The Truth About Evaluating Founders—Even This One

What makes a great founder? It’s been a question on my mind this week, driven partly by the news. Slack’s sale to Salesforce for $27.7 billion was a huge moment of success for founder Stewart Butterfield, the company and its shareholders. Was it also a sign that the company couldn’t succeed independently over the long term, as some commentators...

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DoorDash’s Sky-High Valuation: The Information’s Tech Briefing

Next week is shaping up to be a big one for tech IPOs, with both DoorDash and Airbnb expected to hit the market. Both raise interesting questions for investors, given how each has fared through the pandemic. DoorDash’s offering arguably poses the biggest risks. The restaurant-meal delivery service on Friday raised its pricing range to between $90...

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The Information’s 411 — Slacking Benioff’s Thirst

Cory speaks with Kevin McLaughlin, our enterprise reporter and soothsayer, about the reasons Salesforce spent big to acquire Slack. Tom talks to Paris about why Generation Z is both Amazon's biggest critic and a loyal customer base.

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WarnerMedia Considering CNN Streaming Service

AT&T’s WarnerMedia, long a giant in cable TV, was a late arrival to streaming video. Under its new CEO, Jason Kilar, Warner is trying to make up for lost time. Warner executives are discussing launching two new streaming services. One would be a subscription offering based on content from CNN and could launch next year. Another would be a free...

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Covid Test Startup Cue Health in Talks for $2 Billion-Plus Valuation

Cue Health, a startup that makes handheld coronavirus tests, is in discussion with investors about a new round of capital that could boost the company’s valuation to more than $2 billion, or at least four times the valuation in a fundraising just six months ago, according to two people familiar with the discussions. The San Diego startup’s molecular...

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Data Governance Top of Mind for Tech Policy Chiefs

On Thursday, The Information hosted a roundtable on what's next in tech regulation with PwC. Here's what was top of mind for our attendees, who included the heads of policy at a dozen tech companies. Europe's Digital Services Act: Expected soon, this legislation could limit how big tech companies use data across their products and do things like...

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The People With Power at Opendoor

Six-year-old Opendoor ushered in a new era in residential real estate when it launched a website that allowed people to sell their homes online. While Opendoor still accounts for only a tiny portion of U.S. home sales, its business has grown rapidly and spawned numerous imitators, all betting that consumers will be willing to pay a premium to simplify...

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WarnerMedia Shakes Up Movie Business: The Information’s Tech Briefing

Last Christmas Eve, The Information’s Jessica Toonkel predicted that “2020 will be the year that a major studio, most likely Disney or AT&T’s WarnerMedia, breaks the mold and debuts some movies on its streaming service before they show up in theaters.” At the time it seemed a daring forecast, but then Covid happened, forcing the closure of theaters...

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Slack CEO Downplays Microsoft as Factor in Salesforce Deal

Before word of Salesforce’s planned acquisition of Slack leaked last week, investor sentiment about the workplace chat provider had decidedly soured, causing its stock to lose about a quarter of its value since Slack went public in June of last year. A big reason was competition from Microsoft, that old bogeyman for any upstart in the market for productivity...

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Facebook Splits Up Unit At Center of Contested Election Decisions

Facebook is breaking up its unit focused on the social network’s role in elections globally, dispersing the team of roughly 300 through a sweeping reorganization beginning this week, according to internal memos seen by The Information. Employees from Civic Integrity, who have been at the center of Facebook’s contested decisions on how to handle...

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