While “Retail Apocalypse” would no doubt make a great sequel to the iconic movie “Apocalypse Now” – with Martin Sheen reprising his role as Capt. Willard, trying to navigate his way through the dangerous modern day Mekong of the American mall – the term actually refers to the collapse of brick-and-mortar stores. More than 100 […]
If at first you don’t succeed, try again. That’s not just the motto of drunk blokes trying to pick up women at She Soho in an attempt to pull off Gareth Keenan’s ultimate fantasy. It’s also the words by which most entrepreneurs live by, especially if their ultimate fantasy involves building a communications network in […]
Almost exactly one year ago, our MBAs were doing field research at cannabis dispensaries in the Pacific Northwest and looking into “How Fruit Packing Warehouses Use Technology.” In the small town of Bingen, Washington, there’s a new fruit packing warehouse that transformed its entire operation using automation and robotics. They’re just one of more than […]
Using blockchain technology to create efficiencies in large industries could reap billion-dollar rewards for driven founders. For example, we recently met with a startup called Othera that is using blockchain to transform the residential mortgage industry. They’ve partnered with a co-op that represents over 150 mortgage originators that generate in excess of $230 billion in mortgages per year. The founders are experienced […]
On our first road trip to San Francisco we headed straight to Haight-Ashbury, the birthplace of 1960s counterculture and one of the most iconic landmarks in the city. We were hoping to score some LSD, and within about five minutes of arriving at the famed intersection we bought a sheet of acid from the first […]
“I Worked at an Amazon Fulfillment Center; They Treat Workers Like Robots,” was the title of an article by Time Magazine which went on to talk about how workers were having a hard time enduring “the agony of walking 15 miles a day and doing hundreds of squats.” They shan’t be worried about that for […]
No matter how innovative an idea you think you have, that and $3.50 might get you a small drip coffee at Starbucks. Ideas are worth nothing. Execution is everything. That’s why we’ll often see numerous startups trying to tackle a particular problem with technology. A few years later, a leader will suddenly emerge that hasn’t been at it […]
Famous American philosopher George Carlin did a brilliant riff on stuff. He rightly contended that we just spend our lives moving and acquiring our stuff, and a house is just a pile of your stuff with a cover on it. Companies that are in the business of making and selling stuff have to be able to […]
Retailers are getting smarter by the day, tidying up shelves and aisles with merchandising insights driven by machine learning algorithms. Robots can now optimize inventories at stores with self-service checkouts relaying instant information from the point of sale. Automation goes all the way to the top of the enterprise, with senior managers turning to predictive analytics tools to help them find ways […]
In our recent article on the State of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in China, we talked about how the bright minds at Tsinghua University have counted upwards of 4,925 AI enterprises worldwide that have AI technologies or products as their core operations. It seems like the pace is slowing, and now we’ll see some consolidation as all […]