AV/EV

CASE Race

From Silicon Valley to the Big Three’s boardrooms in Detroit to the nearly 500,000 consumers who bought Teslas last year, we’re seeing incredible levels of enthusiasm for electrified vehicles. It also feels like an inflection point for autonomy, too, even though there are fewer commercialized products. 

To show you what we mean, allow us to present two multibillion dollar deals from yesterday alone. 

EV momentum in the private markets

Rivian said yesterday it’s pulled in an additional $2.65 billion at a $27 billion valuation. It’s eyeing a 2021 release for its all-electric R1T truck and R1S SUV. 

• On the commercial side, Rivian has a 100,000 EV delivery van purchase order from Amazon—a customer and investor. The vans should start rolling out of a Rivian production plant later this year 
• BlackRock, Fidelity, T. Rowe Price, and Ford have also invested in Rivian, which has raised $8 billion in total since the beginning of 2019.  

Microsoft picks a robo-workhorse

Microsoft hadn’t made a big bet in the autonomous space until yesterday. Along with other institutional investors, Microsoft backed GM’s Cruise with $2 billion. Azure will be the legacy automaker’s “preferred cloud provider.” 

About Cruise: GM acquired the startup and Y Combinator alum for over $1 billion in 2016. At that time, Cruise had just 40 employees (fewer than Morning Brew). The Microsoft deal brings Cruise’s valuation to $30 billion. 

• GM’s stock jumped nearly 10% Tuesday morning and, as of press time, its market cap was roughly $79 billion. In other words, Cruise accounts for an eye-popping 38% of GM’s value. 

New vocab term

CASE is shorthand for the four horsemen of new mobility—Connected, Autonomous, Shared, and Electric. While the pandemic has temporarily decimated the use of “shared” mobility modalities, they will eventually make a comeback. As you can see from all of this activity on a single Tuesday, the other three letters are holding steady. 

+ While we’re here: Aurora officially closed the Uber ATG deal yesterday and announced a partnership with PACCAR to develop autonomous trucks. Also, Fiat Chrysler and PSA Group completed their merger. The combined entity, which started trading as $STLA yesterday, shot up 11%. 

TECH POLICY

Tech on Deck

On Inauguration Day, let’s take another look at what the incoming Biden-Harris Administration could mean for tech. 

New faces

President Biden announced his picks on Friday for the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). They’ll advise the president on all things science, technology, and engineering. Say hello to two of them. 

Dr. Eric Lander: A few highlights from his resume? President and founding director of the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard—a genomic research institute focused on disease—and a lead on the Human Genome Project. If confirmed, he'll be the director of OSTP and, under President Biden, the first-ever Cabinet-level Presidential Science Advisor.

Dr. Alondra Nelson: Currently president of the Social Science Research Council and on deck to be OSTP’s deputy director for science and society. She’s passionate about AI ethics, algorithmic bias, and diversity in tech teams. 

• “As a Black woman researcher, I am keenly aware of those who are missing from these rooms,” she said Friday.

Big picture

Chances are we’ll see the White House increase funding for emerging tech R&D, reskilling programs, and rural broadband infrastructure (or closing the digital divide), according to the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF), a nonpartisan think tank.

One more thing: President Biden plans to position America as the “global leader in the manufacture of electric vehicles and their input materials and parts,” including EV charging stations. 

SPONSORED BY GATSBY

Stocks Can Be a Snoozefest

But you know what isn’t? The options market. And you know who’s making the options market available to all (and is also an investment opportunity for you)?

Gatsby.

Gatsby is the fintech phenom designed for a new generation of investors. With the options market growing, investors are using Gatsby to leverage this powerful investment vehicle in a digestible, responsible way. 

The options market had over—not million, not bajillion—but $14 TRILLION worth of options contracts traded in 2019—and things don’t seem to be slowing down.

The fintech revolution is here, and you can get in by investing in Gatsby directly. Since launching a year ago, more than 200k contracts have been traded on their platform—that’s more than $50 million of transactions. 

The campaign closes Friday, February 12th (or when they’ve raised $5 million) and has already reached $2.8 million, so cash in on this fintech revolution while you still can. 

HARDWARE

Same Fold Story

CES 2021 just ended, but let us take you back to the 2020 edition: Covid-19 was just beginning, Hayden and Ryan had never met (technically still haven’t), and foldable phones were all the rage. 

• The names on everyone’s lips were Huawei’s Mate X, Motorola’s re-imagined Moto Razr, and TCL’s foldable phone in concept form. 

A year later, Apple reportedly just got around to prototyping its own. 

What took it so long? 

Although the phones were as buzzy as they were bendy, reviewers and reporters noted issues like glitchy software, screen lags, camera issues, and imperfect creases/hinges. And the Samsung Galaxy Fold debacle—in which screens broke on reviewers after just days of use—was still fresh in people’s minds. 

Apple, usually on the innovation frontlines, was thought to be waiting until the market matured. Its prototype—and the fact that Samsung and Motorola have both rolled out new and slightly improved versions of their foldables—suggest the market is, slowly but surely, heating up.

Big picture: Smartphone makers still haven’t ironed out all the kinks...just look at Microsoft’s Surface Duo, which launched in September to middle-of-the-road reviews. 

BITS & BYTES

Stat: Q4 2020 set a new healthcare AI funding record of nearly $2.3 billion, according to CB Insights—largely thanks to mega-rounds. 

Quote: “These technologies are getting more and more sophisticated, and when they work really well, sometimes we're delighted, and sometimes we're creeped out. It's that balancing act of like, ‘Wait a minute, that was really useful … should I be worried?’” —Anne Toth, Amazon's director of Alexa Trust, in an interview. 

Read: Rest of World explores how one of the most advanced video surveillance systems in the world hasn’t stopped crime in Mexico City. 

SPONSORED BY CISCO

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WHAT ELSE IS BREWING

• DuckDuckGo, a privacy-focused search engine, passed 100 million daily queries for the first time. 
• Desktop Metal is buying EnvisionTEC, another 3D printing company, for $300 million. 
• SpaceX bought two oil rigs to convert into floating spaceports. 
• U.S. Representatives Ro Khanna and Shaun Modi are calling for a federal chief experience officer, who would be in charge of Americans’ digital experience. 
• Facebook and Instagram have an upgraded AI system for auto-generated image captions. 
• President Trump, on his second-to-last day in office, ordered an assessment of security risks from Chinese-made drones.
• Tesla is hiring customer support specialists with the ability to “address social media escalations directed at the CEO.” 

TRIVIA

Yesterday, Netflix reported fourth quarter 2020 results and announced that it passed 200 million paid subscribers for the first time. As of press time, the company’s stock had soared more than 14%. 

Today’s trivia focuses on the streaming giant. Take the quiz here.

FROM THE CREW

We love a good trend piece, especially when it's crossover content from our vertical siblings. We’re in luck, because Retail Brew and Marketing Brew have created “Overlooked/Overhyped” reports on industry trends in 2020. 

• Read Retail Brew’s report, which includes outlooks on supply chain automation and social commerce.
• Then, check out Marketing Brew’s take, which touches on micro-influencers and the death of the third-party cookie.  

ICYMI

Catch up on the top Emerging Tech Brew stories from the past few editions: 

• Q&A: Inside Waymo’s 2021 game plan 
• Intel’s roadmap to reinvention
• GM’s president on its new B2B bet for electric vehicles