el producto #353 🚀
Klarna's AI-shopping, Netflix stores, Microsoft's light AR glasses, Google Search AI-image-generator, Types of assumptions, Unlocking career optionality, Soft skills > Hard skills & more
Hey team,
Happy weekend and welcome to a new edition of el producto
🎰 The week in figures
$69B: Microsoft has successfully closed its $69B acquisition of Activision Blizzard, setting a new record as the largest deal in both Microsoft's history and the gaming industry
$20B: Google pays Apple between $18B-$20B/year to remain the dominant search engine on the iPhone, representing 14-16% of Apple's annual operating profits
$1.3B: OpenAI is generating revenue at a $1.3B annualized rate, implying it surpassed $100M in revenue per month, up 30% from the summer. ChatGPT on iOS and Android hit $4.58M in revenue in September from its $20/month plan
$1B: Apple spent between $200M-$250M on production for Martin Scorsese's Killers of the Flower Moon and plans to spend $1B/year on films that will appear in theaters before they're available on Apple TV+
$975M: Atlassian is making its largest-ever acquisition by purchasing video-messaging startup Loom for $975M. Loom allows users to create and share screen-recorded videos for various work-related tasks, including onboarding, code reviews, feedback sharing, and all-hands meetings
$300M: Lambda Labs, a startup that rents out servers with Nvidia GPUs to AI developers, is in advanced talks to raise ~$300M
-$20: GitHub’s Copilot, which costs $10/user/month, loses Microsoft an average of $20/user/month, with some users costing as much as $80/month, due to the high costs associated with running the generative AI software
-39%: Google-owned DeepMind cut staff-related expenses by 39% last year from £969M in 2021 to £595M in 2022, as revenue fell 21%
📰 What’s going on
Google's AI-powered search feature can now generate images using text prompts directly in the search bar. The image-generating feature is a part of Google's Search Generative Experience (SGE); currently being tested among users who sign up
In its app, Amazon is experimenting with a "Buy Again" feature that can be found on the home page and uses order history to provide recommendations, particularly in categories like groceries and electronics. The goal is to promote repeat purchases and subscription-based ordering, such as "Subscribe & Save," to increase revenue from its current customers
Apple is trying to make its next version of the Vision Pro headset more comfortable with a smaller and lighter design
Apple Wallet now allows Discover US credit card customers to view their card balance and transaction history, following a functionality already launched in the UK
Microsoft launched the Microsoft Advertising Network for retail. The tech giant is now in competition with established third-party retail media platforms, such as Criteo
Microsoft's recently approved patent reveals a design for AR glasses featuring a swappable battery, enhancing usability and application areas by reducing device weight
Netflix is planning to launch physical retail stores to sell merchandise, food, and experiences tied to its movies and TV shows.The first two locations are set to debut in the U.S. in 2025, with a global expansion to follow
Klarna introduces a range of AI-enhanced shopping features in a significant autumn launch. The new "Shopping Lens" feature enables users to photograph items and find where to purchase them at the best deal within the Klarna app. Additional functionalities allow similar item suggestions and make every sight shoppable through image translation into search terms via AI. Other updates include a cashback program, purchase protection, sustainability filters, barcode scanning for details, and “shoppable videos” by creators
Revolut has launched "Revolut 10", its biggest update yet, with a major overhaul of the design and layout of the app
Character.AI launched Character Group Chat, which allows paid users to create group chats featuring a mix of humans and AI characters
Captions, which specializes in AI-powered video editing tools, has introduced a new video dubbing feature. "Lipdub" translates into 28 languages, preserving the user's voice and synchronizing their lips with the translated audio
📚 Good reads
Behind the scenes of Patreon’s new redesign. Many of the principles that guide brand-building today are still rooted in ideas from 20th century retail: have a static logo with an exact shape, one or two key brand colors, and make sure it all stands out on a store shelf or in a print ad. But Patreon wasn’t born on store shelves and print ads. Great insights into the thinking process that goes behind a big rebrand
Some hard truths about soft skills. In today’s world, the average lifespan of a technical skill is roughly 18 months. Soft skills, by contrast, will never get obsolete, and can be transferred from role to role and anywhere outside the company. Anne-Laure Le Cunff shares some learning approaches that do work when it comes to acquiring or improving soft skills
Types of assumptions and their importance in assumption testing for Product teams, by Teresa Torres. “Assumption testing is at the heart of what good continuous discovery teams do week over week. It’s how we evaluate which ideas will work and which won’t. But before we can test our assumptions, we have to identify them. That’s not always as easy as it sounds.“
Team utopia vs the unsolvable maze. John Cutler brings us a short but insightful read on how adding more constraints to a project increases the chances of failure
Unlocking optionality in your career. What options are available outside of full time, in-house employment? Adam Fishman shares how he spreads his bets in a very successful Product-Growth career
How Duolingo designs product (and why). Felix Lee shares a playbook for designing for 500 Million users with high retention. A Trigger-Routine-Reward habit-loop that resonates with Nir Eyal’s “Hook” model
That’s all for this week! Let me know what you think by replying back to this email or commenting on Substack
Angel