Open Source: NC maintains ‘Goldilocks’ status

Hey all. I’m Brian Gordon, tech writer for The News & Observer, and this is Open Source.

The midterms are over, and Gov. Roy Cooper has his veto protected by the slimmest of margins. A single seat in the House to be exact. What’s the significance in that for tech?

In the lead-up to the election, many suggested split government has helped North Carolina attract major tech employers like Apple who appreciate the state’s low corporate taxes and the fact that it hasn’t passed a polemic social issue bill since 2016’s HB2 Bathroom Bill.

One Democratic economic adviser told me the state was functioning in a nice “Goldilocks” balance: not taxing like California or passing strict abortion restrictions or “Don’t Say Gay” bills like Texas and Florida.

As N&O political reporter Will Doran pointed out, there’s a socially conservative Democrat in the House who could put abortion restrictions in play, but at least by the political numbers, North Carolina seems poised to continue as an economic Goldilocks.

Bright day for local stocks

Thursday’s promising inflation report sent stocks soaring yesterday, particularly tech growth stocks. Even if this exceptional day still left companies trading down for the year, quarter or even month, it’s still interesting to see how a ray of inflation optimism affects public companies with Triangle ties:

• IQVIA: +8.94%

• Wolfspeed: +13.11%

• Bandwidth: +12.86%

• IonQ (a Maryland quantum computing company with a Duke lab in downtown Durham): +20.61%

• Lenovo (has North American headquarters in Cary): 7.53%

• Cisco (a top-15 employer in Wake County): 3.99%

• Vontier Corp: 8.75% (I had to look up what they do. It’s actually a collection of six companies that focus on transportation innovation.)

Epic v. Apple Round 2 (take 2)

Cary’s own Epic Games will replay Apple in a high-profile antitrust court battle Monday. After an initial postponement, a California appellate court will hear the case at 5 p.m. Eastern. Legal experts and Epic spokespeople explained that the hearing will be quick, likely around an hour, a far cry from the multi-week initial trial that resulted in a split decision mostly favoring Apple.

Why are the companies suing each other? And why should you maybe care? Here’s a primer before Monday.

Short Stuff: Microsoft in NC, Meta not so much

1. Microsoft will invest at least $1 billion in Catawba County by building four data centers, local officials announced Wednesday. The centers will create at least 50 jobs, officials say, and will be developed over the next decade.

2. Meta laid off 11,000 workers, which is 13% of its staff. And its push into Durham appears to have stalled, too. My colleague Mary Helen Moore found Facebook’s parent company hasn’t had a local job posting since Oct. 1.

National tech happenings

• LeBron James didn’t actually demand a trade. Nintendo didn’t actually post a photo of Mario presenting his middle finger. Donald Trump isn’t back on the site. But a rash of verified Twitter impersonators have sprouted up on the social media platform as people are paying $8 a month to get a blue checkmark.

• Like Meta, the real estate firm Redfin announced it was laying off 13% of its staff this week. A likely casualty of a cooling housing market.

• The crypto exchange FTX collapsed this week as it faces a reported liquidity crisis. Its founder admitted he “f---ed up.”

Podcast Pick of the Week

A little in-house promotion. Listen in on four N&O political reporters who are smarter than me discuss Election Night takeaways in the latest episode of Under the Dome.

Thanks for reading, and remember to throw out your pumpkins.

This story was produced with financial support from a coalition of partners led by Innovate Raleigh as part of an independent journalism fellowship program. The N&O maintains full editorial control of the work.

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