Hi there,

Yesterday, Zillow announced that it’s shuttering its real estate iBuying business. As a result, it’s taking a $500M hit and laying off 25% of its team.

Of course, the hot takes and “I told you so” mafia came out in full force on Twitter and the blogosphere (is that still a term?). Critics highlighted how misguided the iBuyer strategy was, pointed out how this was symptomatic of Silicon Valley hubris, and generally took delight in this failure.

First, let me say most of these critics are clowns. 

They never told us so. And the whole Silicon Valley arrogance schtick is vapid, intellectually lazy, and just getting tired.

Here’s my takeaway. 

In March 2018, when Zillow launched Zillow Offers (its iBuying product), the company had a $10B+ market cap. 

This was a big risk. 

And the risk failed. Badly.

The reality, however, is that this behavior should be emulated. Folks often lament that public companies are risk-averse and not innovative, and they’re mostly right. 

And then when things don’t go well, most companies are afraid to make the hard call and instead will let it carry on in some sort of zombie state.

So when a big co (like Zillow) sticks its neck out, fails, and shuts a business down, there is still actually a lot of goodness in that, which we should look at, admire, and ultimately study and learn from.

Disclaimers:

• I’m a big fan of Rich Barton, the CEO of Zillow.

• This is not investment advice.

• CBI is based in NYC, so we’re not Silicon Valley boosters. 

• If you are a critic who dunked on Zillow, I don’t think you are a clown. I said most critics are clowns. Of course, you are not most.

Herbie fully charged
 

Amazon- and Ford-backed EV startup Rivian announced plans to go public as soon as next week at a valuation of up to $55B.

Rivian is one of several startup contenders battling it out for EV market share. Get to know the key players, obstacles, and opportunities here.

Cha-ching
 

Payments companies are having a big year:

• Funding has already hit $22.4B in 2021, up 57% vs. 2020
• The median late-stage payments deal is now worth a unicorn-minting $2.1B
• Median late-stage deal size is clocking in at $120M

Get up to speed on the state of payments — including 8 new unicorns, and the region that saw its third consecutive $1B+ quarter — here.

Our kind of peeps

The First Round Review published an interview with Zapier co-founder Wade Foster, which I recently stumbled upon. (Grab the link in The Industry Standard section below.)

I highlight it because Zapier is a unique animal in today’s crazy funding environment.

The company graduated from Y Combinator and then intensely focused on building product and revenue. In fact, while it has only raised ~$2.5M, it did $100M to $140M in revenue in 2020, per CB Insights revenue data.

And its current valuation sits at a not-too-shabby $4B.

Yes — the current zeitgeist is to raise money cuz it is plentiful, but Wade Foster and the Zapier team show it's not the only way. 

It’s good to see this increasingly rare philosophy articulated.

BTW, my favorite quote from the article is below. :)

“In Zapier's case, the answer is no. The company is one of an elite group of startups, including Clearbit, CB Insights, Trello, and a handful of others, that, to date, have raised only one institutional round of funding.”

That's a solid crew to be a part of.

For those of you out there revenue-funding your company and working on making it an absolute behemoth, hats off to you. 

BTW, if you like the sound of this and are a data/technology nerd, CB Insights is hiring in every function and currently has 60+ open positions.

Check 'em out here.
 

A bouncer for your data
 

In 2020 alone, nearly 4,000 data breaches resulted in the loss of 37B records.

Our Data Security Tech Market Map highlights 90+ companies protecting organizations’ data from abuse. Dig into 10 tech categories — from data access governance to post-quantum cryptography to blockchain-enabled security — here.

The TL;DR of healthcare
 

With record deal numbers and sizes, the healthcare space is heating and speeding up at the same time.

In tomorrow’s webinar, CB Insights managing analyst Marissa Schlueter will walk through the state of healthcare, including what’s next. Sign up here and make sure to come with questions.

It’s a numbers game

In theory, banks could use quantum computing to build trading strategies that offer better returns, quickly parse through different portfolio combinations to find the most compelling mix of investments, and more.

We analyze how quantum computers will change financial services and how banks like Goldman Sachs and BBVA are already making moves here.

To tokenize, or not to tokenize?

Putting real world assets on a blockchain — also known as tokenization — opens up a wide range of new business models and revenue streams. But doing so requires navigating a complex landscape of regulation. 

Our friends at Blockdata compared some of the biggest asset tokenization providers across notable partnerships, KYC/AML compliance, token standards, and more. Check it out here.

First Round Review. First Round Review interviews Zapier CEO Wade Foster about the company’s lean fundraising approach and mentions CB Insights. 

CoinDesk. Michael Bellusci (@mikeybellusci) covers record blockchain and crypto funding using CB Insights’ State Of Blockchain Q3’21 report.

Grocery Dive. Jeff Wells (@JeffWellsWH) talks with CB Insights senior lead analyst Laura Kennedy and intelligence analyst Jackie Tubbs in analyzing the ultrafast delivery space.
 

P.S. The clock is ticking on our offer for 50% off Future of Health (Dec. 8-9, online) tickets. Use code bigsale to take advantage of the deal through EOD tomorrow.

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