Alphabet puts brakes on drone project: sources

San Francisco

THE latest Google drones have just started taking flight in the real world. But the team behind the technology is slowing down, trimming headcount and shelving initiatives as the experimental unit becomes the latest target of tightening budgets across parent company Alphabet Inc.

Project Wing, a unit of Alphabet's X research lab, nixed a partnership with coffee giant Starbucks Corp, according to people familiar with the decision. Following the departure of project leader Dave Vos in October, the unit also froze hiring and began asking some staff to seek jobs elsewhere in the company, according to some of those people.