President Trump has signed a bill restoring federal funding to tech startups in California and elsewhere, money that had been held up for more than six months.

The Small Business Administration money, a key source of capital for new aerospace and defense firms in the Los Angeles region, ran out in October after a congressional impasse.

The Small Business Innovation and Economic Security Act signed by Trump on Monday funds the Small Business Innovation Research, or SBIR, the Small Business Technology Transfer, or STTR, and related programs.

They provide more than $4 billion in seed funding to commercial startups that provide valuable services to the government and public, stimulate the economy and help maintain the country’s competitive edge.

The money is awarded by multiple agencies, including the Health and Human Services and Energy departments and NASA, with the military distributing the largest portion.

The funding has helped launch defense and aerospace startups across Southern California, including Costa Mesa autonomous weapons maker Anduril Industries, now valued at more than $30 billion.

Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa), chair of the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, held up reauthorization over concerns some startups had become reliant on the money instead of developing commercial businesses. She proposed a bill with a $75-million lifetime funding cap for individual companies.

Sen. Ed Markey of Massachusetts, the committee’s ranking Democrat, contended the bill would crimp innovation and hurt companies.

The reauthorization includes no lifetime caps but requires departments to set limits on how many times companies can apply each year for the Small Business Administration funding, prioritizing startups.

The bill also establishes a Strategic Breakthrough Allocation program that awards up to $30 million in Small Business Administration funding to a single company provided it can bring in matching funding.

The new program is intended to assist startups to become commercially viable after they run through their SBIR or STTR funding, which are intended to fund feasibility studies and prototypes. STTR requires a partnership with a research institution.

Other provisions in the bill include new due diligence standards to prevent any tech developed by the startups from falling into the hands of adversaries such as China.

“With a bipartisan, five-year reauthorization signed into law, small businesses are once again empowered to create these innovative technologies and tackle our nation’s most pressing challenges head-on,” Markey said in a statement.

One of Los Angeles’ most influential home builders, KB Home, is relocating its headquarters out of state, becoming the latest high-profile firm to do so.

The company, which has been based in Los Angeles since 1963 and helped build its sprawling suburbs, is moving its main office to the Phoenix metropolitan area by spring 2027, in part to reduce costs and place its employees in a more affordable housing market.

KB Home touted Arizona’s business-friendly environment as a reason for the move, but said it still plans to maintain six operating divisions in California.

The move to Arizona will help accelerate KB Home’s growth and streamline operations, Robert McGibney, president and chief executive of KB Home, said in a news release last week.

“This move brings our teams together in a more collaborative environment, and Phoenix is the right place to do it,” McGibney said.

The company has deep ties to California, with more than 100 projects and tens of thousands of homes across the state. KB Home has opened nine housing communities in Southern California in the last six months and plans to open 10 more by the end of 2026.

The company’s shares, which have been falling this year amid concern about the property market, have climbed around 1% since it made the announcement late Wednesday. They closed little changed Tuesday at $51.93.

KB Home got its start in Detroit in the 1950s and briefly shifted operations to Arizona before settling in California by 1963. The company, which gets its name from the last names of its founders, Donald Bruce Kaufman and Eli Broad, rode the boom and helped shape the growth of Southern California.

KB Home quickly emerged as one of the top builders of affordable homes in the country, starting in the post-World War II boom, when growing families across the country were leaving crowded cities for the promise of rapidly emerging suburban neighborhoods such as the San Fernando Valley in Los Angeles.

With first-time buyers as their intended customers, the company’s innovations included lowering prices by building homes on slabs, instead of digging costly basements. It pioneered providing financing for buyers and 10-year limited warranties on their homes.

Broad became one of LA.’s most influential civic leaders, using his multibillion-dollar fortune, political clout and forceful personality to spur advancements in the public sphere, particularly in the arts.

He helped guide the redevelopment of Bunker Hill in downtown Los Angeles after it was cleared for urban renewal, and it was there that he built perhaps his greatest legacy: his namesake Broad Museum, which houses the extensive private contemporary art collection that he and his wife, Edythe, accumulated.

As a downtown booster, he and then-Mayor Richard Riordan were widely credited with getting the Walt Disney Concert Hall completed in 2003, raising more than $200 million to get the stalled Frank Gehry-designed project back on track.

In the late 1970s, he became the founding chairman of the Museum of Contemporary Art, and he bailed it out of a financial scandal three decades later with a $30-million grant.

KB Home’s California exit is the latest in a corporate exodus from the state. Some companies have relocated to avoid high taxes and strict regulations that complicate doing business in the state. The move has often been done to cut costs and improve profitability.

Two other California-bred companies connected to real estate, Realtor.com and Public Storage, announced similar moves to Texas in February.

Realtor.com, a real estate services company, was drawn to the Lone Star State for its unparalleled housing growth and affordable living, according to a news release. Public Storage, the largest self-storage business in the country, announced a similar move, citing interest in Texas’ growing talent and innovation.

The Golden State has remained the fourth-largest economy in the world, even as steep taxes and stringent environmental regulations push some firms to leave. Powerful companies across business sectors have expressed discontent with the state’s business environment.

Tesla and financial services firm Charles Schwab left the San Francisco Bay Area in 2021. Elon Musk’s SpaceX and X exited the state in 2024, along with Chevron, the oil giant that was started in California.

California has also lost residents, who are fleeing high housing costs for more affordable states such as Arizona, Nevada, Oregon, Washington and Texas.

California has led the nation in net out-migration for six consecutive years, according to U-Haul data. Los Angeles County lost 54,000 residents from 2024 to 2025, partially due to continued out-migration to other states.

Waze and Waymo are teaming up to help combat Los Angeles’ growing pothole problem.

The companies announced a program that will use Waymo’s self-driving cars to better detect potholes in the city. The data will be available to city officials through Waze’s traffic data-sharing platform, according to a news release last week.

The number of potholes in L.A. jumped early this year after an intense rainy season soaked the city. Residents reported over 6,700 potholes in January and nearly 5,000 reports were submitted in February and again in March, according to data from the city’s 311 tip line analyzed by the nonprofit newsroom Crosstown L.A.

The partnership is the most recent effort in Waymo’s long-standing commitment to making roads safer, Arielle Fleisher, the company’s policy development and research manager, said in the release.

The Waze navigation app will also use the data to warn users as they approach a pothole, the company said.

Drivers will then be able to verify the Waymo-identified pothole in real time.

L.A. has been slow to repair pavement issues on its 23,000 miles of streets in recent years.

The city repaired 310 miles of road in fiscal year 2025, which ended in June — a nosedive from the 850 miles it paved a decade before in 2015, according to Crosstown. Only 216 miles of street lanes were paved in fiscal year 2024.

The Bureau of Street Services, the department in charge of paving the city’s streets, is in communication with Waymo regarding the pilot program, said Dan Halden, a spokesperson for the city department.

“The bureau proactively manages the city’s streets, ensuring roadways are treated not only for repair but also to strengthen the street network and prevent future potholes,” he said.

Many cities, including L.A., rely on residents to report potholes through the nonemergency 311 service. The process provides an incomplete picture of road health, according to Waymo and Waze.

The pilot program intends to fill in reporting gaps and was developed based on feedback from city officials.

“We want to build on the safety benefits of our service by partnering with organizations and city officials to help improve the infrastructure we all depend on,” Fleisher said

The pilot program is running in five cities, including San Francisco, and has already identified 500 potholes. The program is also underway in the metropolitan areas of Phoenix; Austin, Texas; and Atlanta.

The companies plan to expand into cities with colder weather, which can worsen the pothole problem.

“Working together helps our community and makes our roads better for everyone,” Andrew Stober, the strategic partner manager at Waze, said in the release.