š Weekly News Digestā¦ The Seed #16
Netflix.shop, Bitcoin as a legal tender, and the latest unicorns!
Hello everyone! We hope you are well!
We inaugurate today this new format as announced in our previous mail: The Weekly News Digest by the Seed.
Every week, we will share the latest news, trends, IPOs and fundraisings to give you a synthesized overview of what happened around Entrepreneurship, Innovation, and Tech in the world.
A big thank you to everyone for your feedback to improve the newsletter! We hope you'll enjoy it š
š Todayās program:
The Big Tech Retail Bet
Social Network Innovations
Crypto assets: legal or illegal?
New unicorns and successful IPOs of the past two weeks
The Big Tech Retail Bet
Big Tech investments in the e-commerce and retail sectors.
š¬ Netflix has launched Netflix.shop to sell its product directly, partnering with Shopify. You will be able to buy limited editions products from your favorite shows and Netflix productions (e.g., decorative items from Lupin)
š½ Google has just opened its first permanent retail store in NYC, where you can buy their hardware products (laptops, phones, Fitbit wristbandsā¦) but also Google merch (including socks and bags).
Social Network Innovations
A summary of the innovations around social networks and app this week.
š§ Spotify launched Greenroom this week to compete with Clubhouse. Eventually, some of its features will be integrated with the Spotify app itself!
š¤ Similarly, Mark Zuckerberg hosted the first beta test of the Facebook "Live Audio Room" feature this week, which is also based on the Clubhouse experience.
š¦ Twitter is working on a feature that will allow its users to untag themselves from some tweets. This would be particularly useful to prevent unwanted notifications and online harassment.
Crypto assets: legal or illegal?
More and more governments are positioning themselves around these volatile assets.
š¹š Thailand recently decided to ban some "meme" cryptocurrencies (e.g. Dogecoin) and NFTs. The Thai Security and Exchange Commission stated some crypto assets have "no clear objectives or substance".
šøš» Meanwhile, in El Salvador, Bitcoin will become legal tender within 3 months. This means that all companies will have to accept Bitcoin as a means of payment and that even taxes could be paid using the cryptocurrency!
Latest Unicorns and IPOs
This week, letās focus on Israeli and French startups.
š Ledger, aĀ companyĀ specialized in cybersecurity whichĀ developedĀ Crypto WalletsĀ becameĀ the 15th French unicorn raising $380MĀ to a $1B+ valuation.
š IRL, a social app based onĀ calendarĀ plannedĀ eventsĀ raisedĀ a $170mĀ SeriesĀ C toĀ hitĀ aĀ $1B+Ā valuation.Ā TheĀ companyĀ which first suffered fromĀ COVID-19Ā facedĀ aĀ shiftĀ in itsĀ productĀ and couldĀ maintainĀ a 400% growth during lastĀ year.
š Monday, theĀ IsraeliĀ Project Management sandboxĀ wentĀ publicĀ earlier thisĀ monthĀ to a 9B valuation onĀ NasdaqĀ enĀ went upĀ to 27% on its IPOĀ price!
š¬ WalkMeĀ wentĀ publicĀ onĀ Nasdaq, and even though theyĀ struggledĀ in theirĀ firstĀ days of aĀ publicĀ company,Ā IsraeliĀ companiesĀ areĀ on aĀ wonderfulĀ path. How WalkMe became this successful company?
š¶ Believe, a French Music Label Scale-up wentĀ publicĀ onĀ EuroNext.Ā
See you next week! Hope you enjoyed this new format š
ā¦ and see you in two weeks for the first "Deep Dive" format, which will go into further details on a specific topic to allow you to become an expert on the subject and satisfy your curiosity!