Israel election results (fin)

With 99 percent of votes counted yesterday, Benny Gantz’s centrist Blue and White party won a narrow victory with 33 Parliamentary seats while Likud, the party of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, gained 31 seats. Because no party won an outright majority, a coalition will be required to form a government.

Worldwide response

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced yesterday that 530 people have experienced lung injuries related to vaping or e-cigarettes, and that in conjunction with the enforcement arm of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, it is conducting an investigation into the cause of those injuries. Also, in response to the epidemic among youth, India’s government announced an executive action yesterday to ban e-cigarettes and vaping products.

The EPA & California

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency withdrew a 2013 Clean Air Act waiver yesterday that allowed California to enforce stricter emissions standards than those set by the federal government. The EPA announcement also unveiled a program designed to set uniform nationwide emissions standards.

Colt's announcement

Gunmaker Colt Defense LLC has announced it will cease to make its AR-15 rifle available to civilians, citing shifting consumer demand and market dynamics. The company will continue to produce the rifles for “warfighters and law enforcement personnel.”

Taking Wing

Autonomous drone company Wing, an Alphabet subsidiary, announced a partnership with FedEx, Walgreens, and Virginia retailer Sugar Magnolia yesterday. Together, the companies will be launching a test autonomous drone delivery program in Christiansburg, Virginia next month, delivering health care products, food and more.

Changing their Stripes

Fintech startup Stripe closed a $250 million dollar investment round valuing the company at $35 billion. This puts Stripe’s valuation, which has increased 50% from a funding round earlier this year, above Airbnb and Palantir Technologies.

A tall order

Amazon announced an order of 100k delivery trucks from electric vehicle startup Rivian yesterday. According to Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, this is a step towards the e-commerce giant becoming carbon neutral by 2040.

Homeward Bound

When 14-year-old Nicole Grimes had to give up her childhood dog, Chloe, she was absolutely heartbroken. The circumstances of her father’s job had changed and he had to work from home, which meant the family couldn’t keep the dog in the house where she’d interfere with the business. They were devastated, but at the time, there wasn’t another option.

But Nicole never forgot about Chloe. So when she had a family of her own at 21, she started looking for a furry companion for her small daughter. That’s when a post on Facebook caught her eye: an older dog needed a new home, and it looked just like her beloved Chloe… and even had the same name. Without giving it a second thought, she offered to take the dog.

As soon as she got Chloe home, Nicole said there was just something about her. But she couldn’t really be the same dog, could she? Nicole’s mom did some digging, found the microchip number for the pup Nicole grew up with, called the Humane Society, and received the news – in an amazing twist of fate, the puppy that Nicole had been gifted at 10 years old had found her way back home.

Taking the plunge

After seeing an elderly client mistreated by another engineer, James Anderson, a 52-year-old plumber from Lancashire, England, decided there was a better way to do business: for free. So James started a nonprofit, DEPHER, to provide free and discounted emergency plumbing and heating repairs to the elderly, especially during the cold winter months in northern England. He funds his work through donations, but also racked up more than $10,000 in personal debt to ensure that his clients were taken care of regardless of where his funding stood.

DEPHER gained online attention after an invoice started circulating with a summary of heater repairs for a 91-year-old woman battling leukemia. The notes stipulated that she would not be charged “under any circumstances,” and that they’d be available 24 hours a day to keep her as comfortable as possible.

Now, DEPHER is fundraising for the busy winter months. Though the crowdfunding website he set up only asked for around $5,000, James has already raised close to $30,000. On his Facebook page, James thanked everyone for their generosity, saying they will now be able to do this work on a wider scale – saving lives and preventing the elderly from the nightmare of being alone in the cold.