NEW YORK (AFP) -- US lingerie giant Victoria’s Secret announced Monday that it had appointed fashion executive John Mehas as new lingerie CEO, hoping to boost its ailing fortunes. Mehas will take over in the New Year, replacing Jan Singer, who resigned with the brand under fire for slumping sales, idealized glamazonian femininity and reluctance to put larger and transgender models on the catwalk...

WASHINGTON (AFP) -- Apple CEO Tim Cook predicts that new regulations of tech companies and social networks to protect personal data are "inevitable." In an interview with news website Axios being broadcast Sunday on HBO television, Cook said he expected the US Congress would take up the matter. "Generally speaking, I am not a big fan of regulation," Cook said in an excerpt released by Axios. "I...

Nissan chairman Carlos Ghosn faces being fired this week after being arrested in Japan over allegations of financial misconduct, the firm said Monday, in a stunning fall from grace for one of the world's best-known businessmen. Ghosn's arrest and his likely dismissal from Nissan, as well as possibly from Mitsubishi and Renault, sent shockwaves through the auto industry, where he is a towering fi...

As the winners of the biggest corporate prize in decades -- the new Amazon headquarters -- relished their victory, debate was still raging over the billions of dollars in incentives offered to attract the fast-growing US technology colossus. The new Amazon "HQ2" with an estimated $5 billion investment creating 50,000 new jobs will be split between the Long Island City district in New York and Cr...

ROME (AFP) -- Italy's populist government defied the European Commission Tuesday by sticking to its big-spending budget plan, risking financial sanctions in a high-stakes standoff with Brussels. Despite pressure from the European Commission, which rejected Rome’s budget outright last month in a first for the EU, Italian Deputy Prime Minister Luigi Di Maio vowed to stand firm on the country's ant...

The US and China have resumed contact “at all levels” over trade ahead of a planned meeting between President Donald Trump and China’s Xi Jinping, White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow said. There’s no certainty that China will cede to US demands in trade negotiations, but “it’s better to talk than to not talk,” Kudlow said in an interview on CNBC Tuesday. A top Chinese negotiator, Liu He, w...

Amazon's "second headquarters" is being split between New York City and the Washington suburbs, the US tech giant announced Tuesday, capping a yearlong contest that saw dozens of cities fight it out for a promised $5 billion investment and 50,000 expected jobs. The chosen locations are Long Island City neighborhood in the New York borough of Queens, across the East River from Manhattan, and the ...

President Donald Trump took aim at Saudi Arabia’s plan to cut oil production on Monday, injecting new tension into an already fraught alliance that has been clouded by US concerns over the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi and the ongoing conflict in Yemen. Trump’s efforts to influence oil production threatens to further strain relations between the two historic allies, even as his administr...

BERLIN - Germany has earmarked 1 billion euros ($1.2 billion) to support a consortium looking to produce electric car battery cells and plans to fund a research facility to develop next-generation solid-state batteries, three sources told Reuters. The measures, expected to be announced next week, are designed to reduce the dependence of German carmakers on Asianelectric vehicle (EV) battery supp...

As one of the world's richest men and most active philanthropists, Bill Gates usually has his hands full. Just not with poop. So it came as a surprise when the founder of Microsoft brandished a jar of human waste at a forum on the future of the toilet in Beijing on Tuesday. The stunt was an effort to draw attention to a problem affecting developing countries around the world: not enough toilets...

NEW YORK (AP) — After a yearlong search for a second home, Amazon is now reportedly looking to build offices in two cities instead of one, a surprise move that could still have a major impact on the communities it ultimately selects. New York’s Long Island City as well as Crystal City in northern Virginia have emerged as the front runners, according to sources familiar with the talks with Amazon...

NEW YORK (AP) -- Apple’s new iPads will more closely resemble its latest iPhones as they ditch a home button and fingerprint sensor to make more room for the screen. As with the latest iPhone models — the XR and XS —the new iPad Pro will use facial-recognition technology to unlock the device and to authorize app and Apple Pay purchases. Apple also unveiled new Mac computers, including an overdu...

WASHINGTON (AFP) -- IBM said Sunday it has reached a deal to buy open source software company Red Hat for $34 billion, among the biggest tech mergers in history which the computing giant said would enhance its cloud offerings. If approved it will be the third biggest tech merger in history, according to business news site CNBC. Red Hat said it was the biggest involving a software company. The d...

NEW YORK (AP) -- Amazon reported another record quarterly profit Thursday, fueled by the growth of online shopping and its cloud-computing service. But its revenue grew less than Wall Street analysts expected, and Amazon's shares fell after the results were released. The company, based in Seattle, has boosted its profitability as it expanded far beyond online shopping. For years, the company po...

SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. (AP) -- Tesla Motors delivered on CEO Elon Musk’s promise to make money during its latest quarter after fulfilling his pledge to boost production of its first electric car designed for the mass market. The company earned $311.5 million during the three months ending in September, swinging from a loss of $619 million at the same time last year. It’s only the third time that ...