Despite the gossip, SpaceX ISN’T moving Starship development to Texas
Following a day of online chatter about SpaceX’s supposed decision to open a manufacturing and development site in Texas, we learned all the talk was for naught. Wednesday afternoon, Elon Musk tweeted that the intel, broken by the LA Times, was mistaken. According to Musk, all Starship and Super Heavy development will continue out of SpaceX’s HQ in Hawthorne. On the Texas gossip, he conceded, “We are building the Starship prototypes locally at our launch site in Texas, as their size makes them very difficult to transport.” [Engagenet]
Jam City, maker of Harry Potter games, raises $145M in new funding
Jam City, the mobile gaming studio behind instant classics Panda Pop and Harry Potter: Hogwarts Mystery, announced a fresh $145M in funding this week “This $145 million in new financing empowers Jam City to further our position as a global industry consolidator,” said co-founder Chris DeWolfe in a statement about the round. The cash gives Jam City a major leg up in the race against other leading mobile game companies like Zynga and King Digital, creator of Candy Crush. [Built In LA]
Netflix raises prices — stock surges in response
Streaming titan Netflix announced an 18 percent hike in their monthly subscription prices this week — the company’s largest price increase yet. The price of premium service went up two dollars to $15.99, while a basic subscription increased to $8.99 a month. Many speculate that the hike will help Netflix keep up with rapidly rising content costs, especially as both Disney and Warner Media announced plans to pull their content from the site in lieu of developing their own streaming apps. The market signaled that investors are onboard with the updated pricing model, with Netflix stock rising 6.5 percent the day after the news was announced. [Recode]
E-sports gaming company Gen.G names MLB’s Chris Park as CEO
The cross-pollination of talent from online and real-life sports continues this week with the announcement that Chris Park will be joining e-sports organization Gen.G as CEO. Park joins Gen.G from Major League Baseball, where he served as executive vice president of product and marketing. “Having spent years with a traditional sports league, it was evident that competitive gaming was booming — well now it’s here and here to stay,” Park said in a statement. Korean gaming company Gen.G has offices in Seoul and LA. [Venture Beat]
The Broad Foundation is bankrolling a new robotics center at St. John’s Hospital
The Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation awarded $1 million to Providence Saint John’s Health Center in Santa Monica this week to build a robotic joint replacement center at the hospital. The investment was made to honor St. John’s orthopedic surgeon Dr. Andrew Yun, who used robotics technology as part of a joint replacement performed on Broad Foundation namesake, and notable philanthropist, Edythe Broad. [LA Biz]
Looming tariffs lead to record-breaking volume at Port of LA
Officials announced that the Port of Los Angeles, which receives 20 percent of all cargo entering the U.S. annually, moved a record number of goods in December 2018. The reason for the scramble? As the threat of Chinese tariffs looms, companies are importing as much as they can manage. December’s shipping volume surged 15.9 percent over figures from December 2017, according to port officials. [Press release]
