The hosts discuss Spotify's acquisition of the music guessing game Heardle, exploring its potential impact on user engagement. They dive into the serious topic of male infertility and initiatives addressing it, while also tackling the harsh reality of layoffs at startups like Hopin. The conversation shifts to the challenges faced by food delivery services, with personal anecdotes highlighting common frustrations. Finally, they touch on the legal battle between Twitter and Elon Musk, critiquing his unpredictable approach to the deal.
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Spotify Acquires Heardle
Spotify acquired Heardle, a Wordle-inspired music guessing game.
This marks Spotify's first game acquisition, aiming to boost user engagement and music discovery.
insights INSIGHT
Spotify's Differentiation Strategy
Spotify seeks to differentiate its subscription service in a commodified music market.
It needs pricing leverage but faces competition from Apple Music, hence its focus on podcasts and acquisitions.
insights INSIGHT
Posterity Health Tackles Male Infertility
Posterity Health addresses male infertility through personalized services and education.
It offers diagnostics, consultations, and even vasectomy reversals, focusing on a historically overlooked aspect of infertility.
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Hello and welcome back to Equity, a podcast about the business of startups, where we unpack the numbers and nuance behind the headlines.
Alex, Natasha and Mary Ann enjoyed yet another edition of Equity Live this week, hopping on Twitter Spaces to chat everything from Musk’s meme suit to a new take on Wordle that landed Spotify’s attention. When we stopped recording the episode, news broke that Stripe is cutting its internal valuation by 28%. Luckily, we do this three times a week to stay tuned for our take soon.
In the mean time, here’s what we got to in today’s episode:
Spotify acquired Heardle, which felt like a throwback to trivia and of course a nod at its famous predecessor, NY Times-owned Wordle. Only one of us has played the music guessing game so far, so tweet @equitypod your thoughts on if it’s actually fun.
Our last deal of the week, Continuum, gave us a chance to talk about productizing one of the worst jobs in startups: laying folks off. The fractional work play feels even more important given the volatility of startups across all stages right now. Hopin, for example, conducted its second layoff within four months this week and parted ways with its COO, CFO and other executives. Medium had an executive shake up, with Ev Williams stepping down.
The last two themes of the episode were built around Instacart and the future of grocery delivery, as well as the latest of the Twitter and Elon Musk saga.
Equity drops every Monday at 7 a.m. PDT and Wednesday and Friday at 6 a.m. PDT, so subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Overcast,Spotify and all the casts.
Credits: Equity is produced by Theresa Loconsolo with editing by Kell. Bryce Durbin is our Illustrator. We'd also like to thank the audience development team and Henry Pickavet, who manages TechCrunch audio products.
Equity