Business
GM’s new product chief Sterling Anderson eyes technology renaissance for automaker
GM Chief Product Officer Sterling Anderson during the automaker’s “GM Forward” event on Oct. 22, 2025 in New York City.
GM
DETROIT — General Motors’ newest product and technology executive has said he thinks of the Detroit automaker as a canvas. One that can be curated, retouched or even torn apart.
After roughly six months as executive vice president and chief product officer, Sterling Anderson appears to be putting all three ideas to work as he oversees the company’s vast product portfolio — from the vehicles themselves to the software powering them.
Anderson, who left the self-driving car company Aurora Innovation that he co-founded to join GM in June, has quickly become the most influential product executive in more than 15 years, outside of GM President Mark Reuss.
He has consolidated power to oversee “the end-to-end product lifecycle” of GM vehicles, including manufacturing engineering, battery, software and services product management, and engineering teams, according to GM.
“My priority is to accelerate the pace of innovation. One of the ways we do that is with this disaggregation of, or this abstraction of, software from hardware,” he told CNBC during an Oct. 22 technology event in New York. “That’s the point of the role, I think, is it brings together all of these pieces into a unified approach to how we do product going forward.”
Since then, the company’s acclaimed heads of software and artificial intelligence have unexpectedly exited the company after relatively short tenures. Their main responsibilities related to vehicles now fall under Anderson.
GM attributed the abrupt departures of Dave Richardson, senior vice president of software and services engineering, and Barak Turovsky, head of AI, to restructuring efforts.
Mary Barra, Chair and CEO of General Motors (right to left), Mark Reuss, President, Sterling Anderson, Chief Product Officer, and Dave Richardson, Senior Vice President Software and Services Engineering at “GM Forward” on Wednesday, October 22, 2025 in New York.
GM
“We are strategically integrating AI capabilities directly into our business and product organizations, enabling faster innovation and more targeted solutions,” a GM spokeswoman said about Turovsky’s departure in an emailed statement last week.
It’s another indication of Anderson’s strategy. He previously told CNBC that for GM to succeed, software and product must be thought of as one and the same rather than as separate units, like they have been in recent years.
Anderson said he spent the first months of his GM tenure “in a listen mode,” immersing himself in the automaker’s operations.
“What that five months of listening has allowed me to do is really fine tune and target how we’re going, not just kind of what we’re going to innovate on, but how we’re going to do it,” he said in the October interview.
A third executive is also leaving soon, as Baris Cetinok, senior vice president of software and services product management, will depart the company effective Dec. 12, as first reported by CNBC.
Unlike Richardson and Turovsky, the company did not attribute his departure to the restructuring. Three sources familiar with the situation who spoke anonymously because the discussion was private told CNBC that Cetinok left to pursue another opportunity.
Cetinok, Richardson and Turovsky either declined to comment or did not respond to requests for comment about their departures. Cetinok and Richardson joined GM in 2023, while Turovsky was hired in March.
‘Silicon Valley cowboy’
Anderson, a former McKinsey & Co. consultant turned Tesla executive, said before he joined GM, he had thought of the automaker more of a comedic caricature rather than a canvas that he would help turn into a modern masterpiece.
Anderson said CEO Mary Barra and Reuss, whom he reports to, helped him break down that “old-world automotive” caricature and concerns about employees of the automaker not supporting his efforts.
“I was really worried about it, right? I’m the ‘Silicon Valley cowboy’ that’s coming into Detroit and, you know, ‘pew pewing’ his way through an innovation story with a team that I was concerned wouldn’t receive that well. I found it quite different from what I’d expected,” Anderson said.
His appointment is a refocus for the automaker on software-defined vehicles and autonomy. He said GM’s goal is to build an autonomous vehicle, which comes a year after the company disbanded its majority-owned Cruise AV business following years of development and billions of dollars in capital.
New York Times columnist Andrew Ross Sorkin and Chair and CEO of General Motors Mary Barra speak onstage during the 2025 New York Times Dealbook Summit at Jazz at Lincoln Center on December 03, 2025 in New York City.
Michael M. Santiago | Getty Images News | Getty Images
“Just be clear, we’re developing a self-driving product,” he told CNBC. “It’s a self-driving product that can be safe without any handbacks to the human in safety critical situations.”
Barra on Wednesday cited Anderson and the automaker’s past efforts in autonomous vehicles as reasons why GM is “well positioned” to achieve autonomous highway driving in its vehicles beginning in 2028.
“As we talk about artificial intelligence, autonomous driving is one of the ultimate applications that I still strongly believe in,” Barra said at The New York Times DealBook Summit, reconfirming the automaker’s “personal autonomous vehicle” plans rather than Cruise robotaxis.
Anderson is considered a leading expert in vehicle autonomy. Before co-founding self-driving firm Aurora, he led Tesla’s Model X program and the team that delivered its “Autopilot” advanced driver assistance system. He also developed the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s “Intelligent Co-Pilot,” a semi-autonomous vehicle safety system.
Anderson, who holds a master’s and Ph.D. in robotics from MIT, said it took several conversations for him to leave Aurora, which he thought he “would die with.”
He isn’t alone in his change of heart; however not many have lasted long at the automaker. Several other current and former Silicon Valley executives have voiced similar optimism about GM as well as its longstanding CEO and president — both of whom have spent their entire careers at the automaker as “GM lifers.”
Richardson previously hailed working for Barra, who he reported to before Anderson, as “an opportunity of a lifetime.” Cetinok previously described his position as “a product person’s dream” in an interview with CNBC.
Jens Peter “JP” Clausen, who led Tesla’s manufacturing expansion and worked at Lego and Google, partly credited the “opportunity to work for a leader like” Barra as a reason to join GM as its head of manufacturing before an unexpected departure after only one year.
The accolades have gone both ways. When Anderson’s appointment with GM was announced in May, Barra and Reuss hailed Anderson as being equipped to “evolve” and “reinvent” the automaker’s operations.
In addition to Anderson’s new product unit, Reuss continues to oversee the automaker’s manufacturing, design, marketing and sales, among other operations.
Tech execs
The global automotive industry has battled for years to better integrate technology into vehicles — from their production to consumer-facing software and remote, or “over-the-air,” updates like Tesla pioneered.
GM has taken an aggressive approach to tech by hiring leaders from Tesla and companies such as Apple and Google. However, many times, those executives have had short tenures with the company, such as the three most recent departures.
“[Traditional U.S. automakers] have very much had a significant struggle with understanding software and electronics technology, and that has caused them to have a parade of experts quote ‘coming in to help,'” said Peter Abowd, an engineer turned automotive and technology consultant.
Abowd, general manager of engineering excellence at consulting firm Envorso, attributed the executive turnover to “a misapplication of skills and talent,” as well as unrealistic expectations and overwhelming responsibilities in a company as large as GM and an industry as complex as the automotive world.
“It’s just kind of setting the person up for a bit of failure,” Abowd said. “In a couple years, you can’t culturally shift an organization … so the best thing to do is to part ways.”
That kind of turnover has led automakers like GM to regularly pivot in different directions, including in-vehicle technologies, electric vehicle batteries and other areas not traditionally “core” to the automotive industry.
Barra, who is GM’s longest-serving CEO since the company’s founder, has become known for hiring executives at opportunistic times based on the company’s top priorities, which now appear to largely land under Anderson.
GM “is really good at a lot on things” that aren’t necessarily apparent to those outside the company, according to Anderson. He said he believes combining his experience with fast-moving companies such as Tesla and Aurora and GM’s “massive machine” and resources will better position the automaker for the future.
“I view it as a canvas,” Anderson said. “This is an extraordinary opportunity for innovation, and I’d be remiss not to see what I can do for it.”
The FTSE 100 forged ahead on Thursday as a less “hawkish” than feared rate cut by the US Federal Reserve and a brighter US economic outlook spurred stocks, despite some fresh AI worry.
The FTSE 100 index closed up 47.63 points, 0.5%, at 9,703.16. The FTSE 250 ended 21.13 points higher, 0.1%, at 21,852.10, and the AIM All-Share ended up 1.04 points, 0.1%, at 747.66.
In Europe on Thursday, the CAC 40 in Paris closed up 0.8%, while the DAX 40 in Frankfurt ended 0.7% higher.
After Europe’s close on Wednesday, the US central bank cut interest rates by 25 basis points as expected and chairman Jerome Powell struck a softer tone than some had feared.
Bank of America called it an “unintentionally dovish cut”, Citi said markets “had overestimated how hawkish Mr Powell would sound,” while JPMorgan noted Mr Powell’s opening remarks were “less forceful than those used in October”.
“Relative to markets that were looking for Powell to push back more strongly at the potential for further cuts, this was a dovish outcome,” Citi said.
Goldman Sachs said “dovish labour market comments” and the “lack of a stronger lean toward a January pause led to a dovish market reaction”.
In addition, the Federal Reserve raised expectations for economic growth in the US for 2026 through to 2028, expecting a bounce back after the government shutdown.
Sarah House, analyst at Wells Fargo, said: “Our base case remains that the current easing cycle is not over yet but rather that it is entering a slower phase.”
Stocks in New York were mixed at the time of the London equity close after rising sharply on Wednesday in the wake of the Fed’s rate call.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 1.0%, the S&P 500 index was 0.4% lower, while the Nasdaq Composite was down 1.1%.
Oracle knocked the more optimistic market mood after hours on Wednesday by warning of higher capital expenditure as it grapples with buoyant artificial intelligence demand.
Shares in the Texas-based cloud technologies-focused company were 14% lower in New York on Thursday around the time of the London close.
Stifel noted shares are being hit by “continued uncertainty around exactly how Oracle is going to fund its data centre build-out requirements”.
The Fed rate call saw bond yields drop and the dollar fade.
The yield on the US 10-year Treasury was quoted at 4.12%, down from 4.18% on Wednesday. The yield on the US 30-year Treasury was at 4.77%, trimmed from 4.78%.
The pound was quoted higher at 1.3416 dollars at the time of the London equities close on Thursday, compared with 1.3332 dollars on Wednesday.
The euro stood at 1.1746 dollars, up against 1.1647 dollars. Against the yen, the dollar was trading lower at 155.24 yen compared with 156.36 yen.
Figures showed the US trade deficit unexpectedly decreased markedly in September.
According to data published by the US Census Bureau and the US Bureau of Economic Analysis the country’s trade deficit narrowed by 11% monthly in September to 52.8 billion dollars, from 59.3 billion dollars in August.
The FXStreet-cited consensus was for the trade deficit to increase to 63.3 billion dollars in September.
The last time the US’s trade deficit was lower was in June 2020, when it was at 49.16 billion dollars.
US exports climbed 3.0% to 289.3 billion dollars, while imports edged up 0.6% to 342.1 billion dollars.
In London, renewed strength in the gold price lifted Endeavour Mining, up 3.2%, and Fresnillo, up 3.0%.
Magnum Ice Cream continued its strong first week of trading, rising a further 5.6%, while an AI collaboration with IBM supported Pearson, up 2.0%.
Grocer J Sainsbury was lifted 2.1% by an upgrade by Citi to “buy” but the same broker reiterated a “sell” rating on Primark owner Associated British Foods, helping push shares down 1.6%.
Also on the wane, betting operator Entain, which fell 2.2% after stating Rob Wood, its chief financial officer and deputy chief executive, will step down in 2026 after 13 years at the firm.
On the FTSE 250, RS Group took the spoils, up 6.2%, after netting an upgrade to “overweight” from JPMorgan.
But Ceres Power slid 11% after a scathing attack from activist short-seller Grizzly Research.
In a report, Grizzly Research said Ceres is “hiding a flawed business model with abysmally small revenue potential behind a facade of big-name announcements and lofty projections”.
Grizzly said its research shows that Ceres has a history of “ambitious partnerships and unrealistic projections that keeps repeating”.
Faring better, Drax Group advanced 1.4% after stating it expects full-year adjusted earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation to be at the top end of the consensus forecast range of £892 million to £909 million.
In addition, the electricity generator said it is looking at opportunities to maximise value from the Drax Power Station site, which covers 1,000 acres in North Yorkshire.
Brent oil was quoted at 60.91 dollars a barrel at the time of the London equities close on Thursday, down from 61.42 dollars late Wednesday.
The biggest risers on the FTSE 100 were Magnum Ice Cream, up 63.20 pence at 1,186.20p, Ashtead Group, up 225.00p at 5,010.00p, JD Sports Fashion, up 2.80p at 81.72p, Endeavour Mining, up 110.00p at 3,544.00p and IAG, up 12.00p at 397.60p.
The biggest fallers on the FTSE 100 were Informa, down 30.60p at 899.00p, Smith & Nephew, down 34.50p at 1,214.50p, Entain, down 16.60p at 743.20p, AB Foods, down 33.00p at 2,097.50p and Centrica, down 2.20p at 165.30p.
Friday’s economic calendar has CPI prints in France and Germany and UK GDP and industrial production figures.
Friday’s UK corporate calendar has half-year results from Taylor Maritime.
– Contributed by Alliance News
The cost of travelling on the London Underground, the Overground and the Elizabeth line is set to rise by 5.8% next year, the mayor of London has confirmed.
The increase is 1% above the rate of inflation and will come into force in March.
The freeze in national rail fares announced last month will not apply to Transport for London services.
Sir Sadiq Khan says he proposes to freeze the price of Travelcards until March 2027 which means the weekly and daily caps will not change, and fares on London buses and trams will not rise.
The mayor said a rise – equivalent to one percentage point above the RPI rate of inflation – was a condition of the £2.2bn capital funding deal that TfL agreed with central government in the spending review in June.
He said the freeze on bus and tram fares until July 2026 was “an emergency cost-of-living measure” funded by City Hall.
Sir Sadiq added: “This is the seventh time I’ve been able to freeze bus and tram fares, and it will particularly benefit those on the lowest incomes in our city.
“The plans would mean that only fares on Tube and TfL rail services would now increase from March 2026.
“I also plan to ensure that increases to pay-as-you-go fares on the Tube will be capped at 20p, with many only rising by just 10p.”
City Hall Conservatives criticised the announcement.
In a statement, they said: “Whilst the rest of the country enjoys a fare freeze, Sadiq Khan has burdened Londoners with cost increases that are disproportionately going to affect the young professionals that are the backbone of our city’s economy, as well the other millions of passengers who use these services.”
The Liberal Democrats said the mayor had “failed to make this case to his ‘mates’ in government like he promised he would, he’s now expecting working Londoners to stump up the costs instead”.
The fare rises will apply to all TfL-run rail services, including the Docklands Light Railway.
The mayor said the increase would mean an off-peak pay-as-you-go Tube fare from Tottenham Court Road in Zone 1 to Edgware in Zone 5 would rise from £3.60 to £3.80.
Pay-as-you-go fares on Tube and TfL rail services within Zone 1 only will rise from £2.90 to £3.10 in the peak, and from £2.80 to £3.00 during off-peak and weekends.
A peak-time journey from Upminster in Zone 6 to Cannon Street in Zone 1 will increase from £5.80 to £5.90.
The government capital funding deal is expected to help to replace aging fleets, upgrade signalling technology and improve buses.
The fare rises will be subject to a final decision by the mayor.
Business
EPFO Offers Low-Penalty Route For Employers To Enrol Left-Out Employees, Check How To Do It
Last Updated:
EPFO launches a six-month window for employers to declare left-out employees under Employees Enrolment Scheme 2025.
Under existing rules, all employees earning up to Rs 15,000 in basic pay must be enrolled in EPFO schemes.
The Employee Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) has announced a six-month window for employers to declare left-out employees between July 01, 2017 and October 31, 2025. It will help them to regularise past compliance. It has the option to avail benefits under the Employees’ Enrolment Scheme 2025. The special six-month window is open between November 01, 2025 and April 30, 2026.
The regulator is offering several benefits to employers for declaring left-out employees under the scheme. One of the key benefits is a nominal penalty of Rs 100 per establishment for declaring left-out employees. Moreover, there will be no suo moto action during the scheme period against employers.
There is a provision to waive the employee share if not deducted.
All establishments, whether already covered or not covered under the
EPF & MP Act, 1952, are eligible to participate in the Employees’
Enrolment Campaign, 2025.
The objective of the EEC–2025 is to:
a. Facilitate voluntary compliance by employers in enrolling all eligible
employees left out of EPF coverage;
b. Enable employers to regularize past defaults with minimal penal
consequences; and
c. Broaden the social security coverage under the EPF & MP Act, 1952.
How Can They Declare?
Declarations can be filed online only through the EPFO Portal.
Employers will generate a Face Authentication–based UAN for
each declared employee using the UMANG App.
Contributions will be remitted using Electronic Challan-cum-Return
(ECR) linked to a Temporary Return Reference Number (TRRN)
generated during the declaration process.
Click here to add News18 as your preferred news source on Google. December 11, 2025, 18:31 IST
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