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Hi there, 

What companies excel at “beef marketing''?

In other words, which upstarts successfully provoke larger competitors?

Any examples of cos that did/do this well and what they did?

Some that come to mind:

• Salesforce vs. Siebel

• The Mac vs. PC ads by Apple

Others? LMK.

How Discord makes $$$

Millions of people have flocked to Discord to connect, socialize, and work. As of July 2021, the chat platform has 150M monthly active users. 

Discord’s user base has not only attracted investor interest, it’s also propelled the company’s revenue, which nearly tripled to reach $130M in 2020. 

So how does Discord make money? Not from ads. 

Find out how Discord leverages subscriptions, game distribution, and more for growth — and what’s next for the company — in our deep dive here. 

Quantum time bomb

Quantum computing could break the encryption used today to secure everything from emails to bank payments — a risk that’s becoming a high priority as quantum computing advances. 

Fortunately, new encryption techniques called “post-quantum cryptography” will help defend against this quantum threat. 

We dig into what post-quantum cryptography is and what companies need to consider before implementing it here.

Shooting for the moon

Venture capital investing is a game of home runs, where an early investment in a high-performing company can make up for all of a VC’s losses and then some.

See which investors have backed the most current unicorns when they were just taking off in this graphic. 

Big names

The Global Chief Medical Officer of Image Guided Therapy (IGT) at Philips is the latest speaker to join the lineup for Future of Health (Dec. 8-9, virtual).
 

He’ll be joining:

• Chief Digital Officer, R&DS Technology Solutions at IQVIA (NYSE: IQV)

• Co-founder and Co-CEO, GoodRX (NASDAQ: GDRX)

• Global Chief Medical Officer and VP of Healthcare, Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT)

• Executive Chairman and CEO, Transcarent (Livongo founder remaking the health & care experience)

• Co-founder and Chief Health Officer, Cityblock Health (unicorn — $2.9B valuation)

Register here before prices go up one week from today.
 

And if you have an incredible product that’s built for healthcare/pharma, applying to demo here could be the best marketing investment you make all year.

Can we blockchain in private?

Capital markets on a public blockchain sounds great, but what about privacy?

Our Amsterdam-based friends at Blockdata sat down with Dusk Network to find out how open-source tech can preserve privacy on an open blockchain. 

Read the full interview here.

Check it out

We’ve partnered with Insuretech Connect for ITC Vegas, the world’s largest insurtech event. Join us in Vegas (October 4-6) to learn where the industry is headed and network with insurance leaders and innovators.

Adweek. Patrick Kulp (@PatrickKulp) covers buy now, pay later provider Afterpay’s new in-app advertising model and references CB Insights research.

Business Insider. Linette Lopez (@lopezlinette) talks about SPACs and their implications for Wall Street, citing CB Insights data.

Nikkei Asian Review. Minoru Satake reports on SoftBank’s new investment advisor and uses CB Insights unicorn data.
 

P.S. Want to take on a technical recruiting leadership role at a fast-growing SaaS company? Apply here to be a Manager, Technical Recruiting at CB Insights. 

P.P.S. Our friends at Scrum Ventures are hiring a Portfolio Operations Manager. Check out the role here.

Start your engines. The pandemic drove a surge in startup creation, with 4.3M new business applications filed in the US last year — a 24% increase year-over-year.

NYT 

Not lovin’ it. One of many UK businesses facing supply chain shortages, McDonald’s has had to remove milkshakes and other popular items from its UK menu.

Financial Times 

Ready player one. The business of video game coaching has boomed in the pandemic as competitive gaming and e-sports take off.

The Guardian

Harder, better, faster, stronger. A new approach to clustering chips could power AI neural networks that are more than 100 times bigger than today’s models.

WIRED

Head in the clouds. Scientists are attempting to artificially increase cloud cover above the Great Barrier Reef to protect it from the sun’s rays.

Nature