# Top 10 in Tech - What to know for Week ending February 1, 2019

Published: 1 February 2019
Canonical: https://www.top10in.tech/posts/week-ending-february-1-2019

1. eCOMM:

[Business Insider](https://www.businessinsider.com/)'s top 5 [eCommerce predictions for 2019](https://www.evernote.com/l/AAGQauQ2WMJB26ley7RE9qiF1JXqz7NsjTg).

2. CHURN:

Uh Oh! Apparently we’ve all been [calculating churn rates wrong](https://catchjs.com/Blog/Churn) this whole time. Oh, and if your business has Churn problems, it may very likely [be an on-boarding problem](https://medium.com/@cllaudiu/is-your-churn-problem-actually-an-onboarding-problem-d483f36478be).

3. CUSTOMER/PRODUCT:

We are currently in the [age of the Customer.](https://go.forrester.com/age-of-the-customer/) What exactly does that mean? Well if you are an acquisition focused business versus a customer focused business leveraging customer retention and monetization strategies, probably quite a lot of money. Patrick Campbell of [Price Intelligently](https://www.priceintelligently.com/) produced one of the most [amazing presentations](https://nztradeandenterprise-my.sharepoint.com/:b:/g/personal/jon_davies_nzte_govt_nz/EQxNQwkTvGtAt5chxf7UCbsBpxUoAKqaRA2apuexmUIjbQ?e=whg92f) for me in 2018 with so many solid takeaways it’s hard to summarize but the REALLY big takeaway is on slides 41-44. Monetization and retention-based growth strategies FAR outpace acquisition based ones. Founders should look at this and ask themselves if they want to grow at 15% or 2%?

4. GAMING:

[Amazon are developing a Game Streaming service](https://www.theinformation.com/articles/amazon-developing-game-streaming-service) joining Microsoft and Google among others, who both have a much larger head start, putting Amazon at a competitive disadvantage (which is unusual for them with Cloud services). This is all indicative of a larger shift in the gaming industry, likely in anticipation of 5G networks coming one-line en-mass in the next 24 months.

5. PRIVACY:

Complinace (and lack of of it) can really kill sales cadence when hunting larger customers. Plus it can land you a heft fine if they are in the European Union. Here is a [complete guide to GDPR compliance](https://gdpr.eu/) with your data. Plus the fines are real, with Google [facing a €50 fine for breaching European privacy rules](https://www.businessinsider.com/france-fines-google-57-million-for-gdpr-breach-2019-1).

6. Mobile phones and other devices are increasingly being used to shop

7. SERIES A BENCHMARKS:

How well did Series A SaaS companies perform in 2018? My favorite VC analyst, [Tomasz Tunguz](https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomasztunguz/) take a look at [Benchmarks for 2018](https://tomtunguz.com/series-a-saas-startup-benchmarks-for-2018/) - couple fo highlights: Median ARR was $1.8m ARR, and growing at 250%!! However 22% of the businesses analyses manage to raise Series A capital with $0 ARR.

8. FAANG:

Google is [raising prices of it’s G-Suite productivity app ](https://cloud.google.com/blog/products/g-suite/new-pricing-for-g-suite-basic-and-business-editions)20 percent for the basic and business versions for the first time in a decade. Netflix is also [raising it’s subscription price 18%](https://tech.co/news/netflix-raised-prices-subscribers-2019-01)

9. IoT:

[Adoption is expected to soar over the next few years](https://www.evernote.com/shard/s1/sh/40ad11d5-1499-4d9c-8806-2552f49c69a3/7ff92805744add69db5a5c6843c49ce0) as non-users expected to begin using IoT solutions. You can also download the full Internet of Things Report (as a PDF) [here](https://nztradeandenterprise-my.sharepoint.com/:b:/g/personal/jon_davies_nzte_govt_nz/Edm_Cbpy3n1HkGPw7SNFY5kBGOH8ZgE4Ny0J81hcIzV4DA?e=RRCN8E) from Business Insider - NZTE download only. The underlying data can also be downloaded in [excel format here](https://nztradeandenterprise-my.sharepoint.com/:b:/g/personal/jon_davies_nzte_govt_nz/Edm_Cbpy3n1HkGPw7SNFY5kBGOH8ZgE4Ny0J81hcIzV4DA?e=RRCN8E).

10. PRODUCT/MARKET:

How does a business differentiate its product in an increasingly crowded market. Openview have [provided a guide](https://labs.openviewpartners.com/product-differentiation-a-guide-to-the-dos-donts-and-companies-that-get-it-right/#.XE94HM9KhLA).

 POD OF THE WEEK:

How a small startup in Western Australia became one of Australia Unicorn Tech companies. [How I built this features Melanie Perkins, founder and CEO of Canva](https://www.npr.org/2019/01/24/688299882/canva-melanie-perkins)

**BONUS**: Pitch your hardware project, online, or just join as a listener: [StartupBlink are providing an online pitching event for Hardware/IoT founders on Feb 19th](https://webinar.startupblink.com/hardware-pitching)