WEEK IN REVIEW
Monday
More jobs for Huntsman?
The merger of The Wood lands chemical maker Huntsman Corp. into a larger global company likely would create more Houston-area jobs, CEO Peter Huntsman said. Ford replaces its CEO
In a shake-up reflecting the pressure son the U.S. auto industry, Ford Motor Co. replaced its CEO, Mark Fields, and vowed to catch up in the race to build self-driving cars and define a new era in personal mobility. The company said Jim Hackett, who had over seen the Ford subsidiary that works on autonomous vehicles, would immediately take the reins. Less East Texas litigation
The U.S. Supreme Court issued a ruling that may have effectively ended a 15- year intellectual property litigation boom in East Texas. At on of stuff via drone
China’ s biggest online retailer, JD.com, announced plans to develop dr one aircraft capable of carrying at on or more for long distance deliveries.
Tuesday
Trump’ s plans for energy
From selling off oil in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to cutting funding for renewable energy research, the Trump administration proposed a new course for financing the nation’ s energy sector as it seeks to balance the federal budget. Google to track shopping
Google will begin using data from billions of credit and debit card transactions—including card numbers, purchase amounts and time stamps—to solve the advertising juggernaut’ s long standing quest to prove that online ads prompt consumers to make purchases in brick-andmortar stores, the company said. Target to pay over breach
An $18.5 million deal to settle claims after a 2013 multi state data breach means Target Corp. will pay Texas $1.1 million.
Wednesday
Impact on healthcare
The Congressional Budget Office predicted that under the Republican law narrow ly passed in the House three weeks ago, the number of Americans without insurance would increase by 14 million by next year and could reach a total of 51 million people by 2026. That is slightly less than the 10-year number the CBO estimated when it analyzed a of the Republican measure in March. Apple to help local college
Apps are one of the main ways that Apple attracts people to the i Phone, and in the interest of training more people to make them, the tech behemoth said it would launch a new curriculum for community colleges—starting in Houston.
Thursday
Super Bowl spending
Super Bowl LI appears to have been a substantial boon for Houston—albeit with slightly less spending than expected. Gross spending during the nine days of Super Bowlthe amount of usual tourism displaced by the event, came to $338 million, according to a consultant retained by the Host Committee. That’ s a bit off the $372 million originally projected by the same firm, Pennsylvania-based Rockport Analytics. More benefits from BP
B Ph as long boasted of high class per ks, including a health center, childcare service and two fitness center son its Energy Corridor campus. But now it’ s added some new benefits for U.S. employees, including paternal leave after the adoption of a child, special therapy for autistic children and gender re assignment surgery, the procedure required to change the anatomy of am an to that of a woman, or vice versa.
Friday
Still a whimper
The U.S. economy began 2017 with aw himper—though not quite as weak a whimper as the government had first estimated. The gross domestic product—the broad est g au geo ft he economy— expanded in the January-March quarter at a 1.2 percent annual rate, the government said.