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Uber has abandoned its pledge to operate an all-electric fleet across major UK, US and European cities by 2030, after its chief executive warned that drivers, consumers and governments are turning away from electric vehicles.
Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland, Uber chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi said the company’s long-standing commitment to switch to a fully electric fleet by the end of the decade was “just not going to happen”.
It marks the first time Uber has publicly conceded that it will miss the target, which was set in 2020 and closely aligned with Labour’s wider ambitions to accelerate the transition away from petrol and diesel vehicles.
“Our EV target of being all-electric by 2030, that’s just not going to happen based on everything that’s happening in society,” Khosrowshahi said. He added that while Uber would continue to increase the proportion of electric vehicles on its platform, external conditions had made the original pledge unrealistic.
Uber had previously said London would become its first net-zero city by 2025. However, the latest figures show the company remains less than halfway towards achieving that goal, despite London being its most advanced market for EV adoption.
The company has repeatedly warned that the transition would stall without stronger support from policymakers. Last year, Uber said “high upfront EV costs, limited charging access and inconsistent policy support” were continuing to slow adoption among drivers.
Those pressures have intensified as governments have scaled back subsidies and introduced new taxes affecting electric vehicles. In the UK, chancellor Rachel Reeves announced a future pay-per-mile road tax in her Budget, with the government’s fiscal watchdog warning it could significantly dampen demand for EVs.
Rising electricity prices since the pandemic have further eroded the cost advantage of electric cars, while incentives for drivers have been pared back. Uber itself has reduced bonuses for drivers using EVs, weakening financial motivation to switch.
In London, the introduction of the congestion charge for electric vehicles under mayor Sadiq Khan has dealt another blow to Uber’s electrification plans in the capital.
At the end of last year, Uber said 40 per cent of journeys in London were electric, compared with 15 per cent across Europe and just 9 per cent in the United States. In America, the rollback of EV subsidies under president Donald Trump has further slowed uptake.
Despite the shift in tone, Uber’s website continues to state an ambition for 100 per cent of rides in Canada, Europe and the US to be zero-emissions, although no revised deadline has been set.
Khosrowshahi sought to strike a more optimistic note on longer-term technology, suggesting autonomous vehicles could eventually revive Uber’s green ambitions. He said robot-taxis, which are typically electric, could begin operating in London as early as this year.
“One of the benefits of autonomous vehicles is that the vehicles all happen to be electric,” he said. “So the autonomous revolution will also be an electric revolution.”
He added that discussions with UK regulators were progressing, describing London as “leaning in” to both artificial intelligence and autonomous transport, with the UK’s technology talent base “excellent”.
For now, however, Uber’s retreat from its 2030 target underscores the growing gap between political ambition and the realities facing businesses and consumers as the electric vehicle transition loses momentum.
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Uber drops 2030 all-electric target as chief executive warns EV shift is stalling

UK toy sales rose for the first time in five years last year, offering rare optimism for a sector that has struggled since the pandemic, but industry leaders are now watching closely for any fallout from potential social media bans aimed at under-16s.
The value of UK toy sales increased by 6 per cent in 2025, according to data from Circana, marking the first year of value growth since 2020. The total market was valued at £3.9 billion, as the number of toys sold also edged up by 1 per cent compared with the previous year.
Speaking at the annual Toy Fair on Tuesday, analysts said the rebound has been driven largely by the so-called “kidult” market, older children and adults whose purchasing decisions are often influenced by popular culture and online trends.
Melissa Symonds, executive director of UK toys at Circana, described 2025 as a “clear turning point” for the industry after several years of decline.
“Excluding the unusual pandemic years, this was the first period of organic growth since 2016,” she said. “Spending by older consumers has been critical to that recovery.”
Kidults, defined as buyers over the age of 12, accounted for 30 per cent of the UK toy market last year, up from 17 per cent in 2016. Building sets, particularly those produced by LEGO, have remained popular with adults, while collectibles saw 12 per cent growth across generations.
Circana identified franchises such as Pokémon, K-Pop Demon Hunters and Hello Kitty as “market-moving trends”, many of which have been amplified through social media platforms.
Tie-ins with cinema, streaming and video games also performed strongly, with brands linked to Minecraft and Formula 1 cited as particular successes.
However, the industry is increasingly alert to the potential consequences of restrictions on social media use by younger audiences. Symonds said toy makers were closely monitoring developments following the introduction of a social media ban for under-16s in Australia, amid speculation that similar measures could be considered in the UK.
“If bans were introduced more widely, manufacturers and retailers would need to rethink how some products are marketed,” she said, noting the growing role that online platforms play in shaping trends and demand.
Kerri Atherton, spokesperson for the British Toy and Hobby Association, which hosts the Toy Fair at Olympia London, said it was still too early to judge the long-term impact of any potential restrictions.
She described 2025 as a pivotal year for the sector but warned that financial pressures remained acute for both businesses and consumers heading into 2026.
“Cost-of-living pressures haven’t disappeared, even though spending on children, particularly around Christmas, has remained a priority for many families,” she said.
After a pandemic-era surge, toy sales fell back as households cut discretionary spending. The return to growth last year has given the sector renewed confidence, but industry leaders cautioned that sustaining momentum will depend on how successfully manufacturers adapt to changing consumer behaviour, both online and off.
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Toy sellers watch social media curbs as UK market returns to growth

Elon Musk has launched a $134 billion lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft, claiming both companies unjustly profited from his early backing of the artificial intelligence pioneer and abandoned its founding mission.
In a federal court filing on Friday, lawyers for Elon Musk said OpenAI gained between $65.5 billion and $109.4 billion as a result of Musk’s initial funding, reputation and strategic input after he co-founded the organisation in 2015. Microsoft, which owns an estimated 27 per cent stake in OpenAI, is alleged to have benefited by between $13.3 billion and $25.1 billion.
Musk’s legal team argues that without his early involvement, OpenAI, now best known for ChatGPT,  would not exist in its current form. His lawyer, Steven Molo, said Musk provided the “bulk of the seed funding”, lent credibility to the venture and shared expertise in scaling technology businesses.
Musk left OpenAI in 2018 following disagreements over its direction and governance. He now claims the company breached its original non-profit mission by restructuring itself into a more commercially oriented entity, a move designed to attract vast sums of capital to fund its AI ambitions.
OpenAI completed a major restructuring last year alongside Microsoft, valuing the business at $500 billion. Under the new structure, a non-profit OpenAI Foundation will hold equity in a for-profit arm that can raise funds from external investors.
OpenAI dismissed Musk’s claim as “unserious”, accusing him of running a sustained harassment campaign against the company. Microsoft and OpenAI jointly asked the court to restrict the evidence presented by Musk’s expert witness, financial economist C Paul Wazzan, arguing the damages estimates are speculative, unverifiable and misleading.
The companies contend that Musk’s attempt to reclaim “wrongful gains” amounts to an unprecedented transfer of value from a non-profit organisation to a former donor who is now a competitor in the AI race.
The case is due to be heard by a jury in Oakland, California, with the trial expected to begin in April. The dispute adds another chapter to the increasingly bitter rivalry between Musk and Sam Altman, and highlights the growing legal and commercial tensions surrounding the global AI boom.
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Musk sues OpenAI and Microsoft for up to $134bn over ‘wrongful gains’

Gold and silver prices surged to fresh record highs after US President Donald Trump threatened to impose new tariffs on a group of European countries opposing his proposed takeover of Greenland, triggering a renewed rush into safe-haven assets.
Gold climbed to a peak of $4,689.39 (£3,499) an ounce on Monday, while silver touched $94.08 an ounce, as investors sought protection from escalating geopolitical and trade tensions. Precious metals are traditionally viewed as a store of value during periods of uncertainty, and both have already enjoyed a strong rally over the past year.
The move came after Trump announced that a 10% tariff on goods from Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, the UK, the Netherlands and Finland would take effect from 1 February, unless a deal on Greenland is reached. He warned the levy could rise to 25% at a later stage. Reports suggest the EU is preparing a potential €93bn (£80bn) retaliatory tariff package in response.
While bullion prices jumped, equity markets were more subdued. Asian stocks slipped modestly, with Japan’s Nikkei closing 0.6% lower. In Europe, London’s FTSE 100 edged down 0.1%, though mining stocks benefited from the rally in precious metals, with Fresnillo and Endeavour among the risers.
Elsewhere, markets more exposed to trade tensions fell more sharply. Germany’s Dax dropped 1%, weighed down by carmakers including BMW, Mercedes-Benz and Volkswagen. France’s Cac 40 slid 1.2%, with luxury groups under pressure: LVMH fell 3.8% and Hermès dropped 2.5%.
By contrast, European defence stocks traded higher, reflecting heightened geopolitical risk. Germany’s Rheinmetall and France’s Thales both posted gains.
US markets were closed for a public holiday, limiting global trading volumes.
Susannah Streeter, chief investment strategist at Wealth Club, said the rally underlined gold’s renewed appeal. “Gold has hit fresh record highs on its glittering run upwards,” she said. “The precious metal is holding even more allure as a safe haven as worries spread about the repercussions of aggressive US trade and geopolitical policies.”
Gold prices rose by more than 60% last year, driven by persistent global tensions and economic uncertainty, a backdrop that now looks set to continue into 2026.
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Gold and silver hit record highs as Trump tariff threat rattles markets

A pilot of live facial recognition technology in south London has helped cut crime and led to more than 100 arrests, according to the Metropolitan Police, as the force prepares to defend its use of the technology in the High Court.
The three-month trial in Croydon, which began in October, marked the first time the Met has deployed fixed live facial recognition (LFR) cameras mounted on street furniture rather than using mobile vans. Fifteen cameras were installed along two sections of North End, one of the borough’s busiest shopping streets.
The Met said the system has been deployed on 13 occasions during the pilot, with cameras only switched on when officers are present. During that period, 103 arrests were made, with police claiming only one false alert, which did not result in an arrest.
According to the force, around a third of those arrests were linked to offences against women and girls, including sexual assault and strangulation. Other arrests included individuals wanted for kidnap, breach of sexual harm prevention orders, and long-outstanding assault cases.
Superintendent Luke Dillon said overall crime in the Fairfield ward fell by 12 per cent during the pilot period, with notable reductions in shoplifting and robbery. He added that the fixed camera setup allowed officers to operate more efficiently, with arrests made on average every 34 minutes during deployments.
The technology works by mapping facial features and comparing them against police watchlists. The Met said biometric data relating to members of the public who are not wanted by police is immediately deleted.
However, the trial comes amid growing scrutiny of police use of facial recognition. Next week, the force faces a High Court challenge over its deployment of LFR after a man was wrongly identified and stopped near London Bridge last year. Civil liberties campaigners argue the technology poses serious risks to privacy and lacks a clear legislative framework.
The Equality and Human Rights Commission, which has been granted permission to intervene in the case, has said the Met’s current use of LFR breaches human rights law. The force has said it is confident the technology is being used lawfully and proportionately, and insists it has tested its algorithms for bias.
Despite describing LFR as a “game-changing” crime-fighting tool, the Met said there are currently no plans to expand the fixed-camera pilot beyond Croydon.
Tony Kounnis, chief executive of Face Int UK & Europe, said the results highlighted the potential of facial recognition when deployed responsibly.
“This is a strong endorsement of what facial recognition technology can deliver as accuracy improves,” he said. “But it is essential that oversight, transparency and data protection remain central. Without that, there is a real risk of eroding public trust, regardless of the benefits.”
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Facial recognition pilot cuts crime in south London, says Met

Adverts will soon begin appearing inside OpenAI’s flagship chatbot ChatGPT, as the company looks for new ways to monetise one of the world’s most widely used AI tools.
OpenAI has confirmed it will trial advertising in ChatGPT in the United States, with adverts shown to some users on the free version of the service as well as a new lower-cost subscription tier, ChatGPT Go.
ChatGPT Go will be priced at $8 a month in the US, with equivalent pricing rolled out globally. The tier sits below existing paid plans, which include ChatGPT Plus at $20 a month and ChatGPT Pro at $200.
During the trial, adverts will appear at the top of the interface after a user submits a prompt. For example, someone asking ChatGPT for travel recommendations in Mexico may see holiday-related adverts displayed as banner-style placements. OpenAI stressed that the adverts will not influence ChatGPT’s answers and that conversation data will not be shared with advertisers.
The company said it was exploring advertising “so more people can benefit from our tools with fewer usage limits”, signalling that ads could help subsidise wider access to the platform.
The move comes amid growing scrutiny of the economics of the AI sector. Despite explosive user growth, many leading AI companies are still operating at significant losses. The Financial Times reported that OpenAI lost around $8bn (£6bn) in the first half of 2025 alone, with only about 5 per cent of ChatGPT’s estimated 800 million users paying for a subscription.
Henry Ajder, an expert in AI, deepfakes and synthetic media, said the decision was unsurprising given the company’s financial position.
OpenAI has confirmed it will trial advertising in ChatGPT in the United States, with adverts shown to some users on the free version of the service as well as a new lower-cost subscription tier, ChatGPT Go.
“OpenAI has seen enormous growth in users, but it continues to burn investor cash and is not yet a profit-making entity,” he said. “To turn that around, it needs revenue sources beyond subscriptions. For many software businesses, advertising is a proven and reliable model.”
OpenAI was originally founded as a non-profit research organisation but has steadily evolved into a more commercial operation as the costs of building and running large AI models have surged. Advertising has underpinned much of the internet economy for more than two decades, funding everything from search engines to social media platforms.
Despite this, OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman has previously been sceptical about ads, once describing them as “a last resort”. Nevertheless, OpenAI is not alone in reconsidering the approach. Rival AI firm Perplexity created a senior advertising role last year, while Google has denied reports that it plans to introduce ads into its Gemini AI assistant in 2026.
Analysts say OpenAI’s experiment will be closely watched across the tech sector. If successful, it could mark a turning point in how consumer AI products are funded — and potentially signal that the era of ad-free chatbots is coming to an end.
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ChatGPT to carry adverts for some users as OpenAI searches for new revenue

Sir Keir Starmer has condemned Donald Trump’s threat to impose sweeping tariffs on the UK and other European allies over Greenland, calling the move “completely wrong” and warning it undermines Nato unity.
The intervention follows a statement by Donald Trump, who said the United States would introduce a 10 per cent tariff on goods from the UK and seven European countries from 1 February. The levies would rise to 25 per cent on 1 June unless a deal was reached to allow the US to purchase Greenland.
Trump said the tariffs would apply to Nato members, including the UK, France and Germany, that have deployed troops to the Arctic territory amid rising geopolitical tensions. In a post on his Truth Social platform, he accused European countries of travelling to Greenland “for purposes unknown” and described the situation as “very dangerous” for global security.
Responding on Saturday evening, Keir Starmer said the UK’s position was unequivocal.
“Our position on Greenland is very clear, it is part of the Kingdom of Denmark and its future is a matter for the Greenlanders and the Danes,” he said. “Arctic security matters for the whole of Nato, and allies should be working together to address the growing threat from Russia.”
Starmer added: “Applying tariffs on allies for pursuing the collective security of Nato allies is completely wrong. We will of course be pursuing this directly with the US administration.”
Opposition leaders across Westminster echoed the criticism, warning the move would damage British businesses and further strain transatlantic relations.
Kemi Badenoch, leader of the Conservatives, said the threat was misguided. “President Trump is completely wrong to announce tariffs on the UK over Greenland,” she said. “These tariffs will be yet another burden for businesses across our country. The sovereignty of Greenland should only be decided by the people of Greenland.”
Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey said the episode exposed the fragility of the UK’s relationship with Washington. “Trump is now punishing the UK and Nato allies just for doing the right thing,” he said, urging Starmer to work more closely with European and Commonwealth partners to push back.
Even Nigel Farage, a long-time admirer of Trump, acknowledged the potential damage. “We don’t always agree with the US government and in this case we certainly don’t,” he said, adding that the tariffs would “hurt” the UK.
Senior Labour figures also used the moment to argue for a reset in Britain’s strategic posture. Stella Creasy, the Labour MP for Walthamstow, said Trump’s threats underlined the need for closer cooperation with Europe. “If we can’t rely on America and we don’t want to cosy up to China, the answer is to get serious about our strategic future with Europe,” she said.
Former national security adviser Peter Ricketts urged calm diplomacy, telling BBC Radio 4 that European governments should resist escalation and continue to make the case for collective Nato security. He noted that during the Cold War the US maintained a large military presence in Greenland without resorting to economic threats.
“The right way forward is cooperation, not tariffs and bluster,” Ricketts said, adding that any EU response would need to be coordinated at bloc level, limiting Trump’s ability to target individual member states.
The tariff threat comes at a sensitive moment for UK businesses, already grappling with weak growth, high borrowing costs and fragile export demand. Any new trade barriers with the US risk compounding those pressures, particularly for manufacturers and exporters reliant on transatlantic markets.
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Starmer condemns Trump’s Greenland tariff threat as ‘completely wrong’

Amazon is carrying out tuberculosis (TB) testing at its Coventry fulfilment centre after a small number of workers were found to have the infectious lung disease.
The company confirmed that screening is taking place as a precaution, following the identification of several cases at the site, which employs around 2,000 people, according to the GMB union.
The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) began a targeted screening programme at the warehouse in September after a handful of workers were diagnosed with active, contagious TB last year. Amazon said that a further 10 employees subsequently tested positive for latent TB towards the end of 2025.
Latent TB means the bacteria are present in the body but the individual does not have symptoms and cannot pass the disease on. However, without treatment, latent TB can later develop into an active and infectious form.
Dr Roger Gajraj, a consultant in health protection at UK Health Security Agency, said the individuals identified with active TB were responding well to treatment and were no longer infectious.
“As a precaution, and in line with national guidance, we are offering testing to those who may have had closer contact with the affected individuals,” he said. “The overall risk remains low. TB is fully treatable with antibiotics, and we continue to work closely with Amazon to monitor the situation.”
Amazon said it had acted immediately after the initial cases were discovered. A spokesperson said: “We followed guidance from the NHS and UKHSA and made all potentially affected employees aware of the situation. Out of an abundance of caution, we are now running an expanded screening programme with the NHS. Nothing is more important than the safety and wellbeing of our team members.”
However, the GMB union has called for stronger measures. Amanda Gearing, a senior organiser for the union at the Coventry site, urged “immediate and decisive action”, including the temporary closure of the warehouse until infection control measures are fully in place.
The union said NHS staff attended the site this week to carry out blood tests on workers and that multiple cases had been reported. One employee told union representatives there were concerns that some migrant workers could be more vulnerable if they had not received TB vaccinations in their countries of origin.
Coventry City Council said it was encouraging residents to remain alert to symptoms amid a broader national rise in TB cases. A council spokesperson said: “TB testing and treatment is free to everyone on the NHS, regardless of immigration status. Anyone experiencing symptoms should contact their GP or NHS 111 without delay.”
Common symptoms of tuberculosis include a persistent cough lasting more than three weeks, fatigue, fever, night sweats and unexplained weight loss. The disease spreads through prolonged close contact with someone who has active TB.
According to government data published in October, TB notifications rose by 13.6 per cent in 2024 to 5,490 cases, bringing the UK close to the World Health Organization’s threshold for a low-incidence country.
The Coventry warehouse has previously been the focus of industrial unrest, with Amazon narrowly defeating a union recognition vote at the site in 2024.
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Amazon tests Coventry warehouse staff for tuberculosis after outbreak

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In the volatile environment of the cryptocurrency market, DL Mining opening the era of zero-threshold BTC、DOGE、ETH&XRP mining on smartphones,Earn $1K/day easily