CB Insights - Amazon acquisition

Hi there, 

Alright, it’s time for some more startup ideas. 

If you missed the prior request for startup (RFS) ideas, you can find some here, here, here, here, and here.  

For today: buyable Google Docs travel trips.

Why? Cuz vacation planning sucks.

How does it work?

1. Friends often share their travel planning Google Docs with each other. 
2. Since they're your friends, you probably trust their taste/judgment.
3. This would let you just buy the whole trip (actual bookings) with a “buy now” button. 

Vacation planning is done. 

Important notes:

• The offering here is not to buy the itinerary. There are plenty of sources for itineraries online.
• The idea here is to buy the trip, i.e., hotels, restaurant reservations, sightseeing tours, etc. in a single click. It’s like buying a vacation package vetted by someone whose taste you trust.    

Someone build this, please.

As always, neither CBI nor I want to advise, angel invest, provide feedback, etc. This is just an idea we think should exist and we hope someone builds this.

Amazon getting active

Now that Amazon has acquired Roomba, I shudder at all the evil things Amazon will do with my living room measurements.

What scares me most is Amazon analyzing the contents of the vacuum — specifically food crumbs — and using it to target Tyson Foods chicken nuggets ads at my family. 

More seriously, Amazon’s $1.7B acquisition of the smart vacuum maker is another indication of its ambitions in the smart home industry.

The e-commerce giant has already acquired several smart home companies, including:

• Doorbell and smart camera startup Blink for $90M in 2017

• Connected doorbell Ring for $1B in 2018

• Wi-Fi startup Eero in February 2019

Amazon is racing to connect the whole house — and win big — as the smart home market grows.

From the smart home to grocery, see the industries Amazon is going after here.

On a budget

After 2021’s record levels of investment, payments funding is returning to earth in 2022.

While deals remained elevated, global investment dropped 43% from Q1’22 to $5.1B in Q2’22. 

New entrants in the payments space are drawing a higher share of deals (63%) in 2022 so far compared to the previous 4 years as investors shift their attention to early-stage startups.

Core banking 101

Facing increasing competition from fintechs, retail banks are doubling down on digitizing their core services.

They’re also looking to revamp the customer experience, with a focus on mobile. 

From chatbots to customer analytics platforms, we map out 101 companies helping retail banks to digitize and reimagine their core services.

Bringing the hot sauce

Advertisers are increasing their retail media spending.

Retailers' rich customer data = more accurate targeting and attribution. 

In response to this multi-billion-dollar opportunity, retailers like Walmart and Carrefour are building their digital advertising businesses.

Our adoption playbook outlines the 14 technologies helping retailers build out their media networks, and the ones to prioritize now.

Open mic

Here are 4 cybersecurity companies that recently provided us with Analyst Briefings. 

Customers can also click “Connect here” below if they want to speak directly to these companies.

• Acuant, which provides identity verification solutions, counts Tipalti among its partners. [Connect here.]

• Armis Security offers a cybersecurity platform for IoT devices. The company is featured as a Leader in our IIoT Cybersecurity ESP. [Connect here.]

• Password manager 1Password was last valued at $6.8B. [Connect here.]

• Israel-based Cyolo was featured on our early-stage cybersecurity market map. [Connect here.]

Want to get your startup in front of customers, investors, acquirers, and 880K newsletter subscribers? Request a 100% free Analyst Briefing here.

Bloomberg. Antony Sguazzin (@AntonySguazzin), Samuel Gebre (@Habesh_), and Rene Vollgraaff (@vollgraaffR) cover Africa’s standout funding in 2022 so far and cite CB Insights data.

Retail Dive. Dani James (@DJames1264) discusses retail layoffs and mentions CB Insights research.

Insider Intelligence. Eleni Digalaki (@EDigalaki) digs into the CB Insights State of Fintech Q2’22 Report.
 

P.S. Apply for our Digital Health 150 awards. All the cool companies are doing it.