Honda & LG Partner on US EV Batt Production; Data Broker Tracks Millions-FTC Sues; Tesla Workers Can Wear Union Swag; Facebook Supports NFTs

A big boost in US EV battery production from Honda and LG Energy Solution. The two companies are forming a joint venture and funding it with $4.4 billion to make lithium ion batteries in North America. Zdnet.com reports that they will initially just produce pouch type batteries for Hondas. The firms haven’t picked a site yet, but plan to begin construction in early 2023, and intend to be producing what they call ‘advanced’ lithium ion batteries by the end of 2025.

The Federal Trade Commission has sued a data broker for selling location data scooped up from some 125 million active cell phone users. According to arstechnica.com, Idaho-based Kochava has promoted itself as providing “rich geo data spanning billions of devices globally.” The FTC said Kochava amassed the data by tracking the Mobile Advertising ID, or MAID, from phones and selling the data through Amazon Web Services or other outlets without first anonymizing the data. The FTC expressed concern that the data could allow identification of women visiting a reproductive health clinic, and then track them to their residence. 

It’s no secret that Tesla and Elon Musk have opposed unions. Up to now, the company has enforced a dress code in its factories calling for employees to only wear Tesla or other pre-approved back tee shirts. Now, the National Labor Relations Board has stepped in with a decision to make Tesla allow union swag…including shirts with the United Auto Workers logo. Theverge.com says Tesla had claimed its dress code prevented damage to cars and that it needed to maintain ‘visual management’ of its employees. the NLRB rejected those arguments…finding that the policy of no union clothing or logos was ‘presumptively unlawful.’

In a move we’ve all been waiting for breathlessly, Facebook has finally started supporting NFTs…non-fungible tokens. The joy of Facebook users will be overflowing. Actually, your feed may be overflowing…as NFT collectors will be posting the collectibles they have bought! Engadget.com notes that Facebook parent Meta is working on a marketplace where people can buy and sell NFTs…although it remains to be seen if Facebookers will actually use it.