Sir Jim Ratcliffe's chemicals empire, Ineos, has introduced a company-wide hiring freeze as it prioritises debt reduction following years of rapid expansion and weakening market conditions. The British-founded group confirmed a "general recruitment freeze" while tightening capital spending after acquiring assets worth around €2.7 billion across the US, Europe and Asia between 2022 and 2024. The move comes as Ineos grapples with overcapacity in the chemicals market, new US tariffs and falling prices that have squeezed margins across its core businesses.
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It was a perfect storm. We added positions to respond to needs, we negotiated new labor standards, and there was also the expenditure to purchase the theater, and, frankly, we have some internal overtime spending controls that need to be tightened up,
Wang and other former Scale staffers have struggled with some of the idiosyncratic ways of working at Meta, according to someone familiar with his thinking, for example having to adjust to not having revenue goals as they once did as a startup. Despite teething problems, some have celebrated the leadership shift, including the appointment of popular entrepreneur and venture capitalist Friedman as head of Products and Applied Research, the team tasked with integrating the models into Meta's own apps.
Despite ushering in the weight-loss injectable craze and reaching a whopping $604 billion market cap in March 2024, Novo has for the past 18 months suffered hit after financial hit as compounding companies cut into its profit margin by selling cheaper, off-brand Ozempic - and as Eli Lilly, the makers of rival jabs Mounjaro and Zepbound, surged ahead thanks to promising news about its orforglipron GLP-1 pill.