speaks, as he sits with Saudi Minister of Communications and Information Technology Abdullah Alswaha, at the Saudi-U.S. Investment Forum, in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, May 13, 2025.
Hamad I Mohammed | Reuters
Elon Musk said Saudi Arabia has approved Starlink for aviation and maritime use in the region, speaking at an investment forum during a White House-led trip to the kingdom on Tuesday.
Starlink is the satellite internet service owned and operated by Musk’s aerospace and defense contractor, SpaceX.
SpaceX recently began offering its Starlink hardware for free outside the U.S. in a bid to win new subscribers.
Musk also briefly discussed his other business ambitions in the region, promising to bring Tesla robotaxis to Saudi Arabia at an unspecified date.
“I think it would be very exciting to have autonomous vehicles here in the kingdom, indeed, if you’re amenable,” Musk said.
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Musk also said he showed several of Tesla’s Optimus humanoid robots, now in development, to Trump and Saudi Arabia’s crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud.
Tesla has been telling investors for years that self-driving cars and humanoid robots are the key to its future profits.
Tesla’s Optimus is not yet in production and competition abounds in humanoid robotics.
The Tuesday event featured President Donald Trump and U.S. tech executives from companies involved in artificial intelligence, defense and semiconductor manufacturing.
At the same event, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang announced the U.S. chipmaker will sell over 18,000 of its latest artificial intelligence chips to Saudi Arabian company Humain.
The Trump and tech executives’ visit to Saudi Arabia comes as the White House works to strike trade deals following the President’s sweeping, and ever-changing, trade and tariff policies.
Trump received a lavish welcome from the oil power, and secured a $600 billion commitment from Saudi Arabia to invest in the U.S. on Tuesday. He also agreed to sell Saudi Arabia an arms package worth nearly $142 billion, the White House said in a statement.
In addition to his collection of companies, Musk has been a key adviser to Trump, running the Department of Government Efficiency, an initiative where he has steeply slashed jobs, regulations, funding and other resources at federal agencies, including those tasked with oversight of his businesses.
Saudi Arabia’s Kingdom Holding Company and the private office of Prince Alwaleed bin Talal own a stake in Elon Musk’s newest major venture, xAI, which he recently merged with X (formerly Twitter).
In 2022, when Musk led a leveraged buyout of the social network now known as X, Senate Democrats had called for investigations into Saudi Arabia’s role in that deal citing national security concerns.
A file photo of Hiroki Totoki, Sony Group Corporation executive, delivering a keynote address at CES 2025 in Las Vegas, on January 6, 2025.
Artur Widak | Nurphoto | Getty Images
Sony Group shares rose about 2% Wednesday in volatile trading after the Japanese conglomerate announced a 250 billion yen ($1.7 billion) share buyback and operating income beat estimates.
Operating income for the last three months of the financial year came in at 203.6 billion yen, beating mean analyst estimates of 192.2 billion yen, though it was down 11% from the same period last year.
In the earnings report, the Japanese-based electronics, entertainment and finance company announced a stock buyback of shares worth 250 billion yen.
Sony also provided details on a partial spinoff of its financial unit. The company plans to distribute slightly more than 80% of the shares of common stock of the spinoff to shareholders of Sony Group through dividends.
The financial unit will list its financial operation this year and will be classified as a discontinued operation in Sony’s accounting from the current quarter, the company added.
However, Sony’s outlook for the current financial year ending in March was lackluster.
The company forecasted its operating profit to rise a slight 0.3% to 1.28 trillion yen, after flagging a 100 billion yen hit from U.S. President Donald Trump’s trade war.
Yet, Sony clarified that the estimated tariff impact did not reflect the trade deal made between the U.S. and China on May 12 and that the actual impact could vary significantly.
A Samsung Group flag flutters in front of the company’s Seocho building in Seoul.
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Samsung Electronics on Wednesday announced that it would acquire all shares of German-based FläktGroup, a leading heating and cooling solutions provider, for 1.5 billion euros ($1.68 billion) from European investment firm Triton.
Samsung said the acquisition would help it expand in the heating, ventilation and air conditioning business as the market experiences rapid growth.
“Our commitment is to continue investing in and developing the high-growth HVAC business as a key future growth engine,” said TM Roh, Acting Head of the Device eXperience (DX) Division at Samsung Electronics.
The acquisition of FläktGroup stands to bolster Samsung’s position in the HVAC market against rivals such as LG Electronics.
FläktGroup supplies heating, HVAC solutions to a wide range of buildings and facilities, notably data centers which require a high degree of stable cooling. Samsung said it anticipates sustained growth in data center demand due to the proliferation of generative AI, robotics, autonomous driving and other technologies.
FläktGroup has more 60 major customers, including leading pharmaceutical companies, biotech and food and beverage firms, and gigafactories, according to Samsung’s statement.
Samsung said in March that its HVAC solutions had achieved double-digit annual revenue growth over the past five years, and that the company aimed to boost revenue by more than 30% in 2025.
