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Google Aims to Boost AI With Purchase of Spirit Airlines Data
Bloomberg Law News • • business
Key Points:
- Google LLC won a bankruptcy auction for $10 million to acquire a large dataset, software code, and operational records from the defunct Spirit Aviation Holdings Inc. to enhance its artificial intelligence capabilities.
- The acquired data includes 100 million emails, 500 million Microsoft Teams chats, revenue and operations information, but excludes personal data like 97.5 million passenger profiles and loyalty program records, which will be scrubbed of personally identifiable information.
- Spirit Airlines shut down on May 2 after filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy due to rising fuel costs and failed financing, carrying $8.1 billion in debt and laying off about 17,000 employees.
- The data package also contains marketing, HR, strategy, pricing data from billions of competitor flights and passenger transactions, as well as 30 million lines of code, software models, and over 175,000 employee records dating back to 1986.
- Google outbid AI recruiting firm Mercor.io Corp., which offered $7.5 million and is the backup buyer, while Spirit also sold its valuable LaGuardia Airport slots to JetBlue for $58.5 million.
