Stellantis North America COO and Jeep CEO Antonio Filosa speaks during the Stellantis press conference at the Automobility LA 2024 car show at Los Angeles Convention Center in Los Angeles, California, November 21, 2024.

Etienne Laurent | AFP | Getty Images

DETROIT — Five years after the transatlantic automaker Stellantis was formed through a merger, the business hasn’t necessarily panned out as investors hoped.

U.S. shares of the company — created through a $52 billion combination of Italian American automaker Fiat Chrysler and France-based Groupe PSA on Jan. 16, 2021 — are down roughly 43% in the past five years. Italian-listed shares also are off roughly 40%.

Since the combined company’s stock debuted on the New York Stock Exchange on Jan. 19, 2021, days after the merger was completed, shares of the automaker were largely in the black — up as high as 74% in March 2024 — until Stellantis reported troubling financial results that year amid cost-cutting efforts meant to support higher profits and its multibillion-dollar push into electric vehicles.

Many of those plans are being altered or eliminated under new Stellantis CEO Antonio Filosa, who succeeded Carlos Tavares last summer. Tavares, a longtime automotive executive, was largely credited with forming the company, but abruptly left Stellantis in December 2024.

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Stellantis shares listed in the U.S. and Italy.

Filosa is executing a sales turnaround plan for the automaker and is particularly focused on its Jeep and Ram brands regaining U.S. market share following yearslong sales declines.

“The strategy that we have in front of us is a strong one and will lead us to growth if we execute well,” he told reporters Wednesday during the Detroit Auto Show. “So, I believe it’s a year of execution.”

Filosa did not rule out the possibility of regionally refocusing or shrinking the company’s vast portfolio of brands that also includes Italian nameplates Fiat and Alfa Romeo, which have not performed well domestically.

He said he believes the company should “stay together” following some speculation, including from Tavares, that it would be better to sell off assets or brands.

Filosa said the next step in the company’s plans will come during a meeting this month with more than 200 company executives that will focus on an upcoming capital markets day as well as company culture and 2026 execution.

PSA CEO Carlos Tavares and FCA CEO Mike Manley shake hands after signing a combination agreement that will lead to the creation of the world’s fourth-largest global automaker in terms of annual sales (8.7 million vehicles).

FCA

Investors have been eager to hear a new strategy for Stellantis after Tavares’ exit. He left amid troubling sales and financial results as the company strived to achieve 10% or greater profit margins and doubling net revenues under his “Dare Forward 2030” business plan.

U.S. shares of Stellantis since Filosa began as CEO on June 23 are up 2%. They closed Friday at $9.60 per share, down 4.2%.

Filosa this week declined to discuss the company’s past mistakes, but company executives previously told CNBC that Tavares’ fixation on cost reductions and profits hurt business, as well as the company’s products, employees and relationships with suppliers, unions and dealers.

Filosa has spent much of his time attempting to repair those bonds, especially with the company’s distraught U.S. franchised retailers. He’s also approved drastic changes to the company’s product plans, including reducing prices and reprioritizing products away from electrified vehicles.

“In the six months, I see the changes that we will make we need to make to create the bright future that we need,” he said regarding his tenure thus far as CEO.

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An electric air taxi by Joby Aviation sits at the Downtown Manhattan Heliport in New York City, Nov. 12, 2023.

Roselle Chen | Reuters

Joby Aviation on Wednesday said it bought a 700,000-square-foot manufacturing facility in Dayton, Ohio, as the air taxi maker gears up to meet its production goals for electric vertical takeoff and landing aircrafts, also known as eVTOLs.

Joby agreed to purchase the facility from Capstone STS for $61.5 million, according to a filing.

The company said the new location, its second in Ohio, more than doubles the size of its manufacturing footprint. The company also reiterated plans announced last year to more than double production capacity to four aircrafts a month by 2027.

CEO JoeBen Bevirt said the facility will support future growth plans at Joby, and ties into efforts to revitalize the commercial and defense aerospace industries on U.S. soil.

“The reindustrialization of Ohio has become central to Joby’s story and with unmatched governmental and policy support, we’re ready to make sure that the commercial and defense aircraft that define the future of flight are built right here in America,” Bevirt said in a release announcing the news.

Air taxi makers like Joby have scaled manufacturing in recent months, building up production facilities to support the burgeoning market and gain an edge over competitors. These companies are also racing for certification from the Federal Aviation Administration, which they need to start flying their aircrafts commercially.

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The logo of pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk is displayed in front of its offices in Bagsvaerd, on the outskirts of Copenhagen, Denmark, Nov. 24, 2025.

Tom Little | Reuters

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Monday approved the first-ever GLP-1 pill for obesity from Wegovy maker Novo Nordisk, a landmark decision that health experts say could open up treatment access to more patients.

Novo Nordisk said it expects to launch the pill in early 2026. The Danish drugmaker said starting in early January, the starting dose of 1.5 milligrams will be available in pharmacies and via select telehealth providers with savings offers for $149 per month.

That’s the same price that cash-paying patients can access the starting dose of the pill on President Donald Trump’s direct-to-consumer website, TrumpRx, under a deal Novo Nordisk struck with his administration last month. Trump’s site also launches in January.

Novo Nordisk did not say how much higher doses of the drug would cost, but said additional information on coverage and savings options for eligible patients will be available at that time as well.

Shares of Novo Nordisk gained roughly 10% in extended trading Monday.

The FDA’s approval also clears the pill for use to reduce the risk of major cardiovascular events, such as death, heart attack or stroke, in adults with obesity and established cardiovascular disease, according to Novo Nordisk.

That’s consistent with the approval label of the company’s blockbuster weight loss drug Wegovy, which shares the same active ingredient, semaglutide. Both work by mimicking the gut hormone GLP-1 to suppress appetite.

“What we’ve learned through years of research is that having an oral option really kind of opens up, activates and motivates different segments to seek treatment,” Dave Moore, Novo Nordisk’s executive vice president of U.S. operations, told CNBC ahead of the approval. “To have that conversation with their doctor to see if this is something that might be right for them.”

“That’s what we’re excited about — to be able to give people an option and make sure we have access and ease of access like we have been doing with our injections,” he continued. He added that patients will have the “comfort and familiarity” on the safety and efficacy side since the pill contains the same active ingredient as Wegovy.

Some health experts said pills could reach people who are afraid of needles or patients who might benefit from the existing injections but don’t take them because they don’t view their need as severe enough. 

It’s unclear exactly how many people are using GLP-1s in the U.S., especially for obesity in particular. But around 1 in 8 adults said they were taking a GLP-1 drug to lose weight or treat another chronic condition as of November, according to a poll from health policy research organization KFF.

The approval gives Novo Nordisk a head start over its chief rival Eli Lilly, which is currently the dominant player in the market and is racing to launch its own obesity pill. Pills are the next battleground for the two drugmakers, which established the booming GLP-1 space that some analysts say could be worth roughly $100 billion by the 2030s.

Wall Street thinks there’s plenty of room for pills in the market, with Goldman Sachs analyst saying in August that pills could capture a 24% share — or around $22 billion — of the 2030 global weight loss drug market.

In a note Monday, BMO Capital Markets analyst Evan Seigerman said the approval of Novo Nordisk’s pill gives the company a “much-needed win in light of recent challenges maintaining incretin market share dominance.”

Incretins refer to treatments that mimic gut hormones such as GLP-1. Eli Lilly earlier this year gained the majority share of the market thanks to its blockbuster obesity injection Zepbound, which has shown to be more effective than Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy.

“Novo will likely benefit from first-mover advantage, capturing patients with a preference for convenience and comfort provided by an oral dosing regimen,” Seigerman said. But he also noted that the market is “rapidly evolving with competitive assets in development” and an approval for Eli Lilly’s pill, orforglipron, “just around the corner.”

What to know about the Wegovy pill

The approval is based on a phase three trial that followed more than 300 adults with obesity but not diabetes.

In that study, a 25-milligram dose of Novo Nordisk’s oral semaglutide helped patients lose up to 16.6% of their weight on average after 64 weeks, according to results from the trial presented at a medical conference in 2024. That weight loss was 13.6% when the company analyzed all patients regardless of whether they stopped the drug.

The pill appears to be slightly more effective than an experimental oral drug from Eli Lilly, which is still waiting for FDA approval.

But unlike Novo Nordisk’s pill, Eli Lilly’s treatment is not a peptide medication. That means it is absorbed more easily by the body and does not require dietary restrictions. People who take Novo Nordisk’s pill have to wait 30 minutes before eating or drinking each day.

But Moore said several existing medicines have the same dietary requirements, so “we don’t see it as something that impacts adherence to treatment.” He noted that Novo Nordisk’s research has found that it helps patients to remember to take their medicine in the morning with a few sips of water.

“It’s actually a reinforcement factor for patients,” Moore said.

He added that the prices of the pill get costs closer to what some people are paying for unapproved, compounded versions of branded GLP-1s, some of which are still being illegally mass-marketed and sold in the U.S.

Patients flocked to the cheaper copycats when Ozempic and Wegovy were in short supply over the last two years due to skyrocketing demand, or if they didn’t have insurance coverage for the costly treatments. During FDA-declared shortages, pharmacists can legally make compounded versions of brand-name medications. But the agency earlier this year determined that the shortage of semaglutide is over, barring the practice in many cases.

“It continues to be alarming and disturbing for us,” Moore told CNBC, referring to illegitimate ingredients that are imported into the U.S. illegally and used by some compounding pharmacies to create copycat versions of branded GLP-1s.

In terms of manufacturing, Moore said the company is “prepared to be able to satisfy a big demand here in the U.S., and we’re pretty excited about it.” Novo Nordisk said manufacturing is underway at its North Carolina facilities.

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Medianews Group/boston Herald Via Getty Images | Medianews Group | Getty Images

Los Angeles resident Ruth Horne, 76, enticed by a bargain, bought what she thought was a Roomba to vacuum her house, but the experience ended in frustration.

“It kept getting stuck somewhere and would then just go around in circles,” Horne said. She realized it was a cheaper knock-off.

Meanwhile, Marcy Lewis, 75, of Madeira, Ohio, had been wanting a robot vacuum cleaner and deliberately chose a knock-off.

“I’m pretty low tech, but it just seemed like a good idea — cleaner house, less work,” Lewis said.

She was watching Prime Day sales and got a good deal on a Eufy robot vacuum cleaner. “I really liked it and it did a good job, but didn’t last long,” Lewis said.

Product quality was one of the advantages for the Roomba in a flood of less expensive knock-offs, but that didn’t save it from the corporate bankruptcy its maker iRobot announced earlier this week. And cheap Chinese competition was not the only factor in its failure. An attempted 2022 acquisition of iRobot by Amazon, thwarted by regulators, and the changing dynamics around mergers and acquisitions, represent an ongoing concern for struggling tech companies that in the past have turned to M&A as not just an exit ramp, but savior.

The company, which Amazon agreed to pay $1.7 billion to acquire in August 2022, reported in a court filing last Sunday that it had between $100 million-$500 million in assets and liabilities, and owed roughly $100 million to its largest creditor, Shenzhen Picea Robotics Co., the contract manufacturer, located in China and Vietnam, which now owns it. In all, Reuters reported the company has $190 million in debt.

“Today’s outcome is profoundly disappointing — and it was avoidable,” Colin Angle, co-founder and CEO of iRobot, told CNBC in a statement earlier this week. “This is nothing short of a tragedy for consumers, the robotics industry and America’s innovation economy.”

In early 2024, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy told CNBC that regulators’ efforts to block the deal were a “sad story” and said it would’ve given iRobot a competitive boost against rivals.

Some M&A experts agree with the view of both the would-be acquirer and bankrupt company.

“The iRobot case demonstrates that when regulators prioritize hypothetical future harms over present-day financial realities, they don’t protect competition; they destroy the target company,” said Kristina Minnick is a professor of finance at Bentley University. “The bankruptcy of iRobot serves as a definitive cautionary tale for the current M&A environment, underscoring fears that regulators are dismantling the traditional safety net for struggling companies,” she said.

Acquisitions are an integral part of recycling assets and growing the economy, but regulators in the U.S. and in Europe have taken a stance in recent years which Minnick says “distorts this natural cycle.”

She added that by blocking Amazon’s white knight acquisition of iRobot, regulators removed the only viable exit ramp for a struggling American robotics pioneer.

“The tragic irony is that instead of remaining an independent competitor, iRobot was forced into bankruptcy and is now being sold to one of its Chinese manufacturing partners. In their zeal to prevent Big
Tech expansion, regulators effectively handed valuable IP and market share to the very foreign competitors that were crushing the company in the first place,” Minnick said.

After Amazon abandoned the deal in early 2024 citing the likelihood that European regulators would block it, newer issues emerged for the already vulnerable company.

“Roomba didn’t just run out of battery, it got shoved into Chapter 11 after European regulators kicked out Amazon’s $1.4 billion escape hatch and left it bleeding cash on the living-room floor,” said Eric Schiffer, chairman at Reputation Management Consultants. “Amazon walked, tariffs hit, cheap rivals swarmed, and suddenly the king of robo-vacs is begging its own manufacturer to save its plastic rear end,” Schiffer said. “This is a cautionary tale that if your business model is to get bought by Big Tech, one hostile regulator in Europe can turn your dream exit into a Caligula-level catastrophic implosion.”

Jay Jung, managing partner at Embarc Advisors, a San Francisco-based corporate finance advisory firm, says that iRobot’s bankruptcy is ominous for future similar deals if regulators don’t learn the lessons of the past few years. “European regulators are within their rights to block these deals,” he said. But he added that “their stance is too tilted towards anti-big tech. When a Chinese company like this takes over, they will preserve the brand but everything moves to China — lost jobs, and any other economic benefit other than the brand is gone.”

At least publicly, the Trump administration’s Federal Trade Commission seems to be taking a more hands-off approach to M&A than its Biden era predecessors led by FTC Chair Lina Khan, who had a hawkish antitrust stance. It has vowed to take a dual approach on mergers: vigorously pursue ones deemed anti-competitive and stand out of the way one of ones that don’t meet that criteria. “If we’ve got a merger or conduct that violates the antitrust laws, and I think I can prove it in court, I’m going to take you to court. And if we don’t, I’m going to get the hell out of the way,” FTC Chair Andrew Ferguson told CNBC’s Squawk Box earlier this year.

But in Europe, the view towards tech M&A remains tilted to scrutiny. EU antitrust chief Teresa Ribera telegraphed that there could be more to come in comments earlier this month when announcing an anti-trust probe against Meta’s plans to block AI rivals from Whatsapp, which it owns. The action she said was to prevent dominant tech players from “abusing their power to crowd out innovative competitors”

That is cold comfort for a struggling tech company, and Minnick said big tech is already finding workarounds to avoid antitrust scrutiny. As a direct result of these blocked exit ramps, the tech giants are now attempting to circumvent regulators through asset purchases rather than full company acquisitions.

“In deals like Microsoft’s arrangement with Inflection AI or Amazon’s deal with Adept, the acquirer hires the target’s founders and key engineering talent while licensing their intellectual property, leaving the corporate shell behind,” Minnick said, adding that this “reverse acqui-hire” structure is designed specifically as a loophole to bypass antitrust review.

The FTC did in fact issue a report on these types of deals in the final days of Lina Khan’s tenure, after it had targeted the Amazon-Adept deal for scrutiny.

Minnick says even if the deal tweaks are successful, they remain imperfect solutions for a broader M&A problem. “While this allows the technology to survive, it is a sub-optimal outcome that often leaves regular shareholders and non-essential employees stranded in a hollowed-out zombie company, proving that regulatory friction is forcing the market into increasingly complex and inefficient contortions to survive,” she said.

The iRobot headquarters in Bedford, Massachusetts, US, on Friday, June 16, 2023.

Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Minnick believes that if things don’t change, we are likely to see more of these zombie scenarios, where struggling tech and media companies find their exit ramps blocked by regulators overseas or at home. “The refusal to allow organic consolidation means that instead of orderly acquisitions that preserve jobs and innovation, we may see more disorderly bankruptcies,” Minnick said. “If potential acquirers are genuinely concerned about overpaying or regulatory hurdles, they will choose not to engage. But when regulators preemptively block these lifelines to make a philosophical point, they are not saving the market; instead, they are breaking the machinery that allows the economy to heal and grow,” she added.

Roomba did face more than just M&A headwinds, including financial problems accelerated by the Trump administration’s trade policy.

Ragini Bhalla, head of brand at Creditsafe, has been watching iRobot’s deteriorating finances for a while. The company began paying vendors three to four weeks late beginning in May, Bhalla said, and that volatility in paying vendors and suppliers is usually an early warning sign of emerging liquidity pressure. She also said that iRobot’s credit score steadily dropped over a period of five months until it was rated “Very High Risk” in June 2025, where it stayed until the bankruptcy filing.

Bhalla also noted that revenue declined amid intensifying competition from lower-priced Chinese rivals and that tariffs emerged as a direct and material accelerant. Trade policy was the final blow. “Most Roombas are manufactured in Vietnam, exposing iRobot to new U.S. import levies that added millions in costs and disrupted forward planning,” Bhalla said.

Ultimately, the combination of elevated debt, eroding demand, and tariff-driven cost pressure pushed iRobot into a manufacturer-led buyout through bankruptcy. “This illustrates how trade policy shocks can quickly turn underlying operational stress into a solvency event for hardware-dependent businesses,” Bhalla said.

There is no going back from an antitrust regime that has gone global, according to Schiffer, and Roomba may merely be the most high-profile casualty of 2025.

“Your suitor can live in Seattle, your stock on Nasdaq, and some wacky commission in Brussels holds the shotgun to your wedding,” Schiffer said, adding that for founders, “Roomba is the billboard warning that if you rely on one mega-deal to save you, you’re not running a strategy, you’re rehearsing for disaster.”

Meanwhile, Lewis in Ohio just wants a working Roomba.

“I am surprised about the bankruptcy, but I don’t feel that it affects me. I’m also disappointed that a Chinese company is buying Roomba — sadly that seems to be the way things go now. It’s nice to buy American, but it gets harder and harder.”

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An Embraer SA E190-E2 passenger aircraft stands on display on day two of the Farnborough International Airshow (FIA) 2018 in Farnborough, U.K., on Tuesday, July 17, 2018. 

Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Brazilian airplane maker Embraer has landed its first U.S. sale of its efficient but slow-selling E2 jets with a 50-plane deal from startup carrier Avelo Airlines.

Avelo first started flying in April 2021 with used Boeing 737s but has struggled and recently exited a host of cities on the West Coast. It has also turned to flying deportees for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which has sparked protests, demonstrations and backlash from some politicians.

The low-cost airline focuses on smaller cities, with a large operation out of Connecticut. On Monday, without providing a figure or an investor, Avelo announced it won the “single largest investment” since the carrier launched and said the money will be used to grow and improve customer experience. The new Embraer jets, scheduled to start arriving in the first half of 2027, represent big growth for Avelo, which has just 22 Boeing planes now, according to its website.

Avelo said the order for 50 E195-E2 planes, with options for 50 more, will help it modernize its fleet. The airline is betting that the planes’ two-by-two seating configuration and quieter cabins compared with older jets will be a hit with customers.

Read more CNBC airline news

While dwarfed by major U.S. plane maker Boeing and rival Airbus, Embraer is known for building regional jets that airlines rely on for thousands of flights a day for shorter routes or to smaller cities. It has also been solidly profitable for two years, while Boeing, which terminated a more than $4 billion tie-up with Embraer as it dealt with several crises, has struggled.

Despite its solid footing, Embaer’s newer, more fuel-efficient E2 jets have been outsold by similarly sized aircraft like the Airbus A220 family.

The E195-E2, the largest in that family, can seat 132 people in a single-class cabin with 31-inch seat pitch (a measure of the distance from one seat to the one behind it) or 120 people in a three-class cabin.

“The aircraft’s exceptional performance, size, and efficiency make it the perfect choice for the future growth of our scheduled service network,” said Avelo CEO Andrew Levy, former United Airlines CFO, in a news release.

The airline’s used Boeings can seat up to 189 passengers, but too much capacity can drive down fares. Struggling budget carrier Spirit Airlines, for example, lists Airbus A321Neos, with 229 seats.

One challenge with smaller jets for bigger airlines has been that the “majors regard them as a fleet complication,” said Richard Aboulafia, managing director at AeroDynamic Advisory, an industry consulting firm, since they would have to train pilots, acquire simulators and put up other costs to add to their lineups.

“The E2 has terrific economics but airlines have an irrational obsession for range they don’t need,” Aboulafia said.

Avelo’s order is worth $4.4 billion at list prices, the airline said, but that is before usual discounts. Slower-selling planes or big orders often come with significant price cuts.

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Brand new Lucid electric cars sit parked in front of a Lucid Studio showroom in San Francisco on May 24, 2024.

Justin Sullivan | Getty Images

Electric vehicle maker Lucid Group on Tuesday said CEO Peter Rawlinson has stepped down as the company expects to more than double vehicle production this year to 20,000 units.

Lucid said Marc Winterhoff, the company’s chief operating officer, has taken over as interim CEO. Rawlinson will serve as a “strategic technical advisor to the chairman of the board, stepping aside from his prior roles,” the company said.

Winterhoff told CNBC on Tuesday that it was Rawlinson’s decision to resign as of Friday, however he declined to elaborate on any additional details.

“It was Peter’s decision after 12 years of, let’s say, daily grind or daily activities and bringing the company where it is today … that it is time to step aside and pass the baton,” said Winterhoff, who joined Lucid from Roland Berger in December 2023.

In a statement posted Tuesday on LinkedIn, Rawlinson said he decided it was “finally the right time” to step down after “successfully” launching the company’s second product, a three-row SUV called the Gravity. He did not elaborate further on the decision in the lengthy post.

Rawlinson’s departure is unexpected. As one of the company’s largest shareholders, Rawlinson, who also served as chief technology officer, has routinely touted his passion and stake in the automaker. He took Lucid public through a reverse merger with a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC, in July 2021.

CEO Peter Rawlinson poses at the Lucid Motors plant in Casa Grande, Arizona, U.S. September 28, 2021.

Caitlin O’Hara | Reuters

“My mission and my dedication is steadfast. I’ve not sold a single damn share of this stock, except what was necessary for tax purposes,” Rawlinson said during the company’s third-quarter call in November. “So, my promise is to continue to work tirelessly day and night to drive that long-term shareholder value.”

Lucid’s board has initiated a search to identify a new CEO, the company said.

The CEO change and production target were announced in conjunction with the automaker’s fourth-quarter financial results. For the period ended Dec. 31, the company reported a net loss attributable to common stockholders of $636.9 million, or a loss of 22 cents per share, on revenue of $234.5 million.

Analysts surveyed by LSEG expected a loss of 25 cents per share on revenue of $214 million.

During the same period last year, Lucid reported a net loss attributable to common stockholders of $653.8 million, or a loss of 29 cents per share, on revenue of $157.2 million.

The production target for 2025 announced Tuesday is compared with production of 9,029 vehicles and deliveries of 10,241 reported for 2024.

Lucid Gravity Grand Touring SUV (left) and Lucid Air sedan EVs

Lucid

Winterhoff said production of the Gravity SUV will gradually build during the year. He declined to speculate on what percentage of the 20,000-unit production target the vehicle would represent.

Shares of Lucid were about 8% higher during afterhours trading Tuesday.

As of market close, shares of the company were down about 13% this year amid slower-than-expected adoption of all-electric vehicles and uncertainty about federal support for EVs under the Trump administration. The stock declined by roughly 28% last year.

Lucid is largely backed by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund. Its first product was the Air sedan, which it began delivering in late 2021.

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