WHAT IS THIS?

Enterprise is on break this week, bridging the days between the end of Eid El-Fitr and the 23 July holiday, but we get separation anxiety when we don’t visit your inbox on a daily basis. With that in mind, we thought we would pop in today with a little collection of stories we thought you might enjoy, plus a handful of links that might give you a chuckle while you’re in a kahk-and-coffee-induced coma.

Today’s topic is technology, tomorrow is business, and Wednesday is politics. We’re off again on Thursday in observance of the 23 July Revolution, then back on Sunday, 26 July in our usual format and with our usual focus: A roundup of the news and views that will set the day’s business agenda in Egypt, delivered to your inbox before 7am CLT.

Happy reading.

NEWS BRIEF

Valeant Pharmaceuticals agrees to acquire Amoun Pharmaceutical for USD 800 mn: Quebec-based Valeant Pharmaceuticals announced on Friday that it has entered into a definitive agreement whereby it will acquire Amoun Pharmaceutical’s holding company Mercury for c.USD 800 mn in addition to contingent payments, according to a statement released by Valeant. Amoun’s projected turnover for 2015 is EGP 1.75 bn, and Valeant plans on using the acquisition to establish and expand its footprint in the MENA region.

WORTH READING

Slack is no slacker: Often called the “fastest-growing business app ever,” business messaging startup Slack wants to become the “digital spine” for modern business. It also grew to a USD 2 bn valuation faster than any other startup in history, and the softly-outspoken founder Stewart Butterfield says he’s happily stocking cash in the bank to ride out a potential correction in startup valuations. The FT has a great profile of the app — which, with Google for Work, Campaign Monitor and MailChimp, is how Enterprise gets made. And if you can tolerate the sub-standard audio quality, Re/code’s Kara Swisher has an excellent interview with Butterfield in the first of the tech website’s new podcast series. Why read about Slack? Because it’s a case study for how great design (visual and product) and fantastic content marketing turned a “me-too” product into a must-use communications tool. On the design, the guy who led the team that conjured it has written about Slack on Medium. You can also check out the iconic, “So yeah, we tried Slack,” video from Sandwich Video for a perfect example of what consumer-facing content marketing is all about.

A business accelerating change in the world: Twice a year, Y Combinator invests USD 120,000 for a 7% stake in a large number of startups — that’s how they describe their business model. “The startups move to Silicon Valley for 3 months, during which we work intensively with them to get the company into the best possible shape and refine their pitch to investors. Each cycle culminates in Demo Day, when the startups present their companies to a carefully selected, invite-only audience,” Y Combinator says on its website. Since 2005, it has invested in over 800 startups including Airbnb, Dropbox, Reddit, and Scribd. Labelled “the best program for creating top-end entrepreneurs that has ever existed” by venture capitalist Marc Andreessen, the total value of all companies that have gone through Y Combinator since it was founded in 2005 is between USD 20 bn and USD 30 bn and the average value of a start-up financed by Y Combinator in 2013 was USD 22.4 mn. Sam Altman, Y Combinator’s 30-year old President, said in 2014 that companies in his accelerator’s upcoming class “will average valuations of USD 10 mn, and their value will likely be more than USD 1 bn when they graduate.” If you’re interested in knowing more about this, The New York Times profiled some of the entrepreneurs going through the “sleep-away camp for start-up companies.”

Speaking of Andreessen, we’ve linked before to the seminal Andreessen Horowitz presentation on How Mobile is Changing the World. The presentation has since gotten an update and an audio track from A16Z’s Benedict Evans. Don’t be put off by the fact that he comes across as a stuffed shirt — Evans is one of the clearest thinkers of our generation on how technology is changing our business and personal lives alike.Check out the updated How Mobile is Changing the World presentation here.

With Uber heading up to Sa7el for the summer season, check out “This Is How Uber Takes Over a City: To conquer America’s quirkiest city, the company unleashed its biggest weapon.”

Closer to home: As we noted a few months back, Egypt’s vibrant startup scene has won attention from the Wall Street Journal’s editorial page. Perhaps the best source of news on startups across MENA is Wamda, which has recently offered everything from a primer on Iran’s startup landscape to solar-power entrepreneurs in Egypt.

++ We’re also exceptionally partial to the RiseUp Summit — both its every-other-week newsletter and to the conference, the next instalment of which takes place 12-13 December.

WORTH WATCHING

Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, SpaceX and chairman of SolarCity:

• Elon Musk talks about being fired as Paypal CEO from the Inc. 5000 conference in 2008. (Watch, running time: 24:50)
• Elon Musk USC Marshall Undergraduate Commencement Speech, 2014, (Watch, running time: 6:16)

PODCAST

One of the most interesting podcast series out there, Startup takes you through the journey of starting a business from scratch. Season one, which was completed in February, talks about the ups and downs of creating the now-successful media company Gimlet. The second season was completed this month and follows the founders of Dating Ring through successes and low moments alike. Startup is presented by Alex Blumberg (producer for This American Life and co-founder of NPR’s Planet Money until he split to found Startup) and his co-host Lisa Chow (formerly a senior editor at FiveThirtyEight and a reporter at Planet Money). You can listen to the podcast’s episodes here, subscribe to them on iTunes, or visit Gimlet’s website.

ON YOUR WAY OUT

Sharks love death metal + AC/DC: “Sharks ‘hear’ by picking up vibrations from receptors on their bodies, meaning they can be attracted to the low-frequency vibrations of heavy music, which apparently sounds like struggling fish,” reports The Independent. Death metal gives us headaches, but AC/DC? Well, for those about to hop in a shark cage… (Before Phil Rudd was arrested and Malcolm Young came down with dementia.)

This female American rugby player is tougher than you’ll ever be: After making a tackle that left her with a broken nose and a face covered in blood, she continued play and made another big tackle. Football players, please take note. (Run time 00:42)

History of the internet, Vol. I: Lazy Sunday, ft. Andy Samberg and Chris Parnell, SNL. (Watch, run time: 2:53)