077 - What I'm Reading: Week of January 13th.
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⭐️ = What excites me most this week.
🤖 = CES
💬 A new research paper published in Nature shows how innovation in science & technology is slowing by examining research papers & patents. The starting point of the analysis is WWII, a high-point in the innovation/patenting space. The research focuses on the lack of disruptive innovation, as there is still incremental innovation activity within specific fields but new areas of growth are narrowing. (Just this past week, The Hustle, published a piece on IBM’s intentional decision to relinquish its patent crown in order to ‘focus’ on specific areas.) Part of the findings from the paper show an increase in self-citing, citing of older works, and a citing of the same previous works overall leading to more sameness. Remedies suggested are incentivizing broadening fields of research, rewarding depth of research over breathe (which would be a major shift for academia), funneling more funding into new types of research by governmental institutions, and an overall attitude shift.
There are a few reasons this struck me is, having been in the academic realm I understand the pressure to publish or perish, which incentivizes narrow incremental work. The other reason this felt pertinent is last week Mojo Vision, the startup best known for its breakthrough AR lenses, announced at CES it would be moving away from AR lens development to focus on its micro LED business due to a lack of funding and a need to cut staff. This startup, founded in 2015, debuted at CES in 2020 and from the outside seemed to be accelerating smoothly. Ultimately innovation is fed by money and economies - both in terms of the funding of the research and whether the innovative findings can generate cash. A big piece is how quickly this can be done. In the case of Mojo - for the time being, not fast enough. This is the same for IBM by narrowing the fields of focus spending is also narrowed.
💭 This week: Significant cosmetics reforms are here, voice scams are right around the corner, Glossier is coming for your pits, an exciting supplement supporting mental wellbeing via the gut X brain axis, human hair is the hottest thing in sustainability, reverse aging in mice, MIT’s top 10 breakthrough technologies for 2023, China’s top lifestyle trends, and more…
🗞 NEWS & PRODUCTS
⭐️ BeautyMatter: MoCRA - First Significant US Cosmetic regulation reform in the U.S. Since 1938. (*Thanks for the tip SN).
The Free Press: O Holy Crap.
😣 TechCrunch: It’s 2023 and Black founders still raised just 1% of all VC funds in 2022…
🇨🇳 China is developing regulations for deepfakes.
🗣 Microsoft announced VALL-E a new text-to-speech AI model that is capable of simulating a person’s voice with only 3-seconds of audio [VALL-E Whitepaper]. From a scamming perspective this is so scary.
Just for fun:
🌭 Applications are open until January 31st to drive Oscar Mayer’s Wienermobile. There are 12 positions open.
👩🎤 Celebrity Brands:
JB Skrub - a personal care brand for young tween boys from actress Julie Bowen & media exec Jill Biren [Beauty Independent, Instagram].
⭐️ Business Insider: Sephora is dropping the beauty lines of TikTok stars Addison Rae and Hyram Yarbro. Sephora cited a lack of customer fit…
🧴 Skin / Personal Care:
Cocaye is the first skincare brand from the Evoq Brand Lab which is part of World Product Solutions. The brand combines Cacay oil and fermented fruits to target signs of aging, and puts consumer testing results front & center. The claims language on the site is very strong - claiming Cacay oil ‘cures all’ and and the ‘supercharged fermented botanicals solve all signs of aging’ [Beauty Independent].
Kose & Aman partnered to deliver a five-piece skincare line including a serum, face cream, eye cream, toner, and milk cleanser.
Assembled Skincare - a new men’s skincare line covering the fundamentals. It feels like it is from some kind of incubator - with no real brand / founder story.
🇨🇳 Jing Daily: How should beauty brands adapt to a polarized market?
L’Oreal announced a minority investment in PRINKER, the Korean, temporary tattoo startup behind the eyebrow printer unveiled at CES. These tattoos last for 1-2 days and can be removed with soap & water.
🗣 Estee Lauder launched its voice-enabled makeup assistant in the UK, meant to help individuals with visual impairments apply products.
👩🦱 Haircare:Pattern by Tracy Ellis Ross launched its first heat tool, a blow dryer with attachments designed for textured hair. The technology of the hairdryer is not unique. They have designed it to make the different modes easy to access, the filter easy to clean, and the device does not get too hot to the touch.
😅 Deodorant:
Glossier is making moves into the deodorant category - launching on January 17th. Now where is Glossier hair?
⭐️ 🇲🇾 Gote - a Malaysian personal and intimate care brand, offering scent driven high end deodorants along with wipes for male enhancement [ThingTesting].
👃 Fragrance:
🤖 Aroma Shooter, by Aromajoin is a small device capable of rapidly mixing and delivering scents without a delivery media (oils, mist, steam, vapor, etc). It is positioned as a solution for digital scent…the name is unique.
💊 Supplements:
⭐️ 🇬🇧 Ally N°1, a new mental wellbeing supplement from Ally Sciences founded by Linn Elthammar. The neuroscientist led startup is fusing probiotics, polyphenols, and saffron - linking the gut X brain axis to overall wellbeing.
Thorne, the supplement company launched Effusio, its dissolvable supplement discs in 2021. Caliray, known for its California cool makeup partnered with Thorne to launch a ‘Get Lit’ a dissolvable disc supplement for inner / outer beauty with Vitamin D, Nicotinamide Riboside, Biotin, Lutein, and green tea.
🇨🇦 Free Candy, the first ‘cell-based’ collagen high performance gummy.
Üell an immunity supplement brand that appears to be from Iluma Bio.
GORGIE a beauty beverage from the founder of lingerie brand Lively [Business Insider].
👩🔬 Femtech:
Loona, a portable bedside urinal designed for ‘anyone with a vagina’ by Boom Home Medical [Beauty Independent].
🛍 Retail: DTC, Brick + Mortar, Social Commerce, and more.
Glossy: Morphe shutters all US stores to focus on wholesale and e-commerce.
BoF: The year ahead- the DTC reckoning is coming for fashion.
Retail Brew: Consumers are gravitating toward affordable, more reliable brands.
💄 Moda Operandi launched it beauty section, leaning on curated beauty heroes and hidden gems rather than newness. The beauty assortment includes: skin, hair, bath & body, and fragrance. Supplements are noticeably absent [WWD].
Instagram is removing the shop tab [TechCrunch].
Five Below stores are expanding - there are plenty of beauty opportunities here.
NYT: With many retailers offering online sales, phony sites blend in.
🩺 Digital Health: Wearables, Smart Devices, and More...⭐️ The Verge: The regulatory maze behind health tech vaporware - the FDA.
A look at how Best Buy is using its resources to grow Current Health’s reach.
🦻 The Verge: How do you sell over-the-counter hearing aids when nobody knows who you are?
🤖 Earable’s Frenzband, is a wearable to help you sleep - using bone conduction and brain stimulation while measuring sleep using EEG, EMG, PPG EOG, gyroscopic and accelerometer sensors.
🤖 👶 TechCrunch: Halo’s SleepSure is a baby wearable to keep an eye on the little one.
🤖 🇮🇱 🫀 Cardiokol analyzes voice based markers to detect heart rhythm disorders - such as arrhythmia and stroke.
🤖 Wunderman Thompson - CES 2023 - Intuitive tech & and sleep tech.
🤖 Wunderman Thompson - CES 2023 - Superself Tech.
🗣 Social Media: News about TikTok, Meta, BeReal, Snapchat, Twitter...
The Atlantic: Welcome to Geriatric Social Media.
🇨🇳 BoF: Tencent’s TikTok-Style video feed tripled views in 2022.
♻️ Sustainability: Sustainable Design⭐️ Human Material Loop, founded by Zsofia Kollar, proposes a closed loop system for the collection of human hair waste to be used as a raw material in the fashion industry as a way to counter pollution & waste. Hair can be used to absorb pollutants, as well as a strong fiber when used for its keratin.
🚿 Kohler launched a shower head using less water with the help of an air induction system called VES.
⭐️ Holmen Iggesund & Yangi entered into a partnership to develop more sustainable packaging for the beauty world, some of the concepts are very cool.
dot.LA: Why there’s no silver bullet for beauty brands that want to be sustainable.
💸 M&A, IPOs, SPACs, Closings...P&G acquired Mielle Organics, a black founded textured haircare brand (*It has been blowing up on TikTok).
Starco Brands, acquired clean fragrance brand Skylar. In September 2022, they acquired Art of Sport - the personal care brand cofounded by Kobe Bryant.
Microsoft is looking to acquire ChatGPT for a rumored ~$10B.
🔬RESEARCH
⭐️ In an epigenetic breakthrough, Researchers at Harvard were able to increase and decrease the epigenetic age of a mouse by manipulating the methylation of DNA.
⭐️ A great review article: The dynamic balance of the skin microbiome across the lifespan.
⭐️ Nature: Papers and patents are becoming less disruptive over time.
Stanford Medical researchers developed a nasal injection that is showing promising results for restoring smell loss to long-haul COVID patients.
🧐 REPORTS
Cosmetify: The Cosmetify Index 2022.
⭐️ MIT Technology Review: 10 Breakthrough Technologies 2023.
⭐️ 🇨🇳 Xiaohongshu X Chinese Academy of Social Sciences’ Institute of Sociology: The top lifestyle trends in 2023, from local communities to drinking tea.
Rock Health: 2022 year-end digital health funding & trends.
CB Insights: State of Venture - Global 2022 Recap.
🤖 Trendhunter: 100 CES 2023 Innovations.
🤖 Wunderman Thompson: CES 2023 - Key trends.
💡 Enjoy,
-Anne