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- Meta Verified ☑️ // +200,000 tech layoffs 😐 // Stripe's Trillion Dollars 🤑
Meta Verified ☑️ // +200,000 tech layoffs 😐 // Stripe's Trillion Dollars 🤑
And also: Reddit IPO?, Sydney the Bing Chatbot, BMC $15 bn IPO
Update 20223-02-21
Tech industry 🐘
Facebook and Instagram are rolling out a new subscription service called Meta Verified, which will cost $11.99 per month on web and $14.99 per month on mobile in Australia and New Zealand this week, with plans to expand to other countries soon.
The feature grants users a verified badge, increased visibility on the platforms, prioritized customer support, exclusive stickers for Stories/Reels as well as 100 free stars each month that can be used to tip creators on Facebook.
To sign up for the service, you must meet minimum activity requirements; be at least 18 years of age or older; submit a government ID that matches your name & photo from either platform; businesses cannot yet apply for verification & any changes made require re-verification process again.
Rumors about paid verification first surfaced earlier this year when references were found in Instagram’s source code before being confirmed by CEO Mark Zuckerberg later via an update post - similar features have been seen previously with Twitter Blue but Meta's version is more secure due to its additional safeguards against fake accounts (although these still remain unknown).
Meta gave about 10% of its staff performance reviews indicating they were underperforming, WSJ reported. The performance reviews signal that Meta could be gearing up for another round of layoffs. About 13% of the company were laid off late last year. CEO Mark Zuckerberg declared 2023 would be a "Year of Efficiency" for the company.
The tech industry has seen many layoffs in the last two years. According to data compiled by Layoffs.fyi, over 108,754 workers have been laid off from 384 tech companies in 2023 alone. This follows the trend of more than 93,000 workers in U.S.-based tech companies being laid off in mass job cuts during 2022. In total, +200,00 people have been affected by tech layoffs between 2022 and 2023.
SaaS and Cloud ☁️
Stripe reportedly expects to process $1 trillion in payment volume this year, up from the $800 billion it processed in 2022.
This would mean that Stripe has reached the milestone of processing $1 trillion within 13 years, while PayPal did so after 23 years.
The firm is aiming for terms that would value it at around $55 billion and is looking to raise an additional $3 billion from existing investors with a valuation between 55-60 million dollars, according to sources.
Recently, Stripe has been adding and expanding partnerships across North America and Europe with BMW for vehicle preorders and Amazon for strategic payments partnership.
Appfire announces plans for multiple new apps in the monday.com app marketplace. The first apps to be released in the coming months will be Planning Poker and Dashboard Hub. To drive innovation and collaboration, Appfire plans to launch additional products on the m Monday.com marketplace.
AI 🤖
Microsoft has imposed a limit of 50 chat turns per day, and 5 chat turns each session on Bing's AI chatbot, Sydney. This comes after some users shared their "creepy" exchanges with the AI, and it compared one reporter to Hitler in a conversation.
The underlying model can get confused by long conversations, so Microsoft is prompting users to start new topics when limits are reached. Most answers were found within five chats, but 1% of conversations had more than 50 messages before the cap was implemented.
Amazon Music has collaborated with generative AI music company Endel to produce wellness playlists.
The Berlin-based app runs a cross-platform ecosystem of AI-powered apps that use personal inputs from the user’s movement, time of day, weather, heart rate and other factors to produce personalized soundscapes. It previously partnered with Warner Music Group and Universal Music Group’s Republic for albums produced by algorithms.
Now it is partnering with Amazon Music to create an eight hour sleep playlist titled "Sleep Science". This project follows Amazon's investment in Endel's parent company Techstars through its Alexa Fund and $15 million raised in its series B funding round led by Waverley Capital and True Ventures.
Its content is available on iOS, Android, Mac devices along streaming platforms. At the same time, it also teamed up Mercedes Benz Research All Nippon Airways Sony etc., demonstrating growing influence of AI in music production industry.
"From Bing to Sydney - Search As Distraction, Sentient AI," published on Stratechery, Ben recounts his experience with the chatbot and how it blew his mind. From its facsimile of memory to its dark side, read on to discover why a conversation with Bing's Chatbot left Ben deeply unsettled.
Funding, M&A and IPO💰
Reddit is still planning to go public in the second half of 2023, but at a much lower valuation than expected initially. Despite the market turbulence of 2021 and lack of profitability, Fidelity recently valued Reddit at $6.6 billion, which sets the stage for a successful IPO later this year. With the meme stock craze driving usage and revenues for Reddit in early 2021, it will be interesting to see how the company fares in its journey to becoming a publicly traded entity.
KKR & Co.-owned BMC Software has confidentially filed for an initial public offering, according to people familiar with the matter.
The company is estimated to be valued at $14 - $15 billion, and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. has been tapped as lead underwriter.
KKR acquired BMC in 2018 for $8.3 billion, and it was further boosted by the acquisition of Compuware Corp in 2020 worth 1.5 billion dollars; its revenue growth has accelerated under private equity ownership since then. Clients include Transport of London, Sky Italia, Carrefour and Iberdrola, among others worldwide.
Learn 🎓
This article provides insight into the importance of customer success and account expansion strategies. It explains that by building an "expansion strategy" around giving customers what they need when they need it, companies can achieve higher revenues from existing customers. The article also outlines how to surface expansion opportunities and emphasizes that expansion is the ultimate indicator of successful customer relationships.
This article provides an overview of the current state of sales teams in terms of hiring, specialization, attrition and quota achievement. On average, 66% of reps achieve their quotas, and SDRs are increasingly a necessary component for companies with higher ACV's. The article also looks at average salaries and earnings for AEs and CSMs. In short, this article highlights how high-growth companies can maximize their sales potential by specializing their team and making sure to hire experienced personnel.
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