TechWire rewind: Centene’s $1B HQ2; NC’s economy ; Black-owned businesses receive support + 78 other headlines

As Monday morning rolls in, we’re providing TechWire readers with a quick recap of the past week’s news headlines.

Notable headlines from last week included: Health insurance giant Centene picked Charlotte for a $1 billion HQ that will add 6,000 jobs to the city; Durham insurtech startup hired Google veteran Erik Garr as an executive – read our Q&A here; NC State economist Mike Walden shared insights on what NC’s economic recovery may look like; Raleigh startups K4Connect and Pryon teamed up to bring AI-powered assistants to residents at senior care facilities; TechWire has a new columnist: investor and entrepreneur Donald Thompson of Walk West; Amazon said it plans to open its Garner distribution center by year’s end; local Black-owned businesses are seeing a jump in sales and support after recent protests.

Several NC startups landed new funding last week, including Winston Salem-based F5 Sports ($2.1 million), Raleigh-based TerMir ($100,000 pitch competition), Cornelius-based Barvecue ($780,000), RTP-based Innatrix ($224,594 NSF grant) and Durham-based Looma ($1.1 million). Read more startup news in last week’s Startup Rewind here.

And, in national news: More than 500 companies are boycotting Facebook ads over the platform’s hate speech policies; more than $150 billion in PPP loans are unclaimed by small businesses; Airbus is cutting more than 10% of its workforce due to COVID-19; U.S. stocks finished their best quarter in more than two decades; the Senate extended the next PPP loan deadline to August 8; the U.S. unemployment rate dropped from 13.3% to 11.1% in June’s job report.

Keeping with our Monday “TechWire Rewind” tradition, here’s a look back at 81 local, state and national headlines as reported by WRAL TechWire last week: