In the 90s and early 2000s the popularity of the name Alexa was exploding. In 1985 there were 201 babies called Alexa, 20 years later there were almost 5000.
Enter Amazon
At the end of 2014 Amazon released the Amazon Alexa, its virtual assistant that has absolutely, completely, revolutionised the way we set timers when our hands are dirty... and a few other household tasks.
After the Alexa was released the popularity of the name jumped up, with Alexa becoming the 32nd most popular baby girl name in 2015. Explaining that initial jump is difficult in the context of the huge fall in popularity in the next few years, where the number of babies called Alexa halved -- perhaps as Amazon's Alexa made its way into more homes.
The naming of Alexa was obviously intentional. A device that lives in your home, listens and talks to you, definitely needs to be made to feel as human as possible. Technically speaking, the Amazon Echo is the actual device, and Alexa simply your helpful virtual assistant hiding within it.
It's not just Amazon using first names to humanise their brand though. Marcus is the new consumer arm of banking giant Goldman Sachs, lola is the travel management software launched in 2015, Casper is a mattress company, Oscar is an insurance company and Alice helps entrepreneurs grow their business. Keep an eye out for our premium chart service -- Kevin.
At the start of this week HSBC announced it was to cut approximately 35,000 jobs over the next 3 years, as part of a $4.5bn cost saving programme. That announcement sees HSBC not only join, but rise to the top, of a long list of global banks that have cut swathes of jobs in the last year.
Relative to the size of its workforce, only Deutsche Bank has cut more jobs when they announced that they would be shedding approximately 20% of their employees last year, amidst a major restructuring.
Aren't banks doing well these days?
Stock markets are at record highs, unemployment is at record lows and everything is going pretty okay -- right? While it's true that the global economy is in decent enough shape (coronavirus & global warming aside), for the last decade many banks have been operating in an era of record low interest rates.
Banks are heavily geared to interest rates. In very simple terms if they pay 1% interest on deposits, and charge 2% interest on loans, they make a 1 point spread. If interest rates rise, that spread usually rises with it - and hence the banks make more profit.
The first cut is (not) the deepest?
Usually, when having to give bad news it's better to rip the band-aid off and give it all at once. In the business world it's also known as "kitchen sinking". For HSBC... that's not what they did. Last October they announced 10,000 job cuts, only to announce another 25,000 this week. Bad news is bad enough, but when it comes in drips and drabs the market really doesn't like it, and it's why HSBC shares are down 6% since the news.
1) We all owe much to Larry Tesler, who was the inventor of copy-and-paste, who sadly died this week at the age of 74.
2) Nissan, yes the car company, has launched a subscription service in Texas. For $699 a month (and an activation fee) you can drive up to 4 different cars, with unlimited vehicle switches.
3)Morgan Stanley has announced they are buyingE*Trade for $13bn in an all-stock transaction.
4) Just 2 blue whales were sighted during a 2018 survey near the Antarctic island of South Georgia. This year, 55 were seen.
5) A tiny apartment on a high street in the town of Wisbech in England has sold for £1 ($1.30). Bargain right? Shame it's physically inaccessible -- sandwiched between 2 shops above an alley.
6) Organisational charts. Not the first thing you think of when you think "tech". And yet, 2 companies in that space have raised big VC investments this week. ChartHop raised $5m to try and automate them and The Org raised $8.5m to build a global database of org charts.
7) This one could go either way. A Burger King ad for their Whopper is just a video of one going mouldy over 34 days -- in a bid to showcase their "all natural" ingredients.
