After a drought of tech IPOs early this year, 2016 is finally ending on a positive note with a string of successful IPOs. After Twilio, Line, Talend, and Nutanix, cloud spend management company Coupa is the latest among Billion Dollar Unicorns to deliver a successful IPO. >>>
After a rather slow IPO schedule for the technology sector during the year, things appear to be looking up. Last week, hyperconverged storage provider Nutanix, finally went public. It had filed to go public in December last year, but the market conditions led to a delayed listing. It has only been a week since it listed, but the Billion Dollar Unicorn club member appears to be doing well so far.
According to InternetRetailer, overall Latin America web sales grew 15.5% in 2015 to $22.22 billion compared with the 22.1% growth recorded a year ago. The slowing down of the growth rate is attributed partially to the depressed macroeconomic conditions in Brazil, which accounts for 58% of the region’s web sales. Last year, the Brazilian economy shrank 3.8%, recording the biggest decline in gross domestic product since 1991.But slowing down of the Brazilian economy has not stopped online retailers in the Latin American region from continuing to push ahead. >>>
According to IDC, the proportion of digital related consulting engagements are expected to grow from nearly 50% for the period 2013-2015 to 80% by the year 2019, driving the total market for Digital Strategy services to more than $97 billion globally by 2019. Billion Dollar Unicorn player Globant (NYSE:GLOB), the first Latin American Software Services company to list on the NYSE exchange, is making its presence felt in the industry.
According to a report by Digi-Capital, the augmented and virtual reality market is estimated to grow to $120 billion by the year 2020, compared with the forecast of less than $10 billion in 2016. In 2020, virtual reality (VR) is expected to account for $30 billion of the market while augmented reality (AR) will account for the remaining $90 billion. Billion Dollar Unicorn player Blippar is focused on making a mark in this high growth industry.
This year has seen Chinese ride-sharing firm Didi Chuxing expand its list of investors to include the likes of Apple, Foxconn, and even Uber, cranking up its valuation to $33.7 billion. It is now the third largest Billion Dollar Unicorn after Uber and Xiomi.
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An eMarketer report on the global mobile phone messaging market expects the global user base for over-the-top messaging services to grow from 1.4 billion in 2015 to 2.19 billion by the year 2019. Another report by GlobalWebIndex reveals that Facebook Messenger is the most widely used mobile app followed by Facebook-owned WhatsApp. Together, the two account for 70% of the user base globally. While Snap, formerly known as Snapchat, accounts for a modest 7% of global internet users, more than 40% of teenagers in mature markets like UK and US use it. >>>
According to market reports, the mobile gaming industry was worth $34 billion in 2015. Within games, it is among the fastest growing segment. But despite the growth, gaming companies like Zynga are finding it difficult to deliver stellar results.
There aren’t too many Billion Dollar Unicorn stories from South East Asia. But here is an interesting story of Grab, earlier known as GrabTaxi, that has successfully delivered an Uber-like offering in the region and now commands a multi-billion dollar valuation.
According to eMarketer, over-the-top (OTT) mobile messaging services were used by more than 1.4 billion consumers in 2015, recording a 32% growth over the year. Total users are expected to grow to 2.19 billion by the year 2019 and will account for 68% of mobile phone Internet users. Two years ago, Japan’s mobile messaging service Line had abandoned plans to list. But early this year, the company finally took the plunge.