Top 10 in Tech - What to know for Week ending February 8, 2019

1. SECURITY: Data breaches are, unfortunately, an ever evolving and trending topic. One of the biggest breaches to date, with 773 Million records discovered, was reported last month. So how do you as a consumer know if any of your online accounts or passwords are compromised? Luckily the team at TroyHunt are trying to solve that problem and have built a portal to check both compromised email addresses AND, more importantly, Passwords breached.  PRO-TIP: Password managers are a good thing, as is Multi-Factor Authentication.
2. VC: 18 charts that really illustrate the state off US Venture Capital in 2018. Records were reached and looking forward to 2019, thanks today in this report from Silicon Valley Bank, the Unicorns of today raise nearly 4x the historical average for venture-backed tech companies at IPO.
3. FINTECH: FinTechNZ just launched a detailed NZ FinTech ecosystem map. It’s a fun one to review and can also be compared to this more global one from CB Insights.
4. CO-WORKING: WeWork (where our SF offices are based) is currently valued at $47 Billion USD - it’s real-estate-as-a-service model has served them well but is it overhyped and overpriced? CB Insights have just published a 47 page report on this leading real estate/tech company.
5. AMAZON: Online sales growth slowed for Amazon according to their recent earnings call, but they still had their biggest quarter on record. Just exactly how big is the business? Well it's almost too big to comprehend - for example just the Cloud division, Amazon Web Services (AWS), generates more revenue than McDonald’s.
6. SaaS SPEND: We’re at SaaStr Annual this week, so expect a deluge of SaaS news next week. But let's start with: How much does the average SaaS Company spend on R&D? Average is 23%. OK - what about Marketing? Tomasz Tunguz has taken a look and even supplied a simple worksheet. Looks like 10% is about right
7. NPS: What is it and why do we measure it? From our amazing Customer, Asknicely, This White Paper reviews common user experience metrics including NPS (Net Promoter Score) and how to measure and calculate this and other very important customer data points.
8. SALES QUOTAS: In past newsletters I have referenced AE and SDR metrics and quotas. But what about quota expectations in renewal and cross sell/upsell within a Customer Success Team? Tomasz Tunguz takes a look based on a report last year from Gainsight. Most Customer Success Managers can handle between $2-$5M in ARR and somewhere between 10-500 accounts (but it varies based on segment/ACMR).
9. FAANG: Apple gave both Google and Facebook a virtual clip around the ears last week by revoking their ability to publish internal and beta/test apps on the iOS platform as they were both found to be abusing Apple requirements for app deployment and data collection. The team at The Information have some interesting insight on where this can all  could go. Apple definitely get to take the higher ground.
10. eSPORTS. This category of entertainment (watching other people play video games) is massive. It boggles my mind. If you are a non-gamer like me, reading this article is helpful to really lean into just how big eSports is and will be.

POD OF THE WEEK: What does it actually take to win at enterprise sales? a16z Podcast covering stories and Lessons in Enterprise Sales

BONUS: Applications for the Y-Combinator Summer 2019 batch are now open and they are also on the hunt for anyone in an emerging filed for an all expenses paid weekend in Boulder, CO in April (from anywhere in the world).