Good afternoon, friends, and happy hump day. It’s looking like a brisk Tuesday here at home so far, bringing us a range of stories across the news cycle.
THE BIG STORY TODAY
Chinese companies are investing USD 14.75 bn in SCZone projects: Chinese companies signed agreements to invest a total of USD 14.75 bn in energy projects in the Suez Canal Economic Zone (SCZone) during the Belt and Road Forum in Beijing today, according to a cabinet statement. The agreements include a USD 6.75 bn agreement with China Energy to set up a new green fuel production project, as well as a USD 8 bn agreement with United Energy for a renewable energy-powered potassium chloride production facility, according to the statement.
THE BIG STORY ABROAD
Updates on the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict continue to lead the conversationin the international press, with US President Joe Biden’s expected visit to Tel Aviv tomorrow on the front pages of Reuters, the Financial Times, and the Wall Street Journal.
** CATCH UP QUICK on the top stories from today’s EnterpriseAM:
Biden is heading to Israel + Jordan as the IDF prepares an invasion of Gaza: President Abdel Fattah El Sisi will meet US President Joe Biden in Amman tomorrow as global leaders try to find a way to get aid into Gaza and prevent the conflict from spilling over into a regional war. The two leaders will be joined by Jordan’s King Abdullah and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.
☀️ TOMORROW’S WEATHER- Expect the mercury to rise to a high of 30°C during the day and cool to 23°C in the evening, according to our favorite weather app.
Is Google on the cusp of losing its pole position in the search engine world? An ongoing antitrust trial the US Justice Department brought against Google for its alleged monopolization could change the company’s dominance in the search engine world, although it remains unclear what the outcome of the trial will be, the Associated Press says, citing industry players and experts. Google pays USD bns, including to Apple, to secure its position as the default search engine on smartphones and web browsers, which don’t necessarily “preclude users from switching to a different search engine in their settings, but it’s a tedious process that few people bother to navigate,” the AP notes. Apple executive Eddy Cue defended the company's decision to use Google as the default search engine on iPhones, claiming it provides the best experience for customers.
What are competitors asking for? The chance to be the default search engine on devices. However, the repercussions could be vast: iPhones, without Google as their default search engine, can focus on their own search engines which would increase the device’s price point and make it less accessible to the market. Google has an almost “hypnotic grip” on users, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said in his testimony at the trial, suggesting that changing the default search engine would be the best way to break this habit. Nadella also signaled that Microsoft could potentially buy this position for Bing if Google's rivals are not excluded from paying for it.
Do smartphones have nine lives? Unlike cars, your smartphone is born with an expiry date. Androids are viable for four years, while iPhones can keep going for eight years, the Washington Post reports, citing digital security experts. Extending their lives are the consistent security software updates — even if your operating software is out of date. Samsung is committed to five years of phone updates ; however, if you notice that you are getting only two updates a year, then it is time to model up. Not doing so means that you could be susceptible to hackers and other security infringements as the manufacturer has lost interest in your device’s model.
Avoid the security risks and befriend the second-hand market. Since you can determine your smartphone’s death date you can start to dig into the used phone market to buy a phone that can be one to two generations ahead to ensure that your data remains safe. Aside from ensuring that you still have the same apps running smoothly, doing so would be budget-friendly and environmentally-friendly since most phone parts are made of non-recyclable material.
The infrastructural challenges of building NASA’s new outpost on the moon? The space agency’s efforts to create a permanent intergalactic outpost has prompted them to use moondust, a pestilence for all spacesuits and space vehicles alike, to be melted and created into roads, reports The Guardian. By using a giant lens, the agency intends to melt the lunar soil to create smooth dirt-free roads and environment on the moon. They plan to build buildings and house equipment which would be clogged with moon dust when they land on the surface as they take hours to settle due to a lack of gravity.
A giant magnifying glass + moondust will create the outpost’s material. Scientists at the Federal Institute of Materials Research and Testing in Berlin experimented with using a 50mm diameter laser beam to heat a substance similar to moondust to 1.6kºC, causing it to melt. They traced out triangle shapes that, once cooled, could be interlocked to create solid surfaces that can be used as lunar roads or landing pads. The lens, which would concentrate the power of the sun, much like a magnifying glass, is a creative solution replacing the need to transport building materials for a conventional laser machine, and utilizes the moon’s most abundant resource: the dust.
Reviving our buried childhood fears: No One Will Save You is as quiet as it is hair-raising. Very few things scared us more as children than having intruders breaking into our homes. But in this new sci-fi thriller, the intruders making their way through people’s front doors are not your ordinary housebreakers: They’re aliens. This is the nightmarish reality that Brynn — played by Kaitlyn Dever, who you may recognize from Unbelievable and Last Man Standing — must contend with. But even as she overcomes the threat despite living alone in the middle of nowhere, it seems to return on a wider scale than she had previously imagined. The movie had us on the edge of our seats throughout its beginning, but once you are over the initial jolts, it gets a little tired. While the suspense that emerges from the lack of dialogue is successful, the plot feels a little disappointing when compared with John Krasinski and Emily Blunt’s A Quiet Place.
Related
⚽The international break is coming to an end: As the last days of the international break approach, all eyes turn to the face-off between England and Italy at 9:45pm. The two teams are at the top of Group C of the Euro 2024 qualifiers. England currently leads the group with 13 points, followed by Italy, which has 10 points, tying with Ukraine, which has played more matches. The teams landing in the first two spots in each group qualify directly for the next European Nations Cup hosted by Germany.
For the night owls: We recommend that you follow these matches in the South American qualifiers for the 2026 World Cup:
Uruguay v Brazil (3am)
Peru v Argentina (5am)
Next Friday will be the end of the international break and the local league competitions will come back to our screens.
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🎤 OUT AND ABOUT- (all times CLT)
Hit up Cairo Jazz Club tonight for some live rap and genre-bending performances at Leqleem Sound Spectrum. Performers include Hady Moamer, Khaled Rossia, Azzouni, Karim Serry, and others.
The Downtown Contemporary Arts Festival (D-Caf) has kicked off and will continue until Sunday, 5 November. The festival is taking place in several places and art centers in the downtown area. You can check the events and buy the tickets through D-CAF’s website.
Don’t miss the stand-up comedy showat Falaki Theater, Tahrir on Thursday, 19 October.The show will start at 8pm. You can buy your tickets from TicketsMarche.
Awardwinning film Dirty, Difficult, Dangerous will be screened at The Netherlands-FlemishInstitute this Thursday, 19 October from 7-8:30pm, with doors opening at 6pm. There’s no reservation or purchasing of tickets — it’s on a first-come-first-serve basis with limited seats.
Dust off your windbreakers this weekend at Room Art Space in Garden City for theirBack to the nineties event with performances of your favorite Arabic 90s songs on Friday, 20 October from 8pm. Get your tickets at the branch or from this link.
Lab coats and goggles on for Kidzania’s Halloween Adults immersive party with Lab of Horrors on Thursday, 26 October from 6-11pm. Tickets are not on sale yet but stay tuned for more information on their Facebook page.
Music enthusiasts, this one’s for you: The annual Cairo International Jazz Festival is happening at AUC’s Tahrir campus from Thursday, 26 October to Friday, 3 November. For more information contact them on their page.
We’ve got you covered this Halloween:Cairo Jazz Club is hosting a Haunted Mansionnight of eeriness and hit tunes on Friday, 27 October. Costumes are mandatory and you can reserve your spot on their Facebook page.
DJs Kygo, Tiësto, Kungs, and Frank Walker are performing on Saturday, 28 October at the Giza Pyramids. The concert will be part of the next edition of the four-day Palm Tree Music Festival (PTMF) which will be held from Thursday, 26 October until Sunday, 29 October.
The Russian Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra is coming to Egypt for the first time, with three concerts scheduled in Cairo and Alexandria. The Cairo concerts are scheduled for Sunday and Monday, 5 and 6 November at the Cairo Opera House in Zamalek, while the Alexandria concert will follow on Tuesday, 7 November at Sayed Darwish Theater. You can book your tickets for the concerts from here, here and here.
Don’t miss Tamer Ashour at Sheikh Zayed’s Zed Park on Friday, 10 November at 8pm. Tickets are available on TicketsMarche.
Russell Peters is coming to Egypt for the second time: He will be performing on Saturday, 11 November at the Marquee Theatre, Cairo Festival City (CFC). The show will start at 8pm. Tickets are available on TicketsMarche.
Jim Gaffigan’s Barely Alive Tour will hit the Marquee stage at Cairo Festival City on Thursday, 16 November. Get your tickets with Ticketsmarche.
The Masr El Gedida Carnival is back and will take place in Merryland Park on Saturday, 25 November at 10am.
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💡 UNDER THE LAMPLIGHT-
Tokens: The Future of Money in the Age of the Platform. How many times have you received money in the form of gift vouchers, extra points for phone credits, or game tokens? Probably a lot. Tokens have always existed alongside traditional forms of currency, but their presence has become more pronounced as tech giants enter the fray. Rachel O’Dwyer delves into the evolving landscape of digital economies and the increasing prevalence of tokens as a form of currency. She further explores how various online platforms are issuing their own money-like tokens such as Amazon Mechanical Turk that pay compensations to workers via gift cards or when we receive foreign remittances that are transferred via phone credit. By examining the history of alternative economies,O’Dwyer argues that the shift towards platform-based money disrupts the balance of power between online platforms and the state in turn, granting platforms a new alarming power. It’s an insightful read that is longlisted for the Financial Times Business Book of the Year, and is suitable for those interested in understanding the impact of digital currencies in our society.
The EGX30 rose 5.0% at today’s close on turnover of EGP 5.3 bn (142.2% above the 90-day average). Regional investors were net buyers. The index is up 51.2% YTD.
In the green: Mopco (+16.6%), TMG Holding (+15.3%) and Oriental Weavers (+14.3%).
In the red: Orascom Construction (-2.9%) and B Investments Holding (-0.1%).
OUR FOUNDER OF THE WEEK– Every Tuesday, Founder of the Week looks at how a successful member of Egypt’s startup community got their big break, asks about their experiences running a business, and gets their advice for budding entrepreneurs. Speaking to us this week is Ali Elfakharany (LinkedIn), VP of product for StatsBomb.
My name is Ali Elfakharany and I am the VP of Product for StatsBomb. Seven years ago, StatsBomb was a small UK startup that acquired a startup I co-founded in Egypt called ArqamFC. StatsBomb provides data and analytics to help sports people make better decisions and improve performance. My degree was in finance, with a minor in economics and entrepreneurship. I spent my college years interning in the banking sector in private wealth management and investment banking. My first (and only) real job prior to starting the company was at BECO Capital, a regional VC firm.
In hindsight, being around entrepreneurs all the time while I was working in VC was a big inspiration and gave me the courage needed to start. Doing that job, you very quickly realize that there is no right time or idea, and that the most important part is the courage and capacity to act and get started. When I left BECO, I left behind a job I enjoyed, working with people I respected, and a salary that was very competitive.
Now, I really enjoy the creative process of building a new product or feature using new technology. Bouncing ideas off of customers, designers, engineers and finding solutions to our customers problems is always a challenging but fun journey.
The worst part of my job is probably the grind of recruiting new people. Doing outreach, going through CVs, working hard on assessing and convincing people to join. It’s an endless process, and it’s difficult to figure out how well you’re doing as the feedback loop is quite slow.
If I could give someone who is thinking of starting their own business just one piece of advice, it would be to go read everything Paul Graham’s ever written on the subject.
We just recently launched our second sport, American football, and so we’re excited about what the future holds for us as a multi-sport company capable of taking our tools and platforms to other sports. Long-term, our aim is to be the sports data provider for anyone interested in sports (from media to fantasy sports to analysts at teams) at whatever level from the pros all the way down to your local 5-a-side.
The three most important KPIs that we look at are shipping cadence — how quickly we’re getting technical features launched; data collection speed — how many matches we’re able to collect data for per week; and customer churn — whether or not customers are renewing their annual contracts.
We’ve generally been quite capital efficient, as we’ve only raised a couple USD mn from angel investors and high net worth individuals. We are always exploring ways to fund new growth avenues for the company, whether via debt or long-term equity partners who can help accelerate our growth.
I’m not sure we’re quite bootstrapped or VC-backed — we’re somewhere in the middle. But I definitely think fewer businesses should take VC money. The VC business model is highly dependent on achieving huge scale, and a lot of businesses end up failing trying to accomplish something that wasn’t necessarily feasible. Extra money also distorts businesses and allows unprofitable businesses to survive for far longer than they should.
I’m blessed to have a great support system of mentors, a peer group, friends and family that I’m constantly asking for tactical help. The hardest thing about doing anything is managing your own psychology, and I’m grateful to have a full-time committee I live with (wife, sister and mother) who are encouraging me through my failures, helping me manage my psychology, and generally giving me a hard time.
Being the founder of a startup is a lonely journey. It’s a lonely job because you have nobody to blame but yourself when things are broken — and things are always broken, no matter how successful the company is. Very few people also have the context and information you have, which makes most advice you get irrelevant.
My family has always been quite supportive of my career choices. I’m lucky enough where my father has worked in tech companies his entire life and understands this universe quite well. He was a crucial part of encouraging me and making me feel safe enough to take these types of risks. My partner and her family have also been extremely supportive of some career choices that in hindsight were extremely risky.
I’m currently reading Killers of The Flower Moon, which is the book that the new Leonardo DiCaprio movie is based on. It’s about a Native American tribe that discovers oil underneath their land, become the richest people in America in the 1920s, and slowly start getting murdered away. I think it’s an interesting look at what happens when people stumble into resources or wealth and have a target on their back, and the parallels between the MENA region are interesting.
I read a lot of internet blogs/substacks for inspiration. My favorite two are Simon Sarris and @visakanv’s blog. I’d highly recommend them both for curious readers. Visa has two books that I’ve really enjoyed. The My First Mn podcast is also a fun one I listen to for inspiration on business. I also like reading lots of sci-fi for inspiration. Ted Chiang and Andy Weir are two of my favorite authors.
In my down time, I watch & play sports, enjoy puzzles and board games, and read lots of random sci-fi novels.
My favorite two startups are Replit and Driveline Baseball. Replit’s goal is to make the ability to write code as easy as the ability to write. I’ve written a blog post about why I think companies like Replit are super exciting. Driveline is a data-driven performance training center — helping baseball players pitch and hit better using state of the art technology.
If I wasn’t doing what I’m currently doing, I’d definitely work at Replit or Driveline Baseball, as I’m a big believer in their missions. I’d also definitely enjoy starting something new in industries I’m excited about, like skill development for athletes, independent media, or DTC brands.
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