Jobaaj Stories
Story of the week - What's changing in Softbank?
Following the backfire of the recent bet on China's DIDI and Alibaba, Softbank decided to cash on its Uber holdings(45Mn shares @$44) to cover for the losses. Though SB denied any link between both the events, the link is evident itself. Japan's conglomerate's vision fund has invested heavily in China's tech and Edutech sector. With strong crackdowns from the Chinese government, Softbank is revisiting its strategies to address changing geopolitical conditions in China.
What's in it for India?
It is no surprise that Indian tech startups are on the prime and with the Indian government supporting the growth, the lost interest from the Chinese government could translate into a pool of opportunity for a booming and promising Indian startup environment.
What's building across the world?
Facebook's metaverse
Facebook has recently announced its dedicated efforts to build a 3D VR-driven social media platform. Though facebook won't be the only one working on the project, they are confident of being the prominent player in the future of social media.
Facebook metaverse plans to use AI and Virtual Reality to allow users to become part of the post and celebrate the moment.
Global Market Update
Equity Market
Owing to a miss in GDP targets, Dow experienced red lines this week. Though the majority of the GDP shock is driven by shink in supply, the change is believed to be transitory.
But the bigger concerns of inflation have now penetrated into the online market as well. As per the report from Axios and Adobe analytics, the offers made by online retailers are now relatively low compared to years ago. With inflation concerns and implications coupled with supply constraints rising sharply, it won't be a surprise that we see Fed tapering sooner than anticipated.
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Companies In Focus
- Gupshup, an Indian business messaging platform, raised $240 million in new Series F funding (round total now $340m) from Fidelity Management, Tiger Global, Think Investments, Malabar Investments, Harbor Spring Capital, Neuberger Berman, and White Oak.
- SoftBank Vision Fund plans to sell 45 million of its 184 million shares in Uber (NYSE: UBER), to help offset losses on its investment in Didi Chuxing (NYSE: DIDI).
- Neuralink, Elon Musk's embedded brain chip startup, raised $205 million in Series C funding led by Vy Capital.
- Robinhood experienced a shock on the IPO experiencing red lines soon after listing. Robinhood is the no-fee US trading app targeted to make trading mainstream. It is believed that Robinhood's popularity drove the meme stock frenzy of AMC and others.
- OYO looking for strategic partnership and investment from Microsoft at a $9bn valuation. (Read the full story here!)
Thanks for Reading!
Shubham Agarwal (CFA L2 Candidate | Incoming MBA candidate at University of Cambridge, UK)
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