IKEA is restructuring the organization. As a result, 7500 jobs will be gone worldwide.

“We are introducing a new type of organization,” said Håkan Svedman, CEO of IKEA Sweden.

“As we implement these improvements to our organization, it is with the utmost respect as to how our employees will be affected. As soon as we know which of our employees it might involve, we will, in alignment with our values, and the union support every individual, as much as we can, to find the best solution possible for the employees next step, whether it’s within or outside IKEA,” writes Karin Bergman, Head of HR in Sweden in a press release.

Reconstructing the organization comes as a part of IKEA’s plan to become more digitalized, in an effort to keep up with the emerging online retail industry. New warehouses and city stores are also to be established as a part of the plan.

The digitalization effort is estimated to create 11,500 new jobs worldwide at IKEA over a 2 year period.

“IKEA should be ahead of the game, even online,” says Håkan Svedman, in the press release.

For more news on the story:

https://edition.cnn.com/2018/11/21/business/ikea-layoffs/index.html
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/ikea-to-slash-7500-jobs-in-restructuring-2018-11-21

For almost a year, the U.S. has been without official representation and an ambassador in Sweden. The last ambassador, Azita Raji, was appointed by Barack Obama back in 2016 but only stayed in office for a year. Her predecessor, Mark Brzezinski, also appointed by Obama, was the ambassador between 2011 and 2015.

After Mr. Trump stepped up as president in 2016 and Azita Raji ended her assignment in 2017, there had been no new ambassador appointed, and instead, the native Californian, Daniel Lindwall, has acted as the chargé d’Affaires. Basically, a stand-in while a new ambassador is waiting to be appointed.

But there are good news on the horizon for Swedish – American diplomatic relations, and it comes in the form of entrepreneur and investor, Ken Howery, probably best known for being one of the co-founders of PayPal, and good friend of Peter Thiel. After co-founding PayPal over 20 years ago, which was later sold to eBay for staggering $1.5 billion, he went on co-founding Founders Fund together with Peter Thiel, which is known to have investments in companies like SpaceX and Airbnb.

Mr. Trump announced earlier this week that he plans on nominating Ken Howery as the ambassador to Sweden. But before Mr. Howery can start practicing his Swedish, immersing himself in our beloved Fika culture, celebrating every pastry that exists and awkwardly avoiding his neighbor at any cost, the nomination has to be approved and confirmed by the U.S. Senate.

In an era where you can instantly send someone a message through Email, Twitter, Facebook, iMessage, and more, what’s the point of snail mail? If you live in Norway, there’s a fun chance to see a robot deliver your mail!

Thanks to a new partnership between Posten-Norge, Norwegian’s government-run postal service, and Buddy Mobility, a San Francisco- and Oslo-based robotics startup, a “robot mailman” might be a possibility in the near future.

Buddy Mobility notes, “Our robot provides Posten with operational cost savings to offset revenue losses from dramatically decreasing mail volumes. At the same time, the robot offers new revenue streams around package and parcel delivery.”

Although this might seem like a novel idea, the Posten bot is not the first of its kind: similar mailman robots have been tested all around the world. In the United States, several start-ups have been experimenting with postal bots in college towns, and in Germany, DHL’s PostBot is already testing a few different routes in the city of Bad Hersfeld.

So, how does it work? The Posten bot looks like a large box with wheels and plenty of compartments on its side that are filled with envelopes and small parcels. The robot can travel around 6 kilometers per hour (4mph) — yes, you read that right — and will be able to deliver mail to 100 recipients per day. The robot won’t be able to deliver mail directly to a customer’s mailbox. Instead, the robot will “park” in front of the recipient’s house, and the recipient will have to open a special app on their phone to unlock the box and retrieve their mail. Afterward, the robot will head back to the post office to recharge its battery and refill its supply for the next day.

If you’re interested in learning more, check out the video below:

Would you let a robot deliver your mail? Let us know!