The man who gamed Uber 🚕 💻
For the first half of the podcast, Sam and Shaan sit down with a very special guest, Abhishek Kumar Maurya, the founder of UberPro.In. UberPro games Uber’s referral system by offering discounted rides and meal deliveries.
The great exodus 🏃💨
People are fleeing cities, SF alone has seen an 11% decrease in rent prices. This may be a sign of a bigger trend where cities become less important to entrepreneurial success. Shaan and Sam break down the startups capitalizing on this trend.
Why humans will become androids 🤖
Today we get instant feedback loops on almost everything we do, except with our bodies. For example, we have no idea how many calories we’re consuming. There are massive opportunities to better merge tech and fitness into our lifestyles.
- Levels: Blood glucose monitoring startup. Provides instant readings on glucose levels.
- Mirror: Startup that streams live and on-demand classes to users in-home through a responsive display. Recently acquired by Llululemon.
The world of alternate data 📊
Investors are often looking for an edge to beat the market. To do so, many turn to alternative data or “alt data”. Alt data is the use of data obtained through unconventional means to gauge company or industry performance. For example, alt data may include satellite imagery to gain insight on crop yields or oil tanker movement. Robinhood’s selling trader data is an example of alt data.
- 💡 Idea: A marketplace for alt data vendor. Aggregate different kinds of alt data vendors and make it easy for anyone to purchase.
- 💡 Idea: Find new alt data sources, such as cloud usage. Find and track which company’s cloud usage is increasing: This is a signal the company is growing.
- Second Measure: An alt data vendor that tracks credit card usage for companies. Higher credit card processing is a signal for growth for companies.
- Synergy Sports: Provides data on player movement for NBA teams.
Are baseball cards the next tax haven? ⚾ 💵
When art is bought, the buyer is taxed on it. To avoid this, many art collectors never take possession of their bought art. The art piece is stored in places called freeports. Here the art is not only stored and cared for, but it can indefinitely be considered “in transit” — and art collectors aren’t taxed.
- 💡 Idea: Freeports of baseball cards. As we’ve covered previously, baseball cards are booming. As they grow, industries will also grow to support them. A possible need may be freeports for baseball cards. This would essentially be a storage space for baseball collectors.
How to make $5m in 2 months 💰🕒
Shaan was on a call with a successful entrepreneur who asked himself “How can I make $5m in two weeks.”
- Lesson: $5m in 2 weeks from scratch sounds crazy, right? Although the question may seem simple, naive, or impossible, Shaan feels this particular entrepreneur may likely succeed. The lesson here is to ask the good, hard questions. Good questions will challenge you and ultimately result in good answers.
- Framework: How did this entrepreneur find the idea? He began researching companies that were generating $5m now. From there, he found which ideas he could pull off and chose the one likeliest to succeed.
