Wednesday, 5th of January, 2022

Hello,

A jury found Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes guilty of four counts of criminal fraud yesterday after more than 50 hours of deliberation over seven days. The American Dream came to an end. I wrote a piece about yesterday, so you can check it out here.??

Leaving it behind, we have a small announcement at Netguru. We are looking for a Chief of Staff. So if you are looking to join one of the fastest-growing digital agencies in Europe and are business savvy, have strong analytical skills, and experience as Head of Operations/COO/CEO, this offer fits you perfectly. You can apply here or reach out to Katarzyna Paj?k on LinkedIn.

Cheers,

Radek

Disrupting Retail

• Victoria's Secret last week said it's on track to deliver on the Q4 guidance it gave in November, for sales to be flat or rise as much as 3% above 2020's $2.1 billion and for operating income to land between $295 million and $335 million. The lingerie retailer enjoyed encouraging sales growth during the peak Thanksgiving shopping weekend and a "large rush of business as we approached December 25th," CEO Martin Waters said in a statement. Read more.?
• Walmart is expanding its service that will deliver your groceries directly to your refrigerator, the company announced. First launched in fall 2019, Walmart’s InHome delivery service, as it’s called, allows customers to place grocery orders online, then receive their deliveries by having a Walmart associate enter their home by way of a smart lock. The service was initially tested in a small handful of markets, including Kansas City, Pittsburgh and Vero Beach, and is now available to 6 million households across the U.S. after further launches in Northwest Arkansas, Atlanta, Phoenix, and D.C. Walmart says it plans to expand InHome delivery more broadly, with the goal of reaching 30 million U.S. homes by the end of the year. “Above all else, convenience is the leading factor for our customers,” Tom Ward, Walmart’s SVP of last-mile delivery, told TechCrunch. Read more.?
• Adyen, the global payments platform of choice for many of the world’s leading companies, today announced the launch of mobile Android point of sale (POS) terminals in the EU, UK, and the United States. “Our all-in-one Android terminals combine the flexibility of the Android platform with the security of a PCI certified payment terminal,” said Jan-Pieter Lips, Head of Unified Commerce at Adyen Read more.
• ODP Corp., parent company of Office Depot and OfficeMax, agreed in late December to sell its CompuCom Systems IT unit to private equity firm Variant Equity. "This action represents an important step in continuing to align our business model and resources towards our core strategy," said ODP Chief Financial Officer Anthony Scaglione in the press release announcing the CompuCom sale. Read more.?

Finance & Tech

• Customers are reporting a rash of problems with inbound Faster Payments at Natiownide Building Society, which was hit by similar glitches in the busy festive shopping period. A Nationwide Building Society spokesperson says: “As a result of extremely high volumes of transactions on the first working day of the year we took the decision to temporarily queue inbound faster payments. To put this in context, more than 10 million payments were processed overnight. This has been done to ensure we can manage and process those payments, which were taking much longer than normal due to the numbers received. Read more.?
• Riding the BNPL wave, Mastercard-backed Indian merchant commerce platform Pine Labs has picked up a fresh $20 million investment from the country's largest commercial bank, the State Bank of India (SBI). B. Amrish Rau, CEO, Pine Labs, says: “In the last one year, several marquee investors have placed their trust in our business model and growth momentum and that is a gratifying feeling. This association with SBI is a personally satisfying experience as I had started my career selling financial services technology to SBI.” Read more.?
• Tier1 Financial Solutions (“Tier1”), a leading provider of client relationship management solutions, AML compliance and fraud prevention solutions, has received new equity financing from a group of investors led by Wavecrest Growth Partners and MassMutual Ventures. “We’re very excited to continue working with our long-trusted partners at Wavecrest and MassMutual Ventures. Their increased investment demonstrates not only their support for Tier1 but also the firm’s affirmation that we’re staying ahead of the innovation curve in our AML compliance and CRM solutions,” said Jiro Okochi, CEO of Tier1 Financial Solutions. Read more.?
• Offering a smarter way to complete financial transactions, PollenPay, a UK-based Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) company is delighted to announce its exciting launch plans. Speaking on PollenPay’s launch plans, founder and CEO, Leon Wilson commented: “Customers shouldn’t fear the thought of making payments and retailers shouldn’t worry about receiving money in a timely manner. I’ve watched these issues affect British businesses and consumers for far too long and decided a change needed to be made. That’s why I’ve developed PollenPay, which I’m proud to launch very soon. Read more.?
• Flamingo Tech launches its personalized financial platform helping users to set, track and optimize financial goals based on their desired lifestyle. “We are here to equilibrate financial wellbeing… The financial sector has existed in siloed structures, masking data from the user. We must emerge from these silos and make financial data accessible so that the user can make more informed financial decisions.” says Sana Tayyab, C.E.O at Flamingo Tech Pvt Ltd. Read more.?
• Unibo, a neobank for property management, is set to launch imminently in Spain. Speaking to Spanish magazine El Referente, CEO and co-founder Pedro García says property managers and real estate agents are an “unloved” customer segment within traditional banks. “Despite representing a high-volume general business, they continue to be offered the same products and services as 15 years ago,” García told El Referente. Read more.?

Personal Changes?

• Goldman Sachs veteran Joanne Hannaford has joined Credit Suisse as the firm’s chief technology and operations officer (CTOO). Hannaford has replaced James Walker in the role, who will relocate to the US to become deputy chief executive of the Credit Suisse business in the region. Hannaford will also join the Swiss multinational’s executive board and will be based in Zurich, Switzerland, reporting directly to chief executive Thomas Gottstein. Read more.?

All Things Innovation?

• Fractal has raised $360 million from TPG in a new financing round and entered the unicorn club as the Mumbai and San Francisco-headquartered AI startup, which counts Google and Wells Fargo among its customers, scales its offerings and begins preparation for an IPO. The new financing round valued the startup “at well north of $1 billion,” said Srikanth Velamakanni, co-founder and group chief executive at Fractal, in an interview with TechCrunch. TPG invested in the startup through its TPG Capital Asia, its Asia-focused private equity platform. The new round involves some secondary share purchase as well. Read more.?
• Hyundai has some grand ambitions for its robotics development. And thus far, the automaker has been willing to put its money where its mouth is, most notably in the form of its acquisition of Boston Dynamics, which valued the robotics pioneer at north of $1 billion. Robotics are, predictably, taking center stage with the company’s CES presentation this week. Last month, Hyundai offered a sneak preview in the form of the Mobile Eccentric Droid, a four-wheel modular mobility platform. Today, the company outlined broader plans for the future with its new “metamobility” concept. Read more.?
• Cybersecurity breaches are at a high watermark, and so any company serious about expanding its credibility and business in enterprise IT has to continue investing in tackling it. To that end, Google is kicking off the new year by stepping up its operations in cloud-based and enterprise security. The company confirmed that it has acquired Siemplify, an Israel-based cybersecurity startup that specializes in end-to-end security services for enterprises, typically referred to as security orchestration, automation and response (SOAR) services. Read more.

A Number to Remember

$1 million?

• Google will pay top execs $1 million each after declining to boost workers’ pay Ruth Porat, Prabhakar Raghavan, Philipp Schindler, and Kent Walker are all receiving the new salary. Read more.?

Reader’s Corner

• CES 2022: Five Tech Trends to Watch in an Unusual Year. Omicron might prevent some big exhibitors from attending, but over 2,000 companies are expected in Las Vegas to unveil innovations. A summary by WSJ of CES 2022. Read more.?
• In its current form, the internet relies on data collection that some critics liken to mass surveillance. Technology companies and researchers are beginning to wonder whether the metaverse will be any different. Facebook Inc.’s name change to Meta Platforms Inc. signaled that businesses behind games, office tools and other services will increasingly invest in this next iteration of cyberspace. Their pitch is to create loosely connected communities where users can work, play and shop using digital avatars. Read more.