Tesla shares drop after leaked CEO email reveals hiring freeze, plans to cut 10% of staff

Happy Fri-yay the 3rd of June 2022. Or, as this cursed pandemic is still doing its thing, perhaps it’s March 824, 2020, who knows. Whatever is happening in your world, we hope that you are experiencing peace and that you know the source of peace. Can you tell we’ve been reading some hippie literature recently? Those folks do seem pretty peaceful — maybe they’re onto something. Happy weekend and catch you on the flip side! — Haje and Christine

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Startups and VC

Sometimes, you come across companies that speak with a forked tongue. I’m not saying that’s the case for Blackbaud’s self-proclaimed ‘social good’ cloud provider business, but it’s definitely a little whiffy to have had the National Rifle Association as a customer since 1997, as Devin reports.

A propos calling bovine excrement when we see it; the A team (Amanda and Anita, obvz, that other A-team has a lot less finger-on-the-pulse cred) argue that perhaps we should just cool it with the ‘girlboss’ moniker.

But wait, there is more:

Black Founders Matter presses VCs to pledge commitment to diversity

In an interview with new TechCrunch reporter Dominic-Madori Davis, Marceau Michel, founder and managing partner of Black Founders Matter VC Fund, spoke about a new initiative to boost diversity in tech.

“This is about changing the power dynamics in venture capital,” he told TechCrunch. “You have to start at who is left behind and bring them to the starting line.”

Under the 25 by 25 Pledge, investors would promise to direct 25% of their funds to BIPOC women founders by 2025.

“If a fund does not want to do this pledge … the question is why,” Michel said. “The status quo just doesn’t hold up anymore. Keeping people that look like us out of the picture just doesn’t work.”

(TechCrunch+ is our membership program, which helps founders and startup teams get ahead. You can sign up here.)

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Big Tech Inc.

Microsoft said it thwarted a plan by a Lebanon-based hacking group, believed to be working with Iranian intelligence, to allegedly target Israeli organizations. The group, called Polonium, was creating Microsoft OneDrive accounts and then using them to attempt the hacks.

Amazon’s long-time consumer division CEO Dave Clark said he was stepping down from the company in July after 23 years with the company. It’s unclear why he is leaving after having only taken on the role two years ago, but Clark did tweet that “it’s time for me to build again.”

In new features news:

You may have missed these gems from yesterday, but Coinbase surprised us by announcing that it was freezing its hiring process. Initial reports said the company was rescinding offers to new employees that were already accepted, but those people had not yet started. Now we are getting word that their jobs are safe. Don’t worry, we are on it and will hopefully be able to clear this up soon. Next up, General Motors’ autonomous vehicle unit Cruise is now able to charge for driverless robotaxi rides in San Francisco. And we take a look at a report showing just how hard it is to get an app at the top of the App Store.

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