Ford Motor Co. is giving its Louisville Assembly Plant a massive makeover as it prepares to build a new electric truck in 2027.

The automaker is investing $2 billion to transform the roughly 3-million-square-foot Kentucky factory from gas-powered vehicle production to EV manufacturing, according to an announcement from Ford.

The plant will build Ford’s new Fathom midsize electric truck using the company’s Universal EV Production System, which is designed to cut parts, simplify assembly and speed up production.

“It is simply foundationally different from how we have done things before,” Kevin Young, Ford’s advanced program manufacturing chief, said in a statement. “Operators can see everything in front of them and don’t need to bend or reach to do it.”

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A covered Ford Fathom moves through new production equipment at the Louisville Assembly Plant. (Ford Motor Company)

The Kentucky overhaul is part of a broader $5 billion investment that Ford says will create 4,000 jobs across the Louisville Assembly Plant and BlueOval Battery Park Michigan.

Under the new system, the Fathom will be built in three major sections – the front, rear and battery deck – allowing employees to work on each section simultaneously before joining them together.

Ford is also turning to large aluminum castings that replace what once was dozens of smaller stamped and welded parts.

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Equipment operates inside Ford’s Louisville Assembly Plant as the automaker expands factory automation. (Ford Motor Company)

The new system will allow the Ford Fathom to be assembled 40% faster than products currently built at the Louisville plant, according to the company.

The plant is also getting a major technology upgrade.

Wi-Fi access points have nearly tripled from 385 to 1,080, and Ford says the plant will have the highest level of final-assembly automation of its factories worldwide.

Employees have also been training in Michigan on the new production process, which the company says is designed to make assembly work easier and more efficient.

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Ford’s tire room at the Louisville Assembly Plant is shown as the automaker overhauls the Kentucky facility for Fathom electric truck production. (Ford Motor Company)

“We’ve engineered an 84% reduction in reaching over the fender,” Bryce Currie, Ford’s chief manufacturing officer, said in a statement. “The wiring harness is also more than 4,000 feet shorter and 22 pounds lighter than in our first-gen electric SUV, making it much easier to install.”

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Ford remains on track to begin prototype builds using production-ready parts in the first quarter of 2027, with Fathom production expected later that year.

Flock Safety, the embattled AI-powered security camera operator, announced an overhaul to its privacy and security measures Thursday amid growing backlash from consumers and reports of law enforcement abuse. 

As public backlash to the company’s growing network of automated license plate readers (ALPRs) continues to build, the company announced a new set of reforms that includes enhanced privacy protections, strengthening of control for local law enforcement offices and enhanced accountability measures.

To start, Flock is reducing its standard data retention window from 30 days to seven. Previously, all data captured by one of the company’s more than 119,000 cameras nationwide was deleted after the 30-day window. Now, the company announced on Thursday that data will only live on Flock servers for one week.

While law enforcement agencies often respond to privacy-concerned critics by explaining that the Flock system helps them catch criminals, Flock said that 90% of all searches using its product happen within a week anyway, seemingly keeping the privacy reform consistent with law enforcement priorities.

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One step Flock is taking is reducing its standard data retention window from 30 days to seven. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

However, for law enforcement agencies that need more time to investigate, Flock announced the launch of “Evidence Mode,” a feature that will allow agencies to preserve data for longer based on state or local policy. 

Another privacy protection the company announced will be the ability for agencies to decide which types of criminal offenses they want to share data about with other municipalities. 

“For example, City A could allow City B to search its cameras for a stolen vehicle or violent crime while blocking searches related to immigration enforcement,” the company said.

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Flock has come under fire from privacy advocates and concerned citizens, who expressed worry that Flock will be storing data on servers for the long term. 

Some, such as Knox County, Tennessee, Mayor Glen Jacobs have called for a national moratorium on the deployment of Flock’s cameras. 

Civil liberties advocates, such as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), have also offered significant criticisms. 

The ACLU said in a Thursday statement that Flock’s reforms “seem to be a thinly veiled PR attempt to counter communities’ genuine privacy concerns with its mass surveillance system with largely hollow security promises, rather than an earnest effort to address them.”

The backlash has been partially fueled by reports of police abusing the technology to stalk romantic partners. Flock’s latest series of reforms also seek to proactively prevent abuse of its technologies.

A recently released framework called Audit Assistance flags abnormal search behavior. Previously, the feature was optional, with Flock reporting that a third of agencies turned it on. Now, the company says “Flock is making it standard for every law enforcement customer. When a system detects abnormal activity, the user is locked out in real time until an administrator reviews the searches. Flock is moving to more proactively address and root out misuse of technology.”

Flock said that in the 1 million investigations which its technology was involved in last year, roughly 10,000 missing people were located.  (Osmancan Gurdogan/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Flock will also require a reason for every search going forward.

In July 2025, the company introduced an optional case code requirement. The new reform makes the case code mandatory for searches, though there will be an override for “genuine emergencies” such as missing children, the company said.

“A search without a reason is a search that shouldn’t happen in the first place, and now Flock’s system automatically treats it that way,” Flock told FOX Business.

Flock has come under fire from privacy advocates and concerned citizens, who expressed worry that Flock will be storing data on servers for the long term. (Flock Safety)

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Despite the public backlash, Flock highlighted the company’s success in helping to locate missing people, saying that in the 1 million investigations that Flock’s technology was involved in last year, roughly 10,000 missing people were located. 

Boss of Grosvenor Casinos parent says tax plans ‘cast clouds over a regulated industry’

Britain’s “much-loved” bingo halls could be at risk of closure if Andy Burnham proceeds with a £460m increase in gambling taxes, according to the owner of Grosvenor Casinos and Mecca Bingo.

Richard Harris, chief executive of Rank Group, said on Thursday: “Tax proposals from anti-gambling campaigners continue to cast clouds over a regulated industry that is proud to support jobs across the country [and] deliver great hospitality experiences to millions of customers.”

The FTSE 250 company reported paying more than £225m in taxes last year, and warned the government against imposing further tax increases on the gambling sector.

Before Andy Burnham’s appointment as Prime Minister, a left-wing think tank had suggested he could generate £460m by raising tax on slot and fruit machines from 20 to 40 per cent.

Any rise in Machine Games Duty (MGD) “will further impact venue viability across both Grosvenor and Mecca and will lead to a reduction in tax receipts within 12 months,” Rank Group stated, as reported by City AM.

While the government abolished a tax on physical bingo halls earlier this year, the prevalence of gaming machines at Mecca Bingo venues means the company could still suffer from such a tax rise.

Harris said higher gambling taxes would mean that “much-loved bingo halls and casinos will be forced to close, impacting customers in local communities”. The group said it is focusing on efforts to drive revenue from its digital machines and electronic gaming at its Grosvenor Casino and Mecca Bingo sites.

Rank Group recorded a five per cent rise in gaming revenue, to £835m, in the year to June, though pre-tax profit fell by 15 per cent to £39m.

The firm said its statutory profit was impacted by a £7.5m impairment charge relating to its gaming machines.

The business generated an average £7.6m gaming revenue per week at its Grosvenor Casinos arm, a rise of five per cent, which operates around 50 venues across the UK.

The group introduced 850 new machines across 37 of its casinos in an attempt to boost turnover, but noted that the Middle East conflict weighed on performance in its table gaming offering.

Rank has been scaling back its portfolio of Mecca bingo halls, responding to an “oversupply” of venues throughout the UK.

The group has been left with “a much healthier estate of core clubs and flagship venues, well-placed to compete more effectively in their marketplaces,” it said.

Gaming machine revenue climbed by six per cent at Mecca, accounting for 42 per cent of the business’s gaming turnover across the year.

Entain, the FTSE 100 owner of Ladbrokes, on Thursday criticised the government’s “significant and disappointing” hike to taxes on remote gambling, which it said weighed on its underlying earnings.

The Rank Group traces its origins back to media group The Rank Organisation, founded by Hull-born J Arthur Rank.

Ford is preparing to expand U.S. production of Lincoln vehicles as the automaker moves toward ending imports from China for American customers, a move Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick highlighted while discussing the Trump administration’s push to expand domestic manufacturing.

Lutnick joined FOX Business’ Larry Kudlow on “Kudlow” to discuss the Trump administration’s auto tariffs and efforts to expand domestic manufacturing.

U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick speaking during a roundtable. (Eric Lee / Getty Images)

“They’re bringing their manufacturing home,” Lutnick said. “Ford is going to rock us with bringing manufacturing back to America.”

Ford plans to expand U.S. production of Lincoln vehicles beginning in 2030 and eventually stop importing vehicles from China for the luxury brand’s American customers. The company expects the expansion to generate thousands of direct and indirect U.S. jobs, but has not disclosed how much it plans to invest or which plants will receive the additional production.

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Lincoln’s U.S. lineup currently includes the China-built Nautilus. Ford has not said whether Nautilus production will move to the U.S. under the plan or identified which China-imported vehicles will be affected.

The automaker already has a sizable U.S. manufacturing footprint. Ford said it assembled more than 2 million vehicles in the U.S. in 2025 and employs approximately 56,300 hourly manufacturing workers in the country.

Lutnick pointed to Ford and other automakers as examples of companies increasing their focus on American manufacturing, and argued that tariffs are helping drive investment and jobs back to the U.S.

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“Thousands of jobs, thousands and thousands of jobs coming back to America because of these tariffs on automotives,” Lutnick said.

He also emphasized the need to prepare younger workers for increasingly automated manufacturing jobs.

“We’re gonna have to train young people for these high-tech jobs,” Lutnick said. “We are going high-tech in America.”

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A completed commercial truck rolls off the assembly line at Ford’s Ohio Assembly Plant in Sheffield Lake, Ohio. (Dustin Franz/Bloomberg / Getty Images)

Lutnick said the administration’s focus extends beyond final assembly to building advanced manufacturing capacity inside the United States.

“We are going to build these factories here in America, and that’s the key,” he said.

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Brittany Miller contributed to this report. 

China’s increasingly aggressive activity around Taiwan and other flashpoints in East Asia could trigger a wider conflict even if Beijing is not prepared to launch a full-scale invasion, according to a China expert.

Gatestone Institute senior fellow Gordon Chang joined FOX Business’ Cheryl Casone on “Mornings with Maria” to discuss China’s military posture toward Taiwan and the risk that confrontations involving U.S. allies could spiral into a broader war.

Chinese President Xi Jinping attending a meeting. (Shen Hong/Xinhua / Getty Images)

Chang argued that turmoil at the top of China’s military has left Beijing less prepared for a major operation against Taiwan. He pointed to vacancies on the Communist Party’s Central Military Commission, saying the leadership body currently lacks operational officers.

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“China right now, its military, is in no position to invade the main island of Taiwan,” Chang said. “That means that China has to intimidate Taiwan into submission because it can’t use force.”

Chang said his larger concern is that Beijing could stumble into a conflict through confrontations elsewhere in the region. He cited Chinese activity around Second Thomas Shoal and Scarborough Shoal in the South China Sea, where tensions with the Philippines have persisted, as well as disputed islands in the East China Sea claimed by both China and Japan.

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“I do worry about China backing into a confrontation, and I think that may even be probable,” Chang said.

Those encounters, Chang warned, could become especially dangerous if Chinese President Xi Jinping finds himself unable to de-escalate after a confrontation begins.

“That’s how the war starts in East Asia,” Chang said. “It doesn’t start with Xi Jinping saying, I’m invading Taiwan this afternoon. It starts through an accident that no one can control.”

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Chang also argued that Beijing’s pressure campaign may be having the opposite effect on Taiwan, strengthening resistance to Chinese rule rather than pushing the island toward submission.

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Operator

Good afternoon, and welcome to Stardust Power Inc.’s Q2 2026 Earnings Call. My name is Tawanda, and I’ll be your operator today. Before this call, Stardust Power issued its financial results for the quarter ended June 30, 2026.

Joining us on today’s call are Stardust Power’s Founder and CEO, Roshan Pujari; and CFO, Uday Devasper. Following their remarks, we will open the call for questions.

Before we begin, Johanna Gonzalez, Stardust Power’s Director of Investor Relations and Communications, will make a brief introductory statement. Ms. Gonzalez, please proceed.

Johanna Gonzalez
Director of Investor Relations & Communications

Thank you, operator, and good afternoon, everyone. Before management begins their formal remarks today, we would like to remind everyone that some statements we’re making today may be considered forward-looking statements under securities laws and involve a number of risks and uncertainties. As a result, we caution you that there are a number of factors, many of which are beyond our control, which could cause actual results, outcomes, and events, and the timings of such results, outcomes, and events, to differ materially from those described in the forward-looking statements.

For more detailed risks, uncertainties, and assumptions related to our forward-looking statements, please see the disclosures in our earnings release and public filings made with the SEC. We disclaim any obligation or undertaking to update forward-looking statements to reflect circumstances or events that occur after the date the forward-looking statements are made, except as required by law.

We refer you to our filings with the SEC for detailed disclosures and descriptions of our business, as well as