So let me talk a bit about the macro trends that we are seeing in technology and what we're investing in,
because this actually paints a bit of of the view of where I think things are getting interesting around around technology.
So. At the core for me is the acceleration and proliferation of data as an asset.
And yet I think very few entrepreneurs and very few companies still understand the competitive advantage that data can provide for them.
But to start with, let's start with mobile devices, right? The number, the billions, the billions of phones that are now in your hand,
the fact that somebody in Kenya can actually buy a $75 Android device that has more computing power there than the Apollo 13.
The fact that that computer, that the supercomputer is now tied to the cloud,
the fact that the cloud has infinite amounts of computing power, a fraction of sense.
The fact that now storage on an AWB server is pretty much free.
But the decelerated deceleration of the cost of storage and you combine both of these things so you have a
consumption device and interaction device combined with effectively the world's largest supercomputer on the cloud,
allowing you to do some magical stuff.
And the magical stuff delights the consumers and makes their lives easier and allows you to play Angry Birds and Candy Crush.
But all that creates is massive amounts of data. And you lay across all of that a social layer.
And social doesn't mean only Facebook. Social means. WhatsApp and WeChat in Asia.
And Kakao and Line in Korea and Japan. It means Twitter and its own social graph and LinkedIn.
But there's real identity that permeates through mobile devices on the web where you can actually
find that the right person in the right points and service them with the right proposition.
Early in my career, I used to build data warehouses, so I guess I was early in what's now called big data.
And people, these retailers are spending millions of dollars building.
Insights into their customers. And so Tesco Ecom today still knows me as simply the guy that buys beers and diapers and once in a while
the F.T. because all they see is my transaction line data with some third party demographic information.
You compare that with what I've told Facebook about myself that is the world's largest and most beautiful demographic database that has ever existed.
The stuff that I tell Facebook, I will never tell Tesco what movie I like, what song I listen to,
what where I checked in, what movie I went to, what play I wanted to go watch.
That's all there. And if I choose to as a user,
you as as an entrepreneur can actually mine that data and you can actually derive insight into who I am and how to serves me better.
And very few companies actually recognise that value.
The power that exists when the data combined from the sensors of mobile devices and Internet of Things
with the computational power of the cloud and the that effectively freed data storage now exists.
And if you combine all these trends together, you start being able to disrupt e-commerce and marketplaces,
the ability to create dynamic supply and demand. So think about Uber and Hailo, right?
The fact that you can now literally remote control your transportation needs.
It benefits the environment because you use your car less. It provides jobs for people that might not have had jobs.
It provides convenience for me in London to actually be in a car and actually increase my my economic output by more.
I would say cleaning out my inbox is not increasing economic output, but at least it lets me feel better about myself.
Financial services and what's happening around FinTech and London is naturally a home and a hub for fintech around the world.
But look at what TransferWise and the way they've completely disrupted how peer to peer lending works.
And in a way, how elegantly they did it. Instead of having to have money flow from here to France and therefore pay the interchange fees.
They just hold the balance in France and here and effectively becomes a ledger,
takes them out here and added over there and they allow you that the user to have a much lower transaction fee for for money transfer.
There's actually this this this thesis around the unbundling of banks and why we as consumers would
ever think about having just one provider when we could actually go out and shop for different options.
And yet we do in a way because we're losing, because our banks market to us.
But why would I use the best price option for money transfer for loans?
Lending clubs are a great example for for current accounts for savings,
and that's actually powered by the trends around data and the insights in the customer.
I call them affinity networks. Fred Wilson from us, we call them communities.
But these passion points in people's lives that are not represented on Facebook.
So Facebooks are horizontal network. We're friends, but we might not have the same passions.
People's passions are sports or fashion or politics.
It's how do you create these communities of passion where people get to share their emotions,
share what they care about, and therefore drive deeper engagement? And then how do you monetise that engagement?
The whole revolution around SAS as a new business model where effectively computing can happen on the cloud,
you don't have to have the infrastructure inside your business. It allows you as a small business to compete with Fortune 500 companies because
you have as good systems which were effectively price prohibitive in the past.
And then the just the way in which iPads and mobile devices have have redefined,
the way in which we create and consume content and the way in which we actually get entertainment in the way in which we play games,
the way in which we actually monetise games through micro-transactions. It's something that the East was doing ten years ago.
Tencent was already making hundreds of millions of dollars on top of stickers on on messaging.
And now the latest craze in the Valley is messaging apps.
So slowly, I think the this balance of power is beginning to shift from the west towards the east.
And we are beginning to learn something that inside China has been happening for a long time and is now emerging towards towards Europe and the US.