Even Jim Chilton’s part of the company – the space division – was the subject of a searing watchdog report last month that found it had received hundreds of millions of dollars in “unnecessary” payments stemming from an unusually cozy relationship with NASA. For Boeing, the timing of the report couldn’t have been worse, coming as it was preparing to fly a key test of its Starliner space capsule, designed to fly NASA’s astronauts to the International Space Station.

That launch is now scheduled for 6:36 a.m. Friday from Cape Canaveral, and while no astronauts will be on board, the first launch of its new spacecraft has taken on a far greater importance for Boeing than just a test. It’s a shot at a bit of redemption.

A successful launch would be a moment of triumph amid the tumult that has dogged the company the past year and the news this week that it will halt production on its troubled 737 Max airplane in January, a decision that could not only harm Boeing’s bottom line but send shock waves through the economy.

Friday’s launch also comes as Boeing, long one of the major dominant players in space, now faces increased competition from a growing space industry, including from rivals such as Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Jeff Bezos’ Blue origin. (Bezos owns The Washington Post.)

So in the face of the critical report from NASA’s Inspector General last month, Chilton, a soft-spoken engineer who has risen through the ranks during a 35-year career at Boeing, fired off an email to his staff.

He reminded the team that it was building on a heritage that stretched to the dawn of the Space Age: “We have been part of every NASA human spaceflight from – from Mercury, Gemini and Apollo to the space shuttle and [the International Space Station] – and we’re proud to continue that unwavering partnership.”

And he issued an emotional call to arms, both defending the company and its workforce while also pushing back against critics and competitors. The email, a copy of which was obtained by The Post, is part of a broader strategy inside Boeing to fight back aggressively that includes a radio ad playing in Washington touting the flight, saying it “is paving the way for the new age of space exploration.”

“Let’s not allow this inaccurate report or the critical media coverage it’s generating to become a distraction,” Chilton wrote. “Our Starliner teammates have put their hearts and souls into developing a spacecraft that we can all be proud of, and they need all the support they can get from our broader space and launch team in the countdown to first flight.”

If successful, the flight would be a critical step toward helping NASA restore human spaceflight from United States soil. Since the space shuttle was retired in 2011, NASA has been unable to fly people to space. Instead, it has had to pay Russia as much as $84 million a seat to take its astronauts to the space station about 240 miles above Earth.

In 2014, NASA embarked on a risky experiment, awarding contracts to Boeing and SpaceX to develop spacecraft capable of human spaceflight. As part of what’s called the “commercial crew program,” NASA awarded Boeing $4.2 billion and SpaceX $2.6 billion to build capsules capable of flying at least four NASA astronauts.

The first flights with people on board were originally scheduled for 2017. But both companies have suffered delays and setbacks. In March, SpaceX successfully launched its Dragon capsule to the space station and returned it successfully. But weeks later the spacecraft exploded during a test of its emergency abort engines, a problem the company says is now fixed.

Boeing also has had a host of problems – from a propellant leak last year to a problem with its parachute system during a test of its abort engine last month.

But now it says it is on track, and now NASA hopes the launches with humans will happen sometime next year.

“I’m happy to announce we’re go for launch,” NASA Deputy Administrator Jim Morhard told reporters last week.

At a press briefing on Tuesday, John Mulholland, Boeing’s commercial crew program manager, said “the spacecraft is in really good shape” and that the company was “looking forward to a short and successful mission.”

If all goes well Friday, the first flight with people, scheduled for sometime next year, will carry into space two NASA astronauts, Nicole Mann and Mike Fincke, as well as Chris Ferguson, a former NASA astronaut who now works for Boeing.

“We consider this a dress rehearsal for the first flights with crew members on board,” said Pat Forrester, the chief of NASA’s astronaut office. “I don’t think there’s anybody in the office, as they’ve gone about their work, who hasn’t thought about about Chris and Nicole and Mike.”

The company also faces $7 million in additional penalties if it doesn’t meet the terms of a settlement with the government.

The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration began the investigation that led to the settlement last year. The agency concluded that Mercedes missed deadlines in the recall process on multiple occasions.

It’s the first penalty the agency has issued to an automaker under the Trump administration.

“The agency’s reporting requirements help ensure that consumers are protected and given important information about how to get recalls repaired,” said James Owens, the NHTSA’s acting administrator.

“These laws are critical to ensure NHTSA’s ability to provide oversight, and we expect manufacturers to follow their legal obligations to the agency and to consumers in carrying out safety recalls,” he said.

Robert Moran, a spokesman for the company’s U.S. operation, MBUSA, said Mercedes did not believe it had done anything deliberately wrong.

“But unfortunately we missed some deadlines in informing the agency of the measures we had taken in fulfilling their requirements,” Moran said in an email. “We agreed to resolve this matter in an effort to answer NHTSA’s questions and move forward. In all cases, however, MBUSA had announced the recalls, provided consumers with information and launched the recalls as soon as possible.”

NHTSA investigators looked at how Mercedes handled recalls between 2016 and 2018, in which time it reported 101 safety-related defects or problems complying with federal rules.

In six of those cases, the agency found that Mercedes did not mail notices to customers within 60 days, a deadline set by federal rules – overshooting by 20 days in one case. It found dozens of other paperwork problems and questioned how well a Mercedes vehicle lookup tool worked.

The settlement requires Mercedes to have quarterly oversight meetings with the NHTSA. The settlement will remain in force for at least a year.

The agency considered investments Mercedes had made in an automated recall tool, new staff members it hired, and training it conducted in determining the size of the penalty, according to the settlement agreement.

Jason Levine, director of the Center for Auto Safety, said that he was glad to see the settlement and that NHTSA ought to be doing more to routinely monitor recall programs.

“One can only hope that this is the beginning of a renewed effort by the government to remember that its job is to ensure compliance with the law by car manufacturers and to use all of the enforcement tools at its disposal to do so,” he said.

Last year, the Transportation Department’s internal watchdog faulted the NHTSA’s oversight of the recall process. The watchdog issued six recommendations that it now lists as having been closed.

The settlement with Mercedes is the largest the NHTSA has issued since a $40 million agreement with BMW in 2015. In that case, BMW had to pay $10 million up front and commit to spending $10 million to come into compliance with auto safety rules.

That same year, Fiat Chrysler was issued a pair of penalties totaling $175 million, and Takata, whose air bags are believed to have caused multiple deaths, was penalized $200 million – the largest penalty the agency had ever issued.

The problems at Takata affected tens of millions of air bags, which the auto industry is still working to resolve. NHTSA data shows that Mercedes has the lowest recall completion rate of any automaker, at 33%.

“Mercedes-Benz USA, like most U.S. auto companies, is replacing Takata air bags on a schedule that is coordinated with NHTSA,” Moran said. “While we are not aware of any customers who have experienced the Takata inflater malfunction in any of our vehicles anywhere in the world, we are following NHTSA’s protocol in replacing these inflaters.”

Cannabis bears have cleared $993 million in mark-to-market gains so far in 2019, even after losing $132 million this month as stocks bounced off their lows, according to data from financial analytics firm S3 Partners.

Short exposure to the sector grew by $843 million or 35% in 2019, with most of that concentrated in 20 companies, S3 said in a report Wednesday.

The investor frenzy that had characterized the cannabis industry in 2018 quickly faded this year as companies missed earnings expectations and the regulatory landscape proved to be more difficult than expected. Since March, pot stocks are down by about two-thirds, and capital markets have largely frozen for all but the strongest names.

Pot stocks are now among the most expensive to short, with an average borrow fee of 31% for the 20 that are most shorted. Despite that, “the sector has surprisingly been immune to short squeezes,” wrote Ihor Dusaniwsky, managing director of predictive analytics at S3.

“A prolonged cannabis sector rally will be bolstered with a flurry of short covering as the high cost of short financing (stock borrows) coupled with mark-to-market losses will result in multi-security short squeezes,” he said.

The settlement addresses claims arising from a probe opened by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in 2017 into Uber’s workplace culture. The EEOC found reasonable cause to believe “Uber permitted a culture of sexual harassment and retaliation against individuals who complained about such harassment,” according to the agency.

Uber voluntarily agreed to settle the claims with independent monitoring over its workplace culture and the establishment of a victims’ compensation fund.

“We’ve worked hard to ensure that all employees can thrive at Uber by putting fairness and accountability at the heart of who we are and what we do,” Uber’s Chief Legal Officer Tony West said in a statement. “I am extremely pleased that we were able to work jointly with the EEOC in continuing to strengthen these efforts.”

The investigation was initiated after public attention turned to Uber’s workplace culture amid a series of scandals in 2017, including a viral blog post from then-employee Susan Fowler that alleged a culture of sexual harassment and discrimination. Some of those allegations helped result in the ouster of then-chief executive Travis Kalanick.

“This agreement holds Uber accountable, and, going forward, positions the company to innovate and transform the tech industry by modeling effective measures against sexual harassment and retaliation,” EEOC Commissioner Victoria Lipnic said in a statement.

As part of the agreement, Uber agreed to let an outside official monitor its workplace. It will also establish a fund of $4.4 million to issue payouts to those who the EEOC finds experienced sexual harassment, retaliation or both with the company over a period beginning in 2014.

The EEOC said Uber had agreed to establish a mechanism for identifying workers who have been subject to multiple harassment complaints and for managers who did not respond to such complaints in a timely manner. It is also updating workplace policies in an effort to prevent gender discrimination, and focusing special attention on issues of sexual harassment and retaliation in forums such as exit interviews.

The EEOC said that women who worked at Uber from 2014 through June 30 will be informed of the agreement, and that those with claims can submit a report from which the agency will determine whether they’re eligible for compensation.

Uber pointed to numerous workplace changes it has instituted since 2017 under the helm of its new CEO, Dara Khosrowshahi.

The company said it established a new leadership team, eliminated a mandatory arbitration requirement for claims of sexual harassment and assault, and worked to institute a new culture guided by a mantra: “We do the right thing. Period.”

Separately, Uber this month released its first transparency report detailing the scope of its sexual harassment and assault problem on the app, pledging improvements to the platform. The report found that there were 464 reports of alleged rape between 2017 and 2018 and nearly 6,000 reports of sexual assault.

The company has been dogged by allegations that it turned a blind eye to riders’ safety problems and has been scolded for its treatment of drivers, especially in the wake of its May initial public offering.

AOT president Nitinai Sirismatthakarn said the committee will present the result to the AOT board on December 23.

The detail of the company’s proposal cannot be disclosed, pending the board’s approval of the proposal, he added.

King Power is the lone bidder for this concession, which will be valid from October 1, 2022 to March 31, 2033.

In a related matter, the AOT board has resolved to open anew the bidding for a concession to run a duty free pick-up counter service at Don Mueang International Airport, as King Power Development is the only company to have picked up the tender document.