Hey Snackers,
Just in time for your summer wedding circuit.
Four companies found life-long love — The Dow snagged its 6th straight daily win after two big deals boosted stocks to start the week.
It literally acquired DATA... Salesforce has become a software legend through acquisitions (it snagged 12 in one year), but this one's the biggest — The software-as-a-service pioneer dropped $15.7B to buy Tableau (ticker "symbol DATA") in an all-stock deal. DATA shares rose 34% because Salesforce is paying plenty to add to its menu of clouds:
Your worst nightmare... You get an email from Debbie (head of sales) asking to "break down adoption trends in the southwest region over Q3." Instead of bribing the engineer in your office for help, Tableau converts your raw data spreadsheet into visual charts, graphs, and data maps that make sense. From numbers to art.
Data is the currency... Every CEO tells her employees "we're a tech company now." AKA "we need to take data seriously or we'll get disrupted by an engineer somewhere." To capitalize on that demand for data analytics, Salesforce snagged Tableau, while Google bought Looker last week for $2.6B. "Data-driven decision making" — Add it to your resumé.
Those kid-sized army toys... Raytheon and United Technologies make real sized ones for real armies. The New England-based defense companies announced a merger Monday — The US government hasn't approved it yet, but the PR teams seem confident it will (they just launched FutureOfAerospaceDefense.com to promote the deal). It'll be called "Raytheon Technologies," and build for the front lines and the homefront:
There's 1 customer here... The government. Over 80% of Raytheon's revenues came from contracts with US and foreign governments — Its Patriot missile system is used by 9 nations. Raytheon and United hope teaming up will help it win more of the $398B governments dropped on weapons in 2017 (a 3rd straight annual increase).
We're looking at you, Boeing... The leader of the aerospace industry has $101B in annual revenue. This Raytheon-United merger will result in $74B in combined sales, making it #2 behind Boeing (Lockheed Martin would be distant #3). This could be the big rival Boeing needed to keep it honest and competitive in bids for things like the $900M Growler Jet order it won last year. No typo — this merger could boost competition.
Leave no trace... Starbucks is testing out a reusable cups system at Gatwick Airport in London (and taking its Boy Scout commandment very seriously). Here's how it works:
One cafe latte with room for responsibility... Starbucks is killing-off plastic straws, has increased pay for employees, and put its employees through discrimination sensitivity training within the last two years. It's all to convince you to pay $4 for a Starbucks even if you think "coffee is coffee" (marketers can't stand those types).
Wanted: sustainable packaging for your dim sum... The combo of ecommerce and food delivery (@UberEats, @Doordash) means more packaging. So your curry dinner's six styrofoam tubs are popular, too. Delivery diets have become a packaging problem that we hope becomes an entrepreneur's opportunity. Some ways to do it: