02.14.22

Lessons from the Peloton Downfall

BY Fast Company Contributor 5 MINUTE READ

Peloton had a truly impressive run during the beginning of the pandemic: In the first quarter of 2020, subscribers more than doubled from a year earlier, and The Wall Street Journal credited a “coronavirus surge” for its 66% increase in sales. Health-conscious people sidelined by closed gyms ordered bikes despite wait times of a month or more, and the company ramped up production accordingly.

And then came its spectacular flameout. Its share price dropped 76% in 2021. Last month, the company announced it would halt production of its bikes and treadmills due to decreased demand. And last week, the company said it would cut 2,800 jobs and replace the CEO of the decade-old company.

At its core, this was a case of a wild mismatch between supply and demand, but even more critically, it was a case of the company not understanding that its market was finite. After all, what if I told you that every household in America would one day own a $2,000 stationary bike? Hopefully your response would be to stop reading. Logic dictates that there is a limited demand for expensive home exercise equipment, but that logic gets lost when a product captures the zeitgeist the way Peloton did. How do we stay objective when looking at the products we hold so dear?

Anyone working at a company or on a product that took off during the pandemic may be wondering how to avoid the same fate. In the decade-plus I’ve spent as a qualitative researcher, I’ve helped companies including Viacom, Mattel, Instagram, Netflix, and others understand their users. From designing intuitive UI to building accessible products, the secret ingredient remains the same: Asking the right questions of the right people is what allows us to design products that really “get” people and make their lives better. Let’s use Peloton as a case study for understanding how qualitative research can help prepare for the ups and inevitable downs in demand—and how to design products and experiences with staying power.

YOU ≠ EVERYONE

If you’ve used the logic “I like it, so everyone else will too,” now would be a good time to stop. For every person like you, there are dozens who aren’t, and those are the people you need to talk to. Bubbles are bad for business, and responsible design requires that you build a product for a diverse set of users.

For every complaint or concern a customer has, you likely have an answer—but just because you know that answer doesn’t make it intuitive. Just because it makes sense to you, the creator, doesn’t mean anyone else will understand it.

Research doesn’t need to be a long, costly endeavor; Peloton’s designers could have shadowed a delivery team for a few days, paying attention to personal details like where people put bikes in their homes, what other exercise equipment they owned, and how they approached the bike for the first time. When they turn it on, do they know how to ride without an instructor? If new and prospective users don’t know they can track their performance metrics without participating in an instructor-led class, or that they can cruise the streets in the South of France while listening to their own soundtrack, then Peloton’s position in the competitive landscape becomes increasingly small. Had they understood the potential value in those hard-to-find features, Peloton could have improved its UI and captured prospective customers who prefer self-led exercise.

When another person in the household wants to use the bike, do they know how to set up an account? Can they adjust and readjust the bike easily? For many prospective customers, a purchase at this price point is expected to serve multiple people in the household; early design mitigations could have been identified and implemented to make the bike more accessible and customizable.

A slightly higher investment would have allowed the team to check in with new users weekly for a month or two, whether by survey or interview, to see what pain points emerged and how the design was—or wasn’t—serving their needs. With so many stationary bikes flooding the market, gaining these insights could have helped the company stay a step ahead of its competitors.

PAY ATTENTION TO YOUR USERS—AND YOUR NON-USERS

Most people will only want to purchase one Peloton bike and, assuming they’re well designed, it should last for a long time. As a customer, this is fantastic. As a business, it poses some complications.

Early in the pandemic, Peloton couldn’t produce bikes fast enough to meet demand, creating months-long waiting lists. Once production ramped up, wait times declined and, eventually, so did demand. A significant reduction in cost worked to capture prospective customers who were on the fence based on price.

But price isn’t the only factor in a purchase decision of this magnitude. There are some hurdles that are too big to overcome—if someone desperately hates cycling or indoor running, or refuses to exercise at home, they’re not going to purchase a Peloton. Others may be on the fence because they have limited indoor space, don’t enjoy instructor-led classes, or are loyal Peloton app users but only want non-cycling classes.

Continuing to double down on production of their existing bike signaled a resistance from Peloton to listen to users, innovate their design, and expand into categories that could have attracted new customers. Introducing a more compact bike design, non-connected options, and equipment that supports other app-based classes like Pilates, boxing, and strength training may have allowed Peloton to continue serving their existing (loyal) user base while also appealing to new customers.

As a product matures and sales progress, so will the reasons why people aren’t purchasing it. The barriers faced when first launching a product aren’t the same ones poised in a mature market.

UNDERSTAND THE NEED YOU FULFILL

Peloton isn’t really about a bike. It’s gamified, at-home exercise with a strong social community element. It taps into people’s need to feel emotionally connected and physically active. It alleviates the feelings of stagnation and loneliness of the last two years. Its success was due, in some part, to luck. A need emerged and their product was already well suited to fill it.

Now let’s imagine a world where people are actually going to the gym or group spinning classes, where they’re commuting to and from work and lose that time they’d dedicated to the bike. The circumstances may have changed, but the need for community, connection, and endorphins remains. The question then becomes, how else can Peloton fulfill those needs? The company is in a unique position, as consumers trust them to design excellent digital and physical products. If Peloton wants to continue as both a digital content provider and designer of physical goods, it’s time to get off the bike and expand.

One pushback I often get from executives and designers alike is that “customers don’t know what they want.” That is to say, one can really only imagine things they’ve already seen and aren’t always aware of what’s possible. This can make testing individual concepts only somewhat helpful, since consumers are responding only to what they see and not what can be.

Co-creation sessions allow designers and customers to work hand-in-hand, with designers ideating and iterating based on immediate feedback and collective brainstorming. During my time at Mattel, many product improvements and breakthrough ideas were generated by designers who simply sat on the floor and played together with kids. In this way, they could see how their hands were (or were not) able to manipulate the toy successfully, understand their dexterity, see their frustrations, and make meaningful design changes.

DON’T FORGET YOUR COMPETITORS

People can buy a non-Peloton bike at half the price and participate in Peloton classes using the app. The market has already exploded with rival bikes equipped with tablet holders so you can stream classes, and these options will only get better.

But rivals and cheap knockoffs don’t need to signal the beginning of the end. Just look at IBM. After the success of its PC computers, machines running Windows flooded the market and, in 1993, IBM posted a staggering $8 billion loss. So what did IBM do? It completely pivoted the business away from producing low-cost computers and hardware and focused on B2B IT support. It had earned a tremendous amount of trust from its successful inventions and could seamlessly move into what was essentially an advisory support role.

If the magic of Peloton is in the classes, and you can use the classes on any bike, the question becomes why anyone would buy the expensive name-brand version. This is the core question that Peloton, and any brand with excellent, if non-patentable, design must answer about itself.

Annie Sklaver Orenstein is a qualitative researcher, writer, and storyteller who has spent more than a decade conducting research on behalf of companies including Viacom, Mattel, Instagram, Facebook, Pfizer, Netflix, Johnson + Johnson, and more. Follow her on Twitter @anniemollie.

02.08.22

Banking as a Service: Weapon for banks against disruptors

BY Fast Company Contributor 3 MINUTE READ

Years, and sometimes decades, of patchwork additions as new products and services were added have left many banks with a real tech headache. Now, as they struggle with the challenges of open banking and more recently the rise of embedded banking, traditional banks are increasingly turning to cloud-based Banking as a Service (BaaS) platform models to help them stay relevant.

“Traditional banks are dealing with real challenges. Most of them will have a ledger that was built 20 or even 40 years ago. Over time, banks kept the original ledger for its regulatory and reporting requirements, building new products on top of it. The result is that they are left with a coughing and spluttering banking engine, which impedes them from quickly and easily rolling out the services demanded by their digitally savvy customers,” says Sergio Barbosa, CIO of enterprise software development house, Global Kinetic, and CEO of its open banking platform, FutureBank

The pain of building solutions around monolithic infrastructure becomes particularly acute when banks try to access the information they need in order to deliver new digital products – or even just understand who their customers are.

“Traditional banking has slipped into the background, becoming a simple utility around which banks build their digital offerings. Today’s IT leaders are facing the reality that their core banking systems are holding them back. To overcome this they will often build API layers around the old systems, hoping that one day they will be able to simply switch the old systems off. It’s seldom that simple,” Barbosa explains.

When it comes to modernisation, Barbosa says there is mounting pressure on traditional banks to take immediate action. More than just a demanding customer base, the latest threat facing banks is coming from every side including mobile networks, retailers and even clothing and motoring brands.

Modernisation has become more urgent

“More and more banks are being disintermediated by brands. Younger generations would rather trust a person they have connected with – even if that connection is over social media – than a big corporation that their parents may have supported. This has been exacerbated by older banks which have simply digitised their existing products and even their old processes, without giving a moment’s thought to designing an offering that their customers really want,” Barbosa.

Brand banking, or embedded finance, is growing rapidly. Non-banks offering financial services, such as bank accounts, wallets, payments, and lending are the next evolution of companies looking for new ways to derive more lifetime value from their extensive customer bases.

“Brand banking is approaching at a frightening pace and we see many existing banks getting caught on the back foot. There are mass market brands that interact with customers on a more frequent basis which are ideally placed to offer financial services. They have all the insight they need on what their customers want, how they behave, and how best to reach them. It’s the perfect opportunity,” he says.

In fact, the Capgemini’s World Retail Banking Report 2021 shows that 70% of customers opt for non-traditional banking for lower fees, 68% for a superior user experience, and 54% because of speed.

Platforms tap into the strength of the old and deliver the power of the new

Barbosa says traditional banks are being forced to move at two different speeds. One at which the market moves, and the other at which their old systems allow them.

“Banks need to partner with companies which are able to help them design and deliver products which are in high demand. These partners have moved away from big clunky blocks of code, and focus on micro services or functional programming. Banks are now ringfencing these partnerships and building individual business models around each partnership to great effect. This new way of circumventing legacy challenges has saved many traditional banks,” he says.

And it is here that the power of platforms shows its worth.

“Platforms make it really easy for banks to wrap up their old legacy sets. Banks only need a very narrow functionality from their legers such as transaction history, the initiation of a payment or a transfer and beneficiary management. Platforms also enable new partner services and, through these two key activities, they can significantly accelerate the modernisation process,” Barbosa says.

BaaS platform models allow banks to access new value through open ecosystems while leveraging their existing strengths and extensive data.

“The speed at which new banking offerings are being delivered is certainly shaking up the market. But traditional banks still have a sizable advantage if they adopt a bold modernisation strategy. The first step must be leaving behind the legacy mindset,” Barbosa sums up.

Sergio Barbosa – Co-founder and CIO of enterprise software development house, Global Kinetic.

02.01.22

The Future of the Filling Station

BY Fast Company Contributor 4 MINUTE READ

The filling station as we know it is an endangered species. As electric vehicles gradually make up a larger share of cars on the road, entirely new kinds of service stations will be needed to fuel their journeys. A new design competition has come up with a vision for what those stations may look like, and it’s funded by one of the biggest filling station companies in the world.

Parkland, a Canada-based filling station operator with 3,000 locations in 25 countries, is the main sponsor of an international competition to create the electric fueling station of the future. The winning entry has just been announced, and the design envisions a facility where the time it takes to recharge a battery—easily a half hour longer than a typical gas fill-up—is seen as an opportunity to rest, relax, and maybe even explore.

[Image: courtesy Electric Autonomy Canada]

Next, Parkland wants to start building these stations. “We spend a lot of time thinking about where the industry is going, and there’s no question that mobility is starting to electrify,” says Darren Smart, Parkland’s senior vice president of strategy and corporate development. But when it comes to the customer experience of actually charging electric vehicles, Smart says, the industry is lagging. “Charging stations are located in uninteresting spots, they’re out of the way, and in some cases they may not be the safest locations. That is made all the worse by the fact that an EV driver needs to dwell at a location for 20 or 30 minutes to charge,” Smart says. “So it’s a bad combination.”

[Image: courtesy Electric Autonomy Canada]

James Silvester, an Edinburgh, Scotland-based architect, designed the winning entry, and it suggests a dramatically different kind of refueling, which prioritizes experience over expedience.

[Image: courtesy Electric Autonomy Canada]

Silvester’s design is a long linear building with charging ports ringing its perimeter. At the center is a mall-like space made up of stores, vendors, and non-commercial spaces meant to help drivers take a break from the road.

“The building needs to respond quite differently from a five-minute quick fill and drive off,” says Silvester. “It’s got to offer people some sort of destination or unique experience that can keep them entertained. If I was in a car for 40 minutes at a gas station, I’d be pulling my hair out by the end.”

[Image: courtesy Electric Autonomy Canada]

Designed with a modular system that allows the oval-like shape of the station to stretch out to fit different-size locations, Silvester’s EV charging station can provide a broader variety of services and spaces than a typical gas station. In addition to the traditional food and drink options available, his design offers space for things like an exercise area, massage therapy, and even just a small plant-filled garden where drivers can rest while their battery recharges. (Of course, charging technology itself is rapidly evolving, so it’s possible in the future, EV charging times will be much shorter, too.)

The building Silvester proposes would have sustainable materials like wood and stone and a roof capable of holding solar panels. He says its modular design would make it quick to build and flexible enough to accommodate a wide variety of sites.

[Image: courtesy Electric Autonomy Canada]

The design was chosen by an international jury of architects, designers, and electric vehicle advocates—and comes with a prize worth about $19,600. Second and third prizes are also being awarded, as are several honorable mentions. The competition was launched last August by Electric Autonomy Canada, an independent news platform focused on the transition to electric vehicles. Nino Di Cara is the group’s founder, and he says the competition’s main goal was to kickstart the thinking about how these facilities can and should differ from those built for internal-combustion vehicles. Another goal was to lure more gas drivers to the other side.

“We wanted to create a bit of EV envy amongst gas-car drivers,” says Di Cara, imagining a family on a road trip driving past one of these stations, and the kids in the back seat saying, “Why can’t we stop there?”

[Image: courtesy Electric Autonomy Canada]

Silvester says his design’s flexibility also gives the opportunity to even bring some local character to a road-trip stopover. Space within his EV-focused station could be set aside for local vendors or regional specialties. The stations could even be sited near lookouts or trails, giving travelers a chance to see the actual place they’ve stopped and not just the inside of a convenience store. “A lot of these places you just pass through but you never experience, so it’s an opportunity for the community to come get involved as well,” he says.

Silvester’s design may be more than just a clever idea. Parkland’s Smart says the company is beginning discussions with Silvester about how the design can begin to be implemented, albeit slowly. The company is in the early stages of its own electric vehicle transition, but has plans to open a network of 25 ultrafast EV-charging stations across British Columbia by midyear. That could be the start of the company’s shift toward meeting the needs of a growing community. Smart says Parkland is beginning to plan out how one of these EV-only charging stations can get built. “In the next couple of years, I think you’ll start to see these pop up,” Smart says.

NATE BERG

Nate Berg is a journalist covering cities, architecture and urban planning. Nate’s work has been published in a wide variety of publications.

FastCompany

01.26.22

The value of a startup act for South Africa

BY Fast Company Contributor 3 MINUTE READ

Towards the middle of last year, I was fortunate to be part of a panel discussion during which the question ‘does South Africa need a Startup Act?’ was posed. The answer was a resounding yes from the participating ecosystem stakeholders which included investors, ecosystem enablers, institutions, and entrepreneurs from around the country. Essentially, a Startup Act is a call to the President to unleash the growth and innovation inherent in the country’s entrepreneurs and youth.

The Startup Act is a collective effort by the ecosystem including government, academia, investors and startups and is driven by a Steering Committee comprised of representatives from AfricArena, Digital Collective Africa, Endeavor South Africa, i4Policy, Loudhailer, the Southern African Venture Capital and Private Equity Association (SAVCA), Silicon Cape, SiMODiSA, and Wesgro. It is also supported by partners such as the World Bank and UK-South Africa Tech Hub.

While there is existing legislation aimed at small businesses, SMEs are not necessarily the same as startups. We need to have a guideline in South Africa for entrepreneurs of young, high-impact and scalable businesses that speaks directly to them.

How will it benefit startups?

Desktop research, focus groups and research contributed by the World Bank (one of the main sponsors of the research) have all enabled the SA Startup Act Steering Committee to develop a position paper that provides a holistic overview of the problems affecting the ability of startups to establish, grow and scale in South Africa. From this, it has become painfully evident that existing policies and red-tape are constraining the growth of innovation-driven startups and, consequently, their ability to contribute to job creation.

Therefore, proposed interventions derived from this research include relaxations to current legislation and policies impacting the growth of, and investment into startups, such as exchange controls and Capital Gains Tax. Others entail simplifying procurement policies to scale up the involvement of startups in the national economy; direct funding of startup businesses through automatic reinvestment of PAYE and VAT; and easing of labour and immigration laws to foster the availability of and access to talent. It is envisioned that the removal of these and other barriers which are limiting the creation and impact of startups will accelerate the socio and economic spill over to the rest of South Africa.

Startup Acts around the world

In fact, stimulating the establishment of, and leveraging new business enterprises, or startups, has in recent times emerged as a vital instrument in reshaping economic activity in many countries around the world.

Young firms account for about 20% of employment but create almost half of new jobs on average across the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s (OECD) 38 member countries

With this in mind, many countries are emphasising the role of startups in their respective national development and economic policies.

For example, as far back as 2011, the United States implemented an Act to accelerate the commercialisation of university research that can lead to new ventures, review and improve the regulatory processes at federal, state, and local levels, as well as promote innovation and spur economic growth. The legislation also creates both entrepreneur and STEM visas for highly educated individuals so they can remain in the United States legally to promote new ideas, launch new businesses, and create American jobs. According to the Kauffman Foundation, which aims to help individuals attain economic independence by advancing educational achievement and entrepreneurial success, by creating just 75,000 startup visas, more than 1.6 million new jobs could be created over a 10-year period.

Closer to home, Tunisia established its Startup Act in 2018 as a solution to widespread youth unemployment. With roughly a third of all young Tunisians unemployed, the government is using the Startup Act to encourage young people to take matters into their own hands and become novel business owners. So far, this is proving to be a success with funding for startups increasing from $5m in 2017 to $18.5m in 2019. Tunisian Startup Act benefits include state salaries for up to three founders per company during the first year of operations; generous tax breaks and a one-year leave period for both public and private sector employees to start a company, with the right to return to their old jobs.

The South African Startup Act Steering Committee has actually been engaging with Tunisia with the aim of collaborating.

These and other countries around the world face many of the same challenges that we do in South Africa, the most pressing of which is unemployment. They have put Startup Acts into effect, so why shouldn’t we? Surely, we must give those who are creating the most jobs the best chance to succeed.

By removing the constraints that come with operating a South African startup business, the Act will maximise the value and impact of South Africa’s startups and successful entrepreneurs for the benefit of the country and her people. Ultimately, it is for South Africa, by South Africans.

Join the movement at https://startupact.org.za. The voices of all ecosystem players need to be heard if we are to drive awareness for the catalysation of policy that encourages the growth and development of innovative, high growth enterprises in South Africa and, in turn, encourage job creation and socio-economic development.

Matsi Modise – South African Startup Act Steering Committee chairperson and SiMODISA vice chairperson.

01.25.22

Digital Transformation – Business case for in-person meetings

BY Fast Company Contributor 3 MINUTE READ

As someone who works at a digital-first organisation, it’s been incredible to see how the past two years have accelerated digital transformation across Africa. With strict social distancing measures in place, especially in the early parts of the pandemic, organisations had no choice but to find new ways of working and move operations online. Those organisations that managed the change effectively have thrived.

I myself have benefited from the host of technologies that make seamless meeting and collaboration across borders possible. There is no way I would be able to connect with people in multiple countries around the continent on a daily basis if I was relying on in-person meetings. But on a trip to Kenya at the tail end of 2021, I was reminded that in-person meetings still have a place and may even be helpful in accelerating Africa’s digital transformation.

The power of in-person

Over the course of just a few meetings, bonds were strengthened and long-standing reservations were easily resolved. Even though it only lasted a few days, the trip was a powerful reminder of why in-person business is crucial, even for digital organisations.

There is, for example, a richness and openness to physical conversations that simply cannot be matched online. We are, by nature, social creatures and meeting people in person helps facilitate a sense of empathy from the get-go.

A physical presence also lets you experience what conditions are like on the ground in the communities where organisations operate. In Africa, this is especially critical for digital organisations. Someone can tell you that internet speeds are patchy in a particular location or that a mobile-first approach is necessary but experiencing those things for yourself gives you a much greater level of insight.

Similarly, speaking face-to-face with people can give you a much better sense of where an organisation is on its digital transformation journey (as much a mindset shift as the adoption of new technologies and processes) and where they feel its digital experiences could improve. That’s especially true for large organisations, where a lot of investigative work may be required to figure out what silos need to be broken in order for it to provide real, transformative digital experiences.

A hybrid future?

That’s not to say online meetings and virtual collaboration aren’t important. The opposite is true. There is, after all, a reason that remote work is consistently shown to improve productivity. It’s also true that some people just collaborate better in virtual environments, where they may feel less restricted in sharing their ideas.

And with an increasing number of African companies doing business internationally, online tools allow international teams to work together on projects, no matter where they’re located. This includes not only tools for communication but also robust digital platforms for collaboration and automation like digital workplaces. That, in turn, means that the best people within an organisation can work together on something, rather than just the best people in a particular location.

The ideal, then, may well be a blend of online and in-person meetings. Just as the future of work seems not to be fully remote, nor fully in-office, but a blend of the two, so the future of meetings could be a hybrid of virtual and in-person. And, as travel restrictions continue to ease up, achieving that hybrid balance will become simpler to achieve too.

Accelerating Africa’s digitalisation

There is no doubt that organisations across Africa are embracing digital transformation and looking to provide world-class digital experiences. There are even people who argue that the continent could leapfrog other markets on this front.

Many companies across the continent have made significant strides in their digital transformation journey over the past two years. But in that time, we’ve also learned the importance of flexibility and adaptability. And if African organisations are to thrive, they need to find the best possible flexible balance between online and in-person meetings and collaboration.

Greg Gatherer, Account Manager, Liferay Africa

01.17.22

Asynchronous work: Solution for our new remote reality

BY Fast Company Contributor 3 MINUTE READ

The long-awaited workforce revolution has finally happened. Almost one-quarter of office jobs are fully remote. Millions of people are no longer stuck in offices and distributed work—whether it’s hybrid or 100% distributed—is more widely accepted for many careers. But the world had never been built for distributed teams or remote work. We’ve always been told to go to the office, see people face-to-face, use the tools provided by the company, and do our best to stay afloat.

But there is a solution for our new remote reality: asynchronous work.

For more than a decade, I worked with global teams across borders and time zones—at Google, I was based in Amsterdam and London, then in the United States for Android and Uber—and felt like I was in meetings all day while swatting away at a constant stream of emails, messages, and other distractions. My colleagues in Singapore, Los Angeles, and Tokyo would be using different platforms for communication, file sharing, and project management—and those tools were all in silos. None of the tools were interoperable even though they claimed to be. This was an enormous hassle and led to low productivity, wasted time, and overall frustration.

Companies are waking up to the current problems with distributed work and see the need for more flexible solutions. For example, constant messaging from an app like Slack can cause anxiety for teammates in other time zones, when they receive pings throughout all hours of the night or even on weekends. Being on Zoom all the time leads to people having to join meetings late at night or early in the morning.

Why did this happen? Because companies forced employees, no matter where they were, to abide by the same schedule. We want teams to break out of the tyranny of the traditional synchronous, in-office work model that doesn’t put work first. If you’re getting your work done on time and efficiently, why does it matter when or where it’s done? In the new way of working, we need to transition to asynchronous work.

Asynchronous, in short, is when work happens for different people on their own time. Consider a worker in London and one in Los Angeles. Based on a 9-5 work culture, they would have only a few hours to collaborate and work together. With an asynchronous work style, work becomes more like a relay race where one could set tasks and deadlines for the other without the expectation to respond right away. Work gets done on time, people are less stressed, and it allows for a wider talent pool. With an asynchronous work style, companies can hire literally from anywhere in any time zone and are not limited by geography.

It may sound daunting at first, but there are ways to begin your transition. Set up the proper tools to allow asynchronous work to occur. Taskmaster apps are better than simple messaging apps, which let anxiety seep in and can lead to wasted hours—10 hours a month to be exact. Remove pretty much all meetings—especially video ones — and save meeting time for more complicated topics, discussions, and brainstorming.

Company culture needs to change with the times and accept and adapt to distributed work if leaders don’t want to fall victim to the Great Resignation. Workers have spoken and want more flexible and efficient communication styles. Learning to balance synchronous and asynchronous communication should be simple for teams of all sizes with new tools.

It’s time to take a step back and ask if your current way of working and managing people really the most productive and efficient. We have to rethink how we work—and allow people to work when and where they please, as long as they contribute. When we realize that distributed work doesn’t have to be so unnecessarily difficult and time-consuming, workers will be more productive, less stressed, and most importantly, happier.

Kenzo Fong is the founder and EO of Rock, a multipurpose messaging app.

This first appeared on Fast Company.com

12.17.21

Cryptocurrency year in review – 2021 The year crypto took centre stage

BY Fast Company Contributor 2 MINUTE READ

The world of crypto in 2021 was buoyed by a number of high profile institutions and businesses investing in crypto at a far greater scale than previously seen, driving crypto’s evolution into what is now a multi-trillion dollar asset. Bitcoin and Ethereum, the two largest cryptocurrencies by market cap, recorded new all-time highs, and El Salvador became the first country to adopt crypto as legal tender.

The Bitcoin price burst through its all-time high of $68,000 (about R1.08 million) on 5 November, showing a massive increase on the $28,000 range in which it was trading in December last year. But the crypto market also took some brutal hits. Cryptocurrencies are still a new alternative asset class, and volatility is expected to characterise crypto for a while yet.

In the US, where regulation allows for entry into crypto, sophisticated firms like Fidelity, Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan are entering the crypto market, and the Proshare Bitcoin ETF (world’s first Bitcoin ETF) saw record inflows into the fund.

Microstrategy, the NASDAQ-listed business intelligence company, continued to buy additional Bitcoin during the year and now has holdings worth about $6 billion. The move was widely viewed as a green light from corporate USA for crypto.

Fintech and traditional payment providers began to adopt blockchain and crypto solutions, with giants PayPal, Venmo, Mastercard and even Twitter allowing customers to transact in Bitcoin. In South Africa, Capitec and Discovery Bank formed partnerships to list crypto as a new product offering.

Digital assets and crypto businesses showed massive growth and significant market cap gains, indicating maturity in the sector. Coinbase debuted in 2021 as the biggest digital asset listing in history, coming to market at twice the valuation of Nasdaq. This has been positive for the industry, increasing trust and transparency. Having a public company of this size showcases that crypto-related businesses – and the crypto asset class – should be taken seriously. The crypto sector is now valued at more than $3 trillion.

El Salvador became the first country in the world where Bitcoin is considered legal tender, which means that retailers are legally obliged to accept Bitcoin as payment. The move was met with fierce support and fierce criticism, but it does confirm the value of cryptocurrencies as a way for developing economies to bypass a global financial system that relies on unfavourable loans and is geared towards the world’s richer countries and individuals.

Luno has seen record growth in its customer base this year. The SA-founded crypto company now has over 9 million users across 40 countries.

On Luno, the number of monthly active customers buying or selling crypto doubled from last year. People hold their crypto for on average 10 months, compared to an average of just three months in 2017. This is perhaps an indication that we are in the early stages of moving away from pure speculation to some customers seeing longer-term value. While we’re still in the asset phase, we are seeing slow but continuous growth.

Globally, we have seen movements to regulate crypto. Draft regulations were announced in 2021, and South Africa’s regulators have taken a pragmatic approach to regulating crypto.

Globally, a number of central banks have issued digital currencies. Nigeria launched the e-Naira in 2021, and South Africa is investigating a digital currency, which shows central banks bringing crypto closer.

As the sector grows in popularity, it is attracting world-class talent. Users are learning more about crypto and how to keep their crypto safe.

Marius Reitz, Luno’s GM for Africa. Luno is South Africa’s homegrown crypto platform now operating in over 40 countries.

12.13.21

The evolution of Collaboration in the Covid19 era

BY Fast Company Contributor 2 MINUTE READ

Collaboration tools are nothing new – they have been around for many years, but the events of the last two years have accelerated their adoption as well as innovation around the offerings. As the world continues to adapt in a post-pandemic world and the hybrid-remote workforce becomes the norm, collaboration tools are evolving rapidly. New functionality is constantly being developed to enhance the experience, and Artificial Intelligence (AI) and other next-generation technologies are being incorporated into mainstream tools.

Teamwork in the cloud

Workforces have never been more geographically dispersed than they are today, which has made collaboration tools critical to business productivity. While such solutions have been in existence for years, the uptake has not been widespread, and many organisations have been running proprietary in-house systems that are no longer feasible.

The trend toward remote working makes cloud-based solutions essential in allowing team members to work together, coordinate tasks and transition seamlessly between devices. Choosing the right collaboration solution is essential to business success and productivity.

New features, new functionality

As the adoption of cloud-based collaboration tools has accelerated and become a vital business enabler, innovations and new features are rapidly being rolled out to increase functionality. One essential component of remote and virtual working is the ability to track information to improve overall efficiency. New tools such as real-time note-taking, as well as version control and history, help teams to keep records and understand processes as they go.

There are also new innovations being rolled out, utilising next-generation technologies such as AI and Virtual Reality (VR). VR, for example, is being used to create virtual meeting rooms and other virtual spaces, where people who are working remotely can meet ‘in person’. This technology is being combined with AI to create smart meeting rooms, with advanced technology collaboration such as automated minutes of meetings. The ultimate goal is to reduce mundane, repetitive tasks using smart technology, to enable more time for productivity and value-adding activities.

Futureproofing collaboration

The future remains uncertain, but it seems more than likely that workforces going forward will be a hybrid of remote and on-premises. This means that collaboration tools need to be able to integrate the entire workspace into one so that the working experience is consistent regardless of location.

Organisations therefore need to be careful to select the right tools for the job, based on their own business requirements. This may mean only a limited set of features is required, or that an entire enterprise-grade system is necessary, but a trusted IT partner can assist in understanding needs and sourcing solutions. It is also critical to ensure that collaboration tools are open for integration with third-party solutions to enable additional functionality and that they are intuitive and easy to use.

The key to collaboration is to simplify and improve efficiency, without compromising on privacy and data security. Your IT partner should assist in delivering a solution that enables the workforce of today and the future.

By Ankush Joshi, Service Delivery Manager at In2IT Technologies

11.28.21

Oura Ring – the ultimate health wearable

BY Fast Company Contributor 6 MINUTE READ

Among its accomplishments to date, Oura (which is pronounced like “Aura”) deserves a spot on any list of crowdfunding projects that have turned into real businesses. In August 2015, Finland’s Petteri Lahtela and Hannu Kinnunen—both of whom had backgrounds in technology and health—launched a Kickstarter campaign for a ring that was primarily devoted to helping people improve their days by sleeping better. By the standard of the rings they’d later release, their first-generation version was a bit of a bulky blob. But it spoke to enough people to raise $651,803 from 2,383 backers.

The following year, Lahtela and Kinnunen rustled up $5.3M from investors, mainly in the U.S., to continue to build the company. Harpreet Singh Rai, an Oura user and investor, became president in 2017 and CEO in 2018; Lahtela and Kinnunen left their active management roles in 2020. The company has grown to 350 employees with a sizable San Fransisco presence and satellite offices in other cities, along with its original home base in Oulu, Finland.

Along the way, the second-generation Oura, released in 2018, delivered on the promise of the original idea. Though it still wasn’t exactly dainty, it looked like, well, a ring. Rather than making you plug in a Micro-USB cable to recharge, it came with a nifty inductive charging stand, with battery life increasing from two or three days to around a week. Compared to something like an Apple Watch, it asked very little of the wearer; you could even forget you had it on.

Then there was the smartphone app—which was a giant part of the whole proposition, since the Oura Ring has no interface of its own. It offers the prerequisite stats and charts covering everything from how much REM sleep you got to whether you’re meeting your activity goals over time. Its signature feature is the Readiness score, a bottom-line number representing how ready you are to take on the day based on factors such as sleep, resting heart rate, and temperature. Through updates, the app has increasingly emphasized easy-to-digest advice and encouragement; as I write, it’s suggesting that I start winding down for the day—which I would, if I wasn’t trying to finish this article.

The third-generation Oura Ring looks identical to its predecessor and doesn’t tamper with the basics of the experience. But it’s upped its sensor game, building on the fact that a finger is an especially efficient place to take readings of vital signs such as pulse and temperature, which helps the ring deliver accurate results without blowing through battery life. (“When you walk outside on a cold day, your hands and your toes and your ears and your nose—all your extremities—get cold first,” notes Rai.)

The new ring’s additions include two green LEDs that can monitor your heart rate during the day, not just when you’re sleeping. There are now seven temperature sensors, up from three, for greater accuracy. A red LED and infrared sensor have been added for measuring blood oxygen levels at night, giving the ring an additional signal for assessing sleep quality.

The catch is that when the ring launched earlier this month, Oura didn’t have all the functionality in place that it’s been working on. Heart rate measurement during workouts is due by the end of 2021, as is a large library of educational content on subjects, such as sleep and meditation. Blood-oxygen sensing and improved sleep tracking are promised for next year. The fact that certain features were no-shows and will cost $6/month when they arrive has raised some hackles: “I understand why people are feeling frustrated,” wrote Wired reviewer Adrienne So, who said she was disappointed herself and gave the new ring a so-so rating of 6 out of 10.

Rai says that the explanation for Oura’s new subscription plan is simple: Implementing technologies such as machine-learning models and adding more personalized advice is expensive. “For both of those reasons, we felt like moving to a membership model helps us invest in this business and keep pushing the frontier faster than others,” he adds. “And we honestly think that’s what our members want. That’s what they tell us.” Now to see what users say next year when more new features are in place.

A research lab on a finger

One thing that Oura’s founders couldn’t have anticipated back when they were launching their Kickstarter was how central health research would become to the company’s mission. For researchers, the Oura Ring provides a way to collect relevant data that doesn’t ask much of test subjects other than that they occasionally recharge it. And for Oura, supporting such studies isn’t just a contribution to the world’s understanding of human health—it’s also a springboard for discoveries that inform product development.

Laypeople may be startled by the breadth of research areas where Oura can play a role. For example, Ashley Mason, an associate professor of psychiatry at the University of California, San Francisco’s Osher Center for Integrative Health, was investigating studies that suggested that some people with depression also weren’t regulating their body temperature by sweating. That led her to explore the possibility that therapeutic sauna sessions might help such people. To answering that question, she’d need to monitor test subjects’ temperature.

There was one tiny problem: “If you’ll excuse the language, previous studies used an indwelling rectal probe to measure core body temperature,” explains Mason. “I don’t think very many people are very interested in wearing those.” After assessing a variety of non-icky wearables—including the Apple Watch and Whoop fitness band—she settled on the Oura Ring based on both its simplicity and accuracy.

Then the coronavirus hit, which led to Mason’s depression research being postponed. “I ended up pivoting into COVID study almost by accident,” she says. The COVID-19 research project she spearheaded, known as TemPredict, is a collaboration between UCSF and UC San Diego, based on data collected from tens of thousands of Oura wearers. It set out to determine whether temperature monitoring could help doctors catch signs that someone has COVID-19 before symptoms are obvious. The results have been promising.

Early on, Oura provided TemPredict with loaner rings, financial support, and access to engineering resources; the company has been “nothing short of tremendously helpful,” says Mason. As the project gained momentum, it’s since received millions in funding from other sources, including the Department of Defense.

Recently, Mason has also been able to pick up her depression research where she’d left it at the beginning of the pandemic. “The National Institutes of Health actually went on to fund our next study, because the pilot data were so good,” she says. “And we are using Oura Rings in that study as well, to measure ambulatory temperature.”

WOMEN’S HEALTH COMES TO THE FORE

Around the time that Forerunner partner Eurie Kim was deciding to invest in Oura, she and her husband were trying to conceive. A doctor she consulted explained that when body temperature “is at its lowest, it’s when you ovulate.” So when Kim noticed a dip in her temperature as tracked by the Oura app, she recounts, she declared, “Let’s make a baby!” Within five days, her Oura Ring showed her temperature shooting back up—possible evidence of conception that was confirmed weeks later when her pregnancy test came back positive. “I was like, ‘That’s magic—that’s not possible,’” she remembers.

At that point, the Oura app didn’t have any functionality devoted to women’s health; Kim was just extrapolating from its stock temperature measurements. But the company is now building features specifically meant for the more than 40% of its customers who are women. The long-term goal, says science communications lead Caroline Kryder, is to give female Oura Ring wearers “something that they could use to look at what’s happening in their bodies throughout their journey. How can you have a health tool that might help you see when your first period is coming, how your cycle changes with stress, as health conditions come and go, as you age, as new medications or lifestyle habits come into your life?”

The most immediate answer to this expansive question is Oura’s new period prediction feature, which is currently available in beta form for iPhone users. Features for tracking menstrual cycles are available with other wearables, too, but they’re normally manual experiences based on backward-looking information logged by the user herself: “It’s the equivalent of saying, well, it rained on the 13th last month, so it’ll probably rain this month,” says Kryder. Oura’s version automatically analyzes the peaks and valleys of a ring wearer’s temperature data to estimate period start dates up to 45 days in advance. It’s designed to get more accurate the longer a user sticks with it.

The Oura Ring is also proving useful in research efforts devoted to women’s health, an area that’s finally coming into its own after years of getting short shrift from the scientific and medical communities. For instance, in a University of California, San Diego study involving 30 pregnancies, spikes in Oura temperature readings detected pregnancy within five and a half days of the self-reported day of conception and nine days before an at-home pregnancy test would have done so. That’s not a feature in the Oura app yet, but it could become one. Other incoming research also holds potential: “Early data suggests that we could see things like menopause, even things like delivery date,” says Rai.

Beyond that, he says, future iterations of the Oura Ring could tackle all-new areas such as glucose monitoring. They might also play with the industrial design in ways that the third-generation ring does not. “There’s fashion collaborations we can do,” Rai muses. “There’s some people that want the ring bigger and there’s some that want it smaller. There’s people that want different colors.”

For now, though, Oura’s third-generation ring is its platform for innovation—and for something that slips on a finger, it appears to have plenty of headroom.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Harry McCracken is the technology editor for Fast Company, based in San Francisco. In past lives, he was editor at large for Time magazine, founder and editor of Technologizer, and editor of PC World

11.24.21

Black Friday 2021: What if we swapped shopping for subscriptions?

BY Fast Company Contributor 3 MINUTE READ

The countdown to Black Friday is officially on. With some 10 days to go until the biggest shopping day of the year, consumers have their wish lists at the ready and retailers are scrambling to ensure their stock levels are sufficient and that every aspect of the customer experience is optimised for shopping satisfaction.

Though a North American invention, South Africans too have been associating the last Friday of November with great deals and deep discounts for a while now. And every year retailers become better at capitalising in this spending frenzy.

It is around this time that we also see a surge in the number of media articles that caution against spending too much on Black Friday, reminding us that something is only a great deal if you need it, and that constraint now can make all the difference come Janu-worry.

There are two sides to this situation – retail income has been under pressure for some time now and naturally they are keen to participate in any initiative that can drive sales and boost revenue. On the other hand, we know consumer income is under severe pressure at the moment, thanks to the ongoing impact of the pandemic and the high unemployment rate. What’s more, DebtBusters reports the average debt-to-income ratio in South Africa is at the highest level ever.

Needs, wants & the irresistible lure of a good deal

Black Friday deals are specifically packaged to be irresistible, to convince us that we simply cannot live without X product and Y service – it’s something that advertising has perfected over the years. Add the allure of a great/competitive price and all the articles in the world about personal financial austerity simply aren’t going to make a difference.

Plus – it is important to acknowledge – thousands of consumers hold out for Black Friday to hopefully get a significant discount on things they really need. There is no denying that needs arise and that those needs, be it a new fridge, home office furniture or a laptop for a child starting high school, need to be met.

In too many cases where needs need to be met, we know consumers have little option but to turn to high-interest credit, payday loans or costly hire purchase. Because even with the Black Friday discount, thousands of consumers still battle to afford the things they need.

An alternative model – plus flexibility

Instead of waiting for Black Friday and still going into debt, is this not an opportune time to consider alternative retail models that work to both alleviate the pressure on consumers, and help retailers expand their value proposition.

Enter subscriptions, a business model that allows consumers to rent things on a flexible basis, rather than purchase outright. Subscription models prioritise access over ownership, and has expanded to include consumer items such as furniture, appliances, electronics and even clothing, jewellery and leisure equipment.

Subscription services, of which Teljoy’s rent-to-own model is an example, view goods as a service, something that is valued for its usage opposed to the ownership thereof. It’s a model that eliminates the need for large upfront payments, but instead allows the customer to pay for the item on a flexible monthly basis.

A global trend – with a great business case

The subscription economy is gaining traction globally as more, particularly, younger consumers dismiss ownership in favour of access and the convenience and flexibility associated with it. In fact, this growing aversion to ownership has been described as the “growing population of consumers who are willing to pay good money for the privilege of not having to own something”.

The business case for retailers to offer goods as a service is gaining ground too.

Already in mid-2020 a Deloitte article notes that subscription-based businesses are proving to be among the most resilient, with research suggesting that 80% of companies are sustaining or growing their subscriber base.

Black Friday probably isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, but it can be leveraged as an opportunity to rethink current retail and ownership models and how they can be retrofitted to better meet the needs of consumers going forward.

Jonathan Hurvitz, Teljoy CEO