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Tesla CEO Elon Musk tweeted on Tuesday that his electric car company had been about a month away from bankruptcy in recent years when it was still figuring out how to mass produce the Model 3 electric sedan, CNBC.com reported. In the middle of a discussion about Tesla’s fundraising history, a follower asked, “How close was Tesla from bankruptcy when bringing the Model 3 to mass production?” Musk replied: “Closest we got was about a month. The Model 3 ramp was extreme stress & pain for a long time — from mid-2017 to mid-2019. Production & logistics hell.” Musk has often spoken about what he calls the “production and logistics hell” of taking a new electric vehicle into high-volume manufacturing. However, Musk and the company had never disclosed exactly how little runway they had before facing a possible bankruptcy. In early 2019 — when Tesla was manufacturing fewer than 63,000 Model 3s per quarter — Musk raised billions by promoting Tesla’s self-driving ambitions at an Autonomy Day event and in calls with institutional investors.

Quibi, short for “quick bites,” one of Hollywood’s most ambitious startups, aimed to revolutionize entertainment with short-form content designed specifically for mobile phones. Investors who poured $1.75 billion into this idea did so largely because they trusted the gut instincts and vision of Jeffrey Katzenberg, the movie mogul who founded Quibi, and Meg Whitman, the former CEO of Hewlett Packard and eBay, whom he recruited as chief executive. Instead, they witnessed one of the fastest collapses in the entertainment business, the Wall Street Journal reported. According to interviews with current and former employees, investors, advisers and production partners, Quibi failed because the duo’s famed instincts proved wrong. Katzenberg and Whitman misjudged which programming and technology features would appeal to young consumers. They bet, incorrectly, that the service would ride a wave of stay-at-home streaming after launching at the peak of the coronavirus pandemic. And Katzenberg’s spending on advertising left little financial wiggle room when the company was struggling. Quibi anticipates it will have spent more than $1 billion of the money it raised through the beginning of 2021, and projected it would have at least $750 million in cash on hand at the end of October, the people said. Roughly $350 million will go back to Quibi’s earliest investors, including Disney, Comcast Corp.’s NBCUniversal and Sony Corp. , as well as Ms. Whitman and WndrCo, Mr. Katzenberg’s holding company. In a public letter Oct. 21, the day Quibi announced its shutdown, Katzenberg and Whitman said that the company likely failed because its idea wasn’t strong enough and the timing wasn’t good.

A company that has accused Quibi Holdings LLC of infringing on patented technology is seeking a court order barring the streaming-video service from distributing some of its assets to investors as it winds down the business, until the legal dispute is resolved, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. Interactive-video company Eko is asking for Quibi to be forced to set aside at least $101.9 million and for bank accounts and other assets connected to the technology to be frozen, according to papers filed on Wednesday in a federal court in Los Angeles. Eko’s lawsuit, financed by hedge-fund manager Elliott Management Corp., concerns Quibi’s Turnstyle feature, which plays different videos depending on whether users hold their phones vertically or horizontally. Quibi has denied infringing on Eko’s patents or misappropriating trade secrets and has called the lawsuit meritless. The streaming service said last week it was shutting down just six months after its launch. Quibi was designed for watching entertainment in short bursts on smartphones, but the coronavirus pandemic kept many would-be subscribers away from the kinds of on-the-go situations executives had envisioned.

A bankruptcy judge is allowing Speedcast International Ltd. to move forward with a proposed financial restructuring backed by Centerbridge Partners LP but warned of problems that could prevent the satellite communications company from ultimately exiting chapter 11, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. Bankruptcy Judge Marvin Isgur of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Houston said on Wednesday that he would grant conditional approval to Speedcast’s disclosure statement, a document outlining the restructuring plan that will be sent to creditors to vote on. The decision allows the Australian company to move forward with a planned transfer of control to Centerbridge, one of its largest lenders, in exchange for a $500 million equity investment. But Speedcast’s largest lender, Black Diamond Capital Management LLC, is challenging the proposed restructuring and argued that creditors shouldn’t vote on it because it violates provisions of the Bankruptcy Code. Judge Isgur said that he was denying Black Diamond’s challenge for the moment since creditors haven’t yet cast their votes, which he said was a necessary step before considering the lender’s challenge to the restructuring plan. However, the judge said he found arguments made against the proposal made by Black Diamond “very persuasive.” Among the issues Black Diamond raised with the plan is that some debt it owns would take a back seat to more junior company claims, violating bankruptcy rules requiring Black Diamond’s debt gets repaid first.

Quibi Holdings LLC is shutting down a mere six months after launching its streaming service, a crash landing for a once highly touted startup that attracted some of the biggest names in Hollywood and had looked to revolutionize how people consume entertainment, the Wall Street Journal reported. The streaming service, which served up shows in 5- to 10-minute “chapters” formatted to fit a smartphone screen, has been plagued with problems since its April debut, facing lower-than-expected viewership and a lawsuit from a well-capitalized foe. “Our failure was not for lack of trying,” founder Jeffrey Katzenberg and Chief Executive Meg Whitman said in an open letter to employees and investors. “We’ve considered and exhausted every option available to us.” Katzenberg and Whitman decided to shut down the company in an effort to return as much capital to investors as possible instead of trying to prolong the life of the company and risk losing more money. Employees will be laid off and will be paid a severance, the people said, and Quibi will explore selling the rights to some of its content to other media and technology companies. Quibi, which cost $4.99 a month, also had to compete with a growing number of rivals, with launches of Walt Disney’s Disney+, Apple Inc.’s Apple TV+, AT&T Inc.’s HBO Max and Comcast Corp.’s Peacock all occurring in the past year. In yesterday’s letter, Katzenberg and Whitman said that there were “one or two reasons” for Quibi’s failure: The idea behind Quibi either “wasn’t strong enough to justify a stand-alone streaming service” or the service’s launch in the middle of a pandemic was particularly ill-timed.

Private-equity firm Centerbridge Partners LP has increased its offer to buy Speedcast International Ltd. out of bankruptcy to $500 million, two months after another top creditor of the Australian satellite-communications company floated a competing offer for the business, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. Centerbridge’s offer, up from an earlier commitment of $395 million, is part of a broader reorganization proposal backed by the private-equity firm that has the support of Speedcast’s board and a committee representing the company’s unsecured creditors, according to papers filed Saturday in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Houston. Speedcast’s largest lender, Black Diamond Capital Management LLC, in August moved to top Centerbridge’s initial offer and sought more information on decisions made by management surrounding the sale process. Publicly traded Speedcast said in a court filing that even with the Centerbridge offer in hand, it would continue looking for better bids as it works to exit bankruptcy. A bankruptcy judge is scheduled to consider approving Speedcast’s chapter 11 plan in December, and the company expects to leave bankruptcy during the first quarter of 2021, subject to court and regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions.

Ligado Networks LLC on Monday asked investors to supply $4.3 billion in debt financing, offering lofty interest rates to compensate for risks surrounding the company’s efforts to develop a swath of radio frequencies amid opposition from the Pentagon, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. Bankers at JPMorgan Chase & Co., Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Jefferies LLC are marketing $3.26 billion in senior bonds for Ligado at an initial offer of 13 percent annual interest and a 4 percent discount off face value. Ligado also is seeking to raise more than $1 billion in junior debt at 16 percent interest, entirely paid in-kind, meaning only at maturity, the people said. The spectrum venture needs the bond proceeds to refinance debt coming due in December that could otherwise tip Ligado into its second bankruptcy since 2012. Moody’s Investors Service deemed the bond offering a speculative investment, citing the “significant execution hurdles and uncertainties” to the company’s ambitions to develop wireless applications for its spectrum license holdings. Yet the company is angling for capital as corporate debt issuance has surged during the coronavirus pandemic, fueled by sweeping interventions by the Federal Reserve that opened up access to credit markets even for troubled or risky borrowers.

Founders of small technology businesses can sometimes hit a wall generating enough profits to expand their companies. Some have found a solution by selling their companies to ESW Capital LLC, an investment firm that is stocking a Netflix-like subscription service with business-to-business software, the Wall Street Journal reported. ESW, short for enterprise software, is controlled by Texas billionaire Joseph Liemandt. Over the past couple of decades, the firm has bought more than 100 companies in deal sizes ranging from less than a million dollars to at least $460 million. ESW aims for at least 30 more acquisitions next year as the big companies that are its target customers rely ever more heavily on technology to get through the pandemic. Austin, Texas-based ESW has the infrastructure—managers, lawyers, recruiters, developers and sales professionals—that small companies struggle to afford. It also has the cash to allow early investors and founders to move to the next creative challenge. Besides the field of companies backed by venture capitalists looking to cash out, ESW’s hunting grounds include smaller, ailing software businesses destined for bankruptcy court. Since 2015, ESW has sealed deals for about 10 bankrupt companies, including at least three in 2020.

Ligado Networks LLC is heading back to the debt markets in hopes of raising as much as $4 billion that would steer the wireless company clear of a possible bankruptcy, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. The spectrum venture could launch the debt sale as soon as Monday, hoping to refinance more than $2 billion in loans coming due in December that could otherwise tip Ligado into its second bankruptcy since 2012. JPMorgan Chase & Co. is managing the offering for Ligado, which is vying to overcome deep-seated resistance to its business plans among Pentagon officials and some members of Congress. The company is angling for capital as corporate debt issuance has surged during the coronavirus pandemic, fueled by sweeping interventions by the Federal Reserve that opened up access to credit markets even for troubled or risky borrowers. High-yield bond issuance year-to-date is close to $339 billion, up 72 percent from a year ago, according to LCD, a unit of S&P Global Market Intelligence.

Wireless venture Ligado Networks LLC is in talks with key creditors and shareholders to restructure about $8 billion in debt and other obligations while buying time to monetize its 5G-network assets, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy. The company, formerly known as LightSquared, faces a large maturity of senior debt which comes due in December. While earlier this year Ligado won Federal Communications Commission approval to use its wireless spectrum licenses to support a ground-based network, the company is a long way off from completing the project and generating revenues from it to help address the debt maturity. Ligado has said that its wireless licenses could support emerging fifth-generation, or 5G, communications that serve factories, power utilities and other businesses looking to link their infrastructure to the internet. Ligado continues to face opposition from elected officials concerned that the network could potentially interfere with other wireless systems, including military operations, GPS and weather forecasting services. A group of senators led by Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) has asked the FCC to “stay and reconsider” its April decision allowing Ligado to move forward. In order to overcome the impending financial hurdle, Ligado is discussing a potential set of transactions that would convert its roughly $5.2 billion of junior debt and $2.6 billion of preferred equity into common shares. By reducing a substantial portion of debt, it would make it easier for Ligado to refinance the roughly $2.2 billion of senior loans that mature this December. The company is also looking to raise new debt to help provide additional liquidity.