What do our partners read each week? News about our portfolio companies, macro industry trends, our investment focus areas, and general personal and business strategies.
News About Our Portfolio Companies
· Epic! raises Series C including an investment from Social Starts to keep kids reading in a digital age
· Rheo, a new social media video site, launches
· Adelphic integrates Integral Ads to increase viewability
· Rocket Fuel partners with our portfolio company Triple Lift to allow users access to over 30B native ads
· Adaptly’s insight into paid social
· Style Lend launches monthly subscription option
· Werk cofounders discuss how they’re creating equal representation where it matters most
· RentHop demonstrates how much money can be saved by moving one MBTA stop away
· Zingbox named a 2017 Gartner cool vendor for IoT security
· ThingLink’s 360 image editor
· Renzell releases 2018 restaurant rankings by city
Industry Trends
· Parsing the venture capital market
· The essential phone
· The web of self-driving car applications
· 2017 Mary Meeker report
· Amazon, Netflix driving death of old guard; up to 8K stores closing by end of 2017
· Where is global growth happening?
· Oracle and Microsoft investing more in Kubernetes + Draft
· Blue Apron files for IPO + what one investor thinks
· The vanishing teen worker + the passenger economy
· Walmart’s service for workers to drop off packages on their way home
Artificial Intelligences
· Visualizing job loss due to automation
· Dubai introducing robocops
· NATO leveraging AI for strategic decision making
· Apple working on AI chip + new ML API to make mobile AI faster
Commerce
· The secret behind Dollar Shave Club’s billion dollar success
· Google working its way into tracking brick and mortar sales from online ads
· Retail jobs fall again in May
· Some of Amazon’s brands are becoming quite popular online
· China’s move to a cash-free economy through QR codes
· 2017 subscription e-commerce deals decline
IoT
· 1 out of 5 mobile searches is based on voice
· Why voice may not be the future
Content and Experiences
· Microsoft’s Snapchat competitor
· The disappearing computer
· AR/VR: asking the right questions and the path ahead
· Walmart bringing VR training to employees with STRIVR labs partnership
· VR/AR update from Pitchbook on 2017 investments
· Canvs’ adds Instagram to analysis of emotional responses to TV shows
· VR industry hits pause based on slow consumer market
Blockchain
· Some lessons from the dotcom bubble for the coming crypto bubble
· Walmart blockchain drones patent
· Alphapoint partners with Deloitte and E&Y financial services and joins Ethereum Alliance
· The world’s biggest data breaches
· Pitchbook’s latest blockchain report
· Coinbase seeking 1B valuation as first blockchain unicorn
· Ethereum-funded feature film
· Brave’s ICO sale: 35M in 30 seconds
Health
· Outcome Health and its newest billionaire raising 500K on a 5M pre
· Mayo Clinic’s unusual challenge: overhaul a business that is working
· Crispr’s next debate: how messy is too messy
· A rapidly aging population visual
Business and Personal Strategy
· Innovating on the infrastructure of innovation
· Is this the golden age of entrepreneurialism? Statistics say no
· Innovating on the infrastructure of innovation
· Here’s how to go public without Wall Street: Regulation A+
· How to scale teams, cultures, and companies