SpaceX reportedly wants to buy Boost Mobile

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1:39SpaceX reportedly wants to buy Boost Mobile to compete with AT &T, T-Mobile, and Verizon. I'm Imran Shaikh and begun the cell phone carrier wars have. It's your Daily Crunch for Tuesday featuring three big tech headlines starting right now. OpenAI might rebrand its data centers as AI Compute Campuses. We all know data centers are deeply unpopular, but what if we call them something else? Axios reports that OpenAI is preparing a PR blitz for after the midterm elections on Tuesday, as Democrats seem likely to win back the House of Representatives and possibly the Senate too. The company's chief global affairs officer, Chris Lehane, told Axios that the midterms will be a bit of a movie trailer for what you're going to see in 2028 when he expects AI to be the issue in the presidential election.

2:30So OpenAI is to influence the AI debate moving forward, with Lehane discussing several proposals, including the development of AI speed limits, finding ways to help people see AI as empowering them in their daily lives, pushing the US to take a role in developing global standards and, yeah, rebranding data centers as AI compute campuses. Lehane also described the conversation around data centers, a debate that has pushed Amazon and Microsoft to say they will no longer use NDAs and their negotiations with local governments as good and healthy. Communities should hold companies responsible and accountable so they really and truly get a transformative benefit from these projects, Lehane said.

3:12As Ford prepares to launch a new generation of connected cars, the automaker's making a public promise about how it'll handle that information. You see, the company unveiled on Monday what it calls a privacy promise, an explicit commitment to keep customers' vehicle data safe and give them control over what they share. Ford also launched a website designed to educate customers about how, where, and why the automaker uses their data and to show them how to change those settings. While those controls have existed for years now, Ford wants to communicate more clearly with its customers about them, especially ahead of the launch of new, more connected vehicles like the ones being built on its upcoming Universal Electric Vehicle platform.

3:53This new privacy push comes as automakers are making their cars increasingly connected. Now, while some polling does show U.S. customers want the kinds of features enabled by this connectivity, such as remote start, navigation, and driver assistance software, only 14 % said they fully understand what data their vehicle collects. That's left some room for companies to quietly sell that data to third parties, a practice that got General Motors in trouble with the Federal Trade Commission and also resulted in a$220 million settlement with 36 states last week. This lack of consumer awareness around data collection and sharing has also opened the door to other companies to market themselves as better stewards of customer data.

4:36Slate Auto, the EV startup backed by Jeff Bezos, has made that pitch ahead of the expected launch of its minimalist pickup truck later this year. Now for Ford, well, their new website will feature a mix of content that explains what data the company collects, how it uses that information, and how customers can opt in or out. This episode is brought to you by Simplify. Your nest egg is more than something to continually build. At some point, you should put it to work in generating income. Bonds can leave income seekers wanting more. Stocks can mean taking on more risk. XV seeks to offer a different approach.

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5:56Well, SpaceX is looking to buy Boost Mobile from EchoStar, according to a report from The Washington Post. Now, if the deal goes through, it would help the Elon Musk-owned company build a hybrid cellular satellite network that could help catapult it into fourth place among the top U.S. wireless providers. The Space Launch company has been dabbling in cellular connectivity, rolling out satellite access to T-Mobile subscribers in 2024. Last year, SpaceX bought$17 billion worth of wireless spectrum from Echo Star for cellular services, which could help the company's Starlink service reach inside buildings, for example, something it currently struggles with.

6:35This is the last critical piece of the spectrum puzzle needed for SpaceX to provide complete phone coverage in America, Musk said on X at the time of the spectrum acquisition. Sure, sure, sure. But if Musk is still looking to buy access to terrestrial networks, It apparently wasn't the last piece. Musk has also approached AT &T, T-Mobile, and Verizon about buying capacity on their networks. All three rejected Musk, and they may still have a say in a SpaceX acquisition of Boost Mobile. The big three providers each have over 100 million subscribers, dwarfing Boost Mobile. But while the acquisition would give SpaceX an immediate bump in subscribers, the true value of the deal would be giving the company access to terrestrial cellular networks, Gaining access to towers leased to Boost Mobile would expand coverage significantly.

7:24I mean, Boost currently covers most of the 48 contiguous states in the U.S. after all, allowing Starlink to cover devices when they're outdoors and relying on cell towers to handle devices when Starlink signals cannot reach them. And folks, that's your Daily Crunch. Today's stories were reported by Anthony Ha, Shano Kain, Tim Deshaunt, and more awesome TechCrunch journalists. We'll see you here tomorrow. Same tech time, same crunch channel. And until then, find us at TechCrunch.com.

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