Russell Westbrook Social Media?

Six-time NBA All-Star Russell Westbrook waited little time after the conclusion of the NBA Playoffs to do some work off the court..

Today, he is announcing an investment in Blend, a company focused on creating consumable news for generations Y & Z, which has plans to launch a new app called Genies in the near future.

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The Genies app, which will allow users to create mini digital clones that look, act and think just like them as they react to news, has already curated a wait list of 235,000 individuals. It is currently planned to become available for download in mid-July.

"I don't like to speak publicly about what I invest in, but I'm really excited about what Genies will do for the way we all share and read about news," said Westbrook. "It's something I've seen change various times throughout my career and expect it will continue to evolve."

Westbrook was not willing to disclose the amount of his investment. However, Blend did share that it has raised over $10 million in capital to date from investors such as NEA, CAA, Foundation Capital, and former Legendary Entertainment CEO, Thomas Tull.

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The investment made sense to Westbrook based on his belief in Blend's success to date as well as a desire to put money into a product he can see himself using in the future.

"I'm always on the lookout for things that can change my personal day-to-day life, and with social and news being a big part of almost everyone's life, I saw an opportunity to be a part of something that is intertwining the two," added Westbrook.

Westbrook also indicated that he currently gets almost all of his news from social media.

"I see myself having a very hands on approach with the team at Genies," said Westbrook. "I respect their mission am excited to aid however I can. I partnered with their team because of the quality product they will offer to their users and will continue to voice my opinion on features that I'm personally attracted to."

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Westbrook also thinks that other active NBA players should follow his lead by making smart investments before retirement.

"All players should prepare for life after basketball," said Westbrook. "Whether it's investing or just doing whatever you love, you should start preparing for that in advance.

Guest Authored By Darren Heitner. Darren is the Founder of HEITNER LEGAL, Founder/CEO of Dynasty Dealings, LLC, Professor of Sports Law at the University of Florida and University of Florida Levin College of Law and Founder/Chief Editor of Sports Agent Blog, a leading niche industry publication. He is an attorney licensed to practice on the state and federal level, and focuses on sports, entertainment, and intellectual property litigation and transactional work. Darren is the author of How to Play the Game: What Every Sports Attorney Needs to Know (published by the American Bar Association), Contributing Writer of An Athlete’s Guide to Agents, 5th Edition, and has authored many sports, entertainment and intellectual property-related Law Journal articles. Darren has a Bachelors of Arts from the University of Florida and a Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree from the same institution. Follow Darren on Twitter.

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"Blend, a company focused on creating consumable news for generations Y & Z, which has plans to launch a new app called Genies in the near future.."

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  Authored by:

  Fred Hansen Pied Piper of Social Media Marketing at YourWorldBrand.com & CEO of Millennium 7 Publishing Co. in Loveland, Colorado. I work deep in the trenches of social media strategy, community management and trends.  My interests include; online business educator, social media marketing, new marketing technology, skiing, hunting, fishing and The Rolling Stones..-Not necessarily in that order ;)

Facebook - Beyond Social Media?

With 1.94 billion monthly active users, Facebook is the undisputed king in the social media space..

Together with Instagram and WhatsApp, Facebook has created social network strong enough to make competitors sweat. Facebook’s growth story has been impressive with its revenue rising from $7.87 billion in FY13 to $27.64 billion in FY16, and net income soaring from $1.5 billion to $10.19 billion during the same period.

The social media technology giant is growing at a healthy pace on the back of an increasing user base, advertising cost rate and merchants onboard—led by its mobile and video advertising strategy.

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Despite its phenomenal progress, Facebook is far from being complacent. It continues to invest in research and development (21% of revenue in FY16), and innovate aggressively to build new channels of potential growth for the times ahead. Here’s a close look at two of them—P2P payments and telecom infrastructure.

P2P Payments

Facebook unveiled its intent to enter the Peer-to-Peer (P2P) payments market in March 2015 by introducing its convenient and secure mechanism in Messenger that allowed people to send and receive money seamlessly.

Dubbed as “easy and free,” the service by Facebook extended in April 2017 to send or receive money between groups of people on Messenger—to allow people to chip in for a common gift or a dutch party. With the expansion of its services in Europe and eventually other regions, the payments in Messenger is set to become a significant revenue source for Facebook over time.

BI Intelligence estimates that the U.S. annual P2P payments, which includes informal payments by cash, check, digital money transfer, or other means made from one person to another reached over $540 billion in 2014. A report by eMarketer anticipates mobile P2P payments transaction value to climb to $92.11 billion in 2017. These figures project immense scope for Facebook’s payment service that offers ease and security for a strongly ‘connected’ user base.

During the February Conference Call, Sheryl Sandberg said, “We're now per month at a billion messages sent between people and businesses and we think that's very promising for our ability for people to use this platform to make those connections that will ultimately drive business opportunities.”

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Telecom Infra Project

In February 2016, Facebook announced the Telecom Infra Project (TIP) with a goal to produce simple, efficient and flexible technologies that are relevant to both existing and future networks. TIP was launched to focus on three areas—access, backhaul, and core and management—applying the Open Compute Project model. 

Back in 2011, Facebook launched the Open Compute Project (OCP) aimed at “reimagining hardware, making it more efficient, flexible, and scalable” for greater choice, customization and cost savings. In 2015, Facebook reported that the project enabled it to save $2 billion in infrastructure costs over a three-year period and also helped reduce data center electric bills by as much as 20% for companies such as Fidelity Investments. OCP continues to revolutionize the $171 billion data center systems industry.

Now with TIP, Facebook is gearing to upend the billion-dollar telecom market. It is estimated that data traffic in the most advanced markets will triple in the next five years, while traffic in emerging economies is forecast to grow 9x in the same period. Thus, the next-generation networks need to be equipped to support billions of connected devices while offering flexibility at lower deployment costs and better coverage at higher bit rates.

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By working on the model of openness and disaggregation, Facebook is looking to unbundle the traditional telecom market to one that offers greater flexibility in building networks. Overall, it would reduce the huge hardware investments, thereby resulting in gains in cost and operational efficiency for both rural and urban deployments, benefiting not just Facebook but also other industry players and customers. With initial membership consisting of just five names—Facebook, Intel, Nokia, Deutsche Telekom and SK Telecom—the number has now crossed 400.

Overall, Facebook is poised to grow at a robust rate given its commitment to innovation and passion for advanced technologies. It is working to fulfill its mission—to make the world more open and connected—resting on the belief that “this journey is 1% finished.”

Guest Authored By Pableen Bajpai. Prableen is the Founding Director at FinFix; an enterprise in India, engaged in financial research, reports, training and spreading financial literacy while striving to provide counseling to the economically less privileged. Previously, she was heading the research at a wealth management company in India and has also taught business students at the Royal Thimphu College in Bhutan. Prableen is a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) from ICFAI, holds a masters degree in Economics and is pursuing her CFP certification. Her work appears on various platforms including The Tribune (India), Seeking Alpha and Investopedia. Follow Pableen on Twitter.

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“Overall, Facebook is poised to grow at a robust rate given its commitment to innovation and passion for advanced technologies.

It is working to fulfill its mission—to make the world more open and connected—resting on the belief that “this journey is 1% finished.””

• 

  Authored by:

  Fred Hansen Pied Piper of Social Media Marketing at YourWorldBrand.com & CEO of Millennium 7 Publishing Co. in Loveland, Colorado. I work deep in the trenches of social media strategy, community management and trends.  My interests include; online business educator, social media marketing, new marketing technology, skiing, hunting, fishing and The Rolling Stones..-Not necessarily in that order ;)