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(Bloomberg) — Reliance Industries Ltd. started testing its online shopping portal, moving a step closer to billionaire Mukesh Ambani's goal of setting up a digital platform to take on e-commerce giant Amazon.com Inc. in India.

JioMart, open to select customers who pre-register, promises more than 50,000 grocery products, free home delivery and a return policy that asks no questions. Labeled 'the nation's new store,' it is currently available in only three neighborhoods surrounding Mumbai, according to the website.

The pilot site provides an early glimpse of how the energy-and-petrochemicals conglomerate controlled by Asia's richest man is stepping up consumer offerings in a pivot toward newer businesses. With the unveiling of the portal, Reliance Industries will join the battle with Amazon.com and Walmart Inc.'s Flipkart Online Services Pvt. for a slice of an e-commerce market that KPMG says is set to grow to $200 billion by 2027.

Ambani, 62, is giving shape to his online retail ambitions by spending billions of dollars on a string of small acquisitions. The newer businesses, including telecommunications and retail, are likely to contribute 50% of Reliance Industries' earnings in a few years, from about 32% now, Ambani said in August.

A spokesman for Mumbai-based Reliance Industries declined to provide further details on the retail project.

Ambani's previous project, which needed almost $50 billion of capital expenditure, is already showing signs of success.

Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd., the group's wireless carrier started in 2016, is India's No. 1 operator today and has more than 350 million users. The company entered the world's second-largest market by subscribers with free calls and cheap data, forcing some incumbents to exit or merge with rivals.

Ambani is seeking to replicate that success in online retail as well. Terming it "new commerce," the tycoon said in August that his goal is to "completely transform" India's unorganized retail market — mostly mom-and-pop stores — which accounts for 90% of the nation's industry.

"This tech-enabled partnership will link producers, traders, small merchants, consumer brands and consumers," Ambani told shareholders in August. After beta trials with thousands of merchants across the country showed promise, "we are now getting ready to roll out the platform at a larger scale," he said.

Reliance Industries has unveiled a sweeping plan to create a $24 billion digital-services holding firm, and also vowed listings of the new businesses within five years.

Betting the plan would unlock value, investors have piled on Reliance Industries shares, sending the stock soaring 36% this year against the 15% advance in the benchmark index. The gains helped Ambani add more than $15 billion to his wealth — the most in Asia — and taking his net worth to almost $60 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

TOKYO (AP) — Nissan's former Chairman Carlos Ghosn said Tuesday he was in Lebanon and was not fleeing justice, but instead sought to avoid "injustice and political persecution" in Japan, where he was awaiting trial for alleged financial misconduct.

Ghosn was out on bail before his departure, which occurred under unclear circumstances. He disclosed his location in a statement through his representatives that did not describe how he left the country. Conditions of his release on bail banned him from from traveling overseas. He promised to talk to reporters next week.

"I am now in Lebanon and will no longer be held hostage by a rigged Japanese justice system where guilt is presumed, discrimination is rampant, and basic human rights are denied, in flagrant disregard of Japan's legal obligations under international law and treaties it is bound to uphold," the statement said.

Japanese media quoted prosecutors speaking anonymously who said they did not know how Ghosn had left the country while under surveillance.

Ghosn, who is of Lebanese origin and holds French, Lebanese and Brazilian passports, was arrested in November 2018 and was expected to face trial in April 2020.

Prosecutors fought his release, but a court granted him bail with conditions that he be monitored and he could not meet with his wife Carole, who is also of Lebanese origin. Recently the court allowed them to speak by video calls.

Japan does not have an extradition treaty with Lebanon. It is unclear what steps the authorities might take.

Ghosn has repeatedly asserted his innocence, saying authorities trumped up charges to prevent a possible fuller merger between Nissan Motor Co. and alliance partner Renault SA.

He has been charged with under-reporting his future compensation and of breach of trust.

During his release on bail, Ghosn had been going daily to the office of his main lawyer Junichiro Hironaka to work on his case. Hironaka has not commented on Ghosn's departure from the country.

Earlier, Ricardo Karam, a television host and friend of Ghosn, told The Associated Press that Ghosn arrived in Lebanon on Monday morning.

"He is home," Karam told the AP in a message. "It's a big adventure."

Karam declined to elaborate.

Ghosn was credited with leading a spectacular turnaround at Nissan beginning in the late 1990s. The Lebanese took special pride in the auto industry icon, who speaks fluent Arabic and visited regularly. Born in Brazil, where his Lebanese grandfather had sought his fortune, Ghosn grew up in Beirut, where he spent part of his childhood at a Jesuit school.

Nissan did not have immediate comment. The Japanese automaker of the March subcompact, Leaf electric car and Infiniti luxury models, has also been charged as a company in relation to Ghosn's alleged financial crimes.

Japanese securities regulators recently recommended Nissan be fined 2.4 billion yen ($22 million) over disclosure documents from 2014 through 2017. Nissan has said it accepted the penalty and had corrected its securities documents in May.

Its sales and profits have tumbled and its brand image is tarnished. It has acknowledged lapses in its governance and has promised to improve its transparency.

Another Nissan former executive Greg Kelly, an American, was arrested at the same time as Ghosn and is awaiting trial. He has said he is innocent.

Hiroto Saikawa, who replaced Ghosn as head of Nissan, announced his resignation in September after financial misconduct allegations surfaced against him related to dubious income. He has not been charged with any crime.

The conviction rate in Japan exceeds 99% and winning an acquittal through a lengthy appeals process could take years. Rights activists in Japan and abroad say its judicial system does not presume innocence enough and relies heavily on long detentions that lead to false confessions.

The charges Ghosn faces carry a maximum penalty of 15 years in prison.

___

Associated Press writers Sarah El Deeb and Zeina Karam contributed from Beirut.

(SALT LAKE CITY) — When Nalini Nadkarni was a kid, she'd run home from school, climb into one of the eight maple trees in her parents' backyard and spend an afternoon there with an apple and a book.

That time in the treetops set the tone for the rest of her life: She's now a forest ecologist at the University of Utah who's dedicated her career to studying rain forest canopies.

She's also always looking for new ways to get people interested in science, from fashion made with nature imagery to science lectures at the state prison.

"I've tried for years and years to bring the science I do and understand to people outside of academia," she said.

Her childhood memories made her particularly interested in reaching children. After her own 6-year-old daughter asked for a Barbie, Nadkarni decided to re-fashion the iconic dolls as a scientist-explorer in rubber boots rather than high heels.

"Lots of girls, and some little boys, love Barbie," Nadkarni said. "It's almost aspirational, they want to be Barbie."

That was about 15 years ago. Nadkarni said Barbie-maker Mattel wasn't interested in the idea then, so she decided to redo dolls herself, using gear she collected.

She scoured thrift stores and eBay for Barbie dolls and enlisted help from volunteer seamstresses. She called the creation "Treetop Barbie" and began selling them at cost on her website.

Last year, Mattel began working with National Geographic to create a new line of scientist Barbies. Nadkarni has a longstanding relationship with National Geographic, so when the non-profit reached out for help, she quickly agreed.

Nadkarni joined a team of female scientists advising Mattel as it made the line of dolls that includes a marine biologist, astrophysicist, photojournalist, conservationist and entomologist.

Sales began in the summer. As a thank-you, Mattel sent Nadkarni a one-of-a-kind doll with tree-climbing gear and full dark hair woven with strands of white that made the doll resemble the scientist.

For Nadkarni, the company's investment in the dolls reflects a broader cultural shift toward recognizing women in science, math and technology that could spark an appreciation for science even among kids who don't end up entering the field.

Mattel said in a statement that the purpose of Barbie dolls for the last 60 years has been to "inspire the limitless potential in every girl," pointing out that Barbie was portrayed in other science and math-based careers long before the new line, including as an astronaut in 1965.

"Barbie allows girls to try on new roles through storytelling by showing them they can be anything and, through our partnership with National Geographic, girls can now imagine themselves as an astrophysicist, polar marine biologist and more," said Lisa McKnight, general manger of Barbie Dolls for Mattel.

It's not known, though, how career Barbies might affect kids' aspirations. A 2014 study by Oregon State University found that girls who played with the dolls told researchers they could do fewer jobs than boys — even if they played with a doctor Barbie.

The study didn't examine the girls' reasoning, but researchers speculated that Barbie might be an inherently sexualized doll, said associate professor Aurora Sherman, who worked on the paper.

Putting the same doll in a professional outfit likely won't do much to change perceptions about what women can do, she said. But it might help to use it as a starting point for conversations about women in science and math.

"Its really going to depend on how that doll is experienced, and what adults are doing to drive home that message," she said.

Barbie's icon status gives the doll cultural sway, and the new dolls have the potential to normalize the idea of women in science and engineering, said Kris Macomber, a sociology professor at Meredith College in Raleigh, North Carolina.

Barbie sales have been increasing as the becomes available in different body shapes and careers, but there's only so much a toy can do to change broader attitudes about what professions chosen by girls as they grow up, she said.

"Barbie does not hold all the power to change culture," Macomber said. "But it does contribute."

(BEIRUT) — Former Nissan chairman Carlos Ghosn, who is awaiting trial in Japan on charges of financial misconduct, has arrived in Beirut, a close friend said Monday. He apparently jumped bail.

It was not clear how Ghosn, who is of Lebanese origins and holds French and Lebanese passports, left Japan where he was under surveillance and is expected to face trial in April 2020.

Ricardo Karam, a television host and friend of Ghosn who interviewed him several times, told The Associated Press Ghosn arrived in Lebanon Monday morning..

"He is home," Karam told the AP in a message. "It's a big adventure."

Karam declined to elaborate. Local media first reported Ghosn arrived in Lebanon, but didn't offer details.

There was no immediate comment from Japan or from Lebanese officials.

Ghosn, 65, has been on bail in Tokyo since April and is facing charges of hiding income and financial misconduct. He has denied the charges. He had been under strict bail conditions in Japan after spending more than 120 days in detention.

Lebanon-based paper Al-Joumhouriya said Ghosn arrived in Beirut from Turkey aboard a private jet. AP has not been able to confirm those details or how he was able to leave Tokyo.

A house known to belong to Ghosn in a Beirut neighborhood had security guards outside with two lights on Monday night, but no sign otherwise of anyone inside. The guards denied he was inside, although one said he was in Lebanon without saying how he knew that.

Ghosn was arrested last year in Japan and has been charged with under-reporting his compensation and other financial misconduct. He denies wrongdoing and was out on bail. His trial had not started.

Ghosn's lawyers say the allegations are a result of trumped-up charges rooted in a conspiracy among Nissan, government officials and prosecutors to oust Ghosn to prevent a fuller merger with Nissan's alliance partner, Renault SA of France.

Ghosn, one of the auto industry's biggest stars before his downfall, is credited with leading Nissan from near-bankruptcy to lucrative growth.

Even as he fell from grace internationally, Ghosn was still treated as a hero in Lebanon, where many had long held hopes he would one day play a bigger role in politics, or help rescue its failing economy.

Politicians across the board mobilized in his defense after his arrest in Japan, with some suggesting his detention may be part of a political or business-motivated conspiracy.

The Lebanese took special pride in the auto industry icon, who holds a Lebanese passport, speaks fluent Arabic and visited regularly. Born in Brazil, where his Lebanese grandfather had sought his fortune, Ghosn grew up in Beirut, where he spent part of his childhood at a Jesuit school.

His wife, Carole Nahas, is also of Lebanese heritage. In November,Ghosn was allowed to talk to his wife after an eight-month ban on such contact while he awaits trial.

Japanese Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Keisuke Suzuki visited Beirut earlier this month where he met with the Lebanese president and foreign minister.

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(LONDON) — Sustainability in fashion is a hot button topic, with retailers large and small racing to prove their green credentials, but the desire for new attire churns and the industry remains one of the world's largest polluters as climate activists and watchdogs sound alarms.

The industry is the second largest consumer of water and is responsible for 8-10% of global carbon emissions, more than all international flights and maritime shipping combined, according to the United Nations Environment Program.

"So, for example, it would take 13 years to drink the water that is used to make one pair of jeans and one T-shirt," said Fee Gilfeather, a sustainability expert at the nonprofit OXFAM. "It's just an incredible amount of environmental resources that are required for making the clothing that we wear."

Harmful chemicals, global transport of goods and non-biodegradable packaging add to the environmental cost. The combined impact has put the industry under scrutiny among consumers who want to know where — and how — their clothes are produced. They're demanding ethical practices and responsible retailing.

Some manufacturers and retailers have found innovative solutions, both large and small.

At the high end of the market, designers are keen to make sustainable fashion synonymous with luxury. In 2015, a sustainability report by Nielsen found that 66% of consumers are willing to pay more for environmentally friendly clothing. At the low, fast fashion end of the industry, promises have been made.

Inditex, the retail giant that owns Zara, H&M and many other brands, announced a sustainability pledge in July, saying it wants all its clothes to be made from sustainable or recycled fabrics by 2025.

In addition, the global fashion sector addressed climate change by launching the Fashion Industry Charter for Climate Action at the COP24 climate conference in Katowice in December 2018. Leading fashion brands, retailers, supplier organizations, a major shipping company and global NGO WWF International have agreed to collectively address the climate impact of the industry across sectors. Patricia Espinosa, the executive secretary for UN Climate Change, said the charter comes at a time when "we needed it most." The charter recognizes the crucial role of fashion as a contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, with multiple opportunities to reduce emissions. It hopes to achieve net zero emissions by 2050 and notes a number of issues: decarbonization of the production phase; selection of climate friendly and sustainable materials; the need for low-carbon transport; and improving consumer dialogue and awareness.

The scale of the charter is vast, but activists are up against behemoths at times.

In Britain, the Environmental Audit Committee reported on the problem earlier this year and found that the U.K. buys more clothes than any other country in Europe, throwing away 1 million tonnes annually with 300,000 tonnes (over 661,000,000 pounds) going to incinerators or landfills. The EAC, chaired by Member of Parliament Mary Creagh, concluded that fashion retailers should take responsibility for the clothes they sell. The Committee called for a producer responsibility scheme for textiles, which would add a small amount to the cost of each item, raising money to invest in recycling centers to divert clothing from landfills and incineration. The British government, then led by Prime Minister Theresa May, rejected all the committee's proposals, much to the dismay of Fashion Revolution, a global movement calling for greater transparency, sustainability and ethics in the fashion industry.

"That set us back 20 years at the very, very least. It is inexcusable and frankly, unforgivable," said the organization's creative director and co-founder, Orsola De Castro. "Some of those recommendations, you'd think why would you not take that into consideration? And the reality is that the U.K. government in this occasion has also looked very out of touch because we are seeing quite a lot of policy change happening, for instance, in France. And it seems that them not getting up to speed on this is a terrible thing."

The industry has other problems as well. It has been accused of unethical labor practices, though the tide began to turn after the Rana Plaza disaster in 2013, when an eight-story building containing a garment factory in Dhaka, Bangledesh, collapsed and killed 1,134 people.

"We're seeing a huge rise in public demand over not just better products, but better buying habits. And we're looking at a generation that is applying scrutiny, that is wanting to know that brands are accountable. And obviously transparency has been really on the rise ever since the Rana Plaza disaster," De Castro said.

But significant change throughout the industry, coupled with mass consumer action, has yet to come, she said.

"Real effective changes? I don't think we're seeing any particular impact, but look, when it comes to awareness, massive difference," De Castro said.

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A new batch of messages between Boeing Co. employees on the development of the 737 Max paints a "very disturbing picture" of concerns about the plane, according to an aide to a House committee.

The documents were turned over to the Federal Aviation Administration on Monday, the agency said in a statement. The disclosure came the same day that Boeing ousted its chief executive officer.

At least some of them were written by the same Boeing pilot whose 2016 messages were released in October and were the subject of sharp questioning by lawmakers, according to a person familiar with their contents who wasn't authorized to discuss them.

The communications haven't been released publicly. The staff of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee are still reviewing the messages and didn't provide specific details about what they contain.

"But similar to other records previously disclosed by Boeing, the records appear to point to a very disturbing picture of both concerns expressed by Boeing employees about the company's commitment to safety and efforts by some employees to ensure Boeing's production plans were not diverted by regulators or others," a committee aide said in a statement.

"The committee will continue to review these and other records provided by Boeing as part of the committee's ongoing investigation," the aide said.

Boeing brought the emails to the FAA and Congress "as part of our commitment to transparency with our regulators and the oversight committees," the company said in a statement.

"As with prior documents referenced by the committee, the tone and content of some of these communications does not reflect the company we are and need to be," the company said. Boeing has made changes to enhance safety, it said.

Boeing fell 1.3% to $333 at the close in New York, as markets shut down early because of Christmas Eve.

This was the second time that the Chicago-based company has delayed turning over to the FAA sensitive messages related to the development of the 737 Max. The jetliner was grounded in March after a design flaw was linked to two fatal crashes, in Indonesia and Ethiopia. The earlier episode involving messages prompted a rebuke by the agency and stirred tensions between the regulator and the planemaker.

The FAA didn't comment in its statement on the content of the emails, saying only that they were under review. The company's decision to turn the emails over to the FAA was reported earlier by the Seattle Times.

The way Boeing handled the second set of records rankled the agency, according to a person familiar with the issue who wasn't authorized to speak about it. Boeing told the FAA the messages existed in recent days, but didn't initially provide them or disclose their contents, said the person.

Dennis Muilenburg stepped down on Monday as Boeing's CEO, at least partly as a result of deteriorating relations with the FAA, according to a statement from the company's board.

In October, Boeing disclosed to the FAA instant messages and emails by a high-ranking company pilot who in 2016 expressed misgivings about the software implicated in two fatal crashes on the Max.

Boeing had known about those messages since early in the year and turned them over to the Justice Department in February. It didn't give them to the FAA immediately because of the criminal investigation into how the plane was approved, Bloomberg News reported at the time.

The delay angered the FAA, which is charged with overseeing Boeing. One of the agency's key tenets is that entities it oversees must disclose safety issues or possible breaches of regulations. In some circumstances, failing to tell the agency about such an issue may be considered a legal violation.

"The FAA finds the substance of the document concerning," the agency said in a statement on Oct. 18. "The FAA is also disappointed that Boeing did not bring this document to our attention immediately upon its discovery."

The November 2016 instant messages disclosed in October, which were reviewed by Bloomberg News, were between between Mark Forkner, then Boeing's chief technical pilot for the 737, and another 737 technical pilot, Patrik Gustavsson.

Forkner expressed concern that the flight-control feature later implicated in the crashes was "running rampant" and said he might have unknowingly misled the FAA about it. In separate emails he sent to an unnamed FAA official, he said he was "Jedi-mind tricking" regulators outside the U.S. into accepting Boeing's suggested training for the Max.

A lawyer for Forkner, David Gerger, said issues raised in the messages were the result of balky simulator software and not a result of problems with the plane itself. Forkner believed the plane was safe and didn't mislead the FAA, Gerger said.

Gerger didn't respond to requests to comment on the latest messages and whether they involved his client.

–With assistance from Courtney Rozen and Julie Johnsson.

Pirates attacked five ships over four days in one of the world's busiest shipping channels, including two separate attempts on Monday, the Straits Times reported.

Just after midnight on Monday, pirates attacked a crude oil tanker in the Singapore Strait. Within two hours of that, there was another attack on a dry bulk carrier. They tied up crew members in both incidents but failed to rob the ships as alarms were triggered on both occasions, the newspaper reported late on Monday.

The ships in question in Monday's attacks were 105,000 dead weight ton crude oil tanker Bamzi and dry bulk carrier Trust Star. Bamzi loaded from Basrah in Iraq in November and is headed for Qingdao in China, according to Bloomberg tanker tracking data. Trust Star sailed from Gothenburg in Sweden in November and is headed for Huanghua in China, according to the data.

There have been 29 piracy incidents in the Singapore Strait so far in 2019, the Straits Times said. The Regional Cooperation Agreement on Combating Piracy and Armed Robbery against Ships in Asia's Information Sharing Centre had issued alerts after three piracy attempts in the strait on Dec. 20, it said.

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(NEW YORK) — Former Uber CEO Travis Kalanick will resign from the board next week, effectively severing ties with the ride-hailing company he co-founded a decade ago.

Uber turbocharged the gig economy and since 2010 has logged 15 billion trips. Kalanick was ousted as CEO in the summer of 2017 with the company mired in numerous lawsuits.

The departure did not come as a surprise. Kalanick recently sold more than $2.5 billion worth of shares in the company, more than 90% of his holdings.

"Uber has been a part of my life for the past 10 years. At the close of the decade, and with the company now public, it seems like the right moment for me to focus on my current business and philanthropic pursuits," Kalanick said in a prepared statement Tuesday. "I'm proud of all that Uber has achieved, and I will continue to cheer for its future from the sidelines."

Read more: Uber Shows Why Silicon Valley Needs to Rewrite Its Hero-Founder Myth

Uber under Kalanick grew with incredible speed, but like a number of other tech startups, the company ran into trouble with a corporate culture that appeared at times to be reeling out of control.

A former Uber engineer, Susan Fowler, discloses sexual harassment and sexism claims in a blog post about her year at Uber. Fowler says her boss propositioned her and higher-ups ignored her complaints. Kalanick calls Fowler's accusations "abhorrent" and hires former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to investigate.

Days later, Waymo, a self-driving car company spun off from Google, sues Uber. Waymo alleges that Anthony Levandowski — a former top manager for Google's self-driving car project — stole pivotal technology from Google before leaving to run Uber's self-driving car division.

Then, The New York Times reveals that Uber used a phony version of its app to thwart authorities in cities where it was operating illegally. Uber's so-called Greyball software identified regulators who were posing as riders and blocked access to them. The U.S. Justice Department is investigating Uber's use of the Greyball software.

The South Korean business dynasty that gained notoriety with the "nut-rage incident" is generating turbulence again.

Cho Hyun-ah, or Heather Cho, the eldest daughter of the founding family's late patriarch, voiced her discontent over how her brother has been running the Hanjin conglomerate, whose units include flag carrier Korean Air Lines Co.

Walter Cho, the 43-year-old chairman of Hanjin Group and holding company Hanjin Kal Corp., has been running the companies without adequately consulting the rest of the family, violating their father's wishes, she said in an emailed statement made through her lawyers.

It's the first time that any member of the founding family publicly voiced discontent over the management of Hanjin since the patriarch, Cho Yang-ho, died in April. In November, the siblings inherited their father's stake in Hanjin Kal in accordance with the law.

"Hanjin Group is being managed in a way that goes against the previous chairman's wishes," Heather Cho said in the statement. "There haven't been sufficient discussions about who to name as the head of the Hanjin Group. I will listen to various views of shareholders."

Walter Cho wasn't immediately reachable but the group issued a public apology for the family controversy.

Hanjin Kal, which owns shares in Korean Air and other Hanjin units, rose 20% in Seoul trading, the most since April. Korean Air advanced 4.7% and Jin Air, another Hanjin Kal holding, climbed 4.1%.

Walter Cho owns 6.52% of Hanjin Kal and the older sister has 6.49%, according to a November filing. Emily Cho, the youngest in the family, has 6.47% and their mother 5.31%.

Heather Cho, 45, gained global notoriety after she ordered a Korean Air plane to return to the gate after scolding a flight attendant for the way macadamia nuts were served in premium class. As a result of the December 2014 incident, she was convicted for usurping a pilot's authority and spent five months in prison.

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Boeing's CEO is resigning amid ongoing problems at the company over the troubled Max 737 aircraft.

The Chicago manufacturer said Monday that Dennis Muilenburg is stepping down immediately. The board's current chairman David Calhoun will officially take over on January 13.

The board said a change in leadership was necessary to restore confidence in the company as it works to repair relationships with regulators and stakeholders. The Max was grounded worldwide in March after the second of two crashes of its jet, killing a combined total of 346 people.

Calhoun says he strongly believes in the future of Boeing and the 737 Max.

The leadership change follows Boeing's announcement last week that it would halt Max production in January.

Then United Airlines said it would pull the Boeing 737 Max from its flight schedule until June. The same day, Spirit AeroSystems, which makes fuselages, said it would end deliveries intended for the Max in January, and Boeing's new Starliner capsule went off course on a planned trip to the International Space Station.

Board member Lawrence Kellner will become non-executive chairman of the board.

"On behalf of the entire board of directors, I am pleased that Dave has agreed to lead Boeing at this critical juncture," Mr. Kellner said in a prepared statement. "Dave has deep industry experience and a proven track record of strong leadership, and he recognizes the challenges we must confront. The board and I look forward to working with him and the rest of the Boeing team to ensure that today marks a new way forward for our company."

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Congress this week passed perhaps the most dramatic change to U.S. tobacco regulation in a decade, raising the federal legal age of purchase from 18 to 21.

That provision, part of a spending bill that must still be signed into law by President Donald Trump, would apply not only to traditional tobacco products such as cigarettes and cigars, but also to e-cigarettes—products that have lately been caught in regulatory cross-hairs, sparked by rising rates of use among teenagers. According to the latest federal data, 27.5% of high school students reported using e-cigarettes during the past month. Raising the legal age of purchase is meant in part to curb that trend by preventing teenagers from buying vaping products, either for personal use or to distribute to younger classmates.

So-called "Tobacco 21" legislation has already been implemented in almost 20 states as well as numerous cities across the country. The new legislation, which would take effect in the summer of 2020, would make 21 the mandatory minimum age of purchase for all states.Tobacco 21 is the rare policy supported by both public-health groups and pro-vaping advocates, although the latter's support sometimes raises eyebrows among the former. Public health officials support it on the premise that it would theoretically keep tobacco products away from young people—which is especially important since most smokers start before they're 21. In a statement provided to TIME, the American Lung Association called it an "easy way to protect children's health and prevent future generations from getting hooked on nicotine."

Vaping advocates, meanwhile, support Tobacco 21 for several reasons. Tony Abboud, executive director of the trade group Vapor Technology Association, said in a statement provided to TIME that Tobacco 21 is "the most significant step that can be taken to reduce youth access and use." By keeping nicotine products away from young users, for whom they are not intended, Tobacco 21 could also ease some of the hysteria around teen vaping. Further, it could preempt more dramatic proposals, like the all-out ban on flavored vaping products that Trump teased this fall—and then abandoned in favor of Tobacco 21.

Longer-term, it brings much-needed regulation to an industry that has proliferated largely unchecked. E-cigarettes were not regulated by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) until 2016, so any brand for sale before then entered the market without agency approval. By the time the FDA started cracking down on vaping companies for their marketing or for producing kid-friendly flavors like cotton candy around 2018, an underage-use epidemic had already started. Reigning in the wild west of the vaping industry through legislation like Tobacco 21 could enhance the industry's legitimacy and give it a better shot at surviving when the FDA decides next spring whether to pull e-cigarettes off the market entirely.

Of course, losing an undeniably lucrative customer base—teenagers—will have some negative effect on vaping companies' bottom lines. But David Levy, who researches the science and business of e-cigarettes at Georgetown University, says companies will likely come out fairly unscathed. "While sales would be reduced, firms selling vaping devices and liquids will probably indirectly benefit, because regulations will be less strict due to less concern about youth vaping," Levy says.

The policy could also have an outsized benefit for companies like market-leader Juul Labs, and large competitors like Vuse. Juul, a lucrative startup backed by Big Tobacco firm Altria and valued at around $16 billion, can survive the hit that will come from shrinking its pool of legal buyers; Vuse, though less dominant, is also owned by a deep-pocketed Big Tobacco giant, R.J. Reynolds. But small mom-and-pop operations may not be able to, and some could fold. If they do, that means more market share available for the taking for Juul—which, even now, controls up to 70% of the U.S. market.

But the entire vapor industry, Juul included, has been struggling as vaping comes under greater scrutiny, thanks in part to a Congressional investigation and a vaping-related lung disease outbreak (mostly tied to THC, not nicotine). Juul's valuation, while still massive, has fallen drastically since it peaked at $38 billion this time last year, and the company has been forced to navigate a steady stream of lawsuits and PR battles. (Juul did not respond to TIME's request for comment.)

With FDA approval applications due in about six months and the federal government stepping in to regulate, the fate of the industry is far from decided.

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French telecommunications powerhouse Orange is facing a potentially landmark court ruling Friday on whether it was responsible for dozens of employee suicides or suicide attempts during a painful restructuring.

The decision could set a legal precedent, because Orange is the first of France's big listed companies to be tried on a charge of "institutionalized moral harassment." Orange was called France Telecom at the time of the suicides in the 2000s.

Former CEO Didier Lombard could face up to a year in prison, and he and other former or current executives also face tens of thousands of euros in fines. Plaintiffs' lawyers are seeking 2 million euros ($2.2 million) in damages from the company.

Lombard, his former right-hand man Louis-Pierre Wenes and the director of human resources Olivier Barberot were accused of leading a "policy of destabilization" as they sought to shed 22,000 jobs in the 2000s. Four other managers are accused of complicity.

Scores of employees killed themselves amid the restructuring. The trial focused on 39 cases between 2006 and 2009: 19 suicides, 12 suicide attempts and eight cases of serious depression. Other employee suicides couldn't be linked directly and solely with their work.

For two and a half months, the court listened to the families of the victims and projected letters and photos on a giant screen. One read: "I am committing suicide because of my work at France Telecom, it's the only cause."

The three main defendants denied responsibility for the suicides of people they didn't personally know.

But on the last day of the trial in July, Wenes said he was "deeply sorry" to "those for whom work was a source of discomfort and suffering. I never wanted that."

Lombard, now 77, admitted in court that he "made a blunder" in 2006 when he said he "wanted employees to leave by the door or by the window." He also admitted to once saying there was "a pattern of suicide in the business." Lombard left his post in 2010.

His lawyer argued that the restructuring was a necessary result of the privatization of state-run France Telecom, and that Lombard "saved the business" and turned Orange into a big international telecommunications player.

If you or someone you know may be contemplating suicide, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 or text HOME to 741741 to reach the Crisis Text Line. In emergencies, call 911, or seek care from a local hospital or mental health provider.

Ke Jie was once the world's best player of the most complex game ever invented, an ancient Chinese board game called Go. But, in 2017, Ke was beaten by a computer program that had taught itself how to the play the game Ke had spent most of his life mastering.

The robotic victory marked a watershed moment for artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning technology—a subset of AI whereby a computer learns to perform a task without being explicitly programmed to complete it, instead learning and improving from experience.

Now the technology is being applied in industries from transport, where algorithms are being used to teach self-driving cars how to navigate busy city streets, to health care, where robots are learning to diagnose and treat patients. And in finance, increasingly, these technologies are making decisions about what stocks to buy and sell.

Marcos López de Prado has been at the forefront of machine learning innovation in finance. The New-York based Spaniard was the first-ever head of machine learning at AQR, one of the world's largest hedge funds, before he left earlier this year to start his own firm, which sells machine learning expertise and algorithms to Wall Street.

The finance pioneer literally wrote the book on the use of machine learning in investing (his 400-page textbook Advances in Financial Machine Learning is included in the curriculum of several graduate school courses), and he was named the 2019 "Quant of the Year" by the Journal of Portfolio Management.

TIME sat down with López de Prado when he visited Hong Kong recently. Here's what one of the world's top quantitative analysts has to say about how robots are taking over global financial markets, and his great hopes for the technology.

What advancements are you seeing in the field of machine learning?

Machine learning has become very successful at various industry applications beyond many people's expectations. A few years ago, we start seeing all these breakthroughs, like machines defeating the best players at [the board game] Go.

What has changed is that we have computers that are powerful enough to solve these problems. And we have a lot of data that before was not available and we know how to use this data in combination with algorithms.

So all of a sudden, machine learning algorithms have become experts at tasks where five years ago, only humans could be experts.

What are the challenges of using this technology for buying and selling stocks?

Finance is special because we do not come up with very large data sets compared to the data sets that are used to train these algorithms for things like recognizing faces or driving cars.

And markets evolve. You are an investor and you extract money from the market and the market learns to prevent you from extracting profits next year.

Read More: Artificial Intelligence Is Powerful—And Misunderstood. Here's How We Can Protect Workers

What mistakes do you see people making when they apply machine learning to the investment process?

This oracle approach, this black box approach, is doomed to fail. What does not make sense at this point is to use these techniques to make black box predictions.

Unless you understand the reason why the model is working in the first place, you don't know when to switch it off.

What's the right way to use machine learning to invest?

Machine learning should be used as a research tool, not as a forecasting tool. It should be used to identify new theories, and once you identify a new theory, you throw the machine away, you don't want the machine.

In my view, this is the right approach in finance. Everybody should use machine learning to develop theories and test theories, but once the theory is uncovered, you should run the machine, the machine shouldn't run the theory.

How has technology changed the stock market?

Today most transactions are performed by algorithms. There are very, very few transactions that are executed by humans. Humans have been expelled out. Anyone who doubts the efficacy of this and machine learning in particular should look at the execution.

Will machines totally take over investing?

There is no reason to not expect that eventually these machines will be able to solve many tasks that we cannot solve, it's a matter of when, it's not a matter of if.

I think eventually, machines will take over. When is anyone's guess. Making decisions is about information and processing information. If you have a machine that can process information better and faster and more objectively, then they will succeed.

Will companies still be able to raise money if machines are doing the investing?

I think that eventually it will have a very positive effect in society. Assets are allocated more efficiently, the companies that are more likely to be successful receive the assets, the companies that are just not very likely to be successful, they will not receive assets.

Why is developing this technology important?

My hope is that when these technologies are deployed correctly, they will make markets more efficient so when people invest, they will invest following scientific approaches rather than making wild speculation or wild guesses, and hopefully that helps society in the sense that, you want something as important as finance and investing grounded on scientific evidence not on sheer speculation.

A pilot on a jet carrying Amazon.com packages that crashed near Houston in February had a record of repeatedly flunking flight tests and may have become disoriented in clouds, according to newly released documents.

The pilot mistakenly thought the plane's nose was pointed too high and jerked the jet down so steeply that the Boeing Co. 767 dove into a marsh, even as the captain fought to pull up, according to National Transportation Safety Board records released Thursday.

"Lord…you have my soul," Conrad Jules Aska shouted a second before the high-speed impact of the Atlas Air cargo plane, according to a transcript of the cockpit recording.

Packages strewn

Aska, serving as copilot on the flight, Captain Ricky Blakely and a third pilot for another airline, Sean Archuleta, who was sitting at the rear of the cockpit, died in the crash on Feb. 23. The impact littered a bay near Houston with packages and debris.

The NTSB released 2,279 pages of raw investigative reports, providing the first insights into what led to the crash of the jet, which was on a contract flight for Amazon. They stopped short of providing any formal conclusions of the cause, but raised issues with pilot hiring practices and the availability of previous records of failures.

The safety board will conclude the cause of the crash sometime in 2020. Atlas, a division of Atlas Air Worldwide Holdings Inc., said in an emailed statement it is cooperating with the NTSB's investigation.

Routine descent

"We remain devastated by the loss of Flight 3591 that claimed the lives of two of our valued pilots and a colleague," the company said in the statement.

Atlas' training and workforce "meet or exceed all government safety standards" and the company continually evaluates its hiring procedures, the company said.

The jet was descending routinely toward Houston George Bush Intercontinental Airport when it hit turbulence at 12:38 p.m. local time, according to the NTSB.

Earlier: Fifth Fatal Crash in 10 Years Revives Concern About Cargo Planes

The copilot made two comments about being in an aerodynamic stall, which can cause a dangerous loss of lift on the wings. However, the plane was flying normally and nowhere near a stall, according to investigators.

The copilot then added full takeoff power without informing his captain, as is required. A few seconds later, possibly due to being disoriented and thinking the plane's nose was pointed too high, he pushed forward on the control column and the plane nosed over.

Training failures

It reached speeds of about 500 miles (805 kilometers) per hour, according to NTSB data.

The copilot's previous history of failures during training is likely to become an issue in the accident investigation. The NTSB cited similar issues after a crash on now-defunct Colgan Air killed 50 in 2009 near Buffalo, New York.

The Federal Aviation Administration has been attempting to create a better system of logging airline pilot records since that crash, but hasn't completed the effort.

Aska didn't mention in his job application to Atlas that he'd been employed briefly by two other carriers, but had departed after being unable to complete training, according to the NTSB.

The airline wouldn't have hired him if it had known his complete record, the director of training told investigators.

Confusion reigned in the cockpit during the final dive, according to the recording of their comments and flight data.

Blakely, attempting to counteract the dive, was pulling the controls in the opposite direction as the copilot.

"Oh, lord have mercy myself," Aska said as the dive began.

"What's going on?" Blakely said a short time later.

"Pull up," shouted Archuleta from the jump-seat.

Through non-compete clauses, employers have robbed tens of millions of workers of the right to practice their trade where they want. Non-competes can bar workers from accepting new employment in their field or industry for a year or more after they leave. Policymakers are now engaged in a largely unacknowledged debate over how to regulate non-competes. Federal and state legislators are deciding whether the right to leave should be universal or granted to only some workers. Should all workers have the freedom to find and take new work when and where they want, or should this right be conditional on income or occupation?

Earlier this fall, Democrat Chris Murphy and Republican Todd Young introduced the Workforce Mobility Act in the Senate, which would ban non-competes for all workers across America. Other lawmakers have pursued more targeted solutions. For instance, in 2019, legislators in Maryland, Maine, and New Hampshire passed bills prohibiting non-competes for low-wage workers. The city council in Washington, D.C. has proposed outlawing non-competes for workers making up to $87,654. In 2018, Colorado was even more "surgical" and limited non-competes for physicians treating rare disorders.

A universal national solution is necessary. The freedom to exit should be a basic right, not a privilege for a subset of workers. Even if Congress does not pass the Workforce Mobility Act of Senators Murphy and Young, the next president, acting through the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), can ban non-competes and restore all workers' freedom to practice their trade. Nineteen state attorneys general endorsed FTC action as "offer[ing] the quickest, most comprehensive regulatory path to protecting all workers from these exploitative contracts."

Somewhere between 36 million and 60 million workers are bound by non-compete clauses today. Hardly any profession is free from them. Home health workers in Oregon have been forced to accept them and threatened with dismissal for wanting to take additional work in violation of their non-competes. In Washington, D.C., Compass Coffee, a popular chain, has made accepting non-competes a condition of employment for baristas, coffee roasters, and managers. Amazon required warehouse workers to sign potentially global non-competes until this practice was publicized in a 2015 report.

Employers also use non-compete clauses to restrict the movement of workers in the arts and media. Non-competes compound the precarity of these traditionally middle-income workers' jobs. For example, the organizer of the music festival Coachella prohibits artists from performing at any other festival in North America or any venue in Southern California between December 15th and May 1st. Not only do non-competes interfere with these workers' freedom to pursue their trades, they also hinder artistic collaboration and impede the flow of information.

One widely publicized case involved the legal news site Law 360, which required its reporters to accept non-competes that restricted their ability to find work with other digital news outlets. Law 360 threatened to enforce the non-compete against a reporter who had left to accept a position with the Reuters legal news team, and she was terminated soon after by Reuters. After the New York State Attorney General filed suit, Law 360 stopped requiring reporters to sign non-competes. (On a positive note: This incident sparked a successful union organizing campaign among the Law 360 reporters, who were aware that journalists with union contracts were not required to sign non-competes.)

Non-competes bind workers near the top of the income distribution too. Approximately 45% of primary care physicians are subject to non-compete clauses. Doctors are increasingly employed by hospitals and insurers (instead of running their own practice) and may have little power to resist non-competes, due to student debt burdens and other financial constraints. And in metropolitan areas, counties, and states with a dominant hospital network, physicians can face the choice of accepting a non-compete or not working at all.

Non-competes in medicine can abruptly sever long-term physician-patient relationships and put patient health at risk. In one extreme case, the enforcement of a non-compete against a colorectal surgeon in a Midwestern community meant that a single colorectal surgeon had to serve a population of 700,000. Due to this specialized surgeon shortage, patients with colorectal cancer, rectal bleeding, and other serious ailments had to delay lifesaving procedures.

Employers generally don't enforce non-compete restrictions in court—and don't need to. Simply imposing a non-compete discourages workers from looking for new work and switching jobs. Even for well-paid professionals with access to legal services, the mere threat of employer enforcement, backed by rare follow through, is often enough to bind them to their current jobs.

Importantly, many employers ask job applicants whether they are bound by a non-compete and use the existence of a non-compete as a screen when reviewing applications. For employers, why run even a slight risk of litigation with a new hire's former employer when job seekers are plentiful?

Employers' arguments for imposing non-competes on certain workers should be treated with skepticism. In a fair labor market, firms afraid of losing workers have a simple way of retaining them: raise salaries, improve benefits, and offer promotions. They can also use employment contracts that commit both parties to the employment relationship for a fixed period. Think of guaranteed contracts in professional sports. In addition, employers have other legal tools, including copyright, patent, and trade secret law, to protect the valuable business information and job training they purportedly provide to workers.

The Federal Trade Commission already has the authority to ban non-competes for all workers. In March, our organizations, as well as 18 other labor and public interest groups and 46 advocates and scholars, petitioned the FTC to use its rulemaking power to free workers from non-compete clauses. The current chairman of the Republican-majority FTC, Joseph Simons, has expressed interest in the issue but taken no concrete steps toward initiating a rulemaking. Both Democratic members of the FTC—Rohit Chopra and Rebecca Kelly Slaughter—have endorsed a rulemaking on non-competes, suggesting a third Democrat appointed (to the five-person Commission) by President Biden, Sanders, or Warren could make an FTC rule a reality.

Employers in a wide range of industries have deprived workers of the basic freedom to leave their jobs to pursue their trades elsewhere. In an economy with low union density and persistent unemployment or underemployment, threatening to leave is often the only way millions of workers can obtain decent wages or fair treatment. But for workers subject to a non-compete, speaking up about pay or other conditions of employment can mean not only losing their current job, but also risking their entire livelihood. The freedom to leave should be universal, not available only to some.

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Kekeletso Lekaota spends her work days nurturing rows of cannabis plants for harvest. Pruning a few yellowed leaves from stems with thick, flowering heads, she says the job requires a soft touch and delicate hands.

It's a crop Lekaota had no experience with 18 months ago, when she saw an advertisement for a grower in her local newspaper. Now, the 27-year-old trains others how to cultivate the plants for MG Health Ltd., a supplier of pharmaceutical-grade cannabis products, at a farm and oil extraction facility in Lesotho, the tiny, mountainous kingdom bordered on all sides by South Africa.

"I didn't know what cannabis was—it was only when I was applying for this job that I realized it's dagga," Lekaota said, using a word for weed derived from the local Khoisan languages, as she readied the greenhouses for their required 12 hours of darkness.

Marijuana has been widely cultivated across Lesotho, one of Africa's poorest countries, since time immemorial—long used as medicine by the native Basotho people. It's easier to grow and more lucrative than other crops such as maize and sugar cane, and the nation's abundant water and fertile soil provide ideal conditions. Many families rely on the extra income from selling illicitly to recreational drug users, to cover basic costs such as sending their children to school.

The Lesotho government is now trying to spur development of legal plantations supplying the burgeoning global medical cannabis industry to broaden its tax base—currently dominated by exports of diamonds, water and wool—and create jobs. About two-thirds of the country's 2.2 million people live in rural villages, and many survive off subsistence farming. Cannabis is a critical piece of the government's agricultural strategy, which it hopes will help fund basic infrastructure such as roads, electricity and water pipes.

In 2018, Lesotho became the first African nation to issue licenses for the cultivation of cannabis for medicinal purposes. Foreign investors including Canadian companies Supreme Cannabis Co., Canopy Growth Corp. and Aphria Inc. have since poured tens of millions of dollars into a handful of facilities, drawn by the low cost of production.

MG Health, Lesotho's biggest commercial producer, received C$10 million ($7.6 million) from Supreme Cannabis last year in exchange for 10% of the business then known as Medigrow Lesotho (Supreme has said it eventually wants to export medical cannabis oils from Lesotho to Canada). MG Health plans to employ as many as 3,000 workers locally—up from about 350 currently—once it reaches full production in a few years, says Chief Executive Officer Andre Bothma.

The company harvests a strain of marijuana with low levels of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC)—the compound that gets you stoned—to comply with regulations. It exports nonpsychoactive cannabidiol (CBD) oil extracts and other medical cannabis products primarily to South Africa, and is working on entering markets in Europe and the Middle East, as well as Australia.

"We have first-mover advantage in Africa and we think the market is huge," Bothma says.

CBD is a fast-growing piece of the $340 billion global cannabis market. In the U.S. alone, CBD sales are expected to quintuple to about $20 billion by 2024 from six years earlier, according to BDS Analytics.

As cannabis rules loosen around the globe, companies are turning to low-cost regions for supply. MG Health says that even in its start-up phase, it's producing in Lesotho for about 93 cents a gram, less than the $1 or more per gram that it cites as the norm elsewhere. But Lesotho will face competition for investment from other regions known to be cheap, including Colombia and Jamaica, as well as other African nations that may follow in its footsteps and legalize production.

To get large plants with thick flowering heads, growers need controlled temperatures of between 20 and 28 degrees Celsius (68 to 82.4 degrees Fahrenheit), plenty of air circulation to prevent mildew growing and, when in bloom, a strict regime of 12 hours of light and an equal measure of dark, according to MG Health.

As a medical product, it's imperative that the CBD oil produced is standardized and uncontaminated, and quality control testing for MG Health is conducted by the independent LuCan Laboritories Ltd. Workers have to shower at work and wear layers of protective clothing, which are then washed and pressed at the end of each day.

The fledgling legal industry in Lesotho has given big ideas to illegal growers, who produce strains known for their strong psychoactive effects and sell to South Africans. They can avoid arrest by producing in remote locations and bribing authorities.

Kotsoana Clementi, a 43-year-old who grows pot illicitly in his village about a 1.5-hour drive from the capital of Maseru, says he would like to partner with one of the Canadian cannabis companies on a legal business. While Clementi stands out among other villagers with his blue collared shirt, Guess jeans and polished black shoes, the operation in his small stone house lacking electricity is rudimentary.

After harvesting his weed between March and May, Clementi fills hundreds of packets and seals them with the flame from a paraffin lamp and the rounded end of a spoon. He charges 15 rand ($1) apiece and can sell 380 packets a day—an amount worth almost $400 (he says he keeps 60% of the sales and the rest goes to drug mules and bribes for border police).

"The most important thing would be to secure an investor—then the whole village would have work," Clementi says. "I'd still want to be in charge of the business, but the villagers could have a 2-3% stake."

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