Plus: Databricks releases Genie One, an agentic co-worker for businesses. And Rivian and Robinhood announce layoffs. Julie Chang hosts.
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[00:00:00] [SPEAKER_02] Many companies are struggling to scale their AI deployments or even move them past the pilot stage. Often the problem isn't technology, but organizational misalignment around goals, processes and incentives. At the break, join Caroline Roach, Senior Partner IBM Consulting, to learn why.
[00:00:16] [SPEAKER_00] Here's your afternoon TNB Tech Minute for Tuesday, June 16. I'm Julie Chang for The Wall Street Journal. SpaceX shares paired gains after the rocket company overtook Amazon to become the world's fifth most valuable public company. The Elon Musk-led company's stock rose as much as 17% in early trading before falling back.
[00:00:39] [SPEAKER_00] SpaceX ended the day nearly 5% higher, with its market capitalization narrowly leapfrogging the e-commerce giant. We exclusively report that Databricks is releasing AI agents for businesses. The company says its new Genie One is an agentic co-worker that will help professionals get answers and make decisions using corporate data.
[00:01:02] [SPEAKER_00] Databricks, valued at $134 billion, provides the underlying layer for storing and organizing data in the cloud. It's been pushing further into enterprise AI as it aims to carve out a place in the AI era. The company reported a revenue-run rate of over $1.7 billion from its AI products, up from over $1 billion last September.
[00:01:25] [SPEAKER_00] Albertsons and Rivian are already using Databricks' new AI agents to analyze data for merchandising and operational insights. And a challenging day for the job market as both Rivian and Robinhood announced significant staff cuts. Rivian laid off hundreds of employees today. A spokesperson for the EV startup said the cuts represent less than 2% of the workforce. The job cuts affect employees in Rivian Service and Customer Organization, which handles sales and marketing.
[00:01:55] [SPEAKER_00] The company said it restructured to ensure it can profitably scale the business. Robinhood said it'll lay off about 10% of its workforce, eliminating roughly 290 jobs, in a bid to keep the brokerage firm lean and, quote, maximize its talent density. This is Robinhood's first major layoff in three years. The company said it's seeing record average trading volumes in stocks, options, and prediction markets so far this month. And that's it for your TNB Tech Minutes.
[00:02:25] [SPEAKER_00] We'll have another quick tech update in the morning.
[00:02:28] [SPEAKER_02] Scaling AI successfully requires more than the right technology. Here again is Caroline Roach, senior partner, IBM Consulting.
[00:02:35] [SPEAKER_01] The biggest thing that we were talking about a year ago is what model to use. And the biggest thing that I'm talking about with my clients now is how do I drive change within my organization.
[00:02:46] [SPEAKER_02] Companies able to identify, correct, and then avoid misalignment will be best positioned to deliver meaningful business value from AI.
[00:02:53] [SPEAKER_01] The organizations that are the most successful set very clear targets and have several priorities that are very clear across the enterprise. The technology is really good, but if you're not changing your organizational alignment, not incentivizing your people correctly, not looking at workflows, you're not going to see real value with it.
[00:03:14] [SPEAKER_02] Visit IBM.com slash think slash leadership to learn how building organizational alignment can help deliver AI deployments that scale and drive growth.
[00:03:22] [SPEAKER_00] This content was created by custom content from WSJ, a unit of the Wall Street Journal Advertising Department.