Lab Weekly - 07/22/2022
⚠️ Time to BeReal. ⚠️ — analyzing the breakthrough of BeReal; Plus, the latest news from Amazon and Nintendo, as well as must-know stats roundup
Want this newsletter in your inbox every Friday morning? Sign up for our mailing list here
The Mainstream Breakthrough Of BeReal
Gen Z’s embrace of alternative social platforms is changing how they use Instagram and TikTok, and foretells a major shift in online discovery. What propelled its mainstream breakthrough? Is it a reshuffle of the social media landscape or simply another fad app of the month? Taking a closer look at the circumstances surrounding the rise of BeReal suggests that it is far more likely to be the former than the latter. And as every time when a new “it” app arrives on the scene, brands are eager to jump in.
In case you missed it…
The Future of Entrepreneurship
In order to find a viable path to success in the increasingly chaotic environment, entrepreneurs and small business owners will need to embrace the disruptions and innovations that digital technology brings, and smart financial service and B2B brands will need to adapt their products and services to better support them.
Learnings from Netflix’s Recent Woes & Moves
For years, Netflix has been held up as the poster-child for the cord-cutting movement and the market leader in the streaming wars. Yet, recently it seems to have hit a snag after years of unbridled growth and global expansion. By examining the global streamer’s recent woes and moves,we aim to decode the shifting dynamics in the OTT space, and predict what may be coming next to the entertainment industry.
Charting the Ongoing Debate on Web3 Use Cases
Blame it on the looming economic downturn, the music seems to have stopped at web3 party this month. With market confidence in crypto and, by extension, web3 technologies clearly shaken, the web3 skeptics suddenly gained a lot more traction over the past few weeks, especially around the questioning of the legitimacy of the use cases that web3 proponents believe blockchain will unlock.
Amazon To Acquire One Medical For $3.9 Billion [The Verge]
One day soon, you might get a discount for a doctor’s visit through Amazon Prime, as news broke on Thursday that the ecommerce giant is set to acquire One Medical, a membership-based primary care service that offers virtual care as well as in-person visits, in a 3.9 billion all-cash deal. While the nationwide rollout of its virtual care service, part of its Amazon Care program, has significantly increased the company’s reach in the healthcare market, buying Amazon Care would give Amazon 188 brick-and-mortar medical offices across the states and a sizable customer base, supercharging its sustained efforts to transform the U.S. healthcare industry.
Now, there’s still a good chance that this deal may attract regulatory scrutiny and fail to go through, considering the sensitive nature of the healthcare records and patient data. HIPPA rules only apply to data-sharing between different companies and entities, so legally speaking, it can’t stop Amazon from accessing the medical data that One Medical has once the acquisition is approved and completed. However, considering the anti-trust issues that this approach may trigger — imagine if Amazon leverages your medical history to peddle prescription drugs to you — it’d be way more likely that Amazon would choose to leave the One Medical data alone and find other ways to integrate its services into the larger Prime bundle, lest that potential privacy concerns push some existing One Medical customers to switch to its upscale competitors such as The Landby and Sollis Health.
Related: One Medical's Q1 revenue doubles as primary care company expands into chronic care, behavioral health [Fierce Healthcare]; Healthcare organizations seek cure for data analysis paralysis [VentureBeat]
Amazon Announced New Alexa Features & Developer Tools [The Verge]
It turns out to be a rather busy week for Amazon, as the company hosted its annual Alexa Live developer event on Wednesday. Notable new features designed to make Alexa skills easier to develop and use were announced, including one that allows developers to build multi-step “routines” for the first time. Support for Matter, a smart home interoperability standard, is also accounted for, as Alexa seeks to coexist with other assistants, and respond to requests no matter what wake word you’re using.
Overall, while the announcements won’t drastically change the user experience, they lay a foundation for Alexa to become far more automated and capable. Matter-related toolsets will allow Alexa to tap in other virtual assistants to accomplish those third-party tasks via “Universal Commands,” and focus on being proactive and helpful to users. As voice assistants continues to seek a killer use case beyond basic tasks in the home, an automated set of routines triggered by a simple command may prove to be very useful as the number of connected devices and appliances continue to rise. Therefore, “what utility value our brands can provide to become part of a smart home Routine command” is a question that all innovation-driven companies should be asking themselves today.
Related: Amazon Alexa to advertise voice apps that are hard to find [AdAge]; Microsoft tests Discord voice chat integration with select Xbox Insiders [The Verge]
Nintendo Is Buying An Animation Studio [Engadget]
The Disney-fication of Nintendo continues apace as the globally beloved Japanese gaming company announced it is buying a CG animation studio called Dynamo Pictures and rebranding it to “Nintendo Pictures.” According to Nintendo’s filing, this acquisition is intended to “strengthen the planning and production structure of visual content in the Nintendo group” and focus on developing “visual content utilizing Nintendo IP.” Translation: prepare to see a lot more TV shows and movies featuring beloved Nintendo characters, beyond the upcoming live-action Super Mario Bros. movie.
Besides this entry into tentpole content creation to bolster its IP franchises, Nintendo already has a theme park partnership in place with Universal, with the first Super Nintendo World set to open early next year in Los Angeles as part of the Universal Studio Hollywood park. Down the road, there’s a good chance that Universal may end up distributing some of Nintendo’s upcoming original content on Peacock, if Nintendo is not too turned off by Peacock’s relatively small subscriber base.
Related: PUBG Mobile is hosting its first-ever virtual concert with K-pop stars Blackpink [The Verge]; Sony’s first PlayStation loyalty program rewards you for earning trophies [Engadget]; Samsung Gaming Hub goes live today with Twitch, Xbox Game Pass and more [Engadget]
Over 43% of digital media subscribers become inactive the day after they subscribe, according to a new report, up from 39% in 2021. A new report from Piano, a subscription tech company, finds that a vast majority (90%) of those who disengage after they initially purchase a subscription tend to become inactive soon after they subscribe. When they do finally re-engage, it's typically to cancel the subscription.
Spending on video games in the U.S. was down 10% through the first half of the year, per tracking firm NPD, Axios' Stephen Totilo reports, dropping to $26.3 billion. It's another sign the gaming market is experiencing a rare downturn, due in part to a lack of major releases and constraints on console supply.
Netflix only lost around 970,000 subscribers during the second quarter, a smaller loss than the 2 million it had projected last quarter, according to the company’s latest earnings report. But its stock soared following the earnings report, because it had expected to lose 2 million paid users in the second quarter. Netflix currently has 220.67 million subscribers worldwide, said it expects net adds to reach 1 million in the third quarter, reversing some losses seen during the first half of the year.
If you find our insights valuable and would like to have a deeper conversation on technology and media innovations, or need to sound smarter in a client meeting or a pitch, please feel free to reach out to our Group Director Josh Mallalieu!
If you liked this edition of Lab Weekly by IPG Media Lab, why not share it?