Hi there,

The lineup is getting longer for the CB Insights Technology Conference (June 16-18). New additions include:

• Aaron Levie, CEO, Box (NYSE: BOX)

• Julie Bornstein, CEO, The Yes (Former COO, Stitch Fix; newly launched app-only e-commerce startup)

• Matthew Glotzbach, CEO, Quizlet ($1B valuation)

We already have over 40 speakers and 1,100 registrants. Make sure you're part of these important conversations. Register here.

-30%: US Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell warned that US GDP could shrink by up to 30% this quarter as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. He also said that the economic downturn may last until the end of 2021. We compiled our research on how Covid-19 is affecting industries like healthcare, finance, retail, and more on this resource page.  
 

+141%: Target reported that its digital sales were up 141% in the first quarter as customers began buying more consumer products online. Meanwhile, Facebook pushed further into e-commerce by making it easier to buy products within the company’s apps. We dive into the latest consumer product trends, including bright spots for VC investment, in our State Of Consumer Products Q1’20 Report.    

45 people: US-based Moderna Therapeutics announced promising results for a 45-person phase 1 clinical trial of its Covid-19 vaccine candidate. Though still in the early stages of development, the drug is now being tested on larger groups of people. Expert Intelligence clients can see  tech that’s helping to make clinical trials quicker and more effective here. 

$350M: Virtual reality startup Magic Leap raised $350M. We look at how the tech offered by companies like Magic Leap could open up new ways to work remotely in our 14 Tech Trends To Watch Closely In 2020 report.

$400M: Internet of things (IoT) unicorn Samsara Networks raised $400M in new funding. Edge computing is seen as a vital technology for enabling more effective IoT networks. We explain what edge computing is and how it’s affecting industries from manufacturing to finance in this report. 

$150M: Fintech startup Brex, which offers corporate credit cards, raised a $150M mega-round. The deal bucks the broader trend of declining mega-rounds to fintech companies. We dig into this and more emerging funding trends in our State Of Fintech Q1’20 Report.
 

2 acquisitions: Chipmaker Intel acquired Rivet Networks, a company that provides networking tech aimed at gamers. This is the 2nd acquisition that Intel has announced this month — it also bought mobility-as-a-service company Moovit. Intel has made over 70 acquisitions overall. We discuss how the company became a computer giant in our report on 8 Laws Driving Success In Tech. 

22,500 employees: Mark Zuckerberg said that Facebook will allow many of its staff to work from home permanently, and that he expects half of the company’s 45,000 employees will be remote within a decade. We highlight 65+ startups building tech to help people work from home in this market map.

-94%: SoftBank said that it now values office space company WeWork at $2.9B, down 94% from its peak valuation of $47B given just over a year ago. We look at WeWork’s business model and how it makes money in this report. 
 

$72M: Online grocery startup Imperfect Foods raised $72M from backers including Consumer Smart Money VCs Insight Partners and Norwest Venture Partners. We predicted that online grocery — which had previously seen declining interest from top investors in the space — would experience a rebound in our discussion of what we can learn from Smart Money investors in the consumer space. See the rest of our analysis here.   

45%: Researchers from Carnegie Mellon University said that 45% of accounts tweeting about the coronavirus pandemic act like bots and are likely being used to spread misinformation — possibly for the purpose of creating societal divisions. We look at the threat of information warfare here.

$134M: Telehealth platform AmWell raised $134M, bringing its total disclosed funding to over $700M. Telehealth deals doubled in Q1’20 compared to the previous quarter as Covid-19 forced many patients to seek virtual support. We dig deeper into this trend — and many more — in our latest State Of Healthcare report. 
 

-17%: Daily global CO2 emissions were down by 17% in April compared to the average for last year, according to a study published in Nature. The significant decrease is attributed to a temporary effect from lockdown measures around the world in response to Covid-19.   
 

520 light years: Astronomers created an image of a giant planet forming 520 light years away. The new images show twists in enormous spirals of gas and dust that the researchers attribute to the nascent planet accumulating mass. 

I love you.

P.S. We're looking for a product manager. Check out the job specs here. 

Humans aren’t the only ones getting bored and lonely amid quarantine — the zoo animals are, too.

To ease their boredom, zookeepers have been taking these animals out on excursions: Llamas and donkeys at the Toronto Zoo visited their neighborhood polar bears; sea lions at the Shedd Aquarium explored human office spaces; and the Kansas City Zoo let their penguins explore the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. 

“Animals miss people as much as people miss animals,” according to Dan Ashe, the president of the Association of Zoos and Aquariums. “Their day is less interesting or varied without us.”