As job starts fall and prices continue to rise, retailers are scrambling to put programs in place to secure customer loyalty in what's shaping up to be a challenging holiday sales season. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Tuesday a 1.1-million drop in job openings to 10.1 million for August, while inflation continues to tick higher.

After several delays, the Connectivity Standards Alliance released the Matter 1.0 specification and certification Tuesday, with the backing of over 550 technology companies throwing support behind open IoT standards, the alliance said.

The class action in U.S. District Court in Chicago challenging T-Mobile's 2020 buy of Sprint “has no identifiable nexus to this district,” and so should be transferred to the U.S. District Court in Manhattan and Judge Victor Marrero, who wrote the decision clearing the acquisition to proceed, said T-Mobile Friday in a memorandum of law (docket 1:22-cv-03189) in support of its motion to transfer the case. Seven AT&T and Verizon customers sued in June to “undo the merger” on behalf of millions of subscribers whose subscription rates allegedly soared due to the transaction’s anticompetitive impact.

Target previewed deals that will go live beginning Thursday when it marks the early start of the holiday shopping season with its three-day Deal Days (see 2209220013) promotion. Customers can get electronics, video games, toys and household items at up to 50% off, Target said Monday.

Doreen Bogdan-Martin easily won election as secretary-general of the ITU Thursday, winning 139 votes to 25 for Russian Rashid Ismailov at the ITU Plenipotentiary Conference in Bucharest, Romania. The win was expected (see 2209280046), but industry officials said they were surprised by the size of the victory. Bogdan-Martin becomes the first woman to head the ITU and first American since 1965. She had led the ITU Telecom Development Bureau, after being elected to that post in 2018.

Micron Technology’s fiscal Q4 results “were impacted by rapidly weakening consumer demand and significant customer inventory adjustments across all end markets,” said CEO Sanjay Mehrotra on an earnings call Thursday for the quarter ended Sept. 1. Fiscal Q4 revenue of $6.64 billion was down 23% sequentially from the previous quarter and was 20% lower year over year.

The House Commerce Committee’s bipartisan privacy legislation is stronger than California’s privacy law, Chairman Frank Pallone, D-N.J., said Thursday. He hopes to convince House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and other skeptical members that the bill should set the national privacy standard.

The FTC should be “careful” in drawing up potential competition rules that might not withstand judicial scrutiny, former Democratic officials told an antitrust conference Wednesday in Washington.

CARLSBAD, Calif. -- Italy-based Nice, which bought Nortek Control a year ago for $285 million (see 2110050066), completed the transition Wednesday, announcing it retired the Nortek brand name and is now Nice North America. The company is integrating residential smart home brands including Elan, SpeakerCraft and Panamax under the Nice brand, a process it expects to complete by the end of 2023.

ITU votes are difficult to handicap, but Doreen Bogdan-Martin remains the front-runner to be the organization's next secretary-general, industry experts said Wednesday. The vote is scheduled for Thursday in Bucharest, Romania. The other major candidate is Russian nominee Rashid Ismailov, who mounted his campaign despite concerns across the world over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine (see 2205110075).