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Rani Molla

Jury rules that Tesla was partly to blame for 2019 autopilot crash, awards $329 million in damages

As Tesla stakes the future of its company on autonomous vehicles and attempts to expand its autonomous ride-hailing service, a federal court just delivered it a huge setback.

In its first federal lawsuit surrounding an autopilot death to go to a jury trial, the court hit Tesla with an order to pay $329 million in damages, including $200 million in punitive damages, for a fatal 2019 crash in Florida that occurred while a Tesla driver was using the car’s self-driving features.

Tesla argued that the driver was at fault because he took his eyes off the road to fish for a cellphone when his vehicle crashed into two people, killing one and gravely injuring another. The plaintiff’s attorney said the company advertised a product they knew would lead to distracted driving and oversold its capabilities. “In the [Tesla] showroom, it’s the greatest car ever made,” the attorney said. “In the courtroom, they say it’s a jalopy.”

The jury sided with the plaintiff, saying Tesla was partly to blame for enabling the driver to take his eyes off the road.

The stock is down 2% today amid this news as well as reports of falling sales in Europe.

Tesla found partially liable for fatal 2019 crash, hit with $329 million in damages

In its first federal lawsuit surrounding an autopilot death to go to a jury trial, the court hit Tesla with an order to pay $329 million in damages, including $200 million in punitive damages, for a fatal 2019 crash in Florida that occurred while a Tesla driver was using the car’s self-driving features.

Tesla argued that the driver was at fault because he took his eyes off the road to fish for a cellphone when his vehicle crashed into two people, killing one and gravely injuring another. The plaintiff’s attorney said the company advertised a product they knew would lead to distracted driving and oversold its capabilities. “In the [Tesla] showroom, it’s the greatest car ever made,” the attorney said. “In the courtroom, they say it’s a jalopy.”

The jury sided with the plaintiff, saying Tesla was partly to blame for enabling the driver to take his eyes off the road.

The stock is down 2% today amid this news as well as reports of falling sales in Europe.

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Salesforce is on track for its worst trading day in nearly two years, with shares down more than 6% Tuesday afternoon. One potential contributor: Anthropic’s release of Cowork, an autonomous digital assistant for completing office tasks. Essentially, Cowork is an agent-based version of Anthropic’s Claude chatbot that can access and manipulate files, automate workflows, and execute tasks on a user’s behalf.

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Google reaches record high and crosses $4 trillion market cap after major wins for Gemini

Google parent Alphabet closed yesterday at a record-high stock price of $331.86, giving the company a market capitalization just above $4 trillion, as investors reward a string of wins for its Gemini AI model, including high-profile partnerships with Apple and Walmart.

After months of speculation, Apple announced a multiyear partnership to use Gemini to power its AI assistant, Siri, a major endorsement of Google’s AI prowess. That same day, Walmart said it would partner with Google to let customers purchase products directly through the Gemini chatbot, a move that would put Gemini in front of millions of Walmart shoppers and test whether AI chatbots can drive real commerce at scale rather than isolated queries. (Amazon, OpenAI, and Microsoft are experimenting with similar AI shopping tools.)

The stock is up nearly 1% again in premarket trading today. While Microsoft and Apple have both crossed $4 trillion in the past, they’ve since dipped below it, leaving Google and Nvidia as the only companies currently valued above the threshold.

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