Another Friday, another Friday Nooner. There’s no guest today, leaving the full 30 minutes to Joe and Pete to riff on a diverse range of topics from IHOP to JupiterOne’s recent fundraise.
Here are some of the highlights:
- After Facebook’s decision to ban former President Donald Trump from the platform indefinitely following the Jan. 6 insurrection, this week the company was given an ultimatum by its own Oversight Board (who Pete knows someone on) to make a final decision regarding the ban within six months. Facebook basically attempted to shirk the responsibility of making the decision by asking the board to do it. But the board—which, supposedly, is totally independent from Facebook despite being selected by the company—volleyed the ball right back into Facebook’s court. (6:00)
- In a random (but very important) bit of news, Monday is now all-you-can-drink milkshake day at IHOP. Spoiler alert: the reason involves a story about Adam Sandler, which we’re pretty sure the guys brought up solely so Pete could reveal that he also knows Adam Sandler from his days in L.A. (13:30)
- Do billionaires come in twos? If you look around the Triangle, it appears so, Joe said. Founders at Redhat, SAS, and now Epic Games all reached the “B” rank with someone by their side at the company also becoming a billionaire, like Epic Games founder Tim Sweeney with VP of Business Development Mark Rein. During testimony in this week’s Apple-Epic Games lawsuit, it came out that Rein owns 4% of the company’s equity, which is currently valued at $1.1B. (Some insider advice from Joe: if you see a high-flying early-stage startup, try to squeeze your way in there). (21:00)
- JupiterOne, a cyber asset management and security software company in Morrisville, announced a $30M raise this week, following on the heels of a $19M raise in the fall. Clearly, cybersecurity is a big (and growing) need, as exemplified by how the company itself was essentially founded within an already existing company, LifeOmic—a software company for healthcare providers—to address its cybersecurity needs before spinning out last year. LifeOmic is HQ’d in Indianapolis but has an office in Morrisville, which is where JupiterOne was incubated—another example of the potential benefits of tech companies HQ’d elsewhere opening offices in the Triangle. (27:00)
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