AirPods with camera 🎧

Plus: Toyota to unveil first ‘full' self driving EV

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Cash Nut
July 01, 2024

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In Today’s Edition 

  • How to Determine If You Have Product-Market Fit 

  • BlackRock agreed to buy Preqin

  • Robinhood agreed to buy Pluto

  • Toyota to unveil first ‘full' self driving EV next year as it chases Tesla 

  • The EU has charged Meta with violating the Digital Markets Act

  • What SCOTUS just did to broadband, the right to repair, the environment, and more 

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🚀Startups Nuts

Determining product-market fit involves both qualitative and quantitative measures. Qualitative signs of fit include rapid customer acquisition, high product usage, and positive press. Quantitative key indicators include metrics such as high retention rates, Net Promoter Scores above 50, consistent growth in revenue, and favorable customer acquisition costs versus lifetime value ratios. If product-market fit is not achieved, founders should focus on customer feedback, iterate quickly with a lean team, and avoid premature scaling.

Other News

  • SmartHR, a Japanese provider of HR management software, raised $140m in Series E funding

  • K Health, a health symptom-checking chatbot, raised $50m at a $900m valuation

  • Vytal, a German reusable food packaging company, raised €6.2m

  • Vaire Computing, a maker of energy-efficient silicon chips, raised $4m in seed funding

  • Lambda Labs, a San Jose, Calif., cloud computing platform, is in talks to raise $900m

🏭Business Nuts 

Toyota is set to unveil its first EV with an advanced self-driving system next year in China. The Bozhi 3X SUV will be launched in a joint venture with China's Guangzhou Automobile Group. It will have advanced driver-assist features that will allow it to drive on roads, avoid obstacles, and park. A picture of the vehicle is available in the article.

Other News

  • BlackRock agreed to buy Preqin, a London-based provider of alternative asset data, for £2.55 billion.

  • Inside Out 2" crosses $1B at global box office, becoming the fastest animation film to break the $1B mark in just 19 days after its release.

  • Bicara Therapeutics, a Cambridge, Mass.-based developer of dual-action biologics, hired Morgan Stanley for an upcoming IPO, per Bloomberg. The company has raised over $300m in VC funding.

  • Solera, a Westlake, Texas-based auto software firm owned by Vista Equity Partners, for an IPO that Renaissance Capital estimates could raise $1.5b. It plans to list on the NYSE (SLRA), and reports a $486m net loss on $2.4b in revenue for the year ending March 31, 2024.

  • Robinhood agreed to buy Pluto, a trading and research platform that raised $4m in seed funding from Switch Ventures and Caffeinated Capital.

  • Warren Buffett gives away another $5.3 billion, says his children will manage his estate. He converted 8,674 of his Berkshire Class A shares to donate more than 13 million Class B shares. A total of 9.93 million shares went to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, with the rest going to the Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation.

📱Tech Nuts

Apple is reportedly planning to begin mass production of new AirPods with camera modules by 2026. The new AirPods will feature an infrared camera that will integrate with Vision Pro and future Apple Vision headsets to enhance the user experience of spatial audio and strengthen the spatial computing ecosystem. The system may detect environmental image changes to enable in-air gesture control. Apple is also exploring other wearable form factors such as smart glasses and a smart ring.

Other News

  • Apple will reportedly announce at least one other AI model integration this fall. Possible candidates include Google's Gemini and Anthropic's Claude models. Apple may eventually roll out subscription-only Apple Intelligence features.

  • Mary Meeker has written her first report in over three years, focused on the relationship between artificial intelligence and U.S. higher education.

  • The EU has charged Meta with violating the Digital Markets Act (DMA) due to its "pay or consent" advertising model on Facebook and Instagram.

  • Meta has introduced a new benchmark dataset named HOT3D to advance AI research in 3D hand-object interactions, containing over one million frames from various perspectives.

🎁Miscellaneous

The administrative state touches everything in the US like net neutrality, climate change, clean air and water, and consumer protections. Since 1984, the administrative state has largely run on one Supreme Court precedent: Chevron USA, Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council. This law enabled federal agencies to deal with issues that legislators have yet to cover. The decision has now been overturned. It is still unclear what the repercussions of this change may result in - it could completely change the ways courts review agency rulemaking.

💡What else are we reading and seeing?

  • Will We Ever Get Fusion Power? 

  • Venture capital's money model is shifting 

  • How being a cynic at work is holding you back

  • How $5 has become the fast food industry’s magic number 

  • The Best Social Media Site Still Looks Like It Was Made in the 1990s

  • Communicate with animals, win millions: Inside the wild new world of AI prizes6 ways I’m changing my life after having a professional time audit

😎Fun Fact

On this day: In1863, Civil War Battle of Gettysburg begins

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🐦Joke of the Day

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