PLUS: The battle of TV remotes.
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The Big Idea | ||||
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Not even a little bit unsettling (Source: Boston Dynamic) |
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The pandemic is ushering in a new wave of office and warehouse robots. Will the trend continue? |
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Itâs an internet tradition. The robotics company Boston Dynamics releases a video of its latest robot doing some advanced human-looking stuff and Twitter loses its mind. Last month, the firm caught the viral wave with its robots getting their dance on. While the video was no doubt impressive, the practical applications â unless weâve completely lost the plot here â werenât readily apparent. If youâre looking for practical examples of robots at work, a recent report from The Economist says the pandemic has ushered in a new wave of automation thatâs here to stay. The installed base of factory robots is growingâŚâŚ forecast to reach 3.2m units by the end of this year, double the count from 2015 â per research firm Robo Global. Within 5 years, the total spend on industrial robots could hit $73B, up 60% from today. And COVID-19 is only accelerating the trend. Despite the long-term cost savings from automation, corporate managers have to manage investor expectations when it comes to huge upfront cash outlays. The pandemic â which is forcing all industries to re-imagine work â provides cover for big robotics investments. What type of robots we talkinâ bout here?ÂAccording to The Economist, there are a few categories:Â
Itâs not all doom and gloom for labor, thoughÂWeâve also seen increased demand for âcollaborative robotsâ (AKA âcobotsâ) â from firms such as GreyOrange and Amazon-owned Kiva â which are designed to work with people. Cobots are in particularly high demand for ecommerce warehouses, which are obviously booming. We have no idea when the next viral Boston Dynamics vid will drop, but we hope that its next robot is 1% as useful as these army of cobots: |
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But can these cobots deliver jokes? (Source: YouTube/YourStory) |
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Bottoms Up | ||||
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You can safely drink Athletic Brewing while kayaking (Source: Athletic Brewing) |
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A former hedge fund trader founded Americaâs leading nonalcoholic craft beer |
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Itâs Dry January⌠which means somewhere, someone you know is prob having a sip of Athletic Brewing. Founded in 2017 by Bill Shufelt â a former hedge fund trader â Athletic Brewing is one of Americaâs fastest-growing nonalcoholic (NA) brands, Bloomberg reports. As quarantine life pushed many to prioritize health at home, the company saw sales grow more than 5x in 2020 to ~$15m. The entire nonalcoholic beverage industry is $187mWithin that, Athletic Brewing dominates the craft NA beer segment with a 61% share offering low-cal favorites like Run Wild IPA (70 cals) and gluten-free Upside Dawn Golden Ale (50 cals). Donât let the names fool you â this is not hipster fare. Shufeltâs trading career was a âperformance-based lifestyleâ that required him to stay sharp, while investors include A+ athletes like NFL players J.J. Watt and Justin Tuck. The trend has a number of tailwindsâŚâŚ as covered by our Steph Smith in aâŚerrâŚTrends article (un-paywalled for 1 week):Â
Major alcohol brands (e.g., AB InBevâs Leffe 0.0 or Carlsbergâs Nordic Ale) have gotten in on the action. Everything helps when it comes to keeping that âdryâ New Yearâs resolution. |
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SPONSORED |
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Return of the Button | ||||
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Streaming wars, 2021: Battle of the buttons |
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In 2011, Netflix changed our lives â for better or worse â by introducing the Netflix button on remotes. They outdid themselves with the âskip introâ button, but thatâs another conversation. At last weekâs CES, one trend stood out among all kinds of remotes: buttons. More branded shortcut buttons than everChinese smart TV maker Hisense introduced a remote with 6 branded buttons including Netflix, Prime Video, YouTube, Tubi, Disney+, and Peacock. Vizio âhold my beerâdâ them with 7 buttons. Streaming services dish out ~$1 per remote for the real estate, making the buttons a valuable revenue stream for TV manufacturers looking to offset a ~60% decline in TV prices between 2014 and 2019. On the other end â with the smart TV market expected to grow 10.5% annually through 2025 â streaming services see the buttons as a means toward subscriber growth and increased viewership. Now, with voice assistants, brands are fighting a 2-front battleIn 2020, for instance, LG was supposed to integrate Google Assistant and Alexa into its main mic button, but Google reportedly wasnât down to share. This meant that to access Alexa on LGâs remote, users had to long-press the Prime Video button â and no one likes a long-press. This year, things changed: LG gave Google Assistant and Alexa dedicated buttons. But LG also gave its own webOS a button â meaning LGâs remote now has 3 separate voice assistant buttons. Seems a little excessive if you ask us. |
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How has FAAMG done since Inauguration Day 2017? |
We hope youâre sitting down for this. At close on Jan. 20, 2017, the combined market value of FAAMG (Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, Google) was $2.43T. As of yesterday morning, it was $7.19T. In just 4 short years, these 5 tech giants added $4.8T in market value; almost as jarring, Apple itself is today worth almost as much ($2.14T) as the 5 companies combined were in January 2017. đ |
The Hustle Says |
Peaky Blinders is getting a sixth season and a movie. Catch up on the first 5 seasons here. |
Winc continues to disrupt the $300b vino industry with their modern wine subscription. Thanks to bottomless customer insights, theyâll help you discover new wines youâll love and ship âem straight to you. Get $20 off your first order here.* |
Invest in Gatsby, the fast-growing app that makes trading options easy. Their funding round ends on 2/12, or once they hit $5M â whichever happens first. Donât miss your chance to invest in the future of options trading.* |
If youâre gonna watch Peaky Blinders with the kids around, youâll probably want to snag some high-quality earplugs. Cockney accents are cool, your child dropping F-bombs at preschool is |
*This is a sponsored post. |
TRENDS |
How to stand out from your 9.7 competitors⌠Research shows that if you start a business this year, youâre going to have more competitors than if you had started a business 5 years ago. (9.7 competitors vs. 2.6, on average) So, it should come as no surprise that when we asked founders for the #1 skillset a newcomer should have for starting a project in 2021, many gave the same answer: Branding. Branding is what sets you apart from those 9.7 competitors youâre going to be facing. Which is why, in last weekâs Trends newsletter, we dove deep into best practices that have proven successful and frameworks that you can start leveraging immediately for the competitive edge. When you read through last weekâs issue, youâll learn:
If youâre not already a member of Trends, sign up today for a $1 trial to get access to the full newsletter. |
Click here â |
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Listen, we know you want more robot GIFs⌠so, here you go. Above is a grocery-picking robot that Ocado â the British online-only grocer â uses to fill customersâ orders. This robot uses the latest sensors, visions, and suction technology to pick up to 50 items in 2-3 minutes, according to the companyâs CEO Tim Steiner. Ocado now sells its tech to 3rd parties (e.g., Kroger) and its market value has exploded, growing 10x in the past 5 years to ~$26B. |
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