Top 10 in Tech - What to know for Week ending July 5, 2019

1. UPSELL: Sammy Abdullah of Blossom Street Ventures backs up my on-going opinion that net dollar retention (and by proxy upsell) is the most important metric in SaaS
2. SAAS MULTIPLES: Tomasz Tunguz frequently reviews public traded SaaS companies forward multiples. They are currently edging up to a seven-year high average at 9.6x (which is a recovery as it dropped to 7.7x at the end of 2018). Check out newly Public Company, Zoom in his article - an amazing 44.1x forward multiple!
3. SAAS: Complimentary to the above article, Global spending on cloud-based software generated $23 billion in Q1 and is set to pass $100 Billion ARR for the year. It’s a big milestone. And the company on top of that? Well, it’s not Salesforce anymore. That perch has been poached a while back by Microsoft as the company continues on its strategic business model pivot and they now represent a whopping 17% of the enterprise SaaS market. Interesting to also see Adobe creeping into 3rd place (and past SAP and Oracle). 
4. CADENCE: The cadence at which a company operates is set by Senior Leadership, who keeps the rhythm and beat. Startups and Tech companies operate at a fast cadence, often reporting on a weekly basis, some teams daily. But even in larger scale corporates, the top economic performers follow a faster rhythm than their industry counterparts.
5. GROWTH: Two-sided marketplace businesses (such as Uber and Airbnb) face chicken/egg dilemmas when it comes to supply and demand. Here is a curated list from a16z’s Andrew Chen’s on 28 ways to grow the supply side of a marketplace.
6. 5G: This next generation of wireless tech will really blur the line between internet and cellular data connectivity. This report from Business Insider focuses on the threat to the home internet market in the US from Cellular telcos and this report focuses on 5G deployments (Stateside) so far. 
7. CUSTOMER: Survey Monkey has a downloadable PDF on 7 ways a company can actionably put customers first, compare that to HubSpot who also have their (CRM Focused) 7 step version.
8. FUNDING: Point Nine Capital have just updated their famous SaaS Napkin for 2019 (it’s awesome) and also provided a complimentary publication on what it takes to raise capital (in SaaS) in 2019.
9. MOBILE METRICS: When it comes to being a Mobile-first business, what are the metrics that matter? ChartMogul has put together this ultimate guide/Cheat Sheet (downloadable as a PDF!)
10. SAASTR: SaaStr just hosted their first European conference last month and it was hugely successful (with Cecelia Shand from our London offices attending). Here is an attendee report on top lessons for B2B SaaS companies learned at SaaStr Europa. SaaStr have also recently announced a new event this August in SF called SaaStr Scale.​

POD OF THE WEEK: From Y-Combinator. Great discussion on organizing and running Growth Teams. A fantastic discussion on what to do beyond founder-salesian a startup.

BONUS: Y-Combinator run a (FREE!) online course for founders called Startup School (FUN FACT: Thematic were recruited into the physical Y-Combinator Accelerator from this online class and are featured on the landing page). The 10 week course begins July 22, 2019 (Did I mention it’s FREE for everyone to participate). Registration here.