Friday, January 30, 2015

1.30.15

Entertainment:
·         Telecom giant Singtel is planning to beat Netflix to the punch in Asia after it announced it has partnered with Sony Pictures and Warner Brothers to introduce a video streaming service in the region
·         Aspiro, which is behind the streaming services WiMP and Tidal, announced that Jay-Z’s company, Project Panther, had submitted a bid to acquire Aspiro for $56MM
·         Canon’s announcing a new pro-level DSLR camera next week, according to CanonRumors, and now specs have leaked that reveal what we can expect
·         Please see below for an interesting article on Sling TV
·         Early this morning, LASD arrested Suge Knight on suspicion of murder for the fatal hit and run that occurred near the set of the commercial being shot for the upcoming F. Gary Grey-directed N.W.A biopic ‘Straight Outta Compton’
·         "I really have no interest in science fiction at all," said George Lucas to Robert Redford at the Sundance Film Festival
·         Sony Pictures Classics will team up with director Woody Allen for the eighth time on his next film, now titled ‘Irrational Man’
·         Chinese online giant Tencent has signed a deal with the National Basketball Association (NBA) to extend their partnership in China by five years and create the league's largest international digital partnership
·         Please see below for a clarifying article on YouTube’s “Music Key” and their terms for artists
·         Please see below for the best virtual reality from the 2015 Sundance Film Festival
·         Online subscription video services are driving connected TV activities according to research from Futuresource Consulting
Tech:
·         AirBnB’s new head of design doesn’t believe that design-led companies will work
·         Technology companies that want to sell equipment to Chinese banks will have to submit to extensive audits, turn over source code, and build “back doors” into their hardware and software, according to a copy of the rules obtained by foreign companies already doing billions of dollar worth of business in the country
·         Reddit just released its first transparency report, outlining the requests for user information and for content takedown that it received in 2014
·         Facebook invaded the territory occupied by Yelp and Foursquare, launching a new feature for the Facebook iPhone app that delivers information about where its users are in real-time
·         With the latest earnings reports from Microsoft and Apple, “the once unthinkable became reality: Apple’s market capitalization hit $683B, more than double Microsoft’s current value of $338B
·         Design firm argodesign has a wild conceptual solution. It’s a one-person ambulance drone modeled after a standard quadcopter—driven by a GPS, pilot, or combination of both—that could be dispatched to an emergency scene with a single EMT
·         AOL is shutting down The Unofficial Apple Weblog, better known as TUAW
·         Vine just released a version of its app made just for kids
·         Kabam’s revenue for 2014 was $400MM, a new record for the company — but it’s scaling back some of its underperforming divisions
·         Nintendo wants to share YouTube ad revenue with the people who make videos about its games — and is already getting pecked to death over its rules and restrictions
·         Leading Japanese digital media agency D.A.Consortium (DAC) has tapped online advertising firm YuMe for tools to build a private ad marketplace
Deals:
·         DMG Media, publisher of UK newspaper The Daily Mail, announced this morning that it has acquired Elite Daily
·         Early stage venture capital investors Kickstart Seed Fund announced today that it has raised a $39.2MM investment round from various Utah investors
·         Please see below for today’s top tech funding stories
·         Shake Shack's initial public offering priced well above expectations at $21 apiece, netting the burger chain a valuation of $745MM
·         Qatar Airways said on Friday that it had acquired a 9.99 percent stake in the International Airlines Group, the parent company of British Airways and Iberia of Spain
·         The Hershey Company announced plans on Thursday to buy Krave, a fast-growing business intent on turning jerky into the next upscale snack food
Business:
·         Rothenburg Ventures started a new VR accelerator for health and education
·         Amazon just released its fiscal Q4 2014 earnings, reporting $29.33B in revenue, $214MM in net profit representing $0.45 per share
·         Google reported its third-quarter earnings after close of market today, offering up gross revenue of $18.10B, revenue net of traffic acquisition costs (ex-TAC) of $14.5B, and non-GAAP earnings per share (EPS) of $6.88, with GAAP EPS of $6.91
·         Sega said in a filing today that it will shut down its San Francisco offices which were once the flagship of its Sega’s Western empire - the move will likely impact around 120 jobs
·         Visa announced an 11.5% increase in profit during the quarter, as a strengthening U.S. job market and cheaper gasoline prices encouraged people to spend
·         Cablevision is suing Verizon, accusing the company of falsely advertising the "fastest WiFi available"
·         Blackstone has raised about $700MM from wealthy individuals for a new fund intended expressly for this class of investors, a new and largely untapped source of capital for buyout firms
Exec Moves:
Retail:
Startups:
·         Santa Monica-based game console developer Ouya has just scored $10MM in an investment round from Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba, as part of an effort to take the company's technology to China
·         Minibar, which provides on-demand delivery of wine, spirits, beer & mixers, just raised $1.8MM in a seed round
·         Business Insider raised $25MM in a venture round
Government:
·         Mitt Romney is out of the 2016 race - he is expected to confirm the decision in a conference call Friday morning
·         In simultaneous attacks on Thursday, militants hit more than a dozen army and police targets in the Sinai Peninsula, killing at least 25 soldiers and one policeman and wounding more than 60
Other:
·         The secondary market for Super Bowl tickets follows a predictable pattern. Prices sit flat in the $3,000 to $4,000 range, depending on where the game is being played, until two weeks before the game, when the matchup is set
·         Rita Jeptoo, the female Kenyan runner who has won the Boston and Chicago marathons for the last two years, has been barred from competitions for failing a drug test
·         Please see below for a funny video starring Matt Damon, Ben Affleck and other Boston-born actors about ‘Deflategate’ – concerning Tom Brady and deflating footballs


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