Daily Archives: May 3, 2022

Chinese regulators are signaling they may ease a year-long crackdown on Chinese tech giants as the country's leaders prioritize shoring up a flagging economy.

Why it matters: Loosening restrictions on one of China's most vibrant sectors could remove one source of downward pressure on an economy gutted by COVID lockdowns. But it could also slow progress towards Chinese President Xi Jinping's goal of restructuring a major sector of the economy.

What's happening: Xi said the country would pursue "healthy development" of internet platforms after a meeting of top party leaders last week, fueling expectations that the end of the tech crackdown may be in sight.

Background: For more than a year, Chinese regulators have targeted some of China's biggest tech firms as Xi has pursued policies to fix what he calls the "disorderly expansion of capital." China's tech industry has been trending towards the creation of monopolies that hinder domestic innovation and put more economic power in the hands of companies while threatening the Chinese Communist Party's ability to control a massive political and geopolitical lever.

The big picture: The regulatory crackdown represents a "dramatic clash between public and private power," analysts at Lawfare Blog wrote earlier this year.

Between the lines: U.S. analysts have worried Beijing's pressure on some Chinese companies to avoid listing on foreign stock exchanges and keep user data inside China's borders could inhibit and further bifurcate the development of the U.S. and Chinese tech sectors.

What to watch: The Chinese government is expected to take a 1% stake in more of China's top tech companies, the Wall Street Journal reports, and insist on more sway in company decisions, while easing the regulatory environment.

Go deeper: Beijing's antitrust push poses a problem for Western regulators

See more here:

China's top leaders signal reprieve for tech companies - Axios

How The Mobile Phone Market Has Evolved Since 1993

The mobile phone landscape looks drastically different today than it did three decades ago.

In 1993, Motorola accounted for more than half of the mobile phone market. But by 2021, its market share had shrunk to just 2.2%. How did this happen, and how has the mobile industry changed over the last 30 years?

This video by James Eagle chronicles the evolution of the mobile phone market, showing the rise and fall of various mobile phone manufacturers. The data spans from December 1992 to December 2021.

Motorola is known for being a pioneer in the mobile phone industry.

In 1983, the American company launched one of the worlds first commercially available mobile phonesthe DynaTAC 8000X. The revolutionary analog phone cost nearly $4,000 and offered users up to 30 minutes of talk time before needing to be recharged.

Motorola went on to launch a few more devices over the next few years, like the MicroTAC 9800X in 1989 and the International 3200 in 1992, and quickly became a dominant player in the nascent industry. In the early days of the market, the companys only serious competitor was Finnish multinational Nokia, which had acquired the early mobile network pioneer Mobira.

But by the mid-1990s, other competitors like Sony and Siemens started to gain some solid footing, which chipped away at Motorolas dominance. In September 1995, the companys market share was down to 32.1%.

By January 1999, Nokia surpassed Motorola as the leading mobile phone manufacturer, accounting for 21.4% of global market share. That put it just slightly ahead of Motorolas 20.8%.

One of the reasons for Nokias surging popularity was the major headway the company was making in the digital phone space. In 1999, the company released the Nokia 7110, the first mobile phone to have a web browser.

But it wasnt just Nokias innovations that were hampering Motorola. In 1999, Motorola fell on hard times after one of its spin-off projects called Iridium SSC filed for bankruptcy. This put a massive financial strain on the company, and it eventually laid off a large chunk of its workforce after the project failed.

From then on, Motorolas market share hovered between 14% and 20%, until Apples iPhone entered the scene in 2007 and turned the mobile phone industry on its head.

Things really started to change with the launch of the iPhone in 2007.

In a keynote presentation at the San Francisco Macworld Expo in 2007, Steve Jobs presented the iPhone as three products wrapped into one device: a touchscreen iPod, a revolutionary cell phone, and an internet communications device.

One year later, Apple launched the App Store, which gave users the ability to download applications and games onto their iPhones. Not only did this greatly enhance the iPhones functionality, but it also allowed consumers to customize their mobile devices like never before.

This was the start of a new era of smartphonesone that Motorola failed to keep up with. Less than two years after the iPhone launched, Apple had captured 17.4% of the mobile phone market. In contrast, Motorolas market share had shrunk down to 4.9%.

By the end of 2021, Apple held about 27.3% of the global mobile market. The iPhone is a key part of the tech giants growth, driving more than 50% of the companys overall revenue.

While a number of factors contributed to Motorolas downfall, many point to one central hurdlethe companys failure to pivot.

The iPhones emergence was the start of a new, software-driven era. Motorola had mastered the hardware-driven era, but failed to keep up when the tides changed. And the animation above highlights other companies that also failed to adapt or keep up, including BlackBerry (formerly RIM), Palm, Sony, and LG.

But Apple is not alone. The popularity of Googles Android mobile operating system has helped competitors like South Koreas Samsung and Chinas Huawei and Xiaomi flourish, with each company establishing strong footholds in the global mobile phone market.

In todays fast-paced world, the ability to pivot is essential if businesses want to remain competitive. Will todays mobile phone giants like Apple and Samsung remain on top? Or will other companies like Huawei catch up in the next few years?

This article was published as a part of Visual Capitalist's Creator Program, which features data-driven visuals from some of our favorite Creators around the world.

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Animation: How the Mobile Phone Market Has Evolved Over 30 Years - Visual Capitalist

An aerial view of Nairobi City from Ngara.[Wilberforce Okwiri, Standard]

More global tech giants are pitching tent in Kenya, sparking a wave of excitement and apprehension in equal measure in the ICT sector.

But this has not come as a surprise. Kenya, East Africas biggest economy and regional hub, has a thriving start-up scene and has for long been touted as Africas Silicon Savannah.

Tech investors and multinationals have developed a keen interest in internet services, fintech (financial technology), digital payments, health and agricultural innovations and have their eyes on Kenyas Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs).

US tech giants such as Google, Microsoft and Amazon are competing to be the cloud service provider of choice for local companies.

Last month, Google announced plans to invest in its first-ever Africa Product Development Centre (ADC) in Nairobi.

The American tech giant is positioning itself to serve a growing base of internet users on the continent estimated to hit 800 million by the end of this decade.

In the same month, global payments giant Visa opened an innovation studio in Nairobi the first in Africa aimed at co-developing digital payments and commerce solutions.

The facility, which will serve the continents sub-Saharan region, is part of a network of global innovation centres operated by Visa since 2016 in locations, including San Francisco, Miami, London, Dubai and Singapore.

In 2019, Microsoft opened an Africa Development Centre (ADC) in Kenya. With locations in both Nairobi and Nigeria, these represent Microsofts first-ever engineering offices in Africa.

Amazon has also expressed interest in setting up a base in Kenya through its Amazon Web Services Inc (AWS).

The new AWS local zone(s) in Kenya will join 16 existing AWS local zones across the United States and an additional 32 AWS local zones planned to launch in 26 countries around the world in the course of this year.

AWS local zones deliver single-digit millisecond latency performance at the edge of the cloud to hundreds of millions of people worldwide.

Speaking on the interest of the tech giants in the country, Visa General Manager for East Africa Ms Corine Mbiaketcha noted that the country has an innovation track record.

Government support is also key, she added.

When it comes to technology, Kenya is known as Africas Silicon Savannah, this means an environment where the government is supportive of innovation through regulation and an education curriculum that promotes technical background, said Ms Mbiaketcha during the recent launch of the Visa sub-Saharan Africa Innovation Studio in Nairobi.

The facility is aimed at co-developing digital payments and commerce solutions.

It is part of a network of global innovation centres operated by Visa since 2016 in top locations, including San Francisco, London, Dubai, Singapore and Miami.

Speaking at the same event, Central Bank of CBK Governor Dr Patrick Njoroge warned of a problem where big techs are benefiting from Africas digitalisation.

He called for a need to rebalance the benefits.

Dr Njoroge, however, noted that there have been significant benefits for the sub-Saharan African region, especially when it comes to financial inclusion.

Kenya was at 27.6 per cent financial inclusion in 2006, and in 2021 this number had increased to 83.7 per cent, he said.

The CK boss urged innovators to be people-centric and commended Visa for picking Kenya as the regional centre for the innovation studio.

If it (innovation) happens in Kenya, it will also happen in other sub-Saharan African countries. Thats why its important to test things here and have the innovation studio here, said Dr Njoroge.

The entry of the tech giants into the Kenyan market also means more jobs and opportunities for techies.

Google, for instance, is hiring engineers, product managers, user experience designers and researchers to staff its new centre, said Suzanne Frey, vice president for products, and Nitin Gajria, the head of Google Africa.

This is as the multinational invests $1 billion (Sh115 million) in various projects on the continent over five years, according to CEO Sundar Pichai, to help economies accelerate their digital transformation.

Microsoft also targets to hire 100 engineers at its ADC as the firm sets sights on increased partnerships with indigenous small- and medium-sized businesses.

Microsoft had tapped ex-Equity Banks Finserve chief Jack Ngare to be the first managing director of the Africa Development Centre.

Interestingly, Google has poached Mr Ngare to join its cloud business as a technical director in the office of the chief technology officer.

Theres also been some concern from some quarters that the entry of the multinationals will lead to a brain drain and talent war in Kenyas startup ecosystem.

A report byFinancial Timesin October last year explored this phenomenon, noting that the US tech giants pay top dollar, making it harder for local businesses to recruit and retain key staff.

But not long after Microsoft entered the Kenyan market, local start-ups felt the pinch of its presence. The tech heavyweight began an aggressive hiring spree, aiming to fill 500 software engineering roles at the ADCs two hubs by 2023. Smaller companies in the area, such as Lori, Cellulant, Twiga Foods and others, who had invested in and trained young engineers, were swiftly outbid, said the story by Antoaneta Roussi.

Kenya has since the late President Mwai Kibakis era committed to technology. This started with is with The Vision 2030 economic blueprint, which paved way for the establishment of the Konza Technopolis City project aimed at creating a hub of technology innovation in Africa.

In recent years, tech investors have upped their activities in the country.

A 2020 report shows that Kenya was among the top four African countries by value invested through Venture Capital investment.

The AfricArena 2021, by Partech, an investment platform for tech and digital companies, shows that Kenyan startups raised Sh33 billion through venture capital investments, which was second to Nigerias Sh33.3 billion in 2020.

The proportion of venture capital investment in Kenya as a proportion of GDP stood at 0.32 per cent, making it the highest in Africa

The per capita venture capital investment in Kenya was Sh630 in 2020, which is the highest in Africa, said the report.

Read more here:

Tech giants take the fight for clients to local startups - The Standard

NEW YORK -- Stocks rose on Wall Street Thursday as technology companies clawed back some of the ground they had lost recently.

Major indexes are still headed for weekly losses and a dismal monthly performance after sliding for much of April. This week has been especially turbulent as investors review a heavy batch of corporate earnings from major tech companies, industrial firms and retailers.

The S&P 500 rose 0.7% as of 10:19 a.m. Fort Wayne time. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 111 points, or 0.3%, to 33,413, and the Nasdaq rose 0.7%.

Big Tech and communications companies have been behind much of the oscillations in the broader market as their pricey stock values have more force in pushing the major indexes up or down.

Apple, which reports its latest financial results later Thursday, rose 2.7%. Chipmaker Qualcomm jumped 5.8% after easily beating Wall Streets profit estimates. Facebook's parent company Meta surged 13.3% after it beat Wall Streets first-quarter profit forecasts and reported an encouraging increase in daily users.

Encouraging financial reports helped support gains for several other major companies. McDonald's rose 2.1% following a strong earnings update. Southwest Airlines rose 1.7% after reporting solid revenue and telling investors it expects a profitable year as travel demand returns with the pandemic fading.

Bond yields gained ground. The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 2.86% from 2.81%.

The latest round of corporate report cards are hitting the market as Wall Street tries to figure out how rising inflation is affecting businesses and consumer spending.

Supply-chain issues have been crimping business operations in many industries throughout the recovery from the pandemic, and Russia's ongoing war against Ukraine has worsened increases for energy and key food commodity prices. Strict COVID-19 lockdown measures in China have added to concerns about slowing growth.

The U.S. Federal Reserve is set to aggressively hike rates as it steps up its fight against inflation.

The chair of the Fed has indicated the central bank may hike short-term interest rates by double the usual amount at upcoming meetings, starting next week. It has already raised its key overnight rate once, the first such increase since 2018.

The Commerce Department on Thursday reported that the U.S. economy shrank last quarter for the first time since the pandemic recession struck two years ago. But the report showed that consumers and businesses kept spending, despite rising inflation, in a sign of underlying resilience.

Consumer spending is being closely watched as a gauge for the broader economy, as everything from food to clothing and gas becomes more expensive.

Internet retail giant Amazon will report its results later Thursday, giving Wall Street another measure of how retailers and consumers are reacting to higher prices. Investors will also get another update on spending Friday when the Commerce Department releases its personal income and spending report for March.

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Stocks claw higher on Wall Street as tech giants rebound | Business | Journal Gazette - Fort Wayne Journal Gazette

Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said Wednesday the department supports a proposal that aims to block tech giants from giving preferential treatment to their own products and services.

The Commerce Departments backing adds to the Biden administrations support behind the American Innovation and Choice Online Act, following a letter the Department of Justice (DOJ) released last month.

[I] clearly agree that we need to improve competition, which increases innovation, Raimondo said while testifying before the Senate Commerce Committee.

Last month, the DOJ released a views letter on behalf of the administration in support of the American Innovation and Choice Online Act, and the department and I certainly support that and concur with the aim of the legislation and the views expressed in that views letter, she added.

The bill has bipartisan support and advanced out of the Senate Judiciary Committee in January in a 16-6 vote, but even supporters expressed reservations about the current bill, meaning it may undergo some major changes before it reaches the Senate floor.

The proposal would block dominant online companies such as Amazon, Apple, Meta and Google from preferencing their products and discriminating against rivals on their platforms.

A version of the bill advanced out of the House Judiciary Committee last summer but along with the handful of bills that passed during the marathon markup session has not been called to a vote on the House floor.

During Wednesdays hearing, Raimondo also threw her support behind the Kids Online Safety Act, a bipartisan bill introduced by Sens. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) and Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.).

I think this is long-overdue legislation. The goals of your legislation are laudable, and as a Commerce Secretary, I feel equally strongly about it. Its long overdue. We see the corrosive effects, so, yes, Ill help you in any way, Raimondo said.

The proposal would require social media platforms to take additional measures to keep children under 16 safe online, including by providing families with safety tools and additional transparency measures.

Read more:

Commerce Department backs key antitrust bill targeting tech giants - The Hill

Institutional investors in commercial real estate have billions of reasons why brokers, fund managers, developers and other industry groups should listen when they demand advancement in the sector's diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.

Bisnow/Bailey Sondag

Amazon's London Kemp, Google's Marcella Barrire and CohnReznick's Risa Lavine onstage at Bisnow's first-ever Rise Initiative Honoree event.

I think at the end of the day, money talks, Christina Scarlato, the principal portfolio manager for real assets at the World Bank Pension Fund, said atBisnow's inaugural Rise Initiative eventThursday, which recognized commercial real estate companies making real progress withtheir DEI initiatives. I think it's our responsibility as investors to continue to push our managers to do more.

Commercial real estate has historically struggled to hire and retain diverse talent at all levels. While the industry has made some progress towardDEI in recent years, the financial sector is striding ahead of brokers, developers and other areas and is pushing other players to follow suit, tying DEI goals closely to financial decisions.

Following the murder of George Floyd in 2020, many real estate companiespublicly acknowledgedthat they could do more to level the playing field for people of color in the industry, and pledged to change. Bisnow's 2020 analysis of the leadership ranksof the largest companies in the industry showed that nearly 9 in 10 C-suite executives were White.

When Bisnowreleased anupdated analysis of the industrya year later, itshowed private development firms and brokerages' leadership looked largely the same. Publicly traded companies and financial firms, however,faced new requirements from federal government agencies to appoint people of color, female-identifying and LGBTQ+ individuals to their boards.

Bisnow looked at 23 banks, insurance companies and private equity firms in November, and found that 22.5% of companies publicly disclosed board seats were filled by ethnically or racially diverse individuals 20% higher than in November 2020. C-suites and executive teams also had more people of color, increasing from 63 to 70 over the course of the year. REIT board members of color nearly doubled between 2020 and 2021.

That change is now beginning to trickle down, with financial institutions expecting the commercial real estate operations they fund to apply the same DEI principles.

Tying money to DEI goals is key, Google Real Estate Project Executive Marcella Barrire said on a panel at the Rise event. When sending out requests for proposals, Barrire examines firms answers for information about how companies are prioritizing DEI internally something she believes all financial companies can replicate to elevate DEI goals from aspirations to reality.

When the responses come in and we are leveling, one of the questions that has to be included is: What is your DEI policy for permanent employees? What is your permanent policy on developing a diverse permanent staff? she said. That's what I've done in order to drive change.

Bisnow/Bailey Sondag

Invesco's Beth Zayicek, Savills' Mitchell Rudin, Artemis' Debbie Harmon, World Bank Pension Fund's Christina Scarlato, Ivanho Cambridge's Nathalie Palladitcheff and BentallGreenOak's Andrew Yoon.

In recent history, senior executives across CRE came from similar backgroundsmanyknew each other from college sports teams, Artemis Real Estate Partners co-founder and CEO Debbie Harmon said.

Its starting at entry level and widening the funnel, she said. Talent is evenly dispersed, it's just not evenly developed. So it's our responsibility to bring in the talent and develop the talent.

Financial companies shouldnt be afraid to use capital to enforce DEI goals, Ivanho Cambridge CEO Nathalie Palladitcheff said. Her firm manages the real estate investments of Canadian pension fund Caisse de dpt et placement du Qubec, which has more than $50B inproperty holdings.

If you can't change the culture just by saying it or showing it, you have to do what we usually understand very well in this industry: It's about money, Palladitcheff said. When it could have some impacts on your remuneration, then it happens.

The panelists saidnumbers alone are not an indicator of success. Paying attention to what roles people of color, minorities and women occupy within organizations is also critical to DEI initiatives, Scarlato said.

For us, the biggest challenge at the bank is that most of the women sit in the administrative roles and not in senior roles, she said.

Without a path forward at the company, mentorship and responsibility, any staff member including people of color, minorities and female-identifying employees is likely to feel undervalued, Scarlato said.

AmazonDirector of Global Real Estate and Facilities London Kemp echoed Scarlatos statements later onstage, warning that a lack of retention policies would undermine any companys attempt to meet its DEI goals.

It is about making sure that you are providing opportunities for people to promote at the highest levels of the organization, Kemp said. If you're an organization that has band levels, do not hire someone into a midlevel band with the expectation that they will be able to promote. It is unfair, and it is not a way to retain top talent.

A new piece of Amazon's DEI initiativesisspecificallytargetingcommercial real estate. The Amazon Housing Equity Fund is providing a grant of more than $5MtoCapital Impact Partners for itsHousing Equity Accelerator Fellowship, the company announced Friday. The initiative sponsors 15 diverse developers in the D.C. metro area, providing mentorship, training and potential access to funding to promising individuals currently establishing themselves in development a sector typically difficult to break into for people of color, minorities and women.

Speakers at the Rise event acknowledged that while the finance sector of CRE has progressed, it needs to continue critically examining its own definition of diversity and expanding its ranks.

Where we know that we struggle is diversity of thought,"BentallGreenOakManaging Partner and Chief Operating Officer Andrew Yoon said. We all have very similar backgrounds. We all have very similar work experiences, we tend to look at investments very similar. And what we realized is we need to create avenues for opportunities for different people regardless of visible minorities or women people who have different backgrounds. At the end of the day, real estate is a global industry. And it needs to be able to attract global talent.

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Finance, Tech Giants Using Their Wallets To Drive DEI Improvements Across CRE - Bisnow

With Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Spotify, and others reporting earnings this week, the market was prepared to see how the worlds behemoths are faring in what can be described as a turbulent economic environment.

At the end of the week, Bloomberg published an article titled Tech Stocks Lose $1.8 Trillion in a Month Thanks to Fed. The headline speaks volumes: As the federal reserve continues to hike interest rates, valuations for technology companies have suffered.

You dont have to look much further than the pandemic darlings to see the stark change in narrative in 2022. Companies like Netflix, PayPal, Peloton, Zoom, and Docusign are all down more than 60% from their pandemic highs.

Many of the worlds largest tech companies have a tie to sports. Whether its through media rights, esports, health and wellness, or myriad other avenues, theres an increasingly strong link between sports and the technology markets.

But do those relationships really move the needle?

Lets take a look at four tech giants for a closer understanding.

The everything store had its worst period of year-over-year growth in over a decade. While the company did beat overall earnings expectations ($116.4 billion vs. $116.3 billion), the stock traded down 10% after hours on Thursday due to single-digit growth rates.

While Amazon has dabbled in the wearables and healthcare spaces, its biggest tie to sports is its ownership of live rights. It currently owns rights to the following:

All of Amazons meaningful sports-related plays fall squarely in the Prime Video bucket. The overall Prime product was only Amazons fourth-largest revenues segment in Q1 2022, growing at 13% YoY one of the slowest growing segments.

Amazons media strategy revolves almost exclusively around getting customers hooked on Prime. NFL games and major European soccer competitions can lead to customer acquisition, but their overall impact on revenue is still marginal.

Apple saw revenue growth this past quarter up 9% and beating analysts estimates but not enough to result in any positive price movement.

Apple is beginning to invest in sports streaming rights. Apple TV+ aired its first professional sports contest when the New York Mets faced the Washington Nationals at the beginning of April.

The $85 million MLB deal is a comparatively small investment in the sports ecosystem, but theres likely more to come. The tech giant is reportedly close to securing a deal for the NFLs Sunday Ticket that could cost $2.5 billion annually.

Like Amazon with Prime, live sports will act as an acquisition vehicle to increase adoption of Apple TV+ which is currently a loss-leading platform.

Theres also the wearables segment.

From glucose monitoring capabilities to their increasing bank of Apple Fitness+ content, there is a path to a meaningful business line in sports and sports-related categories we just arent there yet.

If Microsofts offer to acquire Activision Blizzard is approved, the tech giant led by Satya Nadella will officially own IP for Call of Duty, Overwatch, and World of Warcraft some of the most valuable esports properties in the world.

Microsoft was one of the few companies to both beat earnings and see a positive reaction in the markets this week.

Xbox had its best sales month ever in March, topping the previous record from March 2014 with $515 million in hardware sales for the month and $1.2 billion for the quarter. That said, it was also the companys slowest-growing segment by a wide margin.

In January, Phil Spencer was promoted from Head of Xbox to a newly created position: CEO of Microsoft Gaming. Spencer has been at Microsoft since 1988, when he started as an intern. Hes been with the Xbox team since it launched in 2001, and is largely credited with leading Xboxs recent turnaround in sales and perception as it competes with PlayStation and Nintendo.

Pulling off the $69 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard would be a major coup in the console wars. Microsoft says it will never make Call of Duty exclusive to Xbox, but it could make it available for free on Xbox Game Pass, which would likely convert PlayStation and Nintendo gamers who dont want to pay $70 to play the same game on other consoles.

Selling consoles is great, but Game Pass with its $10 or $15 per month subscription fee is the real future of the Xbox brand. As of January 2022, it had 25 million subscribers. An entire library of Activision Blizzard games for as low as $10/month could drive that number up quickly.

The deal is getting closer to reality: Activision Blizzard shareholders approved the transaction this week.

All of a sudden Spotify is aggressively planting its flag in the sports arena. On Wednesdays earnings call, CEO Daniel Elk made no bones about how bullish he is on partnering with and leveraging global sports properties.

In March, Spotify announced a partnership making them the primary sponsor of FC Barcelona front of shirt placement on club kits and naming rights to the teams famous stadium, now Spotify Camp Nou. The deal is worth $306 million, per Catalan radio station Rac1.

Elks larger thesis is that global sport is one of the best vehicles for customer acquisition, and he doubled down on that sentiment on the call: I know a lot of you are Americans, but let me just state sports is a massive thing globally and football or soccer is the No. 1 sport in the world we are talking about hundreds of millions of consumers.

Spotify ended the quarter with 182 million paid subscribers, up 15% year-over-year but fell below its original forecast of 183 million. The Barca deal hasnt paid off just yet.

In 2020, the streamer paid $150 million to acquire Bill Simmons sports-centric The Ringer and its podcast network. But the investment is ultimately a small line item. Spotify will need to extend beyond personality-driven podcasts and further into the partnership model to drive meaningful revenues.

Everyones betting that sports will become a bigger part of big tech business models as time goes on, but as it currently stands, the sports lever has yet to be fully cranked up.

Will sports drive meaningful value for big tech companies in the future? Were still incredibly early into the process, but Im looking forward to following the through lines.

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Where Sports and Big Tech Cross Paths - Front Office Sports

Would the open e-commerce network end the dominance of US tech giants in India? (Photo by CHANDAN KHANNA / AFP)

In 2020, India became the eighth-largest market for e-commerce, with a turnover of approximately US$50 billion. The pandemic then accelerated the countrys e-commerce adoption by several years, with eMarketer expecting sales to soar past US$80 billion in 2021. For that to materialize, the Indian government would have to aid local retailers while promoting healthy competition. That would also mean deterring the dominance of US giants such as Amazon.com Inc. and Walmart Inc.

While being in the final stages of drafting new e-commerce rules that had sought to tighten the regulations for foreign-owned marketplaces in the country, the Indian administration launched a pilot not-profit, government-owned platform known as the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) to allow small merchants and retailers to plug in and gain the reach and economies of scale of giants.

Essentially, the government of India would create its own e-commerce ecosystem for all, designed to loosen the stranglehold of companies like Amazon that dictate which brands get access to prime consumers and on what terms. In fact, the platform were launched after Indias antitrust body last week raided domestic sellers of Amazon and some of Walmarts Flipkart following accusations of competition law violations.

Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal in a tweet on Friday said, After UPI, another game changing idea to democratize commerce ONDC soft launch today to select consumers, sellers and logistics providers. Get ready for a world of choice, convenience and transparency. Basically, the government-owned platform will allow buyers and sellers to connect and transact with each other online, irrespective of the application they use.

The platform is spearheaded by the commerce ministry in an initiative aimed to promote open networks for all aspects of the exchange of goods and services over digital or electronic networks. Reports indicated that ONDC is to be based on open-sourced methodology, using open specifications and open network protocols independent of any specific platform. The Indian government even claimed that as UPI is to the digital payment domain, ONDC is to e-commerce in India.

According to the Commerce Ministry, the benefits of ONDC include:

As stated in a strategy paper published by ONDC in January, there needs to be a paradigm shift from an operator-driven monolithic platform-centric model to a facilitator-driven, interoperable decentralized network. That said, the ONDC will not be owned or controlled by a single entity or platform and it is made to connect buyers, suppliers, payment, and logistics providers through open-source specifications and protocols.

Based on local Indian reports, there are currently over 4,000 small and big e-commerce companies in India, 500 logistics companies to deliver goods, and more than 20,000 entities including travel and hotels that provide services through e-commerce. The potential is such that the Indian e-commerce market is expected to grow to US$200 billion by 2026.

The Indian government in a document on the ONDC project noted that two large multinational players controlled more than half of the countrys e-commerce trade, limiting access to the market, giving preferential treatment to some sellers and squeezing supplier margins. It did not name the companies.

However, as per Forrester Research data, by October 2020, Walmarts Flipkart had 31.9% market share making it the largest online retailer in India. Meanwhile, Amazon India is slightly behind in second, with a 31.2% market share. That said, ONDC could help millions of small businesses go online and worry less about the global giants.

The document also said the ONDC plan aimed to onboard 30 million sellers and 10 million merchants online, covering at least 100 cities and towns by August this year. It would focus on apps in local languages for both buyers and sellers, with a special emphasis on small merchants and rural consumers, it noted.

Dashveenjit Kaur| @DashveenjitK

Dashveen writes for Tech Wire Asia and TechHQ, providing research-based commentary on the exciting world of technology in business. Previously, she reported on the ground of Malaysia's fast-paced political arena and stock market.

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Would the open e-commerce network end the dominance of US tech giants in India? - Tech Wire Asia

Vertex Energy Inc VTNR has an average trading volume of over 2 million, so it is no slouch of a stock in terms of interest.

Vertexengages in recycling industrial waste streams and off-specification commercial chemical products. The firm focuses on recycling used motor oil and other petroleum by-products.

Since the start of the year, the stock's performance has been pretty remarkable compared to some tech giants, motor and EV stocksthat dominatemedia channels.

Vertex has increased by 100%. Microsoft Corporation MSFT has decreased by 20%.

Apple Inc AAPL has decreased by 15%.

Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) has decreased by 25%.

Amazon.com, Inc. AMZN has decreased by 18%.

NVIDIA CorporationNVDA has decreased by 38%.

Ford Motor Company F has decreased by 32%.

Nio Inc NIO has decreased by 43%.

General Motors Company GMhas decreased by 38%.

XPeng Inc XPENGhas decreased by 53%.

However, if we take a closer look at Vertex, how good is the stock's performance?

Below, I have the monthly time frame.

This price data goes back to its IPO price of $3,000 in 1992. It surged to its all-time high of $7,125 in 1993. The price plummeted to below $20 by 1997 and has barely recovered since. There have been moments where the price sparked to life, such as in 2000 when the price peaked at $480 and in 2004 at $114.

It does not take much evaluation to see that this is a stock that has a poor history of performance,leaving investors frustrated.

Let's compare the monthly time frame of Vertex to Microsoft, which paints a very different picture of what a good stock looks like.

Despite the 20% decline since the start of this year, which is likely to be nothing more than a pullback/correction before the next surge higher, the price of Microsoft has seen a 10,000% increase in price since Vertex's IPO.

Now, if you like the Warren Buffett approach and are looking for undervalued stocks that have huge upside potential, this may be one of them, but the stock's history showsthe odds are very much against you.

You may be holding this for a very long time before the price starts returning a profit. Who has the time?

Stocks that have a history of trending well and are creating new all-time highs have a much higher chance of returning a profit in a far more reasonable time frame of 12 to 24 months.

The moral of the story is: don't get caught up inshort-term price swings. Instead, look for stocks that have a proven history of performance.

Trend following trumps undervalued stocks for the busy everyday person managing their portfolio from home and seeking consistent returns on their hard-earned money.

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This Obscure Stock Has Outperformed Tech And EV Giants - Benzinga - Benzinga