Friday, October 31, 2014

10.31.14

Entertainment:      
·         Starz to possibly launch a standalone streaming service
·         Open Road Films is expanding into the international sales and distribution business after inking a strategic partnership with Glen Basner's FilmNation Entertainment
·         Ridley Scott's commercial production company RSA Films and movie ad agency Wild Card have launched 3 AM, a specialized consultancy firm geared to develop new forms of content and marketing for global audiences
·         Ellen DeGeneres is taking her selfies to a new level, announcing the launch of ellentube, a site and iOS app that pulls together videos related to The Ellen DeGeneres Show and from fans
·         Tokyo Disneyland and Tokyo DisneySea will get a $4.5 billion expansion and upgrade
·         Marriot International signs social stars to create content for Marriot Content Studio
·         Traditional TV viewing has declined by 13 minutes a day over the last year, and Netflix viewers alone are spending 12 minutes more a day on the service
Tech:
·         Nintendo’s first entry into the “quality of life” business, which it plans to release by early 2016, is a device that tracks a user’s level of fatigue by monitoring sleep
·         Slack, the enterprise collaboration platform, has closed a $120MM round of funding, co-led by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Google Ventures
·         Autodesk is opening a $100MM 3D printing fund, called Spark Investment Fund, to give money to startups and designers in the 3D printing space
·         Instagram to roll out video ads soon
·         On social media, there are more people talking about GamerGate than online privacy
·         Chinese users can now shop from Alibaba while watching videos on Youku
·         MakerBot, the 3D printer maker, will start offering up 3D printable Hello Kitty collectibles, as part of its MakerBot PrintShop app
·         Hello Kitty has turned 40 today
·         A Pirate Bay co-founder has been sentenced to more than 3 years in prison
·         Starbucks to start delivering in 2015
·         Obama administration officials launched their first-ever holiday contest for 3-D printed (or designed) ornaments
Deals:
·         The Japanese telecommunications giant Softbank is said to be looking at the wireless assets that have been put up for sale by América Móvil
·         Salus Capital Partners, a major RadioShack lender, is attempting to buy a bigger piece of the electronic retailer’s debt in exchange for agreeing to back the company’s store-closing plan
Business:
·         Sony’s mobile unit increased its revenue in the last quarter (its fiscal Q2 2014) by 1.2% to $2.83B, but the company wrote down the valuation of the business by $1.59B
·         GoPro shares spike as they beat analyst’s expectations
·         Citigroup revealed that it’s facing a U.S. criminal probe into the bank’s foreign-exchange business and took a $600MM legal charge
·         Time Warner Cable bled yet more residential video customers in the third quarter of 2014, losing profit in the process
Exec Moves:
·         Andy Rubin, Google’s head of robotics and former head of Android, has confirmed that he is stepping down from the company to launch a new incubator for hardware startups
·         Yahoo! has named Lisa Utzschneider as its SVP of sales for the Americas, nabbing her from Amazon
·         Kelly Kulchak has been named head of current programming at the TV division of DreamWorks Animation
·         Will Rowbotham has exited Caliber Media to join 3 Arts as a lit manager
Retail:
Startups:
·         Los Angeles-based uBeam, a developer of wireless charging technology which uses ultrasound to transmit energy, has raised $10M in a Series A led by Upfront Ventures
Government:
Other:
·         JK Rowling has revealed in a Halloween post that Dolores Umbridge was based on a real teacher


Thursday, October 30, 2014

10.30.14

Entertainment:      
·         MPAA bans Google Glass and other wearable cameras from movie theaters
·         Sony and Alibaba are in co-financing talks, and it is stated that the movies would be in both Chinese and English, and aimed at global audiences. Alibaba would handle distribution in China, and Sony elsewhere
·         Fox CEO Rupert Murdoch says that the industry needs Hulu to be “a serious competitor” to Netflix and Amazon
·         Dreamworks Animation shares are down over 5% today after released its mixed Q3 report
·         Universal Pictures has slotted Joel and Ethan Coen’s 1950s-set Hollywood film ‘Hail, Caesar!’ for release February 5, 2016
·         Fox’s broadcast of the 3-2 win by the San Francisco Giants over the Kansas City Royals got a surging 15.2/24 rating
·         'The Hunger Games: Mockingjay' could top $150MM in its US debut
·         Vice Media and Canada's Rogers Communications, a media and communications conglomerate, have formed a $100MM joint venture to create a multimedia production studio
·         Sydney-based animation and VFX studio Animal Logic is in advanced negotiations with Warner Bros. to secure production duties on the next three Lego movies
·         The Foo Fighters’ world tour has added a string of stadium dates across Australia and New Zealand
·         Please see below for an interesting WSJ article on why Hollywood loves Chris Nolan
·         YouNow is a live video site that is gaining traction in the market
·         More than a third of Americans interested in standalone HBO
Tech:
·         Tim Cook, Apple CEO, has publicly announced that he is gay
·         Please see below for an interesting article on how Facebook is making a big push to keep content online and make it easily accessible on their site
·         Viber has been blocked in China
·         Mixify, the live streaming service connecting big-ticket DJs to clubs around the world, is seeing its Clubcast service take off with major DJs signing on to the platform
·         YouTube can now play videos at 60 frames per second
·         About.me’s new ‘Intro’ app aims to replace the business card
·         In Tumblr’s new update, the blogging platform is growing the size of video and image display by 40 pixels and adding a “quick compose” button for posts
·         Spotify updates its iPad app with a fresh redesign and new curation features
·         Pandora ranked as No. 1 among music apps for most downloads and total revenue generated in September, according to App Annie’s new Music App Index report
·         Microsoft has launched its first wearable called the "Microsoft Band"
·         Samsung Electronics reports that its net profit nearly halved during Q3, as its mobile business continued to face heavy competition from low-cost Chinese smartphone makers
·         Facebook loses $24,420 a minute during outages
·         Google Play Books is now a lot better for reading nonfiction titles like textbooks
·         Please see below for reviews on the new GoPro cameras
Deals:
·         Lenovo has completed its $2.91B acquisition of Motorola from Google
·         Next Games acquires mobile game studio Helsinki GameWorks
·         Abbott paid $250MM plus milestones for Topera Medical and its cardiac arrhythmia mapping technology
·         Greene King has offered to acquire the Spirit Pub Company for about $1.2B in cash and stock
Business:
·         Please see below for today’s top tech funding stories
·         Global Eagle Entertainment, the developer of in-flight wireless and entertainment systems for airlines, has partnered with  satellite operator SES, to bring Ku-band satellite bandwith to the company's system
·         Media, finance and automotive brands continue to lead online video advertising adoption, according to new data from MediaRadar
·         Apollo Global Management reported on Thursday that its third-quarter profit declined sharply, weighed down by a loss in its private equity business
·         Goldman Sachs is at odds with its fellow Alibaba advisers after it awarded a “neutral” rating to the Chinese ecommerce group’s shares with a price target well below those of the other banks most closely involved in the initial public offering last month
Exec Moves:
·         Sony will appoint SVP Hiroki Totoki as the new president of Sony Mobile Communications
·         Jeremy Gordon, Twitter’s head of product engineering, and Adam Kinney, a four-year veteran leading the analytics group, are leaving the company
Retail:
Startups:
·         Minted, a social commerce company that crowdsources graphic designs and content from a global design community, raised $38MM in its Series D
Government:
Other:
·         At least two people area dead after a plane crashed into a two-story building at the Mid-Continent Airport in Wichita, Kansas