The question of honing e-commerce capabilities has proven to be a bit of a conundrum in the retail world.

On the one hand, online giant Amazon has, in many ways, defined what it means to offer fast and cheap shipping. On the other, obtaining Amazon-like speeds in a prompt manner seems to come easier to massive national retailers with strong brick-and-mortar presences, like Walmart and Target. Smaller retail players and digitally native brands simply lack the footprint to effectively use physical locations as mini-fulfillment centers. Meanwhile, demand for warehouse real estate is soaring and increasingly expensive as the growth of online shopping continues to explode during the coronavirus pandemic. 

"Warehousing is probably like the biggest bottleneck, the biggest issue in e-commerce right now,"Netalico Commerce e-commerce solutions architect Mark Lewis told Business Insider.

That's where the micro warehouses come in.

"The micro fulfillment center concept is a de-risking concept because retailers are spreading their products across a lot of smaller fulfillment centers," Lewis said. 

Several technology startups have sprung up to help solve the issue of fast shipping for smaller, local, and digitally native brands in recent year. Lewis said that many help provide shipping speeds on the level of Amazon or Walmart by employing predictive artificial intelligence in order to determine where to store certain inventory, and ship it in the cheapest and quickest manner possible.

"If you're only shipping 10 miles or 20 miles instead of state-to-state, that can definitely cancel out some of the potential supply chain costs without having multiple warehouses," he said. 

As a result of their proximity to customers in more densely-populated, urban centers, these smaller warehouse chains tend to rely far less heavily on traditional shipping carriers FedEx and UPS. With major shipping players slapping retailers with surcharges and package quotas during the chaotic 2020 holiday season, an alternative mode of shipping is certainly a promising prospect for many smaller retailers. Lewis predicted that an entire workforce of "gig economy" delivery contractors could spring up around micro warehouses in the coming years.

As investors anticipate consumers demanding speedier shipping, these micro warehousing startups raised millions in venture capital in recent years. And now, thanks to the disruption COVID-19 has wreaked upon e-commerce, they're seeing demand really soar.

SEE ALSO: Demand for warehouse space is surging as historic online spending exposes a major weakness

Ohi

Ben Jones founded Ohi in 2019 with the intention of leveling the playing field in e-commerce fulfillment. Jones said that e-commerce giants like Amazon have innovated a "paradigm shift" that sees faster and faster shipping speeds, and soaring customer expectations.

"Our core belief is that it's just going to happen in the next 18 months to two years, that the consumers will want everything within a matter of hours," Jones said. 

Ohi is seeking to help smaller and direct-to-consumer companies keep up. One of their larger customers is casual menswear company Untuckit. Ohi helped the brand transform its closed stores into micro warehouses to keep up with online orders.

"Our sweet spot are those brands that have a certain volume of orders within a geographic region, 5,000 to 10,000 orders a month across their e-commerce site," he said.

Business Insider spoke with Jones about his push to build "an instant commerce platform." For Jones, Ohi's central mission is to "democratize instant commerce for every e-commerce company" that lacks the "data analytics and physical infrastructure to get inventory close enough to the consumer."

Ohi has raised $2.75 million in a seed round from investors like Flybridge, Afore, and River Park Ventures.

"If you fast forward five years time, can you imagine a world in which consumers are going to expect everything within a matter of hours?" Jones said. "Well, yes. And a lot of VCs realize that."

Darkstore's FastAF

FastAF is a consumer-facing mobile app offering from e-commerce tech company Darkstore. Darkstore unveiled the app in September 2020.

The service is currently available in Los Angeles and just opened for business in New York City as well. So far, FastAF has raised $30.2 million in funding from investors.

FastAF currently offers two-hour delivery for products from direct-to-consumer brands like eyewear company AKILA, outdoor clothing business Equipt, and wellness brand Moon Juice, among others.

CEO Lee Hnetinka describe FastAF's direct-to-consumer partners as being both "the hottest brands" and "specialized up-and-coming local brands who do not have a robust presence or a physical storefront to compete in e-commerce." He said that shoppers have demanded increased delivery speed during the pandemic.

"People's patterns and routines were changing before the pandemic hit but has only accelerated as more and more lockdowns have occurred and consumers want same day delivery and with FastAF two hour delivery is possible," Hnetinka told Business insider. "We work directly with our dark stores to deliver everything from the new Playstation 5, limited edition Nike shoes, or cult beauty favorites like Summer Fridays, in less than 2 hours."

Bond

Founded in 2019 in Tel Aviv as an online grocery store, Bond is now a New York City-based logistics company. The business "couldn't crack the last mile," resulting in "bad delivery experiences, late packages, and confusing return policies" thanks to third-party providers, according to the company's website. 

So Bond pivoted from grocery to shipping solutions, opening up a network of parking-space-sized "nano-warehouses" across New York City, Business Insider's Alex Nicholl reported. The company's roster of direct-to-consumer clients includes CBD business RCVR and dog food company Pet Plate.

As of April, Bond has raised $15 million in funding from Lightspeed Venture Partners, MizMaa Ventures, and TLV Partners.

Asaf Hachmon, CEO and co-founder previously told Business Insider that Bond's nano warehouses offered brands "democracy" versus the "dictatorship" of Amazon. Hachmon's cofounder Michael Osadon still serves as Bond's CRO.

Fabric

Founded in 2015, Fabric was originally based in Tel Aviv. Now, the robotics-focused micro warehousing outfit operates in New York City. Supply Chain Dive reported in January 2020 that Fabric was due to open around 14 locations in the United States. One currently-operating micro fulfillment center is based in Gowanus in Brooklyn.

With $136 million in funds raised to date from investors like CPP Investments, Corner Ventures, Innovation Endeavors, and Temasek, the micro warehousing startup touts itself as "the best-funded player in the industry." Co-founders Elram Goren, Ori Avraham, and Shay Cohen still belong to the company's executive team.

Fabric declined to publicize its initial non-grocery clients to Supply Chain Dive, but said that it was able to "hand-pick" customers "due to overwhelming demand." The micro warehousing company serves its clients with both two-hour and one-hour delivery services.

Compared with its micro-warehousing rivals, Fabric strongly emphasizes its robotics capabilities. Chief Commercial Officer Steve Hornyk told Supply Chain Dive that robots were far better at dealing with demand "spikes" than human workers.

"It's not that humans can't do this," he said. "Humans can do it. But you've got all these spikes in e-commerce. Robots are very good at spikes, humans are not."

• Grafomap is a website that lets you design custom map posters and T-shirts of any place in the world, and the finished products are really cool.  
• Custom map posters start at $49 without a frame and can go up to $119 for metal frames, while T-shirt prints cost just $35.
• Right now, you can save $15 on everything except T-shirts with the code "AFFSAVE15" through December 31. If you're getting this as a gift, keep in mind that items might arrive after Christmas.
• Grafomaps makes great gifts, but you can read all our gift guides here for more holiday gift ideas.

I lived in my previous apartment for six months before I found wall art my partner and I both liked enough to hang in it.

We're picky about what we should hang on our walls. Neither of us wants to decorate our space with Van Gogh reproductions and movie posters. Like a lot of people, we want to decorate it with wall art and photos that mean something to us.

What is Grafomap?

A few years ago, I stumbled across an answer to our problem in the form of a website called Grafomap that lets you design map posters of any place in the world.

You can make one of your hometown, your college town, your favorite travel destination, or the place where you got engaged or married — you're only limited by your imagination.

Once you enter your desired location, Grafomap takes you to its poster editor where you can further customize your location down the exact address or coordinates. After that, you can continue personalizing your map by adjusting, panning, and zooming the map exactly to your liking, adding or removing text, and selecting the finish (paper, framed, or canvas), orientation, and size.

Additionally, Grafomap has 11 unique color themes to choose from (including Noir, Bourbon, Minimal, and Modern) that transform your map from just an ordinary map into a work of art you'll love displaying in your home or wearing in T-shirt form.

Grafomaps also has a partnership with One Tree Planted to plant one tree for every map sold.

How does Grafomap work?

My custom map poster of Sint Maarten took all of five minutes to create, and the finished product is undeniably cool. It's also very affordable. An 18-by-24-inch print sets you back $49.

If you want to get something that's ready to hang right out of the box it's shipped in, you can get an 18-by-24-inch framed print for $104, a print on canvas for $99, a print on metal for $119, or one with a hanger for $69. The T-shirts are the most affordable at $35 each.

I tested the service for free but other colleagues who've bought and created their own maps can attest to the easy design process and cool results. 

Learn more about how Grafomap's custom poster editor works below. And try it out for yourself here.

Start by selecting a location for your map poster. I chose Sint Maarten since my partner and I have been vacationing there together for years.

Once you enter your desired location, Grafomap takes you to its poster editor where you can continue personalizing your map by adjusting, panning, and zooming the map to your liking, adding or removing text, and selecting the size, frame, and orientation.

I most enjoyed toggling between color themes. My favorites were Wheatpaste, Modern, and Carbon.

I ultimately went with Modern since I liked its colors and font best.

Here's a picture of the final product:

Here's a look at my colleague Malarie Gokey's map of Stockholm. She chose Wheatpaste as her color theme.

Here's a look at how another colleague Jada Wong's map of Lake Louise turned out in Blue.

You can also choose to print your map on metal, a canvas, or a T-shirt.

Malarie also tried Grafomaps' T-shirt and Canvas options. The canvas map turned out beautifully and made an excellent birthday gift for her mom. The T-shirt print was well done and looked great, though the cotton wasn't the softest. After several runs through the wash, it's still doing well and has gotten softer over the past few years.

Keep Grafomap in mind for a fun and memorable gift for family and friends.

Create your own custom map poster and T-shirt at Grafomap here.

Read all our holiday gift guides here.

2020 has been a gamechanger for e-commerce.

As the COVID-19 pandemic has wreaked havoc on brick-and-mortar retail, more consumers have moved their shopping online, leading to opportunities for companies that either sell goods online or create products that make it easier for other businesses to do so. 

In a sense, the pandemic has accelerated the rise of e-commerce by several years' time, with eMarketer analysts estimating that US online sales will reach $794.5 billion in 2020, a year-over-year increase of 32.4%.

Read more: The new owners of Brooks Brothers, JCPenney, and Pier 1 Imports reveal what makes a bankrupt retail brand worth buying, and it's all about playing the long game

While 2020 has been a relatively slow year for venture capital investments in consumer retail, and many companies initially delayed their fundraising due to the pandemic and the uncertainty around the election, investors are optimistic about the opportunities that are arising as consumer habits change. 

Business Insider reached out to the top VC firms investing in e-commerce to get their take on where the sector is headed. We emailed the top 25 firms that have made the most deals in e-commerce, based on data from PitchBook. Of the 25 we reached out to, 20 responded with their thoughts. 

The investors told us where they've placed bets this year, what they look for in an investment, and what they're excited to invest in next year:

SEE ALSO: Digital leaders at Gap and Levi's say omnichannel offerings will be more important than ever as they gear up for an unpredictable holiday shopping season

Forerunner Ventures partner Nicole Johnson says the e-commerce "landscape has been turbo-charged in 2020."

Location: San Francisco

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 66

When it came to e-commerce this year, Forerunner Ventures focused its investment efforts on companies that are "reimagining the future of retail" and demonstrate a "disregard for the status quo," Johnson said. 

The firm led a Series A funding round for Dumpling, a platform that enables individuals to launch their own personal grocery shopping businesses. It also upped its investment in Sunday, a startup that delivers customized lawn and garden products, as well as in Faire, the online wholesale marketplace.

Looking forward to 2021, Johnson said Forerunner is looking to fund companies that fit consumers' evolving needs. 

"We're holding people in the driver's seat of our investment strategy: where are their needs evolving to with respect to things like food, globalization, sustainability, family, health; and what are the tech-driven platforms to deliver on these needs while facilitating the most loyal relationships?" she said.

500 Startups partner Clayton Bryan says his firm is looking for "big markets" and "big growth rates."

Location: San Francisco

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 55

In 2020, 500 Startups made more than a dozen investments in e-commerce companies like Invidica, a platform that helps businesses find trustworthy suppliers and get products to market, and EcoCart, an extension that enables online shoppers to offset the carbon footprint of their purchases, Bryan said. It also invested in an influencer-driven skincare marketplace called Apothecary. 

"We spend a lot of time thinking about the large markets of tomorrow, spaces where companies can grow at record speed and how today's trends and preferences will evolve to transform mainstream standards," he said. 

Bryan added the firm is on the lookout for companies that can provide "innovative solutions" as the e-commerce sector continues to grow at a rapid speed. 

"The acceleration in demand across e-commerce has helped to force the need for greater efficiencies through innovation," he said. 

"We have a deeply rooted global network of founders and investors, which has allowed us to closely observe market movements, and helps us source the best teams from around the world."

Founding Partner Fabrice Grinda says FJ Labs is bullish on the future of food and e-commerce.

Location: New York

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 53

Grinda says he doesn't expect consumer habits to ever return to the way they were before the pandemic hit. 

When it comes to food, he sees a bright future in delivery powered by dark kitchens, robotization, and autonomy. FJ Labs' portfolio includes pizza ordering app Slice and alcohol delivery startup Drizly. 

"We are only at the very beginning of the food revolution," he said. 

Grinda is especially passionate about investing in marketplaces because "they create a lot of value by taking opaque, fragmented markets and making that transparent."

He expects the opportunity for marketplaces will grow further as the millennial generation pushes for more of their lives to be brought online, both professionally and personally.

He is especially interested in companies that are "highly differentiated, have a very strong value proposition" and "ideally have no inventory and are therefore capital efficient."

Lerer Hippeau is looking for "mission-driven founders building authentic brands," principal Caitlin Strandberg says.

Location: New York

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 52

Strandberg said Lerer Hippeau is particularly interested in companies in "the caring economy," or that give back in some way. The firm is also looking to invest in startups that can bolster e-commerce, like those involved in headless commerce, reverse supply chain, and logistics. 

Lerer Hippeau made 13 deals in e-commerce in 2020. Strandberg said that the firm has invested in companies bringing traditionally offline categories online, like Corro, which sells horse and stable supplies, and Autofi, an online auto financing company.

They are excited to invest in Gen Z's interests and in companies that can make out-of-home experiences more feasible for consumers at home. 

She said the firm is also considering "the big Amazon question." 

"What types of businesses can effectively compete with such a large player and where might there be white space opportunity? For us, we're seeing it in deeper vertical marketplaces," she said. 

New Enterprise Associates General Partner Liza Landsman says the firm is "excited to invest in companies that create critical change."

Location: Chevy Chase, Maryland

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 44

Landsman said that NEA is "looking for solutions that don't just automate the old ways of doing things, but rather reimagine them for the emerging e-commerce landscape and ever-increasing consumer expectations."

This "could mean anything from tech-enabled logistics to payments to marketing software," she said.

As an example, Landsman said that while many digitally native companies easily adjusted to the shift to e-commerce that happened due to the pandemic, there were many small businesses that needed help building digital infrastructure, and new companies arose to meet that need. 

NEA also invests in e-commerce brands and marketplaces, including fine jewelry company Mejuriand luxury furniture startup Burrow.

"In online brands, we look for differentiated products that consumers love and a distinct voice with a point of view," she said. "It's also very important to us that the company has sustainable unit economics and a strong team that can scale."

It made five investments in e-commerce-centric startups in 2020. 

Catherine Lu, managing partner at Alumni Ventures Group's Basecamp fund, says the firm has invested both in DTC brands and the tech and infrastructure helping them grow.

Location: Manchester, New Hampshire

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 43

Alumni Ventures Group manages investments in families of funds, which are geared towards certain interests or alumni of specific universities. AVG as a whole invested in 20 e-commerce companies in 2020. 

Lu and Michael Madden, who is managing partner of the firm's Harvard-centric Yard Ventures fund, said that Alumni Ventures is excited about the opportunity for growth in three areas: DTC consumer products, online marketplaces, and the tech and infrastructure that power them. 

"That third bucket of infrastructure and supporting technology has had to really catch up quickly to support all of the increased activity," Madden said. He has invested in JUMP, Simplisafe, and Getaround.

Lu, who is the managing partner of AVG's seed and pre-seed venture fund, Basecamp, pointed to a few qualities she looks for in a DTC investment. She has invested in Anycart, Mighty Buildings, and Lily AI.

"The team is very important, and if they have some sort of marketing or a customer acquisition background, that's a huge plus," she said. "If they have some kind of star power or influence, that's also a plus."

Greycroft principal Elaine Russell says the firm is "excited about companies that are empowering individuals and families to improve their physical, mental, emotional, and financial well-being."

Location: New York

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 41

Greycroft made six new investments and 11 follow-on investments in e-commerce in 2020.

Its portfolio includes organic wine distributor Avaline, grocery marketplace Mercato, and healthy grocery shopping site Thrive Market.

Russell said the firm expects the "good for you" theme to dominate even when the pandemic has ended, particularly when it comes to beauty, fitness, and diet, as consumers have adopted healthier lifestyles at home.

Grocery shopping moving online is another important theme. Russell says the impact of e-commerce in grocery will be felt not just by consumers, but by the entire grocery supply chain. 

When it comes to evaluating potential investments, Russell says Greycroft looks for "membership models with strong repeat cohorts and marketplaces that are bundling products and services together."

Accel partner Ethan Choi says that the firm is excited to back platforms that enable e-commerce's rapid acceleration.

Location: Palo Alto

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 40

"The brands that will not only survive but thrive in this new era of e-commerce need to build strong, direct relationships with their customers, and as such, we look for products that enable merchants to own and drive more value from these relationships," Choi said.  

Accel made two e-commerce investments in 2020: Shogun, a platform that enables businesses to build faster websites and storefronts with little-to-no code, and Klaviyo, a marketing automation company. 

"We believe the same things that make a brick-and-mortar retail operation successful have analogies in e-commerce," he said, pointing to beautiful storefronts and merchandise, personalized experiences, and good customer service as examples. 

Accel is also focused on investing companies that are geared towards merchants on Shopify and BigCommerce, which he says have benefited from the recent explosion in e-commerce entrepreneurship. 

General Catalyst takes a "a long view to investing."

Location: Cambridge, Massachusetts

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 40

General Catalyst has invested in a number of successful DTC brands, including Outdoor Voices, Warby Parker, and Great Jones. It's also invested in grocery delivery service Instacart and Rebag, a resale service for preowned handbags. 

In 2020, the firm has focused more on marketing and sales tools that support e-commerce businesses. But, its investors predict that more innovation is on the way.

"The well-worn phrase 'this is a marathon, not a sprint' could not fit a sector better than it does ecommerce. While it may feel that we've seen a large-scale consumer shift to online shopping, this decades-long transition is far from complete," General Catalyst Managing Director Larry Bohn wrote in a recent blog post about portfolio company BigCommerce's IPO.

Bohn continued: "From the first secure ecommerce sale on the internet in 1994 — a compact disc of the pop artist Sting — until now, more than 25 years on, just 10% of global retail spending has migrated online. More is coming."

Brand Foundry Ventures invests in "early stage companies that emerge into the brands you can't live without."

Location: New York

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 38

Brand Foundry Ventures invested early in DTC brands like the shoe company Allbirds, low-alcohol brand Haus, and online plant seller The Sill. 

Founder Andrew Mitchell was also an early investor in Peloton.

Brand Foundry describes itself as a "consumer-only venture fund" but primarily views e-commerce as a distribution channel for goods and not a sector of its own. 

It has also prioritized relationships with micro-influencers as a way for its portfolio companies to engage with their audience.

Y Combinator Group Partner Aaron Epstein says the accelerator firm is looking to bet on "incredible founders who are building startups in any field."

Location: Mountain View, California

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 36

For Y Combinator, a strong founding team is paramount. Epstein says that the firm likes to see teams that have at least one technical founder, that have already built or launched a product, that are "growth-oriented without burning a lot of money," and that are persistent. 

He said Y Combinator funded about 20 e-commerce-oriented startups in 2020, including Carupi, Bikayi, and DahMakan. 

"We've seen an explosion in the number of new creators and people starting side hustles during the pandemic, so we've funded many companies building e-commerce tools to help them run their businesses," he said. 

Epstein said the firm has also targeted companies that are helping businesses that are traditionally offline and have been hit hard by the pandemic to enter the digital age. Y Combinator has funded startups that are helping Shopify merchants grow their businesses and others "working on products to help any online merchant compete with Amazon by offering faster delivery, better recommendations, improved conversions through A/B testing, and more.'

Kevin Dick, managing director at Right Side Capital Management, says the firm is looking for revenue traction at a very early stage.

Location: San Francisco

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 38

Right Side Capital Management makes investments in pre-seed startups across all sectors that incorporate tech. It typically makes investments in the $100,000 to $150,000 range. 

Dick says that the firm is "unique" in that it focuses on companies' revenue traction.

"Naturally, some of those turn out to be e-commerce companies — and our portfolio then reflects that," he said. 

Right Side has more than 1,100 companies in its portfolio. Its active investments include Gorgias, which provides customer service for e-commerce stores, and Silverback, a predictive sales platform for sellers on online marketplaces.

GGV Capital Managing Partner Hans Tung says the firm believes "the best time to start a company is during times of uncertainty because both the cracks and innovation become more evident in a given sector."

Location: Menlo Park, California

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 36

GGV Capital made 12 e-commerce investments this year, six of which were new. 

Tung said there were two major themes to these deals: the continued rise of marketplaces and the verticalization of e-commerce. 

"As e-commerce matures and consumers look beyond the transaction for a more differentiated experience, vertical markets such as real estate, insurance such as with Turtlemint or sneakers such as with StockX" will have an even bigger opportunity, he said. 

Tung has also invested in Wish, Airbnb, Poshmark, and Peloton. 

When deciding whether to invest, the firm looks at a founder's ability to grow and scale a team and their understanding of consumers' needs, as well as the size and scale of of their chosen market. 

And while 2020 has been a big year for e-commerce, Tung said the changes in the market have not affected GGV's investment strategy. 

"If e-commerce is growing, then it's only logical that new demand for infrastructure and analytics will be there," he said. 

M13 partner Gautam Gupta says the firm is "looking for a unique product that inspires consumer love with an unfair distribution advantage."

Location: Santa Monica, California

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 35

M13 made seven e-commerce investments in 2020, including four in marketplaces like Shef and PopShop Live, two in e-commerce infrastructure companies like Passport, and one in supplement brand Rae Wellness. 

"M13 is very bullish on the e-commerce market long term," Gupta said. 

At the same time, he said, the firm is more excited about investing in infrastructure than in DTC brands themselves.

"We're spending more time on technologies and companies that enable sellers with the view that the growth in e-commerce will produce many pick and shovel winners," Gupta said. 

Looking ahead to 2021, he said the firm is excited about investing in companies that blend media and commerce, in companies that create marketplaces for services that haven't existed before, and in companies that can help drive customer acquisition outside of Facebook and Google. 

Khosla Ventures invests "more in people than in a specific plan, because plans often change."

Location: Menlo Park, California

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 34

Khosla Ventures separates its investments into two funds: one seed fund oriented towards experimental tech, and one main fund focused on more traditional ventures. 

The firm describes its philosophy on its website, saying that it seeks "unfair advantages: proprietary and protected technological advances, business model innovations, unique partnerships and top-notch teams."

The e-commerce companies in the firm's portfolio include Everlane, Instacart, and Teespring, as well as Casca, a shoe company, and Because, a personal care company for older adults.

When it's deciding on an investment, the firm says it's looking for "'A' teams and founders — entrepreneurs who know what they know (and are the best in the world at it) but also know what they don't know and are open to building strong teams to fill in those knowledge gaps."

Social Starts looks to fund companies that offer "unique solutions based on science or technology so that our investments have a competitive advantage," partner Charles Smith says.

Location: San Francisco

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 34

Social Starts was more cautious than usual when selecting investments in 2020, due to the unusual environment created by the pandemic. Smith expects the firm to continue being selective into 2021.

Social Starts' approach is driven by analytics; it aims to find all of the companies investing in its areas of focus, then selects the strongest leadership team of those companies. 

The firm made eight e-commerce investments this year. Its portfolio includes Mantl, a personal care brand geared towards bald men, and Hamama, which creates kits for microgreens to be grown at home. 

"We see the Health and Happiness sector as the most robust and fast-growing early-stage investment opportunity in decades, touching every part of our bodies and minds, and every person on earth," Smith said. "We're excited to find ambitious and innovative entrepreneurs attacking huge emerging markets in that space using excellent science and technology."

Enabling e-commerce has been a big theme of BoxGroup's investments in 2020, investor Adina Davis says.

Location: New York

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 34

When selecting investments, the firm likes to see "technology that can scale with a business over time and deliver as much value to small operations as it can to enterprises," Davis said. 

Most importantly, though, BoxGroup looks to fund companies led by founders who are "passionate, curious, and ambitious." 

The firm made four e-commerce investments in 2020, primarily focused on tools and services that can make it easier to start and grow online businesses. Their interests span from software and financing solutions to third-party logistics, warehousing, and checkout innovations. 

Davis mentioned BoxGroup's investment in Alloy as an example of its thinking around e-commerce, as it allows businesses to "easily automate and customize previously cumbersome workflows across fulfillment, marketing, customer service, and more."

"An offering like Alloy's enables e-commerce teams to operate with precision, speed, and a higher degree of customer centricity," she said. 

AF Ventures is looking to fund "emerging brands with omnichannel distribution strategies at the forefront of CPG innovation," Managing Partner and President Jordan Gaspar said.

Location: New York

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 33

For AF Ventures, it's important for potential investments to align with the firm on core values like health and wellness, sustainability, and authenticity. 

Investors look to see that a company's product is actually resonating with customers, "often measured through repeat purchase rates and retention," Gaspar said. 

"In addition, understanding the sustainability of the underlying business model is of critical importance, so we typically perform a deep dive into a brand's unit economics, both at a product and customer acquisition level," she added. 

AF Ventures invested in "a handful" of new direct-to-consumer brands in 2020, all of which are either growing their omnichannel retail presence or considering how to do so.  

Those investments have included snack company Skinny Dipped Almonds and feminine care startup Lola, which launched a retail partnership with Walmart this year. 

In 2021, the firm will be looking to fund startups that drive personalization, sustainability, and omnichannel strategies. Gaspar said it's a plus if those companies' products are "better for both people and the planet," too. 

BAM Ventures' cofounder and managing director Brian Lee says his mantra is that "we have to love the founder and not hate the idea."

Location: Los Angeles

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 33

Lee said that all of BAM Ventures' investments have an e-commerce component. In 2020, that meant investments in dog-food company Sundays for Dogs, holistic beauty startup WTHN, and cookware brand Great Jones.

"There's a unifying theme across consumers wanting more transparency around the products they're purchasing, and caring more and more about what they're putting inside their bodies and homes and giving to their loved ones, including pets," Lee said.  

BAM Ventures is particularly interested in companies that show the ability to build emotional resonance with their product. 

"What separates the great from the good for us are those that can really help you communicate the person you want to be to the world," Lee said.

For 2021, the firm sees opportunity in e-commerce tools that can improve efficiency for sellers and accessibility for consumers. 

Founders Fund invests in "smart people solving difficult problems."

Location: San Francisco

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 32

Founders Fund says in its online manifesto that its investors see the most promise in companies that have a few qualities in common: they're unpopular, they are "difficult to access," they carry "technology risk, but not insurmountable technology risk," and their technology would be extremely valuable if successful. 

"The entrepreneurs who make it have a near-messianic attitude and believe their company is essential to making the world a better place," the firm's manifesto continues.

Founders Fund's portfolio includes e-commerce-centric companies like online wholesale marketplace Faire, wholesale cannabis marketplace LeafLink, and e-commerce site Wish, which went public this month.

Lightspeed Venture Partners says its mission is to "serve the world's most extraordinary people who are building tomorrow's companies today."

Location: Menlo Park, California

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 32

Lightspeed's portfolio comprises more than 400 companies in the consumer and enterprise sectors. Its focus is on disruptive innovations and trends.

Its e-commerce investments include the DTC cereal brand Magic Spoon, the shoe brand Rothy's, healthy frozen food startup Daily Harvest, and the wholesale marketplace Faire. Lightspeed was also an early investor in Stitch Fix.

Its investors have recently pointed to discovery in livestreaming and multi-functional "super apps" as business trends they are excited about. 

"Beyond discovery, we're eager to support the emergence of the overall live streaming ecosystem and would be excited to invest in platforms and creator tools, in addition to discovery tools," partner Ashley Braiser wrote in a recent blog post.

Revolution Ventures Managing Partner Tige Savage invests in companies "disrupting the business models of traditional industries and appealing to new generations of consumers through the use of technology."

Location: Washington, DC

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 32

Revolution completed a dozen investments in e-commerce in 2020, most recently leading a $6 million Series A round in Good Buy Gear, a secondhand marketplace for baby and kid gear.

A common theme across Revolution's deals is the use of technology to power "new business models, consumer value propositions, or specialized approaches to customer acquisition, complemented by a strong, adaptable supply chain," Savage said.

"While the world was already experiencing a massive shift in consumption prior to the pandemic, COVID has led to the 'great catching-up,' a forced acceleration for companies to become more dynamic and agile in how they meet consumer expectations," he said. 

Savage added that the pandemic has changed the VC landscape in that investors working remotely seem to be betting on companies they already know well. He said Revolution sees opportunity in investing in what he calls the "have nots" in this equation. 

The firm is also excited about opportunities in food and hospitality in 2021. 

While Mark Cuban says he is "not a big-ecommerce investor," he's excited about the impact that AI could have on the sector.

Location: Dallas

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 30

Cuban told Business Insider his "favorite" e-commerce investment is Pricestack, a startup that uses machine learning to optimize prices for DTC brands. The idea is to help brands manage inventory, prevent shopping-cart abandonment, and create a positive experience for customers. 

Cuban said he thinks AI will be a gamechanger for the e-commerce sector. 

"When AI is done right, and it's not easy to do right, it can have a huge impact on e-commerce," he said. "It can consider all variables and optimize for results."

He has also invested in Cultivate, an extension that highlights American-made goods, and CarSnoop, an online auto marketplace.

Upfront Ventures partner Greg Bettinelli says the pandemic caused e-commerce investing "to skip second base and head straight to third."

Location: Santa Monica, California

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 29

Bettinelli said that while the pandemic didn't change the firm's strategy dramatically, it did bring certain themes to the fore. 

For example, there was "possibly a little more interest in opportunities related to the friction caused by the unexpected acceleration of commerce in areas like shipping and delivery, returns, customer service," he said.

"It's probably more accurate to say that these themes existed before but became more urgent during the pandemic due to transforming shifts in buyer behaviors and brand development," he added.

Upfront led investments in four new e-commerce companies in 2020. Its portfolio includes Parachute Home, Adore Me, and inVia Robotics. 

In 2021, the firm is looking to invest in "great teams innovating in consumer and B2B marketplaces, intent-driving video shopping and community activation commerce, where brand development is driven by vertical interests or other existing affinity groups," Bettinelli said. 

Maveron looks to fund companies that have a "differentiated product," an "authentic founder story" and an ability to become a leader in a category, partner Jason Stoffer said.

Location: Seattle

Total e-commerce deals in last five years: 29

Maveron made five investments in e-commerce companies in 2020. Its portfolio includes Switch, a subscription jewelry rental platform, as well as healthcare company Thirty Madison and direct-to-consumer brands Everlane and Allbirds. 

Stoffer said that COVID-19 "massively accelerated e-commerce adoption," but that investors "wanted to see past the fog" to determine which new behaviors will last even after the pandemic  is over. 

Maveron wants to invest in community in 2021. 

"The country is more divided than ever — from wealth to ideology — and people are finding their divisions and tribes online," Stoffer said. "We see opportunities for brands to stand for those tribes, to build platforms that can host them, and to harness the good that digital tribes can offer."

2021 is fast approaching, and the startup market is red-hot as VCs fight harder than ever before to get into deals.

It's a stunning transformation from the beginning of the pandemic, when venture firm Sequoia famously released its Black Swan memo advising its portfolio companies to cut their cash burn in anticipation of hard days ahead. 

The spring of 2020 ushered in a wave of layoffs in the startup community but by the end of summer, the bull market was back with a vengeance.

Some 223 deals of $100 million or more have closed through the first nine months of 2020, on pace to set a new annual record for VC mega-deals, at about one per day, reports PitchBook and the National Venture Capital Association. Much of that has occured since the summer, when lock-down restrictions worldwide began to ease.

In that backdrop, we asked a selected list of Silicon Valley's top venture capital firms which startups they think will take off in 2021.

We had two ground rules for participation:

1. The VC must tell us about one startup in their portfolio. After all, they were impressed enough to invest. 

2. And they must also tell us about one startup where they have no financial ties or any other interest. After all, they are the startup world experts, even when they don't invest.

The result is a fascinating list of companies to watch, ranging from tiny, seed stage startups to under-the-radar growth companies, organized alphabetically. They come from industries as diverse as consumer, cybersecurity, fintech, ecommerce, and telehealth.

We've also noted each startup's estimated total funding based on information from deal database Pitchbook. 

Here are the 81 startups that the VCs named: 

Abacus.ai: AI-powered data science for companies

Startup: Abacus.ai

VC: Satish Dharmaraj, Redpoint

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.  

Total funding raised: $40.25 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: helps companies make accurate predictions using AI in any system that collects data.

Why it will boom in 2021: Abacus brings "state-of-the-art AI techniques to companies of all sizes," says Dharamaraj. "Their technology is especially helpful where there is noisy, incomplete, or little training data, and with companies pulling in more data sources than ever before, they are destined to have a big year next year," he added.

Albert: personalized financial advice

Startup: Albert

VC: Sumi Das, CapitalG

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $71.83 million 

Headquarters: Walnut, CA

What it does: helps people automate their financial well-being by tracking bills and spending habits, how much money you make, investments, and more.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Albert is leveraging automation and machine learning to improve consumers' financial wellness through their holistic, mobile financial advisor that Americans can actually afford," Das said. 

Anyscale: distributed computing projects

Startup: Anyscale

VC: Jerry Chen, Greylock

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $60.74 million

Headquarters: Berkeley, CA

What it does: helps run distributed computing projects through an open-source project called Ray.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Anyscale is the next step in cloud computing evolution, allowing developers to easily build distributed applications across the cloud. It effectively turns the cloud into one giant computer," Chen said.

Armis: cybersecurity for enterprise Internet of Things devices

Startup: Armis

VC: Derek Zanutto, CapitalG

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $112 million

Headquarters: Palo Alto, CA

What it does: security platform to help companies protect Internet of things (IoT) devices from cyberattacks.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Many IT departments desire to adopt enterprise IoT devices but opt not to due to the significant cybersecurity risks that accompany large-scale deployments," Zanutto said.

"Through its industry-leading, agentless device and security platform, Armis is uniquely positioned to help enterprises leverage the potential of IoT while keeping their cybersecurity risks in check," he said.

Armorblox: stopping data loss from emails

Startup: Armorblox

VC: Karim Faris

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $16.5 million

Headquarters: Cupertino, CA

What it does: stops attacks and data loss across email, messaging, and file-sharing devices.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Email is one of the most common attack vectors, and the effectiveness of traditional methods [to stop attacks] is fading as phishing and business email compromise attacks surge," Faris said. "Armorblox works in the background to protect users with no change to your daily routine."

Bigeye: cleaning up data for big-data projects

Startup: Bigeye

VC: Bogomil Balkansky, Sequoia

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $3.9 million

Headquarters: Daly City, CA

What it does: data monitoring platform that uses machine learning to help businesses maintain the quality of their in-house data.

Why it will boom in 2021:"As every organization is becoming data driven, the quality of that data becomes paramount. Bigeye provides the transparency data engineers, scientists, and analysts need to ensure their pipelines are producing data that's reliable enough for high-stakes business intelligence and machine learning applications," Balkansky said.

Bloomscape: e-commerce for plants

Startup: Bloomscape

VC: Johnson Yang, General Catalyst

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $24.2 million

Headquarters: Detroit

What it does: a plant shopping platform that delivers fully-grown potted plants to customers.

Why it will boom in 2021:"Bloomscape has figured out how to ship thriving, beautiful plants in a box all across the country 365 days per year, resulting in better quality, variety, and convenience than your typical big box store Garden Center offers," Yang said.

"It's never been easier for new plant enthusiasts to buy and care for plants thanks to Bloomscape," he added.

Builder: designing ecommerce sites without any code

Startup: Builder

VC: Mike Duboe, Greylock Partners

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $3.25 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: Builder helps merchants create their own ecommerce sites through a drag and drop visual editor, without needing to type a single line of code.

Why it will boom in 2021:"Ecommerce will continue its rapid ascent in 2021 and the fastest growing segment -- merchants who are doing millions of revenue and have built their offering largely on Shopify and its partner ecosystem -- operates with minimal engineering support," Duboe said. 

He believes Builder will be a "game-changer" for these merchants by offering them a no-code solution to building their own online ecommerce stores. 

Celona: private 5G platforms for companies

Startup: Celona

VC: Matt Howard, Norwest Ventures

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $40 million

Headquarters: Cupertino, CA

What it does: provides a private 5G platform for companies to help them operate their own super high-speed cellular networks.

Why it will boom in 2021: Celoan gives companies the opportunity of building their own reliable mobile voice and data wireless networks using high-speed cellular technology, Howard said.

"More and more of these mission-critical applications, such as critical care voice communications in hospitals, simply can't reliably run over conventional enterprise wireless technology that suffers from inherent latency, delay, and interference issues," he added. 

ChartHop: helping managers run their teams

Startup: ChartHop

VC: Logan Bartlett, Redpoint Ventures

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool 

Total funding raised: $19 million

Headquarters: Brooklyn, NY

What it does: A tool that automatically builds org charts and helps managers do recruitment planning and compensation planning tasks.

Why it will boom in 2021: Bartlett said the company is "particularly important in a COVID world, as people aren't meeting new coworkers in person and there's uncertainty around hiring."

Clay Software: reconnecting with forgotten friends

Startup: Clay

VC: Peter Boyce II, General Catalyst

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: NA

Headquarters: New York

What it does: a social networking app designed to help users connect with the people they've met throughout their life.

Why it will boom in 2021:"Clay is a beautiful and private rolodex that helps you remember and be more thoughtful with the people in your life," Boyce said, adding that the app can serve a variety of functions, including revitalizing old family relationships and surfacing potential job opportunities. 

Cmd: the cybersecurity gate for Linux

Startup: Cmd

VC: Karim Faris, Google Ventures

Relationship: Investor 

Total funding raised: $21.6 million

Headquarters: Vancouver

What it does: Cmd is a security tool that helps track and authorize the people who have access to a company's cloud servers running the open source operating system Linux.

Why it will boom in 2021:"Workloads continue their move to the cloud at a torrid pace. At scale, security controls are harder to implement or only provide narrow forms of protection," Faris said. "The modern enterprise needs tooling that's purpose-built to protect data in the cloud and who has access to it. Cmd can help."

Coder Technologies: Cloud software development tools

Startup: Coder Technologies

VC: Ethan Kurzweil, Bessemer

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $44.78 million

Headquarters: Austin, TX

What it does: Cloud-based platform for managing and collaborating around software development.

Why it will boom in 2021: "The software world is increasingly a cloud-based one," Kurzweil said. "However, the actual development environment where programmers do their work is still dominated by local tools that are installed and saved locally." 

Coder offers "the benefits of the scalability of the cloud" without sacrificing security, he said.

Crossbeam: finding overlapping customers for companies

Startup: Crossbeam

VC: Logan Bartlett, Redpoint Ventures

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $40.85 million

Headquarters: Philadelphia

What it does: Crossbeam is a tool that allows companies who enter into partnerships to find the customers they have in common while keeping their respective data private.

Why it will boom in 2021:"Crossbeam has a networking effect built into it. As companies join, they invite other partners to join as well making it that much more effective. They've seen explosive growth this past year with companies quickly realizing the ROI. So we're confident this growth will only continue to expand in 2021," Bartlett said.  

Dgraph: fully-managed GraphQL backend service

Startup: Dgraph

VC: Satish Dharmaraj, Redpoint Ventures

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $14.41 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: Dgraph is a database for developers working with GraphQL, a popular open-source tool that helps programmers work with application programming interfaces (APIs). 

Why it will boom in 2021:"The Graph market itself is expected to grow 100% each year and Dgraph is in a unique position where it can apply the power of Graphs on both complex as well as the more everyday problems engineers face," Dharamaraj said.

Divvy: corporate credit cards that help employees with expense reports

Startup: Divvy

VC: Ben Narasin, NEA

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $1 billion

Headquarters: Draper, Utah

What it does: Divvy provides corporate credit cards to a company's individual employees, and helps employees automatically fill out their expense forms.

Why it will boom in 2021:"Divvy will explode next year as companies scramble to get control of their remote workers and use Divvy for corporate cards tied to real time expense management and budgeting," Narasin says. "Swipe your card or pay with your phone and the charge feeds instantly to your expense account, saving time and improving management visibility and control," he added. 

Docsend: secure document sharing platform

Startup: Docsend

VC: Ben Ling, Bling Capital

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool

Total funding raised: $14.70 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: a secure document-sharing platform that lets users know when documents are opened and read.

Why it will boom in 2021: Ling says that DocSend has become "the standard for investor communication and fundraising." 

Double: connecting busy executives with part-time assistants

Startup:Double

VC: Peter Boyce II, General Catalyst

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $12.31 million

Headquarters: New York

What it does: Double connects busy executives with part-time assistants and delegation tools. 

Why it will boom in 2021:"As individuals and companies explore new ways and styles of working, Double can be a platform that amplifies the amount of high-impact work done by executives and employees who use their service," Boyce said. 

Envoy: tracking who is in the office

Startup: Envoy

VC: Matt Murphy, Menlo Ventures

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $59.5 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: Envoy helps companies track who is in the office on a given day and manages routine office tasks, like notifications for things like when a conference rooms runs out of sanitizer. 

Why it will boom in 2021:"Even post pandemic, many workers will only be in the office part-time, and Envoy will help companies best use their office footprint for the flexibility expected by tomorrow's workforce," Murphy said. 

Everlywell: at-home food sensitivity and COVID tests

Startup:Everlywell 

VC: Aileen Lee

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool

Total funding raised: $266.1 million

Headquarters: Austin, TX

What it does: provides consumers with at-home lab tests ranging from food sensitivity tests to metabolism tests.

Why it will boom in 2021: The company recently launched an at-home COVID-19 test, which Lee says will drive its growth numbers.

"Consumers are increasingly stressed about their health and well being, and have time to investigate and adopt new, more convenient and affordable ways to address their healthcare needs," Lee said.

Expel: a cloud service that helps companies respond to cybersecurity issues

Startup:Expel

VC: Gene Frantz, CapitalG

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $117.5 million

Headquarters: Herndon, VA

What it does: a cybersecurity monitoring service that offers companies simple instructions if it sees something amiss.

Why it will boom in 2021:"Securing the enterprise has become an increasingly unmanageable problem for business leaders given the continually expanding cyber threat landscape and endemic shortage of cybersecurity personnel," Frantz said. 

The cyberdefense capabilities Expel offers will be even more critical in a "COVID-affected, widely-distributed work world," he said.

Fishtown Analytics: open-source data engineering

Startup: Fishtown Analytics

VC: Josh Kopelman, First Round; Derek Zanutto, CapitalG; and Ethan Kurzweil, Bessemer

Relationship: No relation. VCs just think it's cool. 

Total funding raised: $42.4 million

Headquarters: Philadelphia

What it does: Fishtown Analytics created the commercial version of DBT, a popular open source analytics tool that helps data scientists more efficiently process data. 

Why it will boom in 2021:

"Fishtown stands out as a company that has built not only a great product but a rabid community of companies and practitioners," Kopelman said.

"The quantity of data generated and stored by enterprises is exploding just as more business users are requiring access to that data," Zanutto said.

Fishtown's tool set is timely "given the unstoppable trend for big companies to store more and more data in their data warehouse," Kurzweil said.

Flexe: distribution and warehousing for ecommerce companies

Startup:Flexe

VC: Scott Jacobson, Madrona Venture Group

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $133.62 million

Headquarters: Seattle

What it does: Flexe runs an online marketplace that provides warehousing spaces on-demand for ecommerce companies, resolving issues like inventory overflow by connecting retailers with warehouse operators. 

Why it will boom in 2021:"As ecommerce continues to increase massively in volume (in part due to COVID-related shifts), companies need scalable and high capacity fulfillment solutions to allow them to meet rising demand. Flexe is well positioned to meet their needs and has continued to see strong growth throughout 2020," Jacobson said. 

Flock Freight: optimizing freight shipping services

Startup:Flock Freight

VC: Chris Farmer, SignalFire

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $184.45 million 

Headquarters: Solana Beach, CA

What it does: a shared freight shipping service that pools deliveries from multiple customers into a single truck.

Why it will boom in 2021:"Traditionally, half-empty trailers dump goods at a depot for delivery later, leading to late fees and broken items. Flock Freight's algorithms efficiently route a single truck to make all the pickups and deliveries to minimize loading and unloading while ensuring timely arrival," Farmer said. 

Folx Health: healthcare for LGBTQIA+ people

Startup:Folx Health

VC: Chelsea Stoner, Battery Ventures

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool. 

Total funding raised: $4.35 million

Headquarters: Boston

What it does: Folx Health is a digital health company designed for LGBTQIA+ people specifically, offering services like hormone replacement therapy, HIV prevention, and fertility testing. 

Why it will boom in 2021:"LGBTQIA+ people often meet with clinicians who don't understand their bodies or their needs, resulting in often difficult and sometimes traumatic experiences. Folx is reimagining healthcare for this population from first principles with a medical team made up of leading queer- and trans-care specialists," Stoner said. 

Forage: career discovery platform

Startup:Forage

VC: Mercedes Bent, Lightspeed Venture Partners

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $12.06 million

Headquarters: Sydney, Australia

What it does: Forage is a career discovery platform that lets employers create courses simulating what it's like to work at their firms.

Why it will boom in 2021: Bent likes how job candidates on Forage can use it for both "casual learning and intense job searches," and how the courses on the platform are designed by actual employers, as opposed to third-party providers. 

ForAllSecure: automating application security bug hunting

Startup:ForAllSecure

VC: Aaron Jacobson, NEA

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $14.7 million

Headquarters: Pittsburgh

What it does: creates cybersecurity tools that finds and fixes software vulnerabilities for clients like the US Department of Defense and Cloudflare.

Why it will boom in 2021:"Given the shortage of cybersecurity talent, enterprises are unable to keep up with discovering, monitoring, and fixing [software] defects," Jacobson said.

"ForAllSecure is pioneering autonomous application security with an advanced fuzzing solution that can discover known and unknown vulnerabilities without manual testing," he said.

Found: business banking for the self-employed

Startup:Found

VC: Bill Trenchard, First Round Capital and Mark Goldberg, Index Ventures

Relationship: No relation. VCs just think it's cool.

Total funding raised: $15.2 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: Found assists self-employed people with business banking services like expense tracking and tax savings.

Why it will boom in 2021: Trenchard said he's "impressed with the simplicity of the product" Found offers. "It radically simplifies finance tasks that millions of self employed people struggle with, including knowing what their taxes owed are in any given quarter (estimated payments) or what they can deduct."

"It's a major headache for freelancers to set aside the appropriate amount of money to pay in taxes, and Found combines banking with expense tracking to do this automatically. With a killer team, this is a company to watch in 2021," Goldberg said.

Glympse Bio: AI for detecting, treating diseases

Startup:Glympse Bio

VC: Ludwig Schulze, Alumni Ventures Group

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $72.79 million

Headquarters: Cambridge, MA

What it does: uses AI to better detect, track, and treat diseases.

Why it will boom in 2021: Glympse just secured a partnership with Gilead to apply its technology for liver disease treatments, according to Schulze. He says that the business is also set to take off as it begins "preclinical testing for applications to cancer and infectious diseases like COVID-19."

Hinge Health: digital healthcare for treating back and joint pain

Startup:Hinge Health

VC: Roger Lee, Battery Ventures

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $127.09 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: digital healthcare programs for chronic conditions such as back and joint pain.

Why it will boom in 2021:"As physical therapy and surgery continue to be postponed during the pandemic, folks with chronic conditions and pain are at risk for being left untreated," Lee said.

"Hinge Health provides a truly end-to-end solution by democratizing access to critical resources and quality services at a lower cost, and more conveniently to members," he said.

Hone: live classes for professional development

Startup:Hone

VC: Aileen Lee, Cowboy Ventures

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $6.35 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: Hone provides live professional development classes with experts on workplace topics like diversity and inclusion, remote 1:1 sessions, and trust building.

Why it will boom in 2021:"As companies are increasingly distributed in 2021, Hone is perfectly positioned to replace location-based training and professional development classes with an even more engaging, convenient and impactful solution," Lee said. 

Hopin: digital events

Startup:Hopin

VC: David Thacker, Greylock Partners

Relationship: Greylock is a Hopin customer.

Total funding raised: $172.18 million

Headquarters: London

What it does: a virtual events platform dedicated to recreating the in-person event experience through features like virtual reception areas, backstages, and user profiles.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Even as the COVID pandemic fades away, many events will continue to be held virtually (instead of in-person) as companies have found them to have higher attendance, better engagement, and they are much less expensive to produce," Thacker said. 

Kandji: managing employees' Apple devices

Startup: Kandji

VC: Josh Kopelman, First Round

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $28.44 million

Headquarters: San Diego

What it does: Provides a platform for large companies to manage employees' Apple devices.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Given the recent adoption of remote and work-from-home culture, Kandji stands to gain by providing the most robust and flexible [device management] solution on the market," Kopelman said.

Kettle: reinsurance for climate change

Startup: Kettle

VC: Lauren Kolodny, Acrew Capital

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $4.71 million

Headquarters: Kensington, CA

What it does: Kettle uses machine learning to generate risk predictions for climate-change related events like wildfires, and then provides reinsurance for those events to insurance carriers.

Why it will boom in 2021:"The prevalence of wildfires on the West Coast (and throughout the world) is increasingly at a rapid clip. Existing insurers are unable to accurately predict and cover for losses due to a reliance on antiquated models," Kolodny said.

"Traditional reinsurers are hesitant to provide capacity in the absence of more predictive underwriting. Kettle can fill that extremely time sensitive gap," she added. 

KitchenMate: Food-as-a-service for offices

Startup: KitchenMate

VC: Ed Yip, Norwest

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $6.76 million

Headquarters: Toronto

What it does: Offers businesses an alternative to hot pantry cafeterias with "smart meal-pods" that are heated in a "smart cooker."

Why it will boom in 2021: "While it might not seem like the right time for any sort of office service, KitchenMate is heating up among essential industries like healthcare, manufacturing, and distribution who need onsite meal options while nearby restaurants and food services remain closed," Yip says.

Labelbox: labeling data needed to train AI systems

Startup:Labelbox

VC: James Cham, Bloomberg Beta

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $38.90 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: provides services to create, manage, and maintain data sets for machine learning applications.

Why it will boom in 2021:"Mainstream companies are starting to realize that the heart of machine learning is the work of humans teaching machines. Labelbox represents the next wave of companies building tools to address that," Cham said. 

Lark: healthcare advice from AI and human coaches

Startup: Lark

VC: Anis Uzzaman, Pegasus Tech Ventures

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $120.15 million

Headquarters: Mountain View, CA

What it does: Provides health counseling powered by AI and humans to people with chronic or persistent illness.

Why it will boom in 2021: In addition to several successful funding rounds, Lark just closed a deal with Anthem, one of the nation's largest health insurance providers, according to Uzzaman.

"The need for digital healthcare support has become even more evident during COVID and this company has advanced products for diabetes, hypertension, and behavioral health treatment," Uzzaman said.

Lumanu: data analytics for influencer-brand partnerships

Startup: Lumanu

VC: Chris Sklarin, Alumni Ventures Group

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $5.03 million

Headquarters: New York

What it does: Lets brands and influencers easily share metrics related to sponsored partnerships.

Why it will boom in 2021: Skarlin anticipates that brands partnering with influencers for marketing will increasingly turn to Lumanu to track and amplify their content.

Lydia: PayPal of mobile payments

Startup: Lydia

VC: Amit Jhawar, Accel

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $72.78 million

Headquarters: Paris

What it does: Provides mobile payments, loans, checking accounts, and credit cards to a primarily French user base.

Why it will boom in 2021: Lydia has become the dominant peer-to-peer payment platform in France, and Jhawar expects it to continue to expand as it rolls out new features like online checking accounts.

"Lydia has become a verb in France and next year will bring a whole set of new capabilities to continue the momentum," he said.

Malomo: marketing platform built into online stores' shipment tracking

Startup: Malomo

VC: Gabby Cazeau, Harlem Capital

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $5.42 million

Headquarters: Indianapolis

What it does: Lets e-commerce brands turn customers' shipment tracking into a brand marketing channel.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Through the pandemic, we've seen a massive shift towards e-commerce that will be the norm in the post-COVID era," Cazeau said, adding that Malomo lets companies "deliver on their brand promise through a delightful user experience post purchase."

Melio Payments: bill payment platform for small businesses

Startup: Melio Payments

VC: Lauren Kolodny, Acrew Capital

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $143.5 million

Headquarters: New York

What it does: Provides a one-stop platform for small businesses to pay vendors and contractors.

Why it will boom in 2021: While peer-to-peer payments companies like Venmo and CashApp have seen booming popularity, Melio brings a similar function to business-to-business transactions.

"With the majority of [small and midsize business] payments still happening via check, there's still a huge opportunity for digitization here," Kolodny says.

Netlify: automating repetitive tasks for web developers

Startup: Netlify

VC: James Cham, Bloomberg Beta

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $97.51 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: A web developer platform that can be used to build, deploy, and run web projects.

Why it will boom in 2021: "31 years into the web, Netlify defined a new way to think about web development," Cham said, adding that the founders are "leading a shift in the core business model of the web—from feature based subscription pricing to value and consumption based pricing."

OctoML: making machine learnings models run more efficiently

Startup: OctoML

Investor: Matt McIlwain

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $19.6 million

Headquarters: Seattle

What it does: helps engineers make their machine learning models run more efficiently on different types of hardware. 

Why it will boom in 2021: McIlwain says OctoML allows machine learning models to be run anywhere, whether that's on a computer chip, a physical device, or in the cloud.

He added that OctoML will become "a key component of the modern MLOps value chain," referring to the process of developing, deploying, and monitoring the machine learning models that are now used in industries ranging from transportation to healthcare. 

Outschool: online classes for small groups

Startup: Outschool

VC: Alex Taussig, Lightspeed Venture Partners and Mike Duboe, Greylock Partners

Relationship: Taussig is an investor. Duboe has no relation to the company. 

Total funding raised: $57 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: A marketplace that offers live, scheduled online classes that students or parents can buy from a variety of teachers across subject areas.  

Why it will boom in 2021: "The pandemic has significantly accelerated the adoption of online learning, and Outschool met the moment this year, growing over 30 times in just a few months earlier this year," Taussig said. 

"While models like Outschool gained momentum out of necessity during the pandemic, the duration of COVID has opened parents' eyes to what schools do and don't offer to students," Duboe added. "Video learning has been normalized, and even as students go back, Outschool plays a valuable role in enrichment content."

Particle Health: parsing medical data for healthcare companies

Startup: Particle Health

VC: Sumi Das, CapitalG and Greg Yap, Menlo Ventures

Relationship: Yap is an investor. Das has no relation and just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $14.34 million

Headquarters: New York

What it does: Provides APIs for healthcare companies to access and parse through comprehensive medical datasets. 

Why it will boom in 2021: "Just as we're seeing an open banking renaissance within fintech, we're also seeing the healthcare industry beginning to demand improved data communications and interoperability," Das said.

"I believe 2021 will mark the turning point in health data interoperability and that Particle Health will play a key role in the solution," Yap added.

Passbase: privacy-preserving ID verification

Startup: Passbase

VC: Ted Wang, Cowboy Ventures

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $4.38 million

Headquarters: Berlin

What it does: An API for companies to verify individuals' identity on their website, app, or checkout screen.

Why it will boom in 2021: "With the internet becoming even more prevalent in the remote-first mentality carrying into 2021, software like Passbase will be increasingly important for companies to validate [that] individuals are who they say they are," Wang says.

Plant Prefab: sustainable homes built from prefabricated designs

Startup: Plant Prefab

VC: Ludwig Schulze, Alumni Ventures Group

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $15.03 million

Headquarters: Rialto, CA

What it does: Custom builds sustainable homes using prefabricated designs that take half the time of a site-built home to construct.

Why it will boom in 2021: The startup's commitment to sustainability — along with its fast construction times — set it apart from competitors, Schulze says. Plant Prefab aims to be a fully carbon-neutral business by 2028, which would make it the first prefabricated home builder to do so.

Pulumi: cloud engineering platform for developers

Startup: Pulumi

VC: Gene Frantz, CapitalG

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $57.5 million

Headquarters: Seattle

What it does: Pulumi's cloud platform lets developers build and automate modern infrastructure using standard languages like Python and Javascript.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Pulumi provides a low barrier, feature-rich way for developers and dev teams to access the capabilities and advantages of cloud infrastructure without needing to write code in languages other than the ones with which they're familiar," Frantz says.

Redox Engine: connecting hospitals with medical vendors

Startup: Redox Engine

VC: Chelsea Stoner, Battery Ventures

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $50.16 million

Headquarters: Madison, WI

What it does: Hosts a cloud API that connects hospitals, doctors and labs with healthcare products and services.

Why it will boom in 2021: The startup recently surpassed 1,000 clients, according to Stoner, as healthcare organizations increasingly turn to digital health tools amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

"We are in the very early innings of digital health, and Redox is well positioned to be a key enabler of the market in 2021 and beyond," Stoner said.

Retool: low-code platform for building internal tools

Startup: Retool

VC: Chris Farmer, SignalFire

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $69.64 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: a software development tool that lets companies build custom business tools without having to code extensively.

Why it will boom in 2021: "The last things developers want to spend their time on are internal tools," Farmer says. "2021 will be Retool's year, as COVID-prompted layoffs and belt-tightening push enterprises to buy less and build more with smaller engineering teams."

Rockset: A real time cloud database for developers

Startup: Rockset

VC: Jerry Chen, Greylock Partners

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $61.67 million

Headquarters: San Mateo, CA

What it does: Provides a cloud database for developers building data applications.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Enterprises need to build apps and make decisions on the freshest data and the only solution today is Rockset," Chen said.

SambaNova Systems: heavy-duty computing systems for running AI programs

Startup: SambaNova Systems

VC: Anis Uzzaman, Pegasus Tech Ventures

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $460.6 million

Headquarters: Palo Alto, CA

What it does: Developing new hardware and software meant to run demanding AI programs.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Nvidia is still the dominant player for AI compute with their GPUs and there is no competitor in sight. SambaNova has been developing a next generation computing platform that could challenge Nvidia in the fast growing datacenter business," Uzzaman says.

Shef: marketplace for homemade meals

Startup: Shef

VC: Johnson Yang

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $8.95 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: A peer-to-peer, community-based online marketplace for homemade meals.

Why it will boom in 2021: Shef wants to give rise to amateur chefs, a "whole new category of gig economy workers," Yang said. 

"I believe Shef can do to the restaurant industry what Airbnb did to the hospitality industry, but similar challenges with regulation, operations, and growth hacking have to be surmounted," he added.

Shopmonkey: mobile software for auto shops

Startup: Shopmonkey

VC: Byron Deeter, Bessemer Venture Partners

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $35 million

Headquarters: San Jose, CA

What it does: Provides cloud software and mobile apps to help autoshops manage their business and customer service needs.

Why it will boom in 2021: "One of the next big cloud waves is vertical SaaS," Deeter said, referring to cloud software geared to a specific industry.

"The automotive repair and maintenance industry represents an $800 billion market that is going to have a massive tailwind post-COVID as the world goes back to traveling and commuting," he added.

ShopShops: Online shopping via livestream

Startup:ShopShops

VC: Eurie Kim, Forerunner Ventures

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $23.14 million

Headquarters: New York

What it does: Lets people remotely shop from brick and mortar stores via online live-streamed events.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Live stream commerce has been thriving in Asia for years, and is projected to drive [roughly] $170 billion in market value in China this year. We are just beginning to see this behavior take off in the US," Kim said, adding that she believes ShopShops will be at the forefront of that trend.

Socure: identify verification for online transactions

Startup: Socure

VC: Amit Jhawar, Accel

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $99.05 million

Headquarters: New York

What it does: Socure uses AI to guard against fraud by examining behaviors to find indications that customers or business partners are not who they say they are.

Why it will boom in 2021: "As we see an increasing number of companies enter financial services, and more legacy players innovate online, Socure will be a vital part of the stack that enables them to deliver consumer and B2B solutions in a secure and low-fraud way," Jhawar says.

SoLo Funds: a way to get, and give, small loans

Startup: SoLo Funds

VC: Mercedes Bent, Lightspeed Venture Partners

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $23.93 million

Headquarters: Los Angeles

What it does: A peer-to-peer lending system that lets people provide loans of $50 to $1,000 without interest.

Why it will boom in 2021: "In stressful times like the pandemic SoLo is allowing users to more easily and affordably access short-term emergency loans," Bent said. "Many people are still under financial distress and in need of personalized lending solutions."

Sonrai Security: securing public cloud computing for businesses

Startup: Sonrai Security

VC: Venky Ganesan, Menlo Ventures

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $38.5 million

Headquarters: New York

What it does: Sonrai's software finds security holes in companies' infrastructure when using public cloud services like Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud, and Microsoft Azure.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Sonrai Security solves a pervasive problem that will only become more prevalent as the trend towards public cloud usage grows in 2021 and beyond," Ganesan said.

Sorcero: AI that rapidly reads and processes scientific papers

Startup: Sorcero

VC: Chris Sklarin, Alumni Ventures Group

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $5.46 million

Headquarters: Washington, DC

What it does: Sorcero's language intelligence platform rapidly reads and digests large amounts of scientific and medical publications, producing insights for its client base of insurance firms and life science companies.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Sorcero has incredible insights into markets and how to build technology that is powerful and differentiated. They move fast, are very quick to course correct and are capital efficient," Skarlin said.

"In 2021, I expect them to smash through their targets and make serious strides towards transforming decision-making for key technical industries that power the world," he said.

Starburst Data: A data analysis platform for enterprises

Startup:Starburst Data

VC: Matt McIlwain and Sudip Chakrabarti, Madrona

Relationship: No relation. VCs just think it's cool

Total funding raised: $63.25 million 

Headquarters: Boston

What it does: Provides the commercial version of Presto, a very fast open source data analysis platform that works with big data, even when that data is located in lots of different spots.

Why it will boom in 2021:"With the proliferation of data volume, complexity and sources, modern enterprises are increasingly looking to analyze data across multiple data silos without moving any of that data. Starburst is solving that critical need with a fantastic enterprise product built on top of Presto," Chakrabarti said.

Steno: remote depositions and court reporting

Startup: Steno

VC: Todd Jackson, First Round Capital

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $16.48 million

Headquarters: Los Angeles

What it does: Steno is a court reporting agency that lets clients conduct remote depositions (as well as traditional depositions) and provides an option to defer payments until a case is resolved.

Why it will boom in 2021: Steno's remote deposition tool has boomed amid the COVID-19 pandemic, and the startup's revenue grew by nearly tenfold in 2020.

"We believe the trend of remote litigations will continue through 2021 and beyond as many folks across the legal industry are adopting remote work as the new normal and seeing the cost-saving benefits as a result," Jackson said.

Step: digital banking for teens

Startup: Step

VC: Todd Jackson, First Round Capital

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $76.3 million

Headquarters: Palo Alto, CA

What it does: Step's digital banking platform is geared toward teens opening their first bank account. It offers a free, FDIC-insured bank account and a secured spending card meant to help them build positive credit, as well as its own person-to-person payments platform.

Why it will boom in 2021: "[Gen Z] has been very vocal about wanting more modern financial resources and Step not only provides those but also markets directly to them," Jackson said.

"At the end of the day, this generation already has massive spending power so if Step can capture these users now, it's bound to be very lucrative," he said.

Stir: business tools for influencers and content creators

Startup: Stir

VC: M.G. Siegler, Google Ventures

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $3.69 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: Stir markets a suite of tools that help content creators track the number of people they reach across social media platforms, how much money they can expect to bring in from ads and subscribers, and keep tabs on their online sales.

Why it will boom in 2021: Most influencers make money from a variety of channels, including YouTube, Patreon, Shopify, Substack, and individual brand deals. Stir's strength is that it consolidates those in one place, according to Siegler.

"If you believe that creators are not just going to use one platform to monetize, this product is going to be increasingly needed as new avenues to monetize come online and diversifying revenue streams become more important," Siegler says.

StockX: online marketplace for hypebeasts

Startup: StockX

VC: Roger Lee, Battery Ventures

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $565 million

Headquarters: Detroit

What it does: StockX's marketplace lets people buy and sell high-demand sneakers, streetwear, bags, and collectibles with a focus on rare and limited edition items that fetch high prices.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Despite unprecedented, industry-wide challenges in retail, StockX's digitally-native and asset-lite business model has proven to be quite resilient, allowing them to serve their consumers throughout COVID-19 with minimal disruption," Lee says, adding that the company is quickly expanding beyond its core Gen-Z demographic.

Substack: newsletter platform for independent writers

Startup: Substack

VC: Alex Taussig, Lightspeed Venture Partners and Eurie Kim, Forerunner

Relationship: No relation to either VC, but Taussig publishes his own (free) newsletter on Substack.

Total funding raised: $21.21 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: Substack's platform lets writers create newsletters which can be sent exclusively to paying email subscribers or published publicly online. 

Why it will boom in 2021: Taussig notes that Substack "has been able to attract top talent from big publishers across the media ecosystem," including writers who recently left established outlets like Vox and New York Magazine to start their own newsletters. 

"In a world where large publications must cater to a mass audience, Substack allows readers to vote with their dollars on content they want to see and this trend is likely to accelerate in 2021," Kim adds.

Tempo: AI-powered gym for at-home strength training

Startup: Tempo

VC: Ben Ling, Bling Ventures and Ed Yip, Norwest

Relationship: Investors

Total funding raised: $77.42 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: Tempo's home gym uses AI-powered 3D mapping to guide users through weight lifting regimens and give them feedback on their form.

Why it will boom in 2021: Ling says Tempo's strength is its "amazing product market fit with strong customer love and engagement," and that it's poised to capitalize on the growing at-home fitness trend.

"Consumers who were once too busy to commit to the gym or who were intimidated by classes are now hopping on the at-home workout train," Yip adds.

Temporal: helps developers fix issues in microservices

Startup: Temporal

VC: Bogomil Balkansky, Sequoia; Jerry Chen, Greylock; Sudip Chakrabarti, Madrona; and Aaron Jacobson, NEA

Relationship: Balkansky and Chakrabarti are investors. Chen and Jacobson have no relation and just think it's cool.

Total funding raised: $25.5 million

Headquarters: Bellevue, WA

What it does: App developers are increasingly adopting a "microservice" architecture, in which a large app with lots of features is broken up into small, independent parts that talk to one another. Temporal's software makes it easier for developers to fix problems when one of their microservices fails.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Creating software applications that handle failures gracefully is a very complex and time-consuming engineering problem,"Balkansky said. "Temporal solves this." 

With customers like Snap, Box, Coinbase and Checkr, "we anticipate greater demand next year as more companies continue to migrate to microservice architectures," he added.

Chakrabarti said that Temporal helps "developers build invincible applications."

By hiding complex data engineering from developers, Temporal is "making it easy to build and orchestrate these apps," Chen said.

"Temporal's open-source 'workflow-as-code' solution bakes in resiliency from the start, freeing up developers to focus on writing impactful business logic code," Jacobson said.

Tonal: an AI-powered home gym and personal training

Startup: Tonal

VC: Matt Murphy, Menlo Ventures

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $276.7 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: A rising star in the booming home fitness market, Tonal sells a smart mirror with adjustable pulleys that uses AI-powered computer vision to evaluate users' workouts and give them feedback, along with remote human-led classes.

Why it will boom in 2021: "The classes and AI to both motivate and improve your form are game changers. No question more people will be working at home post pandemic and home fitness will benefit from that shift," Murphy says.

Topicals: skincare for people with chronic skin conditions

Startup: Topicals

VC: Gabby Cazeau, Harlem Capital

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $2.6 million

Headquarters: Santa Monica, CA

What it does: Topicals sells skincare products geared towards people with chronic skin conditions like eczema and hyperpigmentation. 

Why it will boom in 2021: "While there's been considerable growth in the beauty category, there hasn't been as much focus on medicated skincare products," Cazeau said. "It is a massive market that hasn't seen much innovation and current products don't speak to the needs of millennials and GenZ."

She adds that "Topicals understands their community of 'skintellectuals' and engages with them in creative ways."

Trace Data: tools for sending and tracking sensitive data

Startup: Trace Data

VC: Matt Howard, Norwest Ventures

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks they're cool.

Total funding raised: $5 million

Headquarters: Wilmington, DE

What it does: Trace Data's software lets companies see where their data is being accessed and used to ensure it's kept private and secure.

Why it will boom in 2021: Amid remote work, "managing and securing data has never been a bigger priority," Howard says. "Trace Data keeps all data secure in connected systems with a single platform, making it easier to manage all data at once."

Transcend: Software for fulfilling users' data privacy requests

Startup:Transcend

VC: Mark Goldberg, Index Ventures

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $29.54 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: Provides software for businesses to more easily comply with users' data privacy requests.

Why it will boom in 2021: Goldberg says Transcend will become increasingly popular as privacy becomes an expectation for consumers.

"Privacy will be one of the biggest themes of the next decade, and Transcend is the emerging category leader in it," Goldberg said.

Universe: tools for building mobile-first ecommerce sites

Startup: Universe

VC: M.G. Siegler, Google Ventures

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $17.32 million

Headquarters: Brooklyn, NY

What it does: Universe's platform lets merchants build ecommerce sites from their smartphones.

Why it will boom in 2021: "The company took the time during the unfortunate reality of COVID during 2020 to hone in on and focus on a core mission: to enable anyone and everyone to build on the web and to build businesses while doing it," Siegler said. "While we all hope COVID starts to dissipate in 2021, these types of businesses should be here to stay."

Upgrade: fintech platform focused on personal loans and credit cards

Startup: Upgrade

VC: Ben Narasin, NEA Ventures

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $211.27 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: Founded by LendingClub founder Renaud Laplanche, Upgrade first launched with loans and credit card services and has more recently expanded into more banking tools like digital checking accounts.

Why it will boom in 2021: Narasin expects the startup to see "tremendous uptake" next year thanks to its service offering a low-cost traditional term loan of up to $30,000 that users can draw down with a credit card, "giving them a longer term (multi-year) payback period and lower loan-like rates," he said.

Uptycs: security analytics platform for preventing and detecting hacks

Startup: Uptycs

VC: Venky Ganesan, Menlo Ventures

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $40.25 million

Headquarters: Waltham, MA

What it does: Uptycs' platform provides a dashboard for security teams that lets them monitor what's happening across their company and investigate unauthorized intrusions.

Why it will boom in 2021: Cybersecurity teams need to be able to rapidly gauge potential security threats, Ganasan said, especially as they increasingly rely on cloud computing and shifting endpoints amid remote work.

Uptycs has applied advanced modeling and database techniques for "real-time pipeline processing," Ganesan said, meaning it can crunch through tons of security-related data quickly.

The result is "a security analytics platform for visibility and accelerated time to insight," he said.

UserLeap: tools for product developers to "micro-survey" their users

Startup: UserLeap

VC: Bill Trenchard, First Round and Sarah Guo, Greylock

Relationship: Trenchard is an investor. Guo has no relation and just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $20 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: UserLeap lets product teams build "micro-surveys" into their products that quickly gather feedback from people while they're using the product.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Every company needs a way to understand their customers in real time, and they don't have that capability right now. UserLeap fills that gap," Trenchard said.

"As businesses are increasingly dependent on digital experiences, we believe real-time qualitative data from users will become an competitive advantage," Guo added.

Utmost: software for managing contractors and non-employees

Startup: Utmost

VC: Sarah Guo, Greylock

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $11.2 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: Utmost provides a tool for HR to find, track, and pay contractors and non-employees.

Why it will boom in 2021: "COVID has, of course, driven companies to completely rethink their approach to global talent, and their ties to physical office," Guo said.

"COVID-catalyzed digital transformation intensifies the turnover in workforce skills; the extended workforce is serving as a competitive advantage to companies going on the offensive in the post-COVID era," she added.

Wealthsimple: fintech platform for investing, crypto, and tax filing

Startup: Wealthsimple

VC: David Thacker, Greylock

Relationship: Investor

Total funding raised: $274.96 million

Headquarters: Toronto

What it does: The Canada-based startup began as an automated investing service and now also offers stock and crypto trading tools, savings accounts, a cash card, and tax filing software.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Consumers (especially millennials and Gen-Z) want modern financial products with low, transparent fees, a great user experience, and the convenience of using multiple financial products from a primary institution. This desire has created a massive opportunity to transform the Canadian financial services industry," Thacker says.

Webflow: Software development tools for beginners

Startup: Webflow

VC: Byron Deeter, Bessemer

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $74.9 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: Webflow provides a platform for developing apps and websites tailored to low-code or no-code customers, enabling them to build and launch software without technical expertise.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Webflow marks a paradigm shift in the future of how we work by democratizing software development," Deeter said. "The outstanding product love and network effects are some of the strongest we've seen."

Wheel: Telemedicine and compliance for health startups

Startup: Wheel

VC: Greg Yap, Menlo Ventures

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks they're cool.

Total funding raised: $16.1 million

Headquarters: Austin, TX

What it does: Provides telemedicine software and a marketplace that helps startups find healthcare providers and quickly ramp up virtual offerings.

Why it will boom in 2021: "Demand for virtual care and telemedicine has accelerated during the pandemic, but building and managing national pools of physicians and other healthcare professionals is difficult," Yap says.

"Wheel has built a platform to efficiently attract health care providers and enable digital health companies to staff up quickly and flexibly," he said.

Whisper.ai: AI-powered hearing aids

Startup: Whisper.ai

VC: Ted Wang, Cowboy ventures

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $53 million

Headquarters: San Francisco

What it does: Whisper builds AI for voice recognition and uses it to power hearing aids, which distinguish spoken words from background noise.

Why it will boom in 2021: "The application of AI to hearing loss is an ideal fit," Wang said. Next year "will see the product rollout at scale and continue to increase its lead over conventional hearing aids."

Wyze: Internet-enabled smart homes devices

Startup: Wyze

VC: Scott Jacobson, Madrona

Relationship: No relation. VC just thinks it's cool.

Total funding raised: $36.30 million

Headquarters: Kirkland, WA

What it does: Best known for selling a $20 smart home camera, Wyze is now expanding into other internet-connected home devices.

Why it will boom in 2021: Wyze boasts a "strong team, great product at a great price and awesome growth," Jacobson said.

• Even if it arrives late, a thoughtful gift like calming tea or an aromatherapy diffuser will be much appreciated for anyone feeling burned out or in need of some self-care.
• If you're looking for more inspiration, check out our gift guides for curated recommendations.
• Sign up for Insider Reviews' weekly newsletter for more buying advice and great deals.

Sleep can be a delicious respite from the day's stressors or an uncomfortable challenge of endless tossing and turning. Many of us can experience both at different times in our lives, so we can all appreciate a gift that helps us rest more. 

Whether they're a new parent, a semi-professional napper, or a rise-with-the-sun morning person, everyone's sleep quality could be improved. Put your loved ones on the path to dreamland with gifts designed to soothe them. 

We included multiple retailers where possible in case one store offers faster shipping, though we don't think your loved one will mind too much if their favorite gift arrives after Christmas.

The 23 best sleep gifts for a restorative and relaxing slumber:

A meditation app with soothing content

Subscription to Calm, from $14.99/month

Meditation can slow down racing minds, and the Calm app curates guided meditations to suit personal needs. A subscription to Calm gives access to a library of bedtime stories and meditations geared towards the user's preferences. This app is likely to help even the most restless people sleep deeper.

A journal for curious dreamers

Dreamer's Journal: An Illustrated Guide to the Subconscious, available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble, from $16.98

If you have a friend who claims prophetic powers or loves introspection, a dream journal can encourage them to explore their subconscious mind. With illustrated prompts and a guide to common dream symbolism, this journal is an adventure into the unknown.

An aromatherapy diffuser

SpaRoom Ultrasonic Essential Oil Diffuser, available at Bed Bath and Beyond and Wayfair, from $39.99

The simplicity of this aromatherapy diffuser makes it perfect for before bedtime. The 5-ounce water tank runs continuously for five hours or intermittently for 10. All you need to do is add a few drops of essential oils and the soothing mist will run throughout the night. We appreciate the functionality of this diffuser in small spaces.

*Gift may arrive after Christmas.

An affordable and effective sleep mask

Natural Silk Sleep Mask, available at Amazon, $9.99

A low price doesn't have to mean low quality, and Alaska Bear's sleep mask is one of our favorites. The high-quality silk mask comes in one- and two-strap models, securely blocking out light without irritating skin all night long.

A small but powerful white noise machine

LectroFan High Fidelity White Noise Machine, available at Amazon and Bed Bath and Beyond, from $49.99

Don't let the practical nature of this gift fool you. This compact machine produces blanketing white noise, canceling out street noise with fan sounds at various intensities. For anyone trying to get a good night's sleep in a noisy space (who isn't?), we can't recommend this product highly enough.

A soothing body balm

Rich Body Balm, available at Blade and Bloom, $28

Bring the spa home with a frankincense and amber scented body balm. The shea butter, coconut oil, and sweet almond oil absorb easily into the skin for long-lasting moisture.

*Gift may arrive after Christmas.

An extra-soft throw blanket

Fleece Blanket Throw, available at Amazon, $23.99

Treat a loved one to softness and warmth this year with a microfiber fleece throw blanket. Available in five sizes and 30 different colors, this lightweight blanket fits seamlessly into any decor.

A weighted blanket for all night comfort

Weighted Comforter, available at Brooklinen, $249

As the popularity of weighted blankets soars, this product is sure to be on wish lists everywhere. The Brooklinen weighted comforter can replace regular bed covers, eliminating the need for layered blankets. We recommend also using a machine-washable duvet cover because the comforter itself is dry clean only.

A relaxation set for tea lovers

David's Tea Relaxation Kit, available at David's Tea, $28.50

Sweet Dreams Tea Sachet Variety Pack, available at David's Tea, $12.50

Herbal tea is a favorite bedtime beverage for its soothing properties. With three flavors of loose leaf tea infusions, an eye mask, and a small teacup, this kit is almost like spa vacation in a box for tea lovers. Or to help them find their next favorite, you can give them a variety pack with four soothing flavors.

*Editor's note: Gift may arrive after Christmas.

A story collection for bedtime reading

Best American Short Stories 2020, available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Target, from $13.20 

Two tenants of sleep hygiene are limiting screen time before bed and cultivating a winding down routine. With a short story collection, readers can go through one story a night, creating a screen-free bedtime habit. There are endless options, but the annual Best American Short Stories series is a great place to start.

A pillow spray for sweet dreams

Deep Sleep Pillow Spray, available at Amazon and Ulta, from $25

The spray is vegan and made of cruelty-free ingredients like lavender, vetivert, and chamomile to help relax busy minds as soon as they hit the pillow.

A healthy hot cocoa

Cacao Wellness Blend, available at Golde, $29

Help them realize the dream of healthy hot cocoa with this cacao wellness blend made with turmeric and coconut. It will make them feel all sorts of warm and cozy.

*Gift may arrive after Christmas.

A cult favorite pillowcase

19 Momme Silk Pillowcase, available at LilySilk, $20 

Add some luxury to their bedtime with a high-quality silk pillowcase, featuring an envelope closure and hand-washing instructions. When we reviewed this pillowcase, we found that hot sleepers felt cooler, and testers with a variety of hair textures all noticed decreased frizz.

*Editor's note: Gift may arrive after Christmas.

A more natural alarm clock

Phillips SmartSleep Wake-Up Light, available at Amazon, $99.95

Night owls and early birds alike will love the soothing alarm clock alternative of this simulated sunrise and sunset. Though there's no app (which is good because it's one less device before bedtime), the SmartSleep's manual controls are simple to use and allow some customization.

It's one of our top picks in our wake up alarm clock guide, and our tester felt the mood-enhancing benefits of the light and felt more refreshed the morning after testing it.

A luxurious candle

Chandelier, available at Otherland, $36

This beautiful candle has notes of bubbly, saffron, and leather for a not-too-sweet scent that's perfect for cozy nights in.

*Editor's note: Gift may arrive after Christmas.

A pair of cozy socks

Women's Sweater Knit Sherpa Lined Slipper Socks, available at Target, $10

Give them the gift of toasty toes with a pair of sherpa-lined slipper socks. As if the multi-colored knit and festive patterns weren't cute enough, each pair has pom-poms dangling off the cuff for extra flair.

An everyday and night pair of pajamas

Jambys Pajamas, available at Jambys, from $35

For loungewear lovers, Jambys offers pajama separates that effortlessly go between work and sleep from home. Its gender-inclusive styles aren't restrictive or heat-retaining, making them hard to give up when the day starts.

*Editor's note: Gift may arrive after Christmas.

A star sign pillow

Zodiac Trait Throw Pillow, available at Urban Outfitters, $49

The astrology believer will love going to sleep with a pillow that really gets them. The cotton fabric is printed with bold text and relevant star sign symbols.

*Editor's note: Gift may arrive after Christmas.

A midnight snack

Soft Baked Cookies Variety Pack, available at Partake Foods, $14.99

Almost everyone can enjoy the chewy deliciousness of Partake cookies, made without common allergens like gluten, nuts, and soy. The variety pack includes cookie butter, chocolate chip, and triple chocolate cookies just waiting to be part of a midnight snack.

*Editor's note: Gift may arrive after Christmas.

A soft and durable pair of sheets

Pima Cotton Percale Sheet Set, available at L.L.Bean, from $109

There is nothing better than sinking into bed with amazing sheets, and L.L.Bean's 280-thread-count set is the best we've tried. The fabric is breathable, crisp, and holds up after multiple washes for long-lasting quality worth the price.

*Editor's note: Gift may arrive after Christmas.

A quality travel pillow

Cabeau Evolution Travel Pillow, available at Amazon, REI, and Bed Bath and Beyond, from $29.99

For couch nappers or plane sleepers, a supportive travel pillow is a must-have to avoid neck stiffness. The Cabeau pillow comes in 7 colors with a compact travel case and a strap to attach to uncomfortable headrests.

An adjustable star projector

BlissLights Laser Star Projector, available at Amazon, Bed Bath and Beyond, and The Home Depot, from $49.99

The lucky stargazer can fall asleep under drifting galaxies with this home projector. They can use the adjustable brightness and tilting base to suit their preferences, and the 1-year warranty ensures the magic won't stop anytime soon.

A onesie for grown-ups

Unisex Adult Onesie, available at MeUndies, $78 ($62 for members)

If they won't buy one for themselves, help them take the leap into comfort with a MeUndies adult onesie. Made from sustainably sourced natural fibers, this zip-up one-piece comes in four solid colors and 12 different patterns. Once they put it on, they'll never take it off.

*Editor's note: Gift may arrive after Christmas.

Tiny-living startup Jupe just released new images of its sci-fi inspired portable shelters, or "cosmos-inspired urban escape pods," which are now available to preorder.

The company was founded by Jeff Wilson, an ex-IBM project manager known for living in a dumpster for a year and later creating the Kasita tiny home. With designers from Tesla, SpaceX, and Airbnb, Jupe is a portable prefab shelter that can go just about anywhere. Individual owners can bring their Jupe to remote locations for COVID-safe getaways, or Airbnb hosts could add additional units to properties with high demand.

Read more: Elon Musk and other tech powerhouses are flocking to Texas, pushing an already bonkers real-estate market to new heights. Take a look inside Austin, which is quickly becoming the next Silicon Valley.

"The desire to get out of the cities that we've seen over the past decade and the acceleration of that trend during the pandemic has drained short-term stay inventory for those that want to experience nature,"Wilson said in a statement."Further, the recent success of the IPOs in this space and the off-the-charts demand to 'stay close' make the timing for short-term stay products like Jupe impeccable."

Jupe is now available for preorder for $99, with a total cost of $17,500. The company notes that the price is only about a fifth of the price of an average Airstream RV. Jupe will produce the units at its 10,000 square foot Los Angeles factory, beginning to fulfill orders by March 2021.

Take a look at the tiny prefab shelter here.

SEE ALSO: This California company leases backyards for 99 years to build tiny homes and rent them at affordable rates to fight the housing crisis

Jupe is made of interconnected aluminum masts that provide support for the geometric shape that's designed to be reminiscent of an "interstellar shuttle."

The sides are made of fire-resistant canvas, while the floor is wood tiling.

Jupe designers said that the structure was designed as "a work of art rather than a simple dwelling."

Though it's only 111 square feet inside, Jupe feels surprisingly roomy, with 11 foot-tall ceilings. There's enough room for a queen-size bed, a desk, chair, and ottoman.

The floor also opens up into storage cubes, totaling more than 38 cubic feet of storage space.

The front window can open into a large panorama to take in views.

Each unit comes with solar panels, a 200 Ah battery system, and WiFi router, with the option to add on dimmable LED lighting and a Sonos speaker with Alexa.

The Jupe can be flat-packed down onto the base frame for easy transportation.

It can be reassembled anywhere, even off the grid, thanks to solar power and batteries.

• Hulu has great holiday content to stream, including several romantic comedies, animated movies, and even a Christmas-themed horror flick.
• A basic ad-supported Hulu subscription runs $5.99 a month, while Hulu's ad-free option is double the price at $11.99 a month.
• Both give you access to all the content below, plus Hulu's entire streaming catalog.
• See also: The 15 best Christmas movies on Disney Plus you can stream right now

If you've been busy trimming your tree, putting up twinkly lights, and jamming to Jingle Bell Rock, you're probably ready to curl up with a cup of hot cocoa to watch your favorite Christmas movies. Thankfully, there's a ton of holiday content to stream on Hulu right now.

We've rounded up the best holiday offerings on Hulu to help you cut down on tedious decision making so you can focus on warm and fuzzy, feel good, deck-the-halls Christmas movie binging. Our picks have been selected to represent a range of genres and tastes — from animated films and new releases to dramas and romantic comedies, including a few cheesy picks that are sure to be guilty pleasures.  

Don't have Hulu yet? We've got you covered. While a Hulu Basic subscription might serve you ads, it's one of the cheapest streaming services on the market at just $5.99 a month. Since I can't stand ads, I recommend upgrading to Hulu Premium, so you can stream uninterrupted. It's a bit of a price jump at $11.99 a month, but I've never regretted it. You can even package Hulu with Disney Plus and ESPN+ for a discounted bundle rate.

Updated on 12/21/2020 by Steven Cohen: Added new picks and removed movies that are no longer available on Hulu.

Here are the top 13 Christmas movies currently streaming on Hulu:

SEE ALSO: The best Christmas movies that Prime members can watch for free right now on Amazon Prime Video

'Happiest Season'

This new holiday rom-com comes from director Clea Duvall, and features an impressive ensemble cast with Kristen Stewart, Mackenzie Davis, Alison Brie, Dan Levy, Mary Steenburgen, and Victor Garber. The film follows Abby (Stewart) and her girlfriend Harper (Davis) as they travel to Harper's hometown for the holidays. Though Abby plans to propose during the trip, she soon discovers that Harper hasn't come out to her family yet.

"Happiest Season" has received positive reviews from critics and audiences alike. The movie currently holds an "83% Fresh" on review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes and a score of 69 out of 100 on Metacritic. — Steven Cohen, Technology Editor 

'How to Train Your Dragon: Homecoming'

If you're looking for an animated family program to watch around Christmas, you should check out this holiday special from the "How to Train Your Dragon" franchise. Set after the events of the third movie, the short film focuses on the familiar cast of characters as they put on a holiday pageant to tell the story of the friendship between vikings and dragons. Jay Baruchel, America Ferrera, and Craig Ferguson reprise their roles from the earlier films. 

If you're not caught up on the series yet, the third movie, "How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World," is also available to stream on Hulu. — Steven Cohen, Technology Editor 

'The Man Who Invented Christmas'

"The Man Who Invented Christmas" reveals the story behind the creation of one of the most popular holiday stories ever told, "A Christmas Carol." The movie follows Charles Dickens (Dan Stevens) as he struggles to write the classic tale, using inspiration from his life to help shape the plot and characters. Though not entirely accurate, the movie's whimsical take on Dickens' life received positive reviews, and currently holds a "79% Fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes. — Steven Cohen, Technology Editor 

'The Spirit of Christmas'

Cheesy holiday romance films are a guilty pleasure of mine around the holidays. My girlfriend and I like to binge a few of these with a nice bottle of wine and, though my expectations are often low, every now and then one of these flicks actually surprises me. "The Spirit of Christmas" is one of them. 

The movie focuses on a lawyer, Kate, who falls in love with a ghost who haunts the bed and breakfast she's trying to sell. Yes, that sounds sort of ridiculous, but the plot, which sees the lovers attempt to solve the ghost's murder, is engaging and the performances are convincing. The movie is not likely to win any Oscars, but if you're someone who usually rolls their eyes at films like this, you may be pleasantly surprised by the solid storytelling. — Steven Cohen, Technology Editor 

'Saturday Night Live Christmas Special'

This collection of SNL's best holiday sketches will get you laughing and keep those winter blues at bay. It includes Alec Baldwin talking about his favorite holiday treat, Schweddy Balls; Andy Samberg and Justin Timberlake singing about the best Christmas gift of all time — you know the one; a TV Funhouse sketch that shows what it's like to be Jewish during Christmastime; and so many more.

'12 Dog Days Til Christmas'

A troubled teen sentenced to community service at a dog shelter helps find homes for unadopted strays and, in the process, discovers romance, family, and responsibility for himself.

'A Very Brady Christmas'

Getting any family together for the holidays is a difficult task, but with six kids, the Brady's have it even tougher. But "A Very Brady Christmas" sees the now adult Marsha, Jan, Cindy, Greg, Peter, and Bobby back home for the holidays in spite of all their personal drama. The entire original cast — sans Susan Olsen, the original Cindy — reunited in this 1988 family film.

'Second Chance Christmas'

Unhappy in her marriage, Caroline is on her way to file for divorce when an accident causes her to lose her memory. Her husband Jack, with the help of some holiday magic, helps her fall in love with him all over again.

'Every Other Holiday'

Tracie allows her ex-husband back into the house for the holidays to fulfill her children's wishes of one more Christmas together as a family. But as the magic of the season brings the family closer together, she discovers that maybe the spark of their relationship isn't extinguished after all.

'Deck the Halls'

Eight-year-old Ben notices that his new neighbor moves in with a sleigh and a red suit. Suspecting him to be Santa Claus, he tries to set up his widowed mother who is working for a toy business with the big man himself.

'Pooka!'

A struggling actor gets hired to wear a plush suit to promote Pooka, the hottest toy of the Christmas season. But as he spends more time in the suit, it slowly takes over his personality until it possesses him entirely. This holiday thriller is a Hulu Original.

'Christmas Belle'

Haylie Duff stars in this holiday romance about an auctioneer named Belle who takes on a job working on an estate sale. Though her client, Hunter, seems unfriendly at first, the two soon develop a budding relationship. — Steven Cohen, Technology Editor 

'Holiday in Handcuffs'

It's days until Christmas and Trudie has just lost her job and been dumped by her boyfriend. Desperate to save face and please her overbearing parents, she kidnaps a handsome gentleman and forces him to pose as her boyfriend for the holidays. Melissa Joan Hart and Mario Lopez star.

Read more about Hulu on Insider Reviews:

• How to get the Disney+ bundle with ESPN+ and the ad-free version of Hulu
• 20 must-see Hulu original TV shows to add to your streaming queue
• A complete price breakdown for Hulu and Hulu Live TV packages — here's everything you need to know
• How to watch live TV on Hulu and how much it costs
• I pay $12 a month for the ad-free version of Hulu even though it costs twice as much as a basic subscription, and I have no regrets

Every day, we round up the 5 best deals and bargains available on tech, home goods, fashion, and more. 

We've sorted this list with the best deals first. The prices and discounts are accurate at the time of publication but are subject to change without warning. For even more deals and savings across the web, check out the best online deals and sales happening now and Business Insider Coupons.

1. Apple Airpods with Charging Case (2nd Generation)

AirPods with Charging Case (medium, Preferred: Micro Center)

Learn more about every model of AirPods and how much they cost here.

2. Katamari Damacy REROLL

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Find more great games in our guide to the 29 best games on Playstation 4 here.

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Learn more in our guide to the best instant cameras here.

• An air mattress is a convenient and comfortable option for unexpected visits, sleepovers, and camping trips.
• The SoundAsleep Dream Series Air Mattress (Queen) is our top pick because it's the most comfortable, provides great back support, and the company has excellent customer service.

An air mattress can be a great investment for those who like to be prepared for unexpected visits, sleepovers, and spontaneous trips. It can be set up quickly and stored easily, but still comfortable enough for a good night's rest. An air mattress is also a good option if you like camping but find sleeping on the ground or a camping pad uncomfortable.

As a sleep researcher with two years of experience studying sleep, running a sleep lab, and reviewing sleep products, I've seen firsthand the importance of getting a good night's sleep — no matter the circumstances. Well-rested people experience a better mood, more energy, and enjoy their surroundings more; something we can all appreciate while traveling or staying the night away from home. Improper sleep could potentially have an impact on your guests' social interaction or even ruin their mood for the rest of the day. As the host, you'll want to provide your guests with an enjoyable option to make them feel right at home so they can wake up feeling their best. The same applies to nature-lovers who need to wake up feeling refreshed and ready for their camping adventures. 

To find out what makes a good air mattress, I interviewed sleep expert Bill Fish, president of OneCare media, which runs several major sleep product review sites like sleepfoundation.org, sleep.org, and tuck.com (of which he is founder). Fish has tested thousands of sleep products over many years. "Spinal alignment is key to getting a good night of sleep, and an air mattress is no different. If you can achieve spinal alignment, you will wake up feeling refreshed," Fish said. This applies to both regular mattresses and air mattresses: A scientific systematic review found that individuals who slept with straight spinal alignment (similar to standing), also reported better sleep quality. 

The key with an air mattress, he said, "is finding a product where the quality is enough to maintain enough pressure so you do not 'bottom out' either when stationary or rolling over." According to the same scientific systematic review, a medium-firm air mattress tends to result in better sleep quality. With that in mind, we tested four of the most popular air mattresses on the market and evaluated each of them on their firmness, comfort, durability, and ease of use. You can read more about our testing methodology, as well as tips for caring for and cleaning your air mattress below. 

Here are the best air mattresses

• Best overall: SoundAsleep Dream Series Air Mattress (Queen)
• Best for camping: REI Co-op Kingdom Insulated Sleep System 40 (Queen)
• Best on a budget: Intex Pillow Rest Raised Airbed (Queen)
• Best with an automatic pump: Insta-Bed Raised Air Mattress (Queen)

Prices and links are current as of 12/21/2020. We rewrote this guide and selected new products based on extensive research, expert interviews, and testing.

SEE ALSO: The best mattress toppers

The best air mattress overall

Sleeping on the SoundAsleep Dream Series Air Mattress (Queen) feels like you're resting on a giant soft pillow; it's a durable, comfortable option for in-home use.

Pros: Raised 19 inches off the ground for easy access in and out of bed, extremely comfortable, inflates quickly, built-in pump, comes with storage bag and patch kit, great customer service 

Cons: Not designed for everyday use

The SoundAsleep Dream Series Air Mattress (Queen) is one of the most popular air mattresses on the market because of its comfort, high-quality materials, and great customer service. The mattress is designed with 40 discs on the surface that the company calls "air coils," since they're meant to mimic the firmness and bounce of a spring mattress. The "coils" ensure a balanced distribution of air throughout the mattress as it inflates. It's made with eco-friendly polyvinyl chloride (PVC), which makes it extra durable, waterproof, and long-lasting. It can hold up to 500 pounds; a good size for two people to comfortably sleep on. 

Setting up the SoundAsleep air mattress was so simple. The Queen-sized air mattress inflated relatively quietly and in under four minutes. The pump is built into the mattress, so all you have to do is plug it in and set the dial to inflate until you've reached your desired firmness. If this is your first air mattress, there are step-by-step video instructions on the brand's website demonstrating how to set it up, top it up, fold it, and even how to repair and patch the air mattress in case of punctures.

The bottom of the air mattress has a grippy material to make sure it stays in place, and the whole mattress is made with puncture-resistant material. While it did have the new mattress plastic/chemical odor that I've encountered with most air mattresses, the smell disappeared after only a couple of hours of airing it out and was less noticeable than with others I tested. 

I inflated it to my preferred firmness and slept very comfortably without waking up in the middle of the night. It feels like any traditional mattress; it was so comfortable that I almost forgot I was sleeping on an air mattress until I woke up. Its soft, velvety surface prevented my deep pocket sheets from slipping off, and also helped maintain the right temperature throughout the night; I never got too cold or too hot, as can sometimes be an issue with air mattresses since there isn't much insulation between you and the air. It's raised 19 inches off the ground, which is a good height for easily climbing out of bed in the morning.

I had to give it a brief top-up before bed on the last night of testing, but I didn't notice any air loss during the first couple of nights. Deflating the mattress after the last night took approximately four minutes, and the integrated cord storage and carrying bag are convenient additions. 

Overall, the SoundAsleep Dream Series Air Mattress is a fantastic option for in-home use; it was the best air mattress we tested because of its simplicity and the extraordinary level of comfort. There really aren't many negative things to say about it. However, no matter how much I was tempted to continue sleeping on it, you have to keep in mind that this air mattress is not designed for everyday use in place of a traditional bed. SoundAsleep warns users that everyday use will degrade the mattress and is not covered under the warranty.

The best air mattress for camping

The REI Co-op Kingdom Insulated Sleep System 40 (Queen) is extremely well-insulated and made with high-quality materials that will keep you warm and comfortable while you're camping. 

Pros: Easy-to-use hand pump, insulated system for warmth, firm, does not deflate during the night

Cons: Very bulky compared to typical camping items, which might limit how and where you carry it

If you don't want to give up quality sleep while camping, the REI Co-op Kingdom Insulated Sleep System 40 (Queen) is definitely the best option for a camping-specific air mattress. This air mattress is intended to keep you warm through temperatures as low as 40 degrees. It's made from 100% polyester with an eco-friendly thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) laminate and the bottom contains a polyurethane coating for high durability and weather resistance. It includes a machine-washable mattress cover and top sheet made of polyester so you don't need to worry about bringing a sleeping bag. It also has a 600-pound weight capacity and an included hand pump for electricity-free inflation. 

The REI air mattress doesn't come with a set of instructions, however, it's very intuitive and easy to use and REI offers assistance on its website and by phone.

Although it's completely PVC-free, it still emits a mild odor when first unpacked, but the smell dissipates once it airs out for a few hours. Inflating it with the hand pump was a little laborious considering I have very little upper body strength, but it honestly wasn't as difficult as I expected and only took 12 minutes to fully inflate (including a couple of breaks between pumping). The inflation hose is conveniently long enough to pump from outside of your tent, in the chance that the air mattress occupies your entire tent footprint. Overall it was easy to assemble and took me approximately 20 minutes to set it up entirely with the included sheets and mattress cover. 

I slept surprisingly well on this air mattress; it's very comfortable and cozy. The coffee-colored sheets are soft and warm and the quilted mattress cover has a durable water-repellent finish. The sheets and cover have elastic straps that fit around the bottom of the air mattress to secure them and to prevent drafts — they never fell off during the night. This air mattress is firm, which is great for proper spine alignment and a good night's rest, even outdoors. It didn't make any noise whatsoever when I moved around and it lost very little air, if any, during the four nights that I slept on it. The hand-pump has an option to deflate the air mattress, but I found it easier to simply open the valves and let it deflate as I rolled it up and packed it into the included storage bag. 

The rectangular-shaped air mattress is only six inches thick and very lightweight for an air mattress at just 15 pounds. However, while this may be light compared to other air mattresses, it's on the bulky side for camping gear and is probably too heavy for hiking and backcountry camping. I recommend investing in this air mattress if you enjoy backyard or car camping, but don't want to have to give up a good night's sleep. It's also a good system to have around for at-home use or in situations where you might not have access to electricity, such as in a rural cabin.

The best air mattress on a budget

The Intex Pillow Rest Raised Airbed (Queen) is an affordable option that will still provide great support and comfort for occasional use. 

Pros: Comfortable, affordable price, lightweight

Cons: Low to the ground, built-in pillow bar might be uncomfortable for some, limited 90-day warranty, takes a few days for the chemical smell to dissipate, moves a bit during the night

At less than half the price of any other mattress we tried, the Intex Pillow Rest Raised Airbed (Queen) is quite inexpensive, but will still provide your guests with a solid surface to sleep on. This mattress is made with a built-in pillow bar and composed of thousands of high-strength polyester fibers which provide stability and support. The top is covered in a velvety material for extra comfort and the mattress has a weight capacity of 600 pounds, so two people can sleep on it. It has an internal electric pump, but can also be inflated manually with a properly-sized hand pump. 

The mattress comes with easy instructions and inflates with the switch of a button. It took less than four minutes to lay out and inflate and I was able to adjust it to my desired level of firmness by turning the dial. The indented sides are positioned to keep sheets in place, and my deep pocket bed sheets did not slip off during the night. The new mattress plastic/chemical odor was stronger than the other air mattresses I tested but slowly decreased after a couple of days. It's also very easy to move up and down the stairs and to different rooms because it's only about 16 pounds; one of the lightest we tested. However, since it's so lightweight, it also moved a lot during the night. 

Sleeping on this air mattress for the first two nights was actually very comfortable. The firmness is good and the surface is very cushiony. It's raised 16.5 inches from the ground, making it slightly more difficult to get in and out of than some other models we tried. By the third night, it had lost a noticeable amount of air so I had to re-inflate it again to reach my preferred firmness. The ambient temperature also dropped significantly on the last night and I noticed that the air mattress, even with the sheets on, felt colder than usual. The built-in pillow rest sounds like a great idea, but it creates too much elevation and is too firm; it definitely does not compare to the comfort of a real pillow. By the second night, I had no choice but to sleep with my own soft pillows.

Deflating the Intex Pillow Rest Raised Airbed took less than four minutes and it also comes with a convenient storage bag. The air mattress fits perfectly fine in the bag when folded. Considering the price, this is the best option for occasional use; it's very comfortable for one or two nights, just make sure you provide your guests with a couple of pillows and an extra blanket.

The best air mattress with an automatic pump

The Insta-Bed Raised Air Mattress is built with two internal pumps that constantly adjust the air pressure throughout the night to ensure that you never wake up flat on the floor. 

Pros: Pump automatically shuts off when the mattress is inflated, secondary pump makes sure the air mattress stays inflated through the night

Cons: Larger and heavier than most air mattresses, automatic pump makes noise throughout the night 

The Insta-Bed Raised Air Mattress (Queen) is constructed with a top layer of pierce-resistant PVC, making it water-resistant and extra durable. It's built with 35 circular coils to provide a balanced and supportive surface. Its weight limit is 500 pounds and can hold up to two people. 

The primary built-in pump inflates the mattress to your preferred firmness, allowing you to choose from three different options — plush, medium, or firm. The primary pump automatically shuts off when the air mattress has reached your desired inflation. What makes this air mattress particularly unique is the secondary pump system that monitors air levels and quietly maintains the air mattress at your chosen level of firmness throughout the night. It's built with 35 circular coils to provide a balanced and supportive surface. 

Setting up the Insta-Bed Raised Air Mattress was the most effortless experience of all the air mattresses I tested. All I had to do was unpack, plug it in, and turn the NeverFlat dial to my desired firmness level — I chose medium. The pump is loud compared to the other air mattresses, but I was able to leave it alone and wait in a different room thanks to the auto shut-off feature. It only took around four minutes to completely inflate. 

My sheets fit well on this air mattress and I had no issues with them slipping off during the night. It had a very strong and supportive surface that was comfortable to sleep on. I slept really well on this air mattress without ever having to worry about it deflating, and it's raised 19 inches from the ground, so it was easy to climb in and out. That said, it's also a little on the heavy side, weighing 22 pounds. 

Some users might find the secondary pump somewhat bothersome when it's plugged in. I didn't have an issue with it but I recommend sleeping on the opposite side of the pump if you think you'll be disturbed by a subtle buzzing, or you can also choose to unplug it completely. Deflating the Insta-Bed works the same as inflating; just set the dial to deflate, wait around three minutes for it to completely collapse, fold it, and pack it inside the included carry bag. It's a great air mattress and, as a bonus, it also comes in four different colors — gray, white, tan, and plaid.

Our testing methodology

In order to determine the best air mattress on the market, I used my knowledge of sleep science from two years in sleep research and implemented what I learned from sleep expert Bill Fish, president of OneCare media, on how to properly test air mattresses. I slept on every air mattress in this guide for at least four consecutive nights.

During the testing period, here's what I looked for in the best air mattresses: 

Inflation: I took notes of the unboxing process for each air mattress, including how easy it was to assemble (if necessary) and whether or not the product came with instructions. I also timed how long each air mattress took to inflate and noted whether or not the air mattress emitted any strong chemical odors.

Firmness: This was the most important factor since a good air mattress should be firm enough to support you throughout the night. I paid close attention to any air loss over the course of four nights and took notes on my own sleep quality and how refreshed I felt after waking up. 

Comfort: I noted how comfortable each air mattress was to sleep on over four nights, including any major issues with temperature regulation. I also recorded whether or not the air mattresses made any noise when I moved, or whether my pillow and sheets fell off during the night. I also considered how easy it was to climb in and out of each mattress.

Durability: At the end of the four days of sleeping on each air mattress, I used an uncapped pen to test the durability of the air mattress by poking it in three different places and noting if it punctured. Fortunately, all the air mattresses passed this test. 

Deflating/packing up: I recorded how long it took for each air mattress to deflate. I assessed the difficulty of folding up and packing the air mattress into its respective carry bag, and also noted the ease of storage considering its weight and size. 

Size and special features: In addition to testing out any special features, such as insulated sheets or double pumps, I also noted the dimensions of each air mattress, including length, width, and height, both when fully inflated and when packed up and stored. I also noted each mattresses' weight and method of inflation.

What we're looking forward to testing

Here are some air mattresses we didn't get to test this time but are looking forward to testing for future updates:

• AeroBed Air Mattress for Kids ($59.99): This air mattress is designed with a safety cushion to prevent children from rolling off the edge at night. It's potentially a good option for kids ages four and up who might be too small for a traditional air mattress and need a little more personalized support. It even includes a thick, washable fitted mattress pad with a moon and star design.
• Coleman Air Mattress With Built-In Pump (Queen) ($133.99): We didn't get a chance to test out the Coleman Air Mattress, but we're looking forward to trying it since it's one of the most popular air mattresses and has similar features to our top pick, the SoundAsleep Dream Series Air Mattress. Coleman's customer service is apparently also top-notch and this model includes a quick-release valve for faster deflation, something that the SoundAsleep does not have. I'm looking forward to comparing this one to our top pick.

Air mattress care and cleaning

An air mattress won't last you as long as your regular mattress, and you shouldn't expect it to — most air mattresses are designed for occasional use and should not be used to replace an actual mattress. Here are some tips to extend the life of your air mattress: 

Store in a mild, dry place: Most manufacturers advise against using or storing your air mattress in below-freezing temperatures to avoid tears and cracks. You should also avoid exposing your air mattress to direct sunlight for long periods of time. 

Be gentle: As fun as it might sound, avoid jumping or flopping on your air mattress, as it could damage the material or cause tears. When you're setting up your air mattress, make sure to lay it out on a clean floor or carpet and look out for any sharp objects on the floor that might puncture it.

Expect a break-in period: Due to the elastic materials, you might think that the air mattress is losing air during the first couple of uses. There's nothing wrong with your air mattress: it usually takes a few inflations for it to completely stretch to its full shape. Manufacturers recommend inflating your brand new air mattress a few hours before using it and then topping it off before sleeping on it. 

Keep it clean: In order to keep your air mattress clean, it's always a good idea to sleep on it with a fitted bed sheet. However, accidents are bound to happen, and air mattresses can get dusty during prolonged storage. To clean your air mattress, first lay it out flat on the floor and use a handheld vacuum to remove any crumbs and dust on the surface. To remove stains, you can inflate the air mattress, unplug it, and then use a soft cloth and a mild soapy solution to wash it. Don't use any harsh chemicals or cleaning products as they could damage the air mattress. 

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It's difficult to imagine what 2021 has in store, after a pandemic-ravaged 2020.

But when it comes to the healthcare industry, investors are predicting certain events and trends are bound to transpire in the coming year. 

In 2020, the healthcare industry from biotech to diagnostics to digital health sprang into action to confront the pandemic. It led to a record year of funding, initial public offerings, and triumphs in scientific discovery and development with the arrival of coronavirus vaccines in less than a year.

We spoke to 29 VCs at 26 top firms about what the next year has in store for the healthcare industry. 

Their predictions included:

• Concerns about the staying power of young startups during an uncertain period
• Expectations for more healthcare companies to go public
• New areas of investment, including businesses that aren't traditionally thought of as healthcare
• An industry — and even national governments — more willing to adopt technology that helps share health data
• Increased attention on areas where healthcare falls short, including mental healthcare

.... and more. 

One thing's for sure at the end of 2020: The now-$3.8 trillion healthcare industry will never be the same. 

Read on to see what top healthcare investors predict will unfold in 2021. 

CRV's Kristin Baker Spohn says the pandemic will drive employers to ramp up childcare and other family-focused benefits to relieve employee burnout.

2020 has done a number on the nation's mental health.

Americans are stressed, lonely, and more than 40% of people reported symptoms of anxiety or depressive disorder in November.

CRV partner Kristin Baker Spohn predicted that employers will look for ways to prevent burnout by offering support for childcare and other family benefits.

Spohn said employee burnout has been on the rise, and a number of employers have invested in workers' mental health. But companies are increasingly looking to help their employees with the underlying causes of their stressors.

For many millennial employees, burnout comes from juggling the responsibilities of working while simultaneously raising children and caring for aging parents.

"There's already been significant stress and requirements for this generation, and I think that the pandemic has accelerated or heightened that need to support folks better," she said.

A lot of the burden falls on women, who are often forced to leave jobs to take care of their families. Nearly 2.2 million women left the workforce between February and October, according to an analysis by the National Women's Law Center.

Employers are starting to react to those stark statistics and ask how they can help, Spohn said. They're looking to companies like Cleo, which provides support for new parents and promises to improve engagement among employees. Spohn is an advisor to Cleo.  

— Shelby Livingston

The K-shaped economic recovery will highlight the importance of social determinants, so Maverick Ventures' Ambar Bhattacharyya is already looking for public health investments.

The economic recovery will stretch well into 2021. If the past year is any indication, however, those at the lowest levels of the US economy will continue to struggle while those at the top rebound relatively quickly.

The phenomenon is called a K-shaped recovery, where top earners, a minority, represent the top line of the K. The majority in lower level positions are the bottom line where they will struggle to recover quickly, if at all, without support.

Maverick Ventures' Ambar Bhattacharyya doesn't think those two lines will merge in the next year, drawing out the painful recession among America's low-wage workers while the stock market soars.

With a potentially split Congress, he is unsure what a future stimulus would look like, and whether it would meaningfully impact those that need it most.

US healthcare is closely tied to employment, meaning millions of Americans have lost or will lose health insurance because they are unemployed.

Beyond insurance, those on the bottom slope will also be subject to negative social determinants that widely impact healthcare outcomes. Things like nutritious food, access to clean air and water, or even a respite from daily stresses can massively impact the severity of some health conditions.

Bhattacharyya sees an opportunity for startups to swoop in and help address these problems, which now face even more Americans than before the coronavirus pandemic. 

"The same way mental health had its coming out moment in 2020, social determinants will have its coming out in 2021," Bhattacharyya told Business Insider.

Bhattacharyya thinks a set of solutions for social determinants will have to coexist. Fixing access to affordable housing, for example, presents its own unique set of issues and limitations than, say, making sure people have enough nutritious food to feed their families.

"People understand the magnitude of the recovery and how many people in the US are in need of housing, food, and all the other issues that relate to healthcare," Bhattacharyya said. "The pandemic heightened those issues, so that moment will unfortunately happen in the next few months."

— Megan Hernbroth

Accel partner Philippe Botteri expects patient data to come into the spotlight in 2021, after decades worth of digital transformation happened in the space of a few months in 2020.

2020 saw telemedicine facilitate remote medical consultations during lockdowns, and apps rolled out to track people infected with COVID-19, albeit sometimes imperfectly. 

At the same time, Accel's Philippe Botteri said that people have started using technology more to engage with their health, for example using apps and wearables that provide them with greater insight into their general wellbeing, including for sleep patterns, diet, and heart rhythms.

"All of these [apps and wearables] help people make their own decision on lifestyle choices, illness prevention and medicines," said Botteri.

He said that next year will also bring further digitization of healthcare on all fronts, from telehealth to more connected health services.

Botteri thinks that this increased engagement with health technology overall means real-time insights into people's health. 

"Data will come into the spotlight," Botteri told Business Insider. 

Services will then become more personalized as people demand more control over their healthcare experiences, he said.

— Dr. Catherine Schuster-Bruce

Microbiome drugs will come back in style in 2021, Venrock partner Racquel Bracken predicts.

The biotech industry has been enamored before with the mix of living microorganisms that live in our bodies. Scientists have been working for more than a decade on ways to create new therapeutics based on the microbiome.

There was "great fanfare" in 2015 and 2016 around the promise of the microbiome, Venrock partner Racquel Bracken said. Companies were pitching investors on visions of treating infectious diseases, cancer, and more. 

Seres Therapeutics became a leader in the space, raising $140 million in an IPO in 2015. But a couple of failures in the space led the narrative to rapidly swing. 

"It was kind of nothing works," Bracken said. "And now, I think we're seeing the tip of the iceberg again with some promising work out of Seres." 

Success has brought back some of that original enthusiasm back. Seres, for instance, has seen its stock price increase more than 600% this year after saying a late-stage study of its lead drug candidate made of purified stool bacteria succeeded.

"I think we'll continue to see success and clinical proof-of-concept in microbiome-based therapeutics," Bracken said. 

The venture capitalist has a pretty clear interest in hoping her prediction comes true: she's a lead investor in Federation Bio, a $50 million microbiome-based startup launched by Venrock in late-2020. 

— Andrew Dunn

Kleiner Perkins associate Annie Case thinks 2021 will be the year healthcare officially moves beyond the walls of a clinic.

There's little debate around that the pandemic introduced more patients to remote or virtual care. 

What is still debated is how long telemedicine will stick around.

Kleiner Perkins associate Annie Case doesn't think there's any use in going back to how things were in 2019. Enough patients have used virtual care, whether for a quick call with a primary care doctor or a more intensive visit with a specialist, that it will be hard to erase the habits they formed this year.

There have been shortcomings to a purely virtual approach, Case said, which became apparent when patients started returning to doctors' offices once states started easing restrictions. 

Over the next year, she predicts that hybrid models will become more popular with patients that need to see a care provider in person, but don't need to trek all the way to a doctors' office to do so.

That's the case with MedArrive, a portfolio company Case invested in. The company deploys a national network of EMTs and paramedics to patients' homes while a doctor checks in virtually through a video call.

"We're in the very early days of figuring out what the future of the unbundled hospital could look like," Case told Business Insider. "In many cases, what can't be met with a telemedicine approach can work in the home, especially for the most vulnerable populations."

Hospitals will still be grappling with strained resources, both in labor and funds, going into next year. That could make treatment outside the hospital appealing for doctors in addition to patients, who value convenience, Case said.

Telemedicine also helps improve healthcare access to patients that are either widely dispersed, as is the case in rural counties, or have been historically underserved by the existing healthcare system. The populations have substantially different needs, whether it's an older patient with multiple conditions or a transgender patient who's been denied care. Bringing care back into the communities could substantially improve the experience for those patients, Case said.

"Unlike cord-cutting, there isn't a shared culture around the experience of healthcare, it's more of a reflection of your identity and your needs," Case said of the larger unbundling trend. "It's easier than ever to enable those experiences now with telemedicine adoption being what it is."

— Megan Hernbroth

Balderton Capital general partner Suranga Chandratillake anticipates governments will be quicker to adopt digital tools to help make their healthcare systems run smoother.

The pandemic has exposed how differently health systems around the world respond to a pandemic, Balderton Capital general partner Suranga Chandratillake said. 

"The lack of a shared infrastructure hurt the US. The regional variation of health provision in the UK affected its response," he said.  

On the other hand, the federal provision allowed Germany to have a highly varied and therefore successful response, he added.

"What came out of the situation time and time again, though, was that where a system was digital and where it was truly widespread systems could be deployed quickly, change could happen rapidly and the virus' spread stopped," Chandratillake said. He provided South Korea's successful track and trace system as an example. 

Chandratillake said that this has meant that return on investment on these systems has become very clear during 2020, and he expects governments across the world to invest in them in 2021.

"This will be a huge boom for both those already working in this space and a generation of new start-ups that will rise to meet the challenges," he said.

— Dr. Catherine Schuster-Bruce

There are more companies like Livongo on the way, and their future doesn't depend on mergers and acquisitions, CapitalG's Sumi Das predicts.

Patients with chronic conditions which represent a significant majority of healthcare costs, making their care a big target as the system looks for ways to lower spending, CapitalG partner Sumi Das told Business Insider. 

He said that's going to create more demand for chronic-care companies like Livongo and Hinge Health, which are focused on diabetes and musculoskeletal conditions, respectively.

"What I think we're excited about and think we are starting to see an inflection for, is the adoption of digital tools that can be high engagement with chronic customers and help them sort of navigate their disease, but also reduce costs for the payer in the ecosystem, whether that be the employer or the health plans," Das said. 

But instead of going the mergers and acquisitions route, as Livongo did with Teladoc earlier this year, Das predicts that we'll actually see more of these companies build upon their initial treatment areas. 

Both employers and health plans want to buy solutions for their biggest healthcare costs, which are oncology, mental health, and chronic kidney disease, as well as musculoskeletal and cardiovascular conditions, he said.  

As that pertains to M&A, Das thinks we'll see companies in those areas consolidate under them solutions that have high-rates of comorbidities with their core offering. Like how Livongo moved into hypertension after diabetes, he said, Omada might tackle weight loss. directly.

"Teladoc obviously made a big move in acquiring Livongo, but I think we're probably going to see more independent chronic leaders emerge rather than consolidation with the other telemedicine companies in the near term," Das said.

— Blake Dodge

AlbionVC deputy managing partner Dr. Andrew Elder predicts a fundamental shift from "nice-to-have" to "must-have" for healthcare providers adopting technology.

Pre-pandemic, the rate of technology adoption by providers was a major reason holding the sector back. 

However, 2020's COVID-19 outbreak has meant a significant amount of healthcare delivery has to be done remotely. 

"Investors are feeling like this is a watershed moment," AlbionVC's Dr. Andrew Elder said. "The age of telehealth has finally arrived."

Before the pandemic, certain healthcare providers were on the fence about adopting healthcare technologies like video consultations. However, due to lockdowns, aspects of healthcare have had to be delivered remotely. 

"So all of a sudden health providers are waking up to the fact that they should be using technology," explained Elder.  There will be more remote monitoring and technology-enabled care, for example. 

Elder predicts that the fundamental shift from "nice-to-have" to "must-have" is a really important one and it will change things. But it won't be across the board, and it won't be maintained quite as fast as it's going now.

"COVID-19 is definitely accelerating things, but I still don't think it's an overnight revolution. It's going to be an accelerated evolution," Elder said. 

"Some may backtrack back towards business as usual, but I doubt that any will completely backtrack," he added.

Elder also predicts that more consumers in 2021 will pay for aspects of their health where the benefits are easily tangible. 

"Things like improving eating (nutrition & diet), breathing (various respiratory conditions), sleeping (insomnia), and mental health are the areas of earliest adoption of digital tools by patients," he said. 

"We're interested in all these areas," he added.

— Dr. Catherine Schuster-Bruce

OMERS Ventures' Chrissy Farr is betting that behavioral health companies will raise more funding next year as patients begin to deal with a traumatic 2020.

Come spring next year, the world may begin to see some relief from the pandemic as the supply of COVID-19 vaccines ramps up.

But that doesn't mean the stress and pain of witnessing a global crisis just goes away.

Chrissy Farr, a principal investor at OMERS Ventures, said behavioral health visits are bound to spike in 2021 as people begin to deal with the trauma of the COVID-19 pandemic.

"What you see sometimes is when the worst of a threat is over, you sort of have to reckon with what's happened. I think a lot of people will face the trauma of this past year," she said.

Healthcare providers were already reporting high levels of burnout before the pandemic, and they've been running on fumes for the better part of a year as they battled COVID-19. It's likely that some of them on the verge of retiring will go ahead and do so, she said.

And as lots of people seek treatment for behavioral health, Farr is betting that we'll see more funding go to companies that address those issues.

Already, companies like Headway and Cerebral have raised funding this year. Headway, which helps people find therapists who take insurance, raised $26 million in November. Cerebral, a mental health telemedicine company, raised $25 million in October. Mental health companies Lyra Health and Ginger also nabbed new funding. 

"All of that will continue into 2021, and investors that haven't already invested in it will really take a closer look at the space," Farr said.

— Shelby Livingston

Lux Capital's Adam Goulburn and Zavain Dar are betting that consumer-driven healthcare is here to stay.

2020 put consumers in the driver's seat when it comes to their healthcare and now there's no turning back, said Lux Capital partners Adam Goulburn and Zavain Dar.

"It's like trying Amazon for the first time," Goulburn said. "Once you start having those beautiful or convenient experiences, it's very hard to switch that consumer back."

The healthcare industry has long lagged behind other sectors in designing experiences that put consumer needs first. Patients go to the doctor and expect long waits; they leave without getting on-the-spot answers; and they have no idea what the visit will cost until weeks later, Goulburn said.

But the pandemic has sped up adoption of direct-to-consumer care models that give people choice, convenience, and transparency, he said.

It has also forced once-reluctant hospitals and doctors to invest in technology, especially after seeing their peers who had already made those investments were better able to weather the pandemic, Dar said.

Telemedicine is one example of technology that was wholeheartedly embraced. Faced with a nationwide shutdown and no way to see patients in person, doctor's offices were forced to pivot to virtual care or risk closing.

Virtual visits spiked, and though they've since deflated, some types of doctors, including primary care physicians and dermatologists, are still using telehealth more than they did last year, according to Harvard University researchers.  

— Shelby Livingston

There has been a rapid adoption of healthcare technology in 2020, and LocalGlobe partner Julia Hawkins says it's here to stay.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, more patients have received care remotely, both primary care, and also for more complex diseases.

"I believe this reality is here to stay," LocalGlobe partner Julia Hawkins said.

AccuRx exemplifies this pandemic-fueled rapid growth. It's a company that provides communication tools for the healthcare system. Its flagship product, Chain SMS, is used by family doctor clinics to communicate with their patients via text. 

Hawkins said that the number of family doctor clinics in the UK using Chain SMS grew from 40% to 99% during 2020.

Hawkins also expects to see wide scale use of accurate remote diagnostics without the need for labs, more digital therapeutics come to market for chronic conditions, and more complex illnesses treated at home.

"Patients in hospitals will be discharged earlier to continue their treatment at home, with continuous monitoring and AI used to identify health deterioration," she said.

"Overall, we will see better software to help orchestrate and support care teams and patients," Hawkins added.

— Dr. Catherine Schuster-Bruce

Section 32's Steve Kafka is betting on progress toward earlier detection of diseases.

Section 32 partner Steve Kafka is keenly watching diagnostic technology in 2021, he told Business Insider. 

It's advanced considerably in the past few years. We can now measure small quantities of disease markers like DNA very accurately and at costs that are attractive for health plans, he said. 

There are several companies valued in the billions that are pursuing these approaches just for cancer, like Thrive, Grail, Guardant Health, Invitae, and Foundation Medicine, he said. Kafka was president and chief operating officer at Foundation, and has invested in Thrive.

"And this will extend to additional disease areas over the years to come such as fatty liver disease [Glympse Bio], cardiovascular disease, perhaps even neurodegenerative disease like Alzheimer's," Kafka said in an email. 

Meanwhile there's an urgent need for better testing, since patients do better when their diseases are identified earlier, he said. They get more treatment options, and sometimes less complexity to the disease, like before a cancer can metastasis. 

Read more: Meet the 11 companies racing to make coronavirus tests that cost as little as $5 and deliver results in under 15 minutes

— Blake Dodge

Venrock's Dr. Bob Kocher thinks 2021 will have even more IPO activity than 2020's record-breaking streak, and Amazon and Google could be hunting for acquisitions.

2020 was a banner year for digital health companies' public debuts and deals.

The sector benefited from the pandemic, which shuttered doctors' offices and pushed many patients to telemedicine for the first time, and also from many investors' belief that healthcare is one of a few "recession-proof" investments. The result was all-time high private funding amounts and number of deals, in addition to the steady parade of IPOs and mega-mergers like Livongo and Teladoc.

Venrock's Dr. Bob Kocher thinks 2021 could shake out to be even bigger in terms of deal activity for digital health companies. The relative stability and predictability of outside forces, namely politics, could encourage many companies to get their heads above water and start plotting expansion instead of survival.

Point solutions, like startups that specialize in treating back pain or remote patient monitoring, are particularly appealing targets, Kocher said. The companies are still relatively small and niche, which keeps deal prices lower, but also offer buyers new patients and new technology. 

The companies also naturally hit a growth plateau given the focused nature of the solutions, Kocher said, and will need to partner with a larger company if they want to go public.

"Any of these very narrow therapeutic virtual care companies will want to combine with bigger platforms to get scale to go public," Kocher said. "Some of the smaller telemedicine companies will get ingested in larger things, too."

Amazon and Google could be very active acquirers next year, Kocher said. Amazon will likely want to expand the capabilities of its newly announced pharmacy business with more end-to-end pharmacy solutions. Google will be eyeing startups that accumulate large data sets, like voice transcription companies or hospital analytics, to boost its cloud business.

— Megan Hernbroth

Accel healthcare investor Amit Kumar is betting big on startups that exist outside the traditional healthcare industry.

Over the next 12 months, the future of healthcare could be determined by companies operating on the periphery of healthcare.

That's where Accel's Amit Kumar is placing his bets going, at least. The healthcare investor thinks the biggest opportunities sit in highly specific areas of care, such as addiction treatment or elder care.

The coronavirus pandemic showed how important holistic health is, Kumar said. Many of the conditions that at-risk populations may have, such as a history of smoking, fall outside the traditional purview of a doctor but have an outsized impact on the patient's long-term health. 

"COVID is the third wave of innovation," Kumar said. "In technology, there was the internet, then mobile, and now COVID."

In healthcare, Kumar pointed to the rapid adoption of software tools that enable telemedicine or other aspects of digital health as proof that the industry has shed its slow-to-move reputation in favor of cost-saving, efficiency-boosting technology. 

That will have an even larger impact on these "adjacent" areas, he said, because many are not beholden to legacy software deals or budget crunches that are currently facing hospitals and clinics. 

Kumar's target treatment areas also largely operate beyond the scope of many insurance plans, so new companies are able to rely on cash-pay payment models. The reliable revenue and lack of complications that come with insurance, creates more appealing businesses, he said.

"You want to build long-term, sustainable businesses no matter what, five or 10 years from now," Kumar said. "Will mental health care be important five or 10 years from now? Yes, I totally do. Will the healthcare system want to be involved and find a role to play? The answer to that, I think, is yes."

— Megan Hernbroth

Primary care startups are falling out of favor with early-stage investors, according to Canaan partner Byron Ling.

Canaan partner Byron Ling won't be investing in any early-stage primary care startups come 2021.

The healthcare sector has been one of the hottest areas for VCs to cut checks over the last several years, and IPOs like One Medical and Oak Street Health have proven lucrative paydays. 

But Ling thinks those more mature companies have effectively crowded out the early stages and made it hard for young companies to compete.

"There's been a lot of innovation and frankly a lot of value created in primary care and the telehealth solutions that are around that," Ling told Business Insider. "It's not going away, but it's a broad transformation of a big sector. I wouldn't spend a lot of time with a company in the seed stage in this category right now."

Canaan invested in women's health and primary care startup Tia early on, but Ling said that's not an investment he would be keen to make today. 

Instead, Ling is setting his sights on companies that cater to older populations with tech-forward solutions. 

The pandemic has proved that older populations can successfully navigate seemingly complex technology, but it has also created a loneliness epidemic among America's seniors. 

Ling is searching for companies that help combat those concerns, and is particularly interested in companies that effectively recreate the communities and social groups present within assisted living facilities, but in members' own homes and neighborhoods.

"It sounds obvious but we might see, going into next year even with the vaccine, is the acceleration of adoption and innovation on in-home aging products of the future," Ling said. 

Other areas Ling thinks could take off are remote monitoring tools, like fall detection, and adjacent industries such as longer-lasting batteries.

Similarly, Ling predicts a rise in informal remote monitoring tools for family caregivers that may not be able to physically check in with aging relatives or neighbors as often as they'd like.

— Megan Hernbroth

NEA's Mohamad Makhzoumi is relying on his experience in past downturns to weather 2021's early challenges.

After a turbulent year, NEA general partner Mohamad Makhzoumi is bracing for what he expects to be a difficult few months to start 2021.

Makhzoumi is evaluating prospective investments on three separate factors, one of which is how the US rolls out vaccine distribution for the coronavirus and how much pressure is on the nation's hospitals before a critical mass of the population is vaccinated. 

Even if everything goes smoothly, Makhzoumi said he is expecting hospitals to experience a lot of strain, both financially and otherwise, which could trickle down to startups.

"These next five to six months between now and late spring are going to be really challenging, especially already seeing where we are from a community spread perspective," Makhzoumi told Business Insider.

The other side of the equation looks more promising, Makhzoumi said. In particular, he is expecting health insurers will have excess cash as more hospitals delay non-emergency procedures. 

"I think insurance companies will be long-term net winners from the pandemic," Makhzoumi said. 

He's anticipating a wave of large acquisitions as insurance companies look for ways to spend their fortunes. He's predicting that healthcare delivery networks, such as companies that facilitate virtual visits or provide care to a very specific group of patients in-person, could be appealing targets. 

"You will see a consolidation of insurers buying care delivery networks and expanding their reach," Makhzoumi said.

Makhzoumi's years in venture are to his benefit, he said, because he has successfully weathered past crises and downturns, although 2020 was his first pandemic. He is certain that eventually the healthcare ecosystem will cycle out of its current financial struggles and settle into a new normal.

"In a market environment like this, it benefits operations-minded entrepreneurs and investors that lived through multiple cycles," Makhzoumi said. "If you only were in the industry from 2012 until now, it would be hard."

Even so, Makhzoumi is hesitant to make any firm predictions about what 2021 might hold beyond the pandemic and its associated challenges. 

"If you find someone who's super confident in making predictions for 2021, send them my way because I'll hire them," Makhzoumi said.

— Megan Hernbroth

Consumer experience will be critical to any healthcare startup hoping to succeed in 2021, according to Threshold Ventures' Emily Melton.

Amazon's push into pharmacy is going to upend the digital health ecosystem, but not how many might expect.

Threshold Ventures' Emily Melton said there's been a "consumerization" trend within healthcare over the last several years. Amazon's foray into the sector will accelerate that.

In practice, that could look like more startups emerging to tackle primary care for specific populations, similar to what Folx is hoping to accomplish for the LGBTQIA+ community. It could also look like new interfaces, software, or services that create a smoother, more enjoyable experience for the patient.

A catalyst, beyond Amazon Pharmacy, was the personal experiences many Americans had within the healthcare system during the coronavirus pandemic. There was an awareness, she said, of how localized and individualized healthcare was.

"People care about their health," Melton said. "Healthcare used to be this big behemoth of companies and hospitals, but now it's personal. People are checking their ICU stats or what their counties' vaccine plan is. It's about how strong your personal healthcare system is."

The pandemic also exposed drastic inequities within the system, something that's been clear to unserved or underserved communities for decades. But now, investors and everyday Americans are aware of the ways in which the US healthcare system fails large swaths of the population.

That, too, could help fuel growth of upstarts challenging the status quo.

"We are recognizing that all people aren't the same," Melton said. "The paradigm has been a white man for so long. There's a real opportunity to bring personalized care to life by treating the whole person and not treating it as just a symptom."

But rethinking and rebuilding any key element of healthcare will require what Melton calls "system-level thinking," something she's tried to adopt during the pandemic when she ran out of applicable analogies to what she was experiencing in her daily life. As the name suggests, system-level thinking involves rethinking of the entire system, not just a single issue or component. 

— Megan Hernbroth

Khosla Ventures' Alex Morgan expects a big future for rapid diagnostic tests that can be run right in the doctor's office or the patient's home.

Alex Morgan, a partner on the investment team at Khosla Ventures, is betting that "point-of-care" testing technology will begin to change the way we get healthcare.

Diagnostics technologies haven't attracted a lot of investment in the past several years, he said. 

But that's changing because of the pandemic and the recognition that patients and providers need the ability to get answers as fast as possible, Morgan said.

"There is a huge amount of innovation in point-of-care diagnostics because of concern for COVID," he said.

Now that those diagnostic technologies have been created, they can be put to other uses, including diagnosing other kinds of infectious diseases.

New diagnostics capabilities will also allow more care to be provided in patients' homes, Morgan said.

"The pandemic has shown that you can deploy remote diagnostics tools and then make treatment decisions or guide people's care entirely remotely," he said.

— Shelby Livingston

ARCH's Robert Nelsen expects some event will let the air out of biotech's bullish investing environment in 2021.

Biotech has had an extraordinary 2020. By almost any metric, it's been record-setting in terms of cash raised and investor success stories. 

A leading biotech index — the XBI — is up 57% on the year, compared to a 13% uptick for the S&P 500. There's both a boom and a bubble happening in biotech, said Robert Nelsen, a top venture capitalist at ARCH Venture Partners.

He expects the overall sentiment to change in 2021. 

"A lot of 2021's trajectory will be something that let's the air out a little bit," he said. "And then I think the market will become more discerning. Right now, it's not discerning." 

That event could be two Democrats winning the special Senate elections in Georgia in January, or if there's proposed legislation on drug pricing with President-elect Joe Biden coming in, Nelsen said.

"We're going to be more in a winners and losers market than we are today," he said. "It'll be more bifurcated and there will be some event or two that pressures either the broader market or the biotech market specifically." 

He added the best companies won't be impacted, since he sees large pharmaceutical companies having more money than innovation, meaning they'll be looking to smaller biotechs for deals and partnerships. 

But a pullback " will take some of the shine off the companies that are just riding the wave," he said. 

— Andrew Dunn

General Catalyst investor Reva Nohria is betting that healthcare startups geared toward under-served populations are going to be the 'great big companies of the future'.

A few startups rose to the occasion of the coronavirus pandemic, General Catalyst investor Reva Nohria told Business Insider, delivering food, booking hotel rooms, and catering telehealth services to the needs of their populations in real time. 

She said those were primary care companies like Cityblock Health, Iora Health, and Oak Street Health, which are all paid, on some level, in accordance with value-based models that pay a set rate instead of fees-for-service.

Especially for vulnerable populations, which have been let down by the traditional medical system, it's important to consider the social determinants of health, or the things in people's lives, like housing, that affect their health long-term, Nohria said.

"Because these models are fundamentally built towards serving someone in that context, that is what helped them rise to the occasion of COVID," she said. 

"They already got that it was beyond just funneling you through some kind of fee-for-service system, and I think that's what's going to help them become the really great big companies of the future," she added.

— Blake Dodge

Mayfield partner Ursheet Parikh thinks the future of treating mental health, America's 'hidden epidemic,' could come from massive breakthroughs in 2021.

The past year has taken a toll on Americans' mental health.

Even with startups taking novel approaches to what Mayfield partner Ursheet Parikh calls the "hidden epidemic," he thinks more can be done.

"COVID pretty much created a silent epidemic of sorts, a hidden epidemic, around brain health and mental health," Parikh said. "We think brain health will drive as much, if not more, of healthcare cost in coming years."

The key lies in treatment advances, Parikh told Business Insider. While talk therapy and medication can be helpful for some, he believes there are other, more effective ways of treating mental health conditions using cutting-edge technology that can speak to and work with the brain's natural capabilities rather than medications given in pill form.

Technology that works directly with the brain is particularly promising, Parikh said. The brain's anatomy means that drugs already have to work extra hard to be effective and breach the blood-brain barrier. Parikh thinks the future is in working smarter, not harder.

"There has been a lot of work done in understanding the brain outside the drug cycle," Parikh told Business Insider. "I think what will happen is, we will start seeing solutions that talk to the brain and activate parts of the brain to fight disease."

Right now, many companies are "listening" to the brain, Parikh said, where it records and processes electrical signals during a particular task.  He pointed to companies like Akili Labs, which makes a video game to treat children experiencing ADHD, as promising steps forward in creating data to prove such a solution can work at scale.

However, his long-term vision is a company that uses electricity to talk to the brain instead of just listening to it, essentially working with humans' most powerful organ to solve the body's problems. But first, the unconventional approach needs proof that it works.

"For a medical practice to evolve, we need entrepreneurs to create real medical data," Parikh said. "It starts sounding hard to believe that you put something on your skin to activate the brain to fight disease [without data]." 

In the next nine months, Parikh predicts three or four startups will announce initiatives to publish data and show how effective this line of treatment can be in a wide range of mental health conditions. 

— Megan Hernbroth

Amadeus partner Pierre Socha believes the hottest area is novel human-computer interfaces.

Human-computer interfaces refer to the interaction between a human and a computer system. Amadeus partner Pierre Socha is interested in how the technology can be applied to healthcare, especially brain-computer interfaces and neural interfaces.

Brain-computer interfaces connect the brain to a computer, and are usually non-invasive wearable devices. Neural interfaces are devices that interact with the nervous system and can be placed externally, internally or both to record or stimulate neurological activity.

Elon Musk's Neuralink that aims to create a wireless interface between human brains and a computer system to allow people with neurological conditions to control their personal devices, like a mobile phone, with their mind, is an example. 

"We have invested in the space for the better part of 20 years, from voice to vision-controlled computing, backing many startups that have become leaders in their industries," said Socha. 

Apple acquired UK-based speech technology start-up VocalIQ in 2015, and Microsoft bought speech software developer Entropic in 1999. Other companies have gone public, like Swedish firm Tobii, now a leader in developing products for eye-tracking.

"We are more bullish than ever about the space, especially when it comes to applications in healthcare," Socha said.

"The hottest area right now is unquestionably around novel neural interfaces," he added. 

Socha also anticipates breakthroughs in an emerging generation of quantum computers.  

"Quantum biology is considered to be a new discipline", said Socha. It arises from research that suggests biological phenomena  — for example the process that creates our sense of smell  —  may operate according to quantum mechanics, as well as classical physics, he explained.

— Dr. Catherine Schuster-Bruce

HLM Venture Partners' Steve Tolle said new payment models are encouraging providers to dig into their data and tap IT companies like Redox to improve their care.

The coronavirus pandemic was hard on many providers, creating more than $200 billion in estimated losses, because it decreased emergency visits, surgeries, and inpatient admissions, according to a report by the American Hospital Association.  

That has people rethinking fee-for-service payment models, which is when doctors and institutions are paid for each surgery, scan, and visit, Steve Tolle, a partner at HLM Venture Partners, told Business Insider. 

"If there's a meaningful disruption in patient flow, you're in trouble," Tolle said. "So I think you're going to see more willingness to do some value-based care agreements that physicians and hospitals might have otherwise shied away from." 

Value-based care is a model in which companies and providers are paid to keep patients healthier, rather than for each service, For instance, they can be paid flat fees, or bonuses based on keeping patients out of the hospital.

"I'm not saying we're going to flip all the way there, but I think people learned a lesson here, right?" he said. 

Asked which companies would benefit from the push, Tolle pointed to startups like Apervita and Redox, which help healthcare data flow between providers. 

— Blake Dodge

Optum Ventures partner Laura Veroneau predicts 2021 will test healthcare startups' staying power.

The COVID-19 pandemic drove incredible growth and lots of funding across a slew of healthcare startups.

The next 12 months will test which of those companies are here to stay, said Laura Veroneau, a partner at Optum Ventures.

"It's going to be a year that's heavily focused on execution, where companies and investors have to be hyper-focused on sustaining a lot of the relationships and growth that was achieved in 2020," Veroneau said.

The pandemic forced startups and incumbents in the healthcare industry to think differently about consumer healthcare. Companies that were able to position themselves as solutions to the pandemic by helping people manage their care from home did really well, Veroneau said.

Those include companies like Buoy Health, which allows people to check their symptoms and figure out the type of care they need, and Dispatch Health, which delivers healthcare in patient's homes, she said. Optum Ventures is an investor in both of those companies.

For some startups, the pandemic simply pushed them faster toward a future they were always going to achieve, but for others, that growth may be "misleading," Veroneau said.

"We'll see both how consumer and incumbent behavior translates after a very interesting 2020, and we'll see which companies are actually the winners and have sustainable business models," she said.

— Shelby Livingston

General Atlantic managing director Robb Vorhoff, predicts the IPO markets will remain hot, especially in the first half of 2021.

A "huge" number of healthcare companies that represent the future of healthcare will attempt to go public in the first half of 2021, and possibly throughout the full year, said Robb Vorhoff, managing director and global head of healthcare at General Atlantic.

"It's amazing to me if you look back three years ago at the lower market cap, newer public companies in healthcare and roll forward 12 months from now, the amount of change in that public company healthcare universe is going to be staggering," Vorhoff said.

The companies that have gone public over the last year or are poised to go public next year are part of the future of healthcare, he said.

They will likely include virtual car startups and value-based care companies that either provide healthcare or that provide services and technology to shift other medical practices to value-based care models.

"They're in big, big markets, so I think there is a lot of enthusiasm about just the scale, the volume, and the quality of the companies that are going to be coming to the public markets over the next 12 months," he said.

Vorhoff also said to expect lots of consolidation, especially among virtual-care companies. Many venture-backed virtual-care companies aren't likely to grow to be big, standalone publicly traded on their own. Some will be looking for a home, and the bigger players in the space have cash to spare from recent public offerings.

Teladoc and Livongo, which just merged in a $18.5 billion deal, and telehealth company Amwell are likely to acquire smaller companies, Vorhoff said.

— Shelby Livingston

Luminous VC co-founder and general partner Lomax Ward predicts that digital therapeutics will hit the market in Europe.

Prescribed digital therapeutics are prescription-only software that delivers evidence-based interventions to prevent, manage or treat a medical disorder or disease. 

Luminous VC cofounder and general partner Lomax Ward said that 2020 saw the US Food and Drug Administration approve the first cohort of prescribed digital therapeutics, including: Pear Therapeutics for chronic insomnia, Akili for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder  — ADHD  —  and Mahana Therapeutics for irritable bowel syndrome  —  IBS.

In 2021 he expects to see the first wave of these approvals in the European Union. Ward said that Germany is a particularly receptive market. 

"The commercial rollout of these products in the US could also be an indicator for what may be coming down the line for Europe," he added.

Ward also predicts that 2021 will see virtual and augmented reality become more mainstream in treatment and care delivery.

"Payors and providers are waking up to the efficacy of these treatments, as well as the scale that they can deliver through a remote offering," said Ward. "And it keeps patients out of the hospital reducing both costs and stress," he added.

According to Ward, areas of particular impact will be mental health  — for example, Oxford VR  —  and chronic pain  — for example, Karuna Labs  —  because both are significant areas of healthcare spend.  

Ward cited a report that says the market will jump from $2 billion in 2019 to $34 billion in 2027.

— Dr. Catherine Schuster-Bruce

Menlo Ventures' Greg Yap thinks 2021 could be the year someone finally disrupts the blood pressure monitor.

Menlo Ventures' Greg Yap is looking for opportunities to disrupt basic healthcare tools, like the ubiquitous blood pressure monitor. 

Although he hasn't found the right investment yet, Yap is encouraged by a set of companies that have set out to tackle the challenges associated with monitoring patients outside of doctors' offices during the pandemic.

With offices closed and many primary care physicians checking in virtually, these devices have become one of just a few ways for them to get an accurate read of their patients' health. This is even more important for elderly or otherwise at-risk populations.

"I'm looking for the next wave of remote monitoring," Yap told Business Insider. "The first wave was mostly commodity devices, like your Apple Watch, connecting you to hospitals and doctors. The more interesting part is when you get those unique sources of data that are really consumer friendly, coupled with existing data, coupled with actual changes in care."

A future blood pressure monitor would be small and portable, and be able to automatically send readings to a doctor's office at least twice daily. That way, doctors have access to more data than a once yearly checkup.

"That's what saves peoples lives," Yap said. "If you can get blood pressure under control, that's a huge factor in the number one and number two causes of death in the US."

— Megan Hernbroth

Early-stage companies may struggle to get funding, which could stifle innovation, said Echo Health Ventures partner Jessica Zeaske.

Next year could be a tough one for young companies, as investors increasingly look to place their bets on proven models with a clear return-on-investment, said Jessica Zeaske, a partner at Echo Health Ventures.

"We're going to have an increased spread between the have and have nots," she said. "From the venture perspective and private equity perspective, that relates to the continued rise of megadeals, which for unproven companies, it can also lead to them not being able to get funding."

Many early-stage companies are struggling this year, and it has become harder to make bets on them, Zeaske said.

The time it takes to close a sale and get paid has lengthened from about 12 months to 18 months during the pandemic, so young companies are having to endure an extra six months without revenue coming in to fund their engineers, she said.

That's a challenging situation for a startup to survive, so more venture capital firms are instead looking to place their bets on later-stage, "COVID-proof" companies, she said.

That worries Zeaske. 

"We really want to continue to support our seed and Series A companies and to continue to foster innovation," she said.

— Shelby Livingston

• The best way to shop for gifts for the yogi in your life is to consider where they are in their practice and the yoga accessories they enjoy using.
• Yogi novices need basics like comfortable but flexible athletic wear, yoga props like blocks or mats, and storage options for their mat or whatever else they use.
• Yoga card decks and books about yoga can also help advanced yogis take their practice to the next level.
• Below, you'll find 15 of the best gifts for yogis of all skill levels, including memberships to Glo, lululemon gift cards, and specialty yoga socks.
• See also: The best online yoga workouts

Practicing yoga, and any of its many forms and disciplines, is one of the best ways to manage stress, improve flexibility, and calm your mind. A practice that dates back centuries, yoga originated in ancient India and has roots that tie it to Hindusim, Buddhism, Jainism, and a host of other religions.

Yoga today encompasses a variety of formats and its popularity continues to expand every year. Whether it's Bikram Yoga, which is colloquially referred to as "hot yoga," Ashtanga, or Vinyasa (which is considered the most popular form of yoga in the western world), there's a practice for literally everyone. 

If someone on your holiday list is an avid yogi, coming up with gift ideas beyond a simple yoga mat or a comfy pair of leggings might be challenging — because let's face it, they already have these in abundance. Sticking to the basics is a solid game plan when you're buying gifts for someone just beginning a yoga-friendly lifestyle, but shopping for seasoned practitioners requires some creativity.

If you're fresh out of ideas, we've got you covered. To some, yoga is a spiritual, mindful practice and to others, it's their dedicated form of routine exercise. Whatever their connection, there's a gift for every yogi on your list. Here are our favorites.

Glo Membership, from $18 at Glo

The Glo app offers yogis of all levels unlimited access to more than 4,000 classes taught by world-class instructors, on-demand whenever, wherever they're itching to get on the mat. Classes are recommended based on how long you have to practice (from 10 minutes on up to a full 60-minute session), your interests (yoga, Pilates, or mediation), and user favorites. You can even browse the app's library and choose classes however you see fit.

SPUNKYsoul New Beginnings Bracelet Stack, $18.99 on Amazon

SPUNKYsoul wants to help yogis channel their positive energy on and off the mat with its Lotus New Beginnings bracelet collection, and after all 2020 has put us through, who couldn't use the good vibes? A lotus charm hangs from each stack of bracelets, representing "good fortune, positive energy, purity, eternity, creation, enlightenment, and new beginnings."

All stacks also include a bracelet made from lava beads, which can be used as a diffuser: Just add a few drops of your favorite essential oils to one of the lava beads and let the blend create an aromatic accessory that's good for the soul.

Saje Yoga Grounding Diffuser Blend $31.20 at Saje

If your yogi is just as obsessed with essential oils as they are yoga, they'll love Saje's grounding diffuser blend. The aromatic combination of earthy patchouli, bright orange, peaceful neroli, spicy ho wood, and crisp champaca is said to promote feelings of gratitude and Zen. It's the perfect formula to have circulating whether you're on or off the mat.

Ewedoos Yoga Mat Bag, $13.75 on Amazon

Whether their studio classes are back in session, or their home yoga space could use some organization, this roomy bag from Ewedoos is a storage staple. Unlike other yoga bags that are only roomy enough to fit your mat and maybe a towel, the main compartment of the Ewedoos bag is spacious enough to hold a mat and accessories like straps or a yoga block. Plus, a water bottle and towel can go in the large side pocket, while a small interior zip compartment holds the essentials you'd usually keep in a purse, like your car keys, phone, or wallet.

Lululemon Gift Card, from Lululemon

Nothing motivates me to exercise quite like a new pair of leggings, so if you're struggling to find the perfect gift for a yogi, I highly recommend treating them to a shopping spree at lululemon. The store is swarming with technical athletic wear geared toward yogis because the brand acknowledges the ways clothes can make or break your flow. The brand also designs clothes for different genders, so there's something for everyone.

Ajna Yoga Bolster, $69.99 Amazon

Though yoga bolsters are underrated accessories compared to blocks and straps, they're essential to restorative practices. Bolsters support and alleviate pressure on joints, provide lumbar relief, deepen stretches, and help the body achieve total relaxation in times of discomfort. They're also quite versatile and can be used in a range of practices or meditations, and even work off the mat when the body needs extra support.

Ajna's yoga prop is an especially great pick because it's eco-friendly, made with 100% vegan materials, free of harmful chemicals or toxic solvents, and super comfortable. The bolster also comes in a range of colors, so you can give your yogi their favorite.

The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali by Sri Swami Satchidananda, $15.95 on Amazon

There's so much more to yoga than poses named after animals and an Instagram-worthy aesthetic. Yoga is rooted in Ayurvedic beliefs, spiritual connections, and Indian philosophy. The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali offer readers a deep dive into some of these teachings, specifically those of Raja Yoga, which is the practice of concentration and meditation.

The text is a compilation of valuable lessons from the yogic teachings on ethics, meditation, and physical postures, and also provides insight on how to cope through everyday situations both on and off the mat.

AmazonBasics Foam Roller, from $10.49 at Amazon

Foam rollers aren't typically grouped with yoga props but they can be extremely beneficial to a yogi's practice. Because yoga requires a lot of movement and fluidity from one pose to the next, your muscles need to be pliable; when they're restricted, so is your movement.

Foam rollers help work out the kinks in your muscles, so they stay healthy and limber. They can be used pre-flow to warm the muscles, and post-flow as a recovery tool.

Yoga Mat Storage Display, $145 at Uncommon Goods

How and where one decides to practice looks different for almost every yogi. For anyone hopping on the mat at home, this storage display is a gift that helps make their new space look and feel a little more special. The gorgeous wooden display is thoughtfully designed to help clear both physical and mental clutter for yogis as having dedicated storage for their mat and props takes the guesswork out of preparing for practice. The piece can be mounted to the wall or stand on its own, depending on the yogi's space.

Sunflower Home Foam Yoga Cushion for Knees, Wrists, and Hands, $14.99 on Amazon

As amazing as yoga is for the mind and body, it can also be extremely hard on the knees, wrists, and hands. Sunflower Home's miniature cushions help ease the strain by putting pressure off of these sensitive areas. They're made with eco-friendly PU foam, so they won't absorb much moisture (re: sweat) and are made extra thick for optimal support. The cushions are also multi-purpose and can be used off the mat anytime your joints require some relief.

Calm Club Yoga Card Deck, $25 at Urban Outfitters

Pick a card, any card, then flow it out. This fun card deck from Calm Club is a compilation of 52 yoga poses — one for every week in the year. The idea is that yogis choose a card at random on a Monday and dedicate the week to incorporating the illustrated pose into their practice. By Sunday, they'll hopefully have mastered it (or, at the very least, are on their way to mastering it).

Herban Essentials Yoga Towelettes, $16 at Anthropologie

Admittedly, I don't wash my yoga mat near as much as I should, though I know I'm not the only one guilty of doing this. Do your yogi friend a favor and gift them these hygienic towelettes from Herban Essentials — they need them, I promise. Each single-use towelette is made from therapeutic-grade essential oils from organic fruits, herbs, and vegetables supplied by American farmers.

They're also naturally antibacterial, antiseptic, aromatherapeutic, and leave a calming scent of lavender lingering on your mat so you're inhaling soothing fumes, not days-old sweat,

Tavi Noir Yoga Socks, $20 at Tavi Noir

Rather than a festive pair of socks, gift your yogi some cushy footwear with a little more grip this holiday season. Tavi Noir's grip socks are made of cozy cotton, are non-slip, and feature a compression arch band. Designed for yoga and Pilates, these socks do well to keep feet planted and firm on the mat. The best part is the brand is technically unisex in sizing and offers a variety of larger styles for anyone with larger feet.

Yoga Mat Ornament,$14.99 at Old World Christmas

Maybe it won't directly improve their flow, but how can a yogi not like this yoga mat ornament from Old World Christmas? Yogis are proud of their practice, so if they celebrate the holidays with a gorgeously decorated tree, you can be sure they'll hang this pretty little yoga mat front and center for all to see.

100 Yoga Poses Scratch-Off Poster, $15 at Uncommon Goods

Spontaneity is the best way to spice up a routine, so if their practice is feeling a little stale, this yoga poses scratch-off poster can help them shake things up on the mat. Yogis can go in whatever order they please and just need to scratch off each individual square to uncover new poses or to be reminded of old favorites.

Not only will it serve as a fun way to progress in their training and track progress, but the artwork is gorgeous and looks great hanging above their meditative space.

There are many ways entrepreneurs can fund their small businesses, but one method seems to be talked about more than the rest: venture capital. Yet most small businesses don't access venture capital when they launch. 

The rest rely on options like personal savings, business loans, and credit cards. According to a 2019 report, almost 65% of entrepreneurs rely on personal and family savings for startup capital. 

There are plenty of ways to get cash for starting, funding, or expanding your business — the first obstacle is learning what's available and determining the best fit for your goals. 

To that end, we spoke with funding expert, mentor, and Harvard grad Arielle Loren, who owns and operates the first business-funding app for women, 100K Incubator. She breaks funding into three levels based on monthly revenue, from $0 to over $100,000. 

Here are 12 ways you can fund your small business, level by level.

SEE ALSO: Women-owned businesses are tapping into millennial-friendly growth markets like houseplants and hostels.

SEE ALSO: 2 millennial women just won $100,000 to scale their vegan ice cream business. Here’s how they perfected their 'scoopable' banana-based recipe and landed their pints on Whole Foods shelves.

Level 1: Business credit cards

To Loren, a level-one business is at its earliest stage, often a mere concept that hasn't started earning revenue yet. Maybe you have a lifestyle blog that you want to turn into an online store and you need to hire a web developer or designer. 

Loren tells entrepreneurs to keep their jobs when they're first starting out, not only to pay their personal expenses, but to have a back-up income. "The most important thing is to never take out funding that you're not comfortable repaying," Loren said.

If you're confident you have the cash flow and income to pay your bills on time, a business credit card is one of the easiest ways to build up your business credit without having substantial revenue, since you can get approved with little to no profit. And it could help you access other types of funding in the future. It's relatively low-risk, plus many business credit cards come with benefits and perks, like miles, discounts, and cashback deals.

If you've never opened a business credit card before, your application will be based on your personal credit score. Loren suggests having a score of 650 or higher. A lower score doesn't mean you can't get approved, but it may come with higher interest rates and more aggressive payback terms. 

Level 1: Personal loans

It can be very difficult to secure a business loan or line of credit when you're just establishing your business. Loren says these options usually require revenue, a personal guarantee, or some form of collateral. 

Personal loans from a bank are based on your income and personal credit, so they can be easier to get if you have a good credit score and high income. As long as the lender doesn't stipulate the loan for personal use only, it can help you afford retail or office space, initial supplies, or marketing. 

Level 1: Home equity loans or lines of credit

If you're willing to put your home up as collateral, there are two options to get some major capital. A home equity loan gives you access to all the funds at once, or a home equity line of credit (HELOC) disburses the funds incrementally.  

There are a couple big advantages to a home equity loan. First, you can get large amounts of capital at interest rates that are very low compared to most small business loans. Typically, home equity loans have long payback terms, up to 10 or even 30 years, so you have more time to pay them off.  

Some people prefer not to mix their personal assets with their business, so there's a lot to consider before taking out a home equity loan or line of credit. For example, if you co-own your home with a partner, they would be jointly involved in many of the decisions that impact your business.

Level 1: Crowdfunding

Loren doesn't recommend crowdfunding to a business in its very early stages, because they effectively act as more of a marketing campaign than anything else. "It's not as simple as loading a page up on Kickstarter or Indiegogo and then expecting people just to flock to you because you have a good idea," Loren said.

Crowdfunding campaigns usually get funded in one of two ways: either you have an existing audience or you pay to access someone else's audience. If you're a new entrepreneur, you're likely in the latter group, without a major following on social media or in your industry. So you may have get publicists, influencers, and advertisements to promote your campaign — in that case, you're paying money to make money.

If you have the capital and an established audience to crowdfund, rewards-based campaigns, the most popular method, can help you identify and gain target customers.

Level 2: Pitch competitions

Once you've established your business, it's steadily increasing revenue, and you're confident in your concept, pitch competitions are an accessible way to get cash that will help you continue growing. 

That means you've reached level two, where businesses are typically looking to expand and scale. Imagine a local bakery earning $5,000 in sales per month after two years. The shop owner may want additional funding to hire a couple employees or offer catering.

Business owners put a lot of effort and creativity into their business concepts, but Loren says the most important element is often overlooked. "You have to know your numbers," Loren said. For example, explain your customer acquisition costs or how much you profited from an advertising campaign compared to the budget you set for it. 

"If you can get those numbers in place, even on a small scale, it's going to be so impressive to the judges, because the majority of entrepreneurs who walk into that room are not prepared on that level," Loren said.

Level 2: Business grants and government contracts

Business grants and government contracts can give you consistent cash and leverage your business to then pursue more traditional funding like investments. 

There are several grants the Small Business Administration (SBA) gives to small businesses, which you can learn more about here. Many opportunities are catered to small businesses owned by veterans or that can fulfill needs in research and development. 

If your business makes a product that could benefit the government, whether it's uniforms or office supplies, you could get some serious funding from a government contract. The US government requires federal agencies to list buying opportunities and consider bids from small businesses. 

This option does come with a lot of requirements, such as registering your business, compliance, and ensuring you have the supplies and resources to fulfill the contracts. You can find government contracts on databases such as governmentbids.com or through the Small Business Administration (SBA). 

Loren recommends businesses to get certified as woman-owned or minority-owned, if either of those apply to you, since the government has to meet minimum quotas for contracts within certain demographics.

Level 2: Government small business loans

If your business doesn't qualify for a grant or government contract, you can also apply for an SBA loan. They can take longer to disburse than personal loans, but are more accessible than private business loans and can have lower down payments.

Your business concept is part of the application, but numbers reign supreme. Loren says most institutions and underwriters consider the numbers as 80% of your application, if not more. They'll need to see your most recent tax return and business bank statement, your personal credit score should be average or above, and they may want to see capital projections for at least 12 to 36 months out. 

Your overall business history is also important. Strong numbers show underwriters that you have a good grasp on your plans for the capital, especially if you demonstrate a track record in producing revenue and flipping capital, like if you doubled your sales after launching an online shop for your retail store. 

Lastly, government institutions will look at how your business benefits the community. Are you going to create jobs in your neighborhood or town? How will your business impact the local economy? "They're not looking to just give solo entrepreneurs a bunch of money," Loren said.

Level 2: Payment processor loans

If you use a payment processor for your sales transactions, sometimes companies like Paypal, Square, and Stripe will loan funds to their clients. Revenue generated through the company's payment processor is the most important factor for getting this type of loan. The company will also likely consider your personal credit score.

If you qualify for one of these loans, the company takes a percentage of your sales until you pay off the loan, with interest. Loren said many business owners like these loans because payback terms are more comfortable than traditional loans and are based on sales volume, rather than a weekly or monthly payment.

Level 2: Private business loans

If you're not able to secure financing through a traditional bank, you may have better luck going to a private lender. Business loans are harder to get than personal loans, but they protect you from any personal liability should your business encounter any financial difficulties. 

As with any other loan, getting approved is not just about your business pitch. "Lenders who loan directly to businesses, they want to see traction," Loren said. So that revenue and credit history is just as important as with other funding options.

Level 2: Business lines of credit

A business line of credit works much like the home line of credit mentioned above, but in most cases don't require collateral like real estate or inventory. Again, revenue and credit history are important to secure a line of credit, so usually this option is best for entrepreneurs who have been in business for a couple years. 

Level 3: Angel investing

Level three brings us into investor territory, when your business is showing enough growth and revenue to start sourcing major funding. For example, the owner of a bed and breakfast could be making $150,000 in annual revenue and decide to open up a second location. 

The biggest advantage to investment is that, unlike loans and credit, there's nothing for you to repay — it's a cash-in transaction. But giving up equity means more people involved, so think of every investment as a relationship. Can you commit to this person asking about your revenue and weighing-in on decisions? 

The most important factor for you to prove to an angel investor is that they'll get a return on their money. Most are willing to take risks, but they won't make the commitment if you can't demonstrate a promising track record.

Angel investors can bring valuable mentorship and expertise to your business, since they are often experienced business owners and tend to invest within the industries they know. 

Level 3: Venture capital

Venture capital will affect your small business much the same as angel investments — capital gained is equity earned. But apart from pitching an individual, you can seek venture opportunities from the many VC firms across the country, looking to invest in promising startups and small businesses.

Loren says many entrepreneurs ask her why they should seek capital of any kind if they can start their business from personal savings. She tells them: "You can do a lot more with $50,000 in capital and you can scale a lot faster, versus if you just did $100, $300, $500 every pay period, it's going to take a lot longer to build the business."

Public relations pros have to juggle more responsibilities and prove their worth more than ever.

The result is a PR software industry worth $4.5 billion in 2019, up 7.2% over the prior year, according to Burton-Taylor International Consulting, a research and advisory firm.

It consists of PR software companies that help PR experts in areas like measurement, journalist and influencer databases, campaign planning, social media listening, and crisis detection.

New PR software startups like measurement platform Prophet have entered the fray, helped by interest from private equity and venture capital firms, while others like Memo are courting investors.

And tech companies like information-alert firm Dataminr have expanded to products aimed at that sector while PR agencies roll out their own tools for clients.

Business Insider identified the 27 players in this space, based on our reporting, that are used by many brands and PR pros to solve their toughest challenges like monitoring social media, managing corporate websites, staying ahead of crises, and planning campaigns.

Here are the companies, listed in alphabetical order.

Brandwatch

Founded in 2007, Brandwatch helps PR pros make sense of social media noise by monitoring social conversations and measuring brand sentiment. Since 2008, its platform has collected more than 1.2 trillion public posts and adds half a billion new ones every day.

Its flagship product, Consumer Research, grew out of Brandwatch's merger with Crimson Hexagon, another social intelligence firm known for machine learning.

That merger created a 500-person social intelligence giant with more than $100 million in annual recurring revenue and more than 2,000 clients like Unilever, Delta, and Nestlé.

Brandwatch has raised $64.7 million through venture capital firms like Partech, Highland Europe, and Nauta Capital, which helped finance its four acquisitions: Qriously Technologies in 2019, Crimson Hexagon in 2018, Buzz Sumo in 2017, and PeerIndex in 2014.

Business Wire

Newswire giant Berkshire Hathaway-owned Business Wire lets clients distribute press releases and regulatory disclosures to the investors, journalists, and the general public.

Its 16 newsrooms help clients like Apple, Amazon, and P&G disclose information that meets regulatory requirements. Founded in 1961, the company has 428 employees.

Business Wire has a number of technology partnerships with in place, including Muck Rack, Onclusive, reporting and compliance platform Workiva, and investor relations software company Q4.

Cision

Cision, the world's largest PR software company, offers a platform that stitches together a range of services like media monitoring, social listening, and measurement.

Over the past six years, Cision has spent billions of dollars rolling up 12 companies like press release distributor PR Newswire and measurement companies Trendkite and Prime Research and bundled them into a cloud platform. PR pros say one of Cision's best features is its vast database of contacts, which includes 1.4 million journalists and more than 1 billion influencers.

The company is owned by private equity firm Platinum Equity, which took it private through a $2.7 billion buyout. Previously, its biggest financial backer was private equity firm GTCR.

Dataminr

Dataminr is best known for using public information like social media data, to send real-time alerts to help clients like Wall Street banks and government entities like police departments.

In 2018, it started selling those services to the PR industry, pitching its platform as the best way to detect and tamp down crises. American Airlines, Home Depot, and Allegiant Airlines use Dataminr's services for their communications needs.

Dataminr closed a Series E funding round in 2018, bringing its total funding to $577 million and giving it a $1.6 billion valuation. Dataminr grew revenue 674% between 2016 and 2019, landing it on the Deloitte Technology Fast 500 list. The company has more than 600 employees.

Dynamic Signal

Dynamic Signal is an employee communications technology company that helps employers create, publish, and send content to their employees, leveraging their workforce as a way to spread their messaging.

For example, Dynamic Signal allows its clients to create social media content that employees can share on their own accounts. The company has 200 employees.

In January 2020, CEO Eric Brown told PRWeek that he planned to take Dynamic Signal public. That same month, the company announced it added 75 new customers, including UPS, Toyota, JPMorgan Chase, and Procter & Gamble.

Edelman

The data and intelligence arm of PR giant Edelman combines research, data, and AI solutions under one roof to collect data across multiple channels and let clients send personalized messages to customers.

Global chief data and analytics officer Yannis Kotziagkiaouridis, who Edelman poached from Wunderman Thompson in 2019, heads the division.

The 328-business unit is comprised of researchers, data scientists and engineers, behavioral and machine-learning experts and performance marketing specialists. Prominent clients include Time's Up, Cigna, Hologic, and Microsoft's Xbox.

Intrado

Telecommunications company Intrado took on global players like Meltwater and Cision in 2019 by launching its own PR software offering, Notified.

Intrado launched Notified in North America in April 2019, merging that company's media monitoring and measurement services with some software it acquired from Nasdaq the year before like press release distributor GlobeNewswire.

With that combination, Intrado billed Notified as an all-in-one platform where PR pros can host virtual events and earning results, distribute press releases, and find journalists' contact information.

The 7,700-person company has clients including Omnicom Media Group, Hertz, and Bacardi. 

Private equity firm Apollo Global Management bought Intrado in 2017 for $5.1 billion and took the company private.

Meltwater

Meltwater, the second biggest PR software company in the world, started as a news monitoring service. Now it's now rapidly building out AI technology and social media monitoring.

Like other PR tech companies, Meltwater claims to offer an all-in-one platform that combines social listening, measurement, and crisis management services. One of its biggest acquisitions was Sysomos, a social media management and analytics company, which it bought in 2018.

Meltwater went public in December and is listed on European stock exchange Euronext. Its IPO raised $395 million, allowing it to pay down debt, pursue more mergers and acquisitions, and acquire more customers.

In its filing to go public, Meltwater recorded annual revenue of $346 million, and $345 million during the 12 months ended on September 30, 2020.

Memo

Entrepreneur Eddie Kim founded measurement company Memo to provide more precise metrics for PR pros through exclusive data provided by publishers like Condé Nast, Forbes, and The Washington Post.

With this pitch, it's signed on big clients like Google and Walmart. Those exclusive rights give Memo an edge over other players who rely on third-party data providers like TVEyes and LexisNexis, Kim contends.

Kim said he originally saw Memo as a data marketplace where PR pros would buy data for individual stories, but he's now packaging the data for clients so they don't have to find insights themselves.

Muck Rack

Greg Galant started Muck Rack with Lee Semel as a kind of database of journalists based on what they write as well as their social media activity.

Since then, Muck Rack has become an all-in-one Saas company by bundling other services like monitoring and distribution into its platform.

Galant said the 100-person company has grown revenue more than 60% year-over-year since its founding in 2011, and is now profitable.

Clients include brands like Taco Bell, Pfizer, and JP Morgan Chase, and agencies including Weber Shandwick, Ketchum, and MSL.

MSL

MSL has been building its own technology platform for the past two years under CEO Diana Littman.

The Publicis-owned PR agency hired Bryan Pedersen as chief innovation officer in 2019, launched a 250-million member influencer marketing platform, and increased its tech budget.

It's rolling out customized solutions for its clients and improving services like measurement, media monitoring, and social listening, helping it attract clients like P&G, Cadillac, White Claw, and Align Technologies.

Netbase Quid

Market intelligence company Netbase Quid formed out of Netbase's acquisition of Quid in early 2020 that combined Netbase's social media analytics with Quid's AI-driven text analytics.

Netbase Quid says that it collects data from social media posts, consumer reviews, product reviews, news articles, and other sources to help clients stay on top of business trends and competitors.

The 250-person company's clients include American Airlines, FleishmanHillard, Coca-Cola, and Yum Brands. Collectively, Netbase and Quid have raised almost $200 million.

News Direct

Gregg Castano, the former president of Business Wire, founded News Direct in 2019 to shake up the press release distribution business.

News Direct's pitch is that it streamlines the process of writing and publishing press releases on its network, and lets clients publish infographics, videos, and other kinds of content, as well as offering a flat rate pricing model.

Castano said the company took a government backed-bank loan and money from family and friends to finance its growth and is close to securing its first round of funding from private equity investors.

NewsWhip

NewsWhip tracks the spread and impact of stories published on social media — intel that helps PR pros handle crises, improve media relations, and understand their audiences.

Most of NewsWhip's revenue comes from PR agencies like Brunswick Group and MSL, but its tech is also used by media companies, brands, governments, universities, and nonprofits.

The 51-person company has raised a total of $9.5 million across two rounds of funding from equity investors that includes the Associated Press. The company may explore another fundraise in 2021.

Onclusive

Data science company Onclusive's flagship product is PR Attribution, which gives brands intel like how many people read a piece of content about their company and visited their website.

Clients of the 100-person firm include 23andme, Airbnb, Experian, and Lyft.

Backed by Salesforce Ventures, Mohr Davidow, Storm Ventures, and Pereg Ventures, Onclusive's revenue increased by 50% from 2019 to 2020.

Propel

2-year-old software company Propel boasts a media database with more than 1 million journalists, 50 million influencers, and 3 billion articles. 

It also has an online and broadcast monitoring service and AI tool to help PR pros tailor their pitches to journalists and influencers.

Propel has 50 clients, including Google, W2O, and The Daily Mail. It's raised $1.2 million in venture capital and its lead investor is a recently established startup accelerator in California called LogicBoost Labs.

Prophet

Prophet is a new player in the communications software market.

Launched by MDC Partners' PR agency KWT Global in October 2020, it analyzes journalists' coverage to help clients like Ironman predict which journalists to pitch a story to, how much the story will spread, and how it'll be covered.

Prophet has 10 employees and most recently hired Andrew Meranus, a vet of Cision and digital media platform Piano, as EVP of sales.

Pulsar

Pulsar pulls data from social, news, search, and first-party data that clients like Levi's, Heineken, and HSBC use to create messages for their audiences.

Pulsar also has a market research division it gained through its 2017 merger with Face and has been expanding its platform with new products and updates. Today, Pulsar has 75 employees across London, New York, and Los Angeles.

Pulsar was sold in 2019 to Access Intelligence PLC, a PR software company that also owns Vuelio and ResponseSource.

In December 2020, Access Intelligence raised about $13.4 million by selling shares to private investors.

Signal AI

David Benigson, founder and CEO of Signal AI, started in media monitoring and since 2019 has moved into areas like compliance.

Signal AI analyzes information from regulatory, social media, broadcast, radio, and alternative data sets like SEC filings and net promoter scores.

For example, Signal AI helped Deloitte's tax division keep track of changes in tax codes and automatically send alerts to Deloitte clients, according to TechCrunch.

Founded in 2013, Signal AI has 157 employees and 600 clients, which includes HSBC, Citigroup, and Save the Children. It's raised $49.5 million across two rounds, most recently in 2019 with a round led by Redline Capital. Other investors include MMC Ventures, GMG Ventures, and Hearst Ventures.

SocialChorus

SocialChorus is an employee communications technology company that allows clients like Amazon, Dow, and Lowe's to send content to employees through digital channels and measure its impact.

As a result of the pandemic and other workplace trends, SocialChorus focused on helping companies adapt with new tools like an assistant to highlight important subjects, alert employees about open action items, and connect to systems used by their companies.

The 120-person company has grown revenue more than 50% three years in a row. Most recently, SocialChorus sold a majority stake to Sumeru Equity Partners for $100 million.

Talkwalker

Founded in 2009, Talkwalker is a social listening and analytics company used by more than 2,000 brands and agencies.

Since selling a majority stake to Marlin Equity Partners in 2018, Talkwalker has doubled its client volume to include Spotify, Adidas, and Golin. 

It's also released a number of new features, including video and image visualization tools. The Luxembourg-based company also acquired social measurement and audience insights software Nielsen Social, bolstering its position in the US.

400-person Talkwalker has also partnered with media intelligence company Burrelles to track media and struck a data-sharing agreement with Quora.

TVEyes

TVEyes is a broadcast and podcasting monitoring service that transcribes content into a text format for clients.

Political campaigns often hire TVEyes to monitor ad content and keep tabs on their opponents' moves, but the company is also used by Fortune 500 brands and global media agencies. The company's technology also powers other PR software companies like Cision, Meltwater, and Burrelles.

In January 2020, TVEyes made the news when it disclosed it was hacked by a ransomware attack.

Traackr

As PR pros cultivate relationships with influencers as well as journalists, they're using platforms like Traackr, an influencer marketing platform, to optimize, streamline, and scale their campaigns.

Founded in 2007, the 50-person company has clients across a variety of industries, such as L'Oréal, Coach, Expedia, and Samsung. Traackr has raised $14.5 million over five rounds.

Recently, Traackr has focused on providing metrics that show how influencer marketing campaigns perform compared to competitors, the general market, and over time.

Vivid Communications

Vivid Communications is a new player in the PR software industry, launching its first product in April 2020, a media planning tool that streamlines the often tedious process of putting together a list editors and journalists to pitch stories to.

Founders Caitlin Kelly and Neel Shah said Vivid also plans to launch an ecommerce platform. 

Vivid Communications has clients like automation company Hyperscience, The Netherlands Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy, and DTC consumer brands like Uprising Food.

Backed by MediaLink vice chair Wenda Millard and Forbes vice chair Mike Perlis, Vivid has raised about $1.5 million in seed funding. It's outpaced its forecasts of 15% month-over-month revenue growth, Kelly said.

Weber Shandwick

IPG-owned Weber Shandwick launched a 120-person global intelligence division in early 2020 to address clients' demand for more data-driven solutions.

Its key service is A-Hub, a platform that takes in billions of datapoints from social media, news stories, and clients and spits out insights and predictions for clients like General Motors, McDonald's, and Nespresso.

Weber Shandwick's global intelligence division is run by Brian Buchwald, formerly the CEO and cofounder of Bomoda, a data science and business intelligence firm that Weber Shandwick acquired in 2017.

Yonder

Jonathan Morgan launched AI software company Yonder in 2017 to analyze how stories and conversations spread across social media and influence public opinion, focusing on groups like Russian entities and ISIS.

Now, the 25-person company is using those same tools to help brands like Johnson & Johnson, Disney, and Walmart tamp down on crises and suss out real conversations from disinformation. For example, Fast Company reported on Yonder's analysis of how anti-vaxxers are pushing the idea that vitamin C can prevent people from getting the coronavirus.

Yonder said it's averaged 23% annual revenue growth since 2017. It's raised $18 million in seed and Series A funding from investors like GGV Capital, Lux, Build Group, Moonshots Capital, and Haystack.

Zignal Labs

Zignal Labs started in 2011 as a technology platform providing real-time data and analytics to political campaigns.

Since then, its "war room" approach has attracted brands like Levi's, Uber, and The Lending Club looking to track social media and news to manage their reputations and tamp down on misinformation and disinformation.

Zignal has raised $59.9 million in total funding from investors like Blum Capital Partners and North Atlantic Capital, according to Crunchbase.

The company is led by CEO Adam Beaugh, who took over for Josh Ginsberg when Ginsberg stepped down to join Facebook as VP of public affairs marketing in 2019.

• Finding gifts for the gamers on your shopping list can be tough since there are so many new games and gadgets to choose from.
• We've put together a list of our favorite gaming gifts, ranging from customizable controllers to exclusive collectibles.
• Before buying games or accessories, it's helpful to know if your gamer prefers PlayStation, Switch, Xbox, or PC when playing.
• For more gift ideas, check out all of our gift guides for 2020 here.

Gift shopping for a tech-savvy gamer can be challenging, but we've put together a list of can't miss picks that will leave any gamer happy. 

From this year's most popular releases to wireless headsets and awesome collectibles, our selection offers something for all gaming tastes and budgets. If you're looking for more last-minute tech gifts, be sure to read our guides to the best tech gifts under $100, the best tech gifts under $50, and the best tech gifts under $25.

Here are the best gifts for gamers:

A headset to stay in contact with friends

The right pair of headphones can help players feel fully immersed in their games, whether they're exploring a fantasy world or listening closely for enemy footsteps. Headsets with microphones are essential for communicating with teammates online too, whether you're playing on your computer or a console.

The HyperX Cloud Flight Wireless is on sale for $100 right now, and it works with PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, PC, and Nintendo Switch. It uses a USB dongle for a faster, more consistent wireless connection than Bluetooth can provide, at ranges up to 60 feet.

The battery can last for up to 30 hours on a single charge, and even without power, you can always connect the HyperX Cloud Flight to your phone or controller with a 3.5mm audio cable to listen. There's a physical mute button for the microphone, and you can even remove it when you only need the headset.

PlayStation 5, PS4 consoles, and Nintendo Switch have different headphone requirements than the Xbox, so you'll have to pick up a pair of Xbox licensed headphones like the HyperX CloudX if you know the gamer in your life prefers Xbox.

If you're willing to go with a more affordable wired headset, the Razer Kraken X provides 7.1 surround sound on PlayStation, Switch and Xbox, and it's on sale for just $35.

A gaming monitor for 4K resolution and competitive play

Sharing the living room TV with a gamer can be tough, so consider getting your favorite player a dedicated screen so they can play in peace. Monitors have become increasingly popular for gamers of all-types, including console players, since they offer less delay than TVs and sport smoother looking frame rates while playing.

Newer monitors have support for popular TV features, like HDR color and contrast, making them easier to pair with consoles like the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X. This BenQ 28-inch gaming monitor is about the size of a small TV, it supports 4K resolution, it's AMD FreeSync compatible, and it boasts a fast 1 ms (GtG) response time.

This year's best blockbuster games

The best games of the year can vary based on a gamer's platform of choice, so it's essential to know if your gift recipient owns consoles (like the PlayStation, Switch, or Xbox) before buying a game.

Some of the year's best games are console exclusives, like "Ghost of Tsushima" and "The Last of Us Part II" on PlayStation 4. "Ghost of Tsushima" is an open-world samurai adventure set on a scenic Japanese island, while 2020 Game of the Year winner "The Last of Us Part II" features impressive cinematic storytelling and cutting-edge graphics.

Nintendo's offerings are known for being more family-oriented; the casual village-building game "Animal Crossing New Horizons" helped millions of people spend time together amid social distancing. "Pokémon Sword and Shield" are the latest entries in the popular franchise, adding a new batch of collectible creatures alongside familiar faces like Pikachu and Charizard.

A rare collection of classic Mario games

"Super Mario 3D All-Stars" is a collection of three classic Mario adventures remastered for the Nintendo Switch, but it's only available digitally and in-stores until March 31, 2021. "Super Mario 3D All-Stars" includes "Super Mario Sunshine," which hasn't been re-issued since its release in 2002.

With the Switch continuing to grow in popularity and the longstanding legacy of "Super Mario," you can expect "3D All-Stars" to become a collector's item in the years to come. Nintendo also released a special 30th anniversary edition of "Fire Emblem," that translates the game for the first time for American audiences and replicates the game's original NES packaging. Like "3D All-Stars," this "Fire Emblem" bundle is only available until March 31, 2021.

A subscription to hundreds of games on PC, Xbox, and Android

Millions of people have picked up Microsoft's Netflix-style subscription for video games to help pass the time at home during 2020. The library has more than a hundred games, ranging from Xbox classics, like "Halo," to some of the most popular games of 2020, like "Among Us" and "Doom Eternal."

Xbox Game Pass Ultimate isn't exclusive to Xbox consoles; games can be played on Windows computers and streamed on Android phones too. For Xbox owners, Xbox Game Pass Ultimate also includes Xbox Live Gold, a $10 monthly service required to play games online; so you get a ton of value for just $5 more per month.

If your gamer friend or loved one is only interested in PC gaming, however, you can currently snag a three-month membership to the PC-only Game Pass plan for just $17.

A premium controller with customizable buttons

If you know a gamer who has been playing with the same old Xbox or PlayStation controller for years, you can give them a major upgrade. The $180 Xbox Elite 2 controller has a rechargeable battery, four extra paddle buttons on the rear, and comes with extra tools to customize and tighten your joysticks and directional pad.

The Xbox Elite 2 works on PC, is Bluetooth compatible, and will work with the Xbox One and Xbox Series S|X.

Sony doesn't make their own premium version of the PlayStation's DualShock controller but Scuf Gaming makes a $160 PlayStation 4 controller with paddles similar to the Xbox Elite 2, plus a wide selection of customizable faceplates.

Extra storage space to spend more time playing, and less downloading

The latest games can require anywhere from 20GB to 200GB to install, so gamers of all types will appreciate an upgrade in storage space. PlayStation and Xbox both allow external USB drives for storing games, screenshots, and your video recordings. You'll need a USB 3.0 drive with between 250GB or 8TB of storage.

We recommend buying a drive from a reliable brand like Seagate or Western Digital — 1TB is enough to at least double the space available on consoles, and there's not much of a performance advantage if you buy a more expensive solid state drive for your consoles.

The Nintendo Switch uses MicroSD cards to expand beyond its 32GB of internal storage. The Switch supports MicroSD cards up to 2TB in size but we recommend a 128GB or 256GB card, which offer plenty of space at a significantly lower price.

A retro console for nostalgia and preserving the classics

Retro consoles like the Sega Genesis Mini pack a bunch of classic games into a nostalgic replica of consoles past. The Sega Genesis Mini (currently on sale for $50) comes with 42 games from the '90s console including "Sonic the Hedgehog" and "Street Fighter 2." Games are displayed in high definition and the digital copies let you instantly save.

Nintendo set off a craze for retro consoles a few years ago with the NES Classic and Super NES Classic, but those consoles had a limited run and have less games than the Genesis Mini. The PlayStation Classic also collects 20 games from that console, but the selection isn't as impressive as the competition.

An all-in-one VR headset to explore gaming from a new perspective

Released in May 2020, the Oculus Quest 2 has set a new standard for virtual reality headsets with finger tracking, greatly improved image quality, and no external sensors needed for setup. Oculus Quest 2 can be used as a standalone device for gaming, chatting, and watching movies, or connected to a PC for even more immersive performance.

Iconic collectibles inspired by popular games

Not every video game series is popular enough to have its own set of collectibles, but you can find a wide selection of gaming-inspired figures and statues from brands like Pop!, Nendoroid, and Kotobukiya. Prices can range from $10 to $250 or more depending on the item, but what's important is finding a collectible that matches your gamer's style.

The collectible shop iam8bit also offers lots of rare and limited collectibles, like vinyl video game soundtracks and customized cartridges for old games.

Microsoft cofounder and philanthropist Bill Gates is an incredibly busy man, but he always makes time to read. 

"Reading books is my favorite way to learn about a new topic," he wrote on his blog. "I've been reading about a book a week on average since I was a kid. Even when my schedule is out of control, I carve out a lot of time for reading."

Aside from a handful of novels, the books he likes are mostly nonfiction, covering his and his foundation's broad range of interests. A lot of them are about transforming systems: how nations can intelligently develop, how to lead an organization, and how social change can fruitfully happen.

Here are the titles he's given glowing reviews and that changed his perspective over the past several years.

SEE ALSO: 25 book recommendations from Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, and other top CEOs

'The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined' by Steven Pinker

In "Better Angels," Harvard cognitive scientist Steven Pinker branches out into the history of the most contentious of subjects: violence.

Gates said it's one of the most important books he's ever read.

"Pinker presents a tremendous amount of evidence that humans have gradually become much less violent and much more humane," he said, in a trend that started thousands of years ago and continued until this day.

This isn't just ivory-tower theory. Gates said the book has affected his humanitarian work.

"As I'm someone who's fairly optimistic in general," he said, "the book struck a chord with me and got me to thinking about some of our foundation's strategies."

Buy it here >>

'Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong About the World—and Why Things Are Better Than You Think' by Hans Rosling

In this book, the late Hans Rosling, a Swedish physician, academic, and close friend of Gates, proposes 10 obstacles that prevent people from seeing the world objectively. These include the fear instinct (the idea that we pay more attention to scary things) to the gap instinct (the notion that most people fall between two extremes).

"Hans gives you a breakthrough way of understanding basic truths about the world—how life is getting better, and where the world still needs to improve,"Gates wrote.  "I've been recommending this book since the day it came out."

Buy it here >>

'Origin Story' by David Christian

In 2012, Gates and historian David Christian created Big History, a free online history and science course designed for high school students that tells the story of the universe and humanity. Christian essentially turned that online course into a book when he wrote "Origin Story." 

Perhaps not surprisingly, Gates loves the book. 

"It shows how everything is connected to everything else, weaving together insights and evidence from across disciplines into a single, understandable narrative,"he wrote. 

Buy it here >>

'The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness' by Michelle Alexander

"Like many white people,"Gates wrote, "I've committed to reading more about and deepening my understanding of systemic racism." He highlighted "The New Jim Crow" as one of the most impactful books he read in 2020.

Alexander, a civil-rights advocate and attorney, published the book, which explains how the US criminal-justice system fuels racial inequities, 10 years ago. But Gates said"this is a topic that has taken on extra relevance this year. The horrifying killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor set off a summer of protests that put Black Lives Matter front and center."

He finished the book "more convinced than ever that we need a more just approach to sentencing and more investment in communities of color."

Buy it here >>

'Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World' by David Epstein

Epstein is a sports journalist who came to realize that people who learn and try out different experiences tend to fare better than people who stick to just one. That's true, Epstein argues, even though the world continues to demand specialization.

Gates said the book, also named one of the best things he read in 2020, helped put his own career trajectory in perspective.

"As a kid,"he wrote, "I used to sneak out of my basement bedroom to do late-night coding at the University of Washington, but my passion for computers was always mixed with many other interests."

"Range" even explains Microsoft's success, Gates said: "We thought more broadly than other startups of that era. We hired not just brilliant coders but people who had real breadth within their field and across domains."

Buy it here >>

'The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History' by Elizabeth Kolbert

It can be easy to forget that our present day is a part of world history. Gates said that New Yorker writer Elizabeth Kolbert's book "The Sixth Extinction" helps correct that.

"Humans are putting down massive amounts of pavement, moving species around the planet, over-fishing and acidifying the oceans, changing the chemical composition of rivers, and more," Gates wrote, echoing a concern that he voices in many of his reviews.

"Natural scientists posit that there have been five extinction events in the Earth's history (think of the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs)," he continued, "and Kolbert makes a compelling case that human activity is leading to the sixth."

To get a hint of Kolbert's reporting, check out the series of stories that preceded the book's publication.

Buy it here >>

'The Man Who Fed the World' by Leon Hesser

Even though Gates can get a meeting with almost anyone, he can't land a sit-down with Norman Borlaug, the late biologist and humanitarian who led the "Green Revolution"— a series of innovations that kept a huge chunk of humanity from starving.

"Although a lot of people have never heard of Borlaug, he probably saved more lives than anyone else in history,"Gates said. "It's estimated that his new seed varieties saved a billion people from starvation," many of whom were in India and Pakistan.

Borlaug was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and the Congressional Gold Medal for his efforts — and is one of only seven people to receive that honor.

For Gates, Borlaug is a model in getting important work done in the world.

"Borlaug was one-of-a-kind," he said, "equally skilled in the laboratory, mentoring young scientists, and cajoling reluctant bureaucrats and government officials."

Hesser's "The Man Who Fed the World" lets you peer into the personality that saved a billion lives.

Buy it here >>

'Business Adventures: Twelve Classic Tales from the World of Wall Street' by John Brooks

Back in 1991, Gates asked Buffett what his favorite book was.

To reply, Buffett sent the Microsoft founder his personal copy of "Business Adventures," a collection of New Yorker stories by John Brooks.

Though the anecdotes are from half a century ago, the book remains Gates' favorite.

Gates said that the book serves as a reminder that the principles for building a winning business stay constant. He wrote:

For one thing, there's an essential human factor in every business endeavor. It doesn't matter if you have a perfect product, production plan and marketing pitch; you'll still need the right people to lead and implement those plans.

Learning of the affections that Gates and Buffett have for this title, the business press has fallen similarly in love with the book. Slate quipped that "Business Adventures" is "catnip for billionaires."

Buy it here >>

'The Vital Question' by Nick Lane

Nick Lane might not be a household name, but Gates want to change that.

"Nick is one of those original thinkers who makes you say: More people should know about this guy's work," he said. "He is trying to right a scientific wrong by getting people to fully appreciate the role that energy plays in all living things."

The book seeks to resolve unanswered questions about how life formed on earth, and raises thoughtful questions about where solutions for disease may come from.

"Even if the details of Nick's work turn out to be wrong," Gates said, "I suspect his focus on energy will be seen as an important contribution to our understanding of where we come from."

'String Theory' by David Foster Wallace

No, not that kind of string theory.

The book is a collection of essays from David Foster Wallace that all revolve around tennis — the late author's favorite game.

Gates said he's been trying to get back into the sport after some small professional matters (read: starting one of the world's largest tech companies and becoming a celebrated philanthropist) got in the way.

"You don't have to play or even watch tennis to love this book," he wrote. Wallace "wielded a pen as skillfully as Roger Federer wields a tennis racket."

'The Heart' by Maylis de Kerangal

Though it may be a novel, "The Heart" is about as close to creative nonfiction as fiction gets, Gates said.

The story involves a man dying in an accident, after which his parents decide to donate his heart. "But the plot is secondary to the strength of its words and characters," Gates wrote. "The book uses beautiful language to connect you deeply with people who may be in the story for only a few minutes."

The recommendation is courtesy of his wife Melinda, he said, and now he's passing it along to the public.

'How to Lie with Statistics' by Darrell Huff

Published in 1954, "How to Lie with Statistics" is an introduction to statistics — and a primer on how they can be manipulated.

It's "more relevant than ever," Gates said.

"One chapter shows you how visuals can be used to exaggerate trends and give distorted comparisons," he said. "It's a timely reminder, given how often infographics show up in your Facebook and Twitter feeds these days."

Buy it here >>

'The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism' by Doris Kearns Goodwin

Like us, Gates is fascinated by the way Theodore Roosevelt was able to affect his society: busting trusts, setting up a park system, and the like.

For this reason, Gates appreciates how Goodwin's biography uses the presidency as a lens for understanding the shift of society.

"How does social change happen?" Gates asked in his review."Can it be driven by a single inspirational leader, or do other factors have to lay the groundwork first?"

He says that TR shows how many stakeholders need to be involved.

"Although he tried to push through a number of political reforms earlier in his career," Gates said, "[Roosevelt] wasn't really successful until journalists at 'McClure's' and other publications had rallied public support for change."

Buy it here >>

'How Asia Works' by Joe Studwell

Joe Studwell is a business journalist whose central mission is understanding "development."

The Financial Times said that "How Asia Works" is "the first book to offer an Asia-wide deconstruction of success and failure in economic development."

Gates said that the book's thesis goes like this:

All the countries that become development success stories (1) create conditions for small farmers to thrive, (2) use the proceeds from agricultural surpluses to build a manufacturing base that is tooled from the start to produce exports, and (3) nurture both these sectors with financial institutions closely controlled by the government.

Buy it here >>

'Tap Dancing to Work: Warren Buffett on Practically Everything, 1966-2012' by Carol Loomis

Warren Buffett and Gates have a famously epic bromance, what with their recommending books to each other and spearheading philanthropic campaigns together.

So it's no surprise that Gates enjoyed "Tap Dancing to Work," a collection of articles and essays about and by Buffett, compiled by Fortune magazine journalist Carol Loomis.

Gates said that anyone who reads the book cover-to-cover will walk away with two main impressions:

First, how Warren's been incredibly consistent in applying his vision and investment principles over the duration of his career;

[S]econdly, that his analysis and understanding of business and markets remains unparalleled. I wrote in 1996 that I'd never met anyone who thought about business in such a clear way. That is certainly still the case.

Getting into the mind of Buffett is "an extremely worthwhile use of time," Gates concluded.

Buy it here >>

'The Rosie Project: A Novel' by Graeme Simsion

Gates doesn't review a lot of fiction, but "The Rosie Project," which came on the recommendation of his wife, Melinda, is an oddly perfect fit.

"Anyone who occasionally gets overly logical will identify with the hero, a genetics professor with Asperger's Syndrome who goes looking for a wife,"he wrote. "(Melinda thought I would appreciate the parts where he's a little too obsessed with optimizing his schedule. She was right.)"

The book is funny, clever, and moving, Gates said, to the point that he read it in one sitting.

Buy it here >>

'The Myth of the Strong Leader' by Archie Brown

Two years ago, Oxford political scientist Archie Brown offered his theory that history's most effective leaders don't actually live up to the tough-as-nails stereotype. They aren't all "strong leaders."

Figures such as FDR and Nelson Mandela instead wielded a more discreet kind of power — mainly through their delegation and diplomacy. Given that Donald Trump won the most recent election largely for his perceived strength, Gates said Brown's book is incredibly relevant.

"Brown could not have predicted how resonant his book would become in 2016," Gates wrote.

'Born a Crime' by Trevor Noah

Noah, host of "The Daily Show,"recounts his experiences growing up with a black South African mother and a white Swiss father in apartheid South Africa in the late 1980s.

His book is equal mixture heartbreaking memoir and laugh-filled comedy, according to Gates, a self-admitted longtime fan of "The Daily Show."

"Much of Noah's story of growing up in South Africa is tragic," he said. "Yet, as anyone who watches his nightly monologues knows, his moving stories will often leave you laughing."

'Stuff Matters' by Mark Miodownik

If you're like most people, you use steel razors, glass cups, and paper notepads every day without thinking much about the materials they're made of.

In "Stuff Matters," Miodownik, a materials scientist, aims to show you why the science behind those materials is so fascinating.

That premise might sound similar to "Making the Modern World," a book by Gates' favorite author Smil, which Gates has also recommended. But Gates said the two works are "completely different." While Smil is a "facts-and-numbers guy," Miodownik is "heavy on romance and very light on numbers," potentially making "Stuff Matters" an easier read.

Gates claims his favorite chapter is the one on carbon, "which offers insights into one atom's massive past, present, and future role in human life."

Buy it here >>

'Hyperbole and a Half' by Allie Brosh

It might be hard to imagine Gates curled up with a book of comic drawings. But "Hyperbole and a Half," based on the blog by the same name, is more moving and profound than it is silly.

The stories and drawings in the book are based on scenes from Brosh's life, as well as her imagined misadventures.

"It's funny and smart as hell," Gates wrote, adding that "Brosh's stories feel incredibly — and sometimes brutally — real."

Gates was especially moved by the parts of the book that touch on Brosh's struggles with severe depression, including a series of images about her attempts to leave an appropriate suicide note.

It's a rare book that can simultaneously make you laugh, cry, and think existential thoughts — but this one seems to do it.

Buy it here >>

'The Power to Compete' by Hiroshi Mikitani and Ryoichi Mikitani

Japan used to be an economic juggernaut, but today its output tends to live in the shadows of South Korea and China. "The Power to Compete" explores the country's fall from technological grace, which Gates said touches a soft spot for him.

Hiroshi Mikitani is the founder and CEO of Rakuten, one of the largest internet companies in the world. Together with his father, who died in 2013, the pair envision a future in which Japan is once again a thriving economic hub.

"Although I don't agree with everything in Hiroshi's program," Gates said, "I think he has a number of good ideas. 'The Power to Compete' is a smart look at the future of a fascinating country."

'What If?' by Randall Munroe

Another book based on a blog, "What If?" is a collection of cartoon-illustrated answers to hypothetical scientific questions.

Those questions range from the dystopian ("What if I took a swim in a typical spent nuclear fuel pool?") to the philosophical ("What if everyone actually had only one soul mate, a random person somewhere in the world?") Each question was posed by a different reader, and Munroe, a former roboticist for NASA, goes to the greatest lengths to answer it accurately through research and interviews.

Gates wrote:

The reason Munroe's approach is a great way to learn about science is that he takes ideas that everybody understands in a general way and then explores what happens when you take those ideas to their limits. For example, we all know pretty much what gravity is. But what if Earth's gravity were twice as strong as it is? What if it were three times as strong, or a hundred? Looking at the question in that way makes you start to think about gravity a little differently.

For anyone who's ever wished there were someone to indulge and investigate their secret scientific fantasies, this book comes in handy.

Buy it here >>

'Stress Test: Reflections on Financial Crises' by Tim Geithner

Gates stood at the center of an enormously complex system as CEO of Microsoft. Timothy Geithner did much the same as US Treasury secretary — and saw the structure fall down around him during the financial crisis.

"Geithner paints a compelling human portrait of what it was like to be fighting a global financial meltdown while at the same time fighting critics inside and outside the Administration as well as his own severe guilt over his near-total absence from his family,"Gates said. "The politics of fighting financial crises will always be ugly. But it helps if the public knows a little more about the subject."

"Stress Test" provides that knowledge.

Buy it here >>

'On Immunity' by Eula Biss

Even though the science all says that vaccines are among the most important inventions in human history, there's still a debate about whether they're a good idea.

In "On Immunity," essayist Eula Biss pulls apart that argument.

She "uses the tools of literary analysis, philosophy, and science to examine the speedy, inaccurate rumors about childhood vaccines that have proliferated among well-meaning American parents," Gates wrote. "Biss took up this topic not for academic reasons but because of her new role as a mom."

Buy it here >>

'Should We Eat Meat?' by Vaclav Smil

Gates isn't shy about proclaiming Smil, a professor emeritus at the University of Manitoba, his favorite author. In fact, he's recommended several of Smil's books before.

As usual, Gates wrote, Smil attacks the issue of whether humans should consume meat from every possible angle. First he tries to define meat, then he looks at its role in human evolution, as well as how much meat each country consumes, the health and environmental risks, and the ethicality of raising animals for slaughter.

Gates, who was a vegetarian for a year during his 20s, is especially impressed by how Smil uses science to debunk common misconceptions, like the idea that raising meat for food involves a tremendous amount of water.

In fact, Gates writes:

Smil shows you how the picture is more complicated. It turns out that not all water is created equal. Nearly 90 percent of the water needed for livestock production is what's called green water, used to grow grass and such. In most places, all but a tiny fraction of green water comes from rain, and because most green water eventually evaporates back into the atmosphere, it's not really consumed.

Overall, the book left Gates feeling that eventually, "the world can meet its need for meat."

Buy it here >>

'Shoe Dog' by Phil Knight

Knight, the co-founder of Nike, released the first insider account of the world-famous retailer earlier this April.

Gates called the book a "refreshingly honest" reminder that the road to success is never a straight line. It's a winding path rife with disagreements, fallouts, and hurt feelings.

"I've met Knight a few times over the years," Gates wrote. "He's super nice, but he's also quiet and difficult to get to know. Here Knight opens up in a way few CEOs are willing to do."

'Epic Measures' by Jeremy Smith

Reading this biography was especially meaningful for Gates because he's known its subject, a doctor named Chris Murray, for more than a decade.

According to Gates, the book is a "highly readable account for anyone who wants to know more about Chris's work and why it matters."

That work involves creating the Global Burden of Disease, a public website that gathers data on the causes of human illness and death from researchers around the world. The idea is that we can't begin finding cures for health issues if we don't even know what those issues are.

Writes Gates: "As Epic Measures shows, the more we make sure reliable information gets out there, the better decisions we all can make, and the more impact we all can have."

Buy it here >>

'Making the Modern World: Materials and Dematerialization' by Vaclav Smil

Gates said his favorite author is Vaclav Smil, an environmental-sciences professor who writes big histories of things like energy and innovation.

His latest is "Making the Modern World." It got Gates thinking.

"It might seem mundane, but the issue of materials — how much we use and how much we need — is key to helping the world's poorest people improve their lives,"he wrote."Think of the amazing increase in quality of life that we saw in the United States and other rich countries in the past 100 years. We want most of that miracle to take place for all of humanity over the next 50 years."

To know where we're going, Gates said, we need to know where we've been — and Smil is one of his favorite sources for learning that.

Buy it here >>

'The Grid: The Fraying Wires Between Americans and Our Energy Future' by Gretchen Bakke

"The Grid" is a perfect example of how Bill Gates thinks about book genres the way Netflix thinks about TV and movies.

"This book, about our aging electrical grid, fits in one of my favorite genres: 'Books About Mundane Stuff That Are Actually Fascinating,'" he wrote.

Growing up in the Seattle area, Gates' first job was writing software for a company that provided energy to the Pacific Northwest. He learned just how vital power grids are to everyday life, and "The Grid" serves as an important reminder that they really are engineering marvels.

"I think you would also come to see why modernizing the grid is so complex," he wrote, "and so critical for building our clean-energy future."

'Seveneves' by Neal Stephenson

After a science-fiction dry spell of more than a decade, in 2016 Gates picked up "Seveneves" on a friend's recommendation, and he said he's grateful for it.  "The plot gets going in the first sentence, when the moon blows up," he wrote. 

But that's only the beginning. The world soon learns the entire species is doomed: In two years' time, a cataclysmic meteor shower will destroy all life on the pale blue dot. It's up to humanity to send as many spacecraft into orbit as possible with the hope of escaping the apocalypse.

"You might lose patience with all the information you'll get about space flight," Gates wrote, "but I loved the technical details."

'A Full Life' by Jimmy Carter

After having written more than 24 books already, President Carter's memoir about growing up in the small town of Plains, Georgia still reads as a quick, impressive book, Gates writes.

"I loved reading about Carter's improbable rise to the world's highest office," he said. "The book will help you understand how growing up in rural Georgia in a house without running water, electricity, or insulation shaped — for better and for worse — his time in the White House."

The stories may be from another time, but Gates said they carry a distinct timeliness as people's trust in political institutions (and the people running them) are at near rock-bottom.

'The Gene: An Intimate History' by Siddhartha Mukherjee

Genome science can hardly be considered a topic of mainstream interest, but Gates said Mukherjee manages to capture its relevance to people's daily lives. He seeks to answer big questions concerning our personalities and what makes us, us.

"Mukherjee wrote this book for a lay audience, because he knows that the new genome technologies are at the cusp of affecting us all in profound ways," Gates wrote.

Mukherjee is what Gates calls a "quadruple threat." He's a practicing physician, teacher, researcher, and author. 

This is an updated version of a previously published article. 

• If you gift a product that has been featured on the show "Shark Tank," then you know it'll be both creative and practical. 
• Games, kitchen tools, skincare products, and food are all thoughtful gifts you can give to the "Shark Tank" fan in your life. 
• Most of these items are available with Prime two-day shipping, so there's still a chance for them to arrive before Christmas. You should order soon in case there are carrier delays. 
• Sign up for Insider Reviews' weekly newsletter for more buying advice and great deals.

One of our favorite shows to spot new products and enjoy some entertaining celebrity judge banter is "Shark Tank," which is currently in its 12th season. 

As we've seen over the years, some pitches do extremely well, while others aren't so lucky — but the fact remains that the show brings forward new and innovative ideas most of us have never considered.

That's why the products from the show tend to make especially good gifts. They're far from generic and they usually solve a common problem or annoyance. Conveniently, most are also available on Amazon so you can get them as last-minute gifts.

Most of these items are available with Prime two-day shipping, which means there's a good chance they'll arrive before Christmas. However, keep in mind that carriers are busier than usual this year and your gift may still be delayed. 

The top 5 gifts from 'Shark Tank':

1. A memorable 3D card, $15
2. A reusable smart notebook, $24
3. The famous "Comfy" sweatshirt that they'll never want to take off, $50
4. High-fidelity earplugs to protect their ears during concerts, $24
5. A drink accessory that keeps their beer cold, $35

If they love watching 'Shark Tank,' they'll recognize these 25 awesome last-minute gift ideas:

A cake accessory for people who love surprises

Surprise Cake Popping Cake Stand, $49.98

This clever product lets you hide gifts inside a cake, giving the gift an extra oomph and wow factor. As long as it fits inside the Gift Pod, which measures 2.8 inches by 6 inches, it can go in the cake. 

A blanket inspired by warm sleeping bags

Rumpl Sherpa Puffy Blanket, $134.09, available at Amazon

Rumpl blankets are made from the same material as super warm sleeping bags and insulated jackets, but they're not limited to use on outdoor trips. Since they look nice and come in various patterns and colors, these might just be the blankets your recipient needs inside their own house. 

Note: Arrives after Christmas 

A funny gift box

Prank Pack Bathe & Brew Gift Box, $6, available at Amazon

The Prank Pack isn't the actual gift, but it is a funny way to prank your recipient and trick them into thinking they're receiving a strange or gimmicky present. The co-founder is a former writer at The Onion, so expect nothing less than hilarious fake products and product descriptions that your recipient will have to pretend to enjoy. 

Note: Arrives after Christmas 

A travel accessory that combines a hoodie with a memory foam pillow

HoodiePillow Memory Foam Travel Pillow, $29.95, available at Amazon

The clever design of this two-in-one hoodie and memory foam pillow, which feels like their favorite fleece sweatshirt, lets them fall asleep comfortably while traveling. The hood helps block out light and noise, while the pillow provides soft neck support.

Note: Arrives after Christmas 

A baking pan that gives them more edge pieces

Baker's Edge Nonstick Edge Brownie Pan, $36.95, available at Amazon

The days of fighting over the limited number of edge pieces are over. With this unique pan, every piece has two delectable, chewy edges. Other than to make brownies, they can also use it for other desserts, pasta, or any baked good that requires some extra crust.

Note: Arrives after Christmas 

Rich, dessert-like peanut butter spread packed with protein

Nuts 'N More Chocolate Maple Pretzel Peanut Butter Spread, $11.99, available at Amazon

For the family's resident sweet tooth or fitness enthusiast, get these chunky, sweet-and-salty peanut butter spreads. They contain whey protein isolate, providing 11 grams of protein per serving, and they're low-sugar and low-carb. Spread the creative flavors, which include birthday cake and gingerbread, over pancakes or fruit, or enjoy them straight out of the jar. 

Note: Arrives after Christmas 

A fun outdoor game

Spikeball 3 Ball Kit, $59.95 available at Amazon

On a beautiful sunny day at any park in the city, you'll probably see at least one group playing this fun and active game. With rules similar to volleyball, it's easy to learn so the whole family can get involved. Prior to the pandemic, the company even held nationwide tournaments. 

A back support belt that improves posture

BetterBack, $49.99, available at Amazon

Insider Reviews senior editor Sally Kaplan can't recommend this posture corrector enough. If your recipient suffers from back pain, this ergonomic belt provides the relief they'll need.

Note: Arrives after Christmas 

A glass that makes any wine bottle into a single serving

Guzzle Buddy 2GO Wine Glasses, $12.99, available at Amazon

This handy tool can attach a glass to nearly any bottle of wine. It's odor-free, virtually unbreakable, and top-rack dishwasher safe. Plus, it lies at the intersection between a humorous white elephant gift and an actually useful accessory, given how the past year has panned out. 

Note: Arrives after Christmas 

An appliance that turns any beer into draft beer

Fizzics FZ403 DraftPour Beer Dispenser, $124.99, available at Amazon

Using sound waves, this cool appliance turns any can or bottle of beer into fresh draft beer by turning its natural carbonation into compacted micro bubbles. All they have to do is insert their favorite beer, then pull and push the tap to receive the enhanced version of their IPA, pilsner, or stout. 

A balance bike

KaZAM No Pedal Balance Bike, from $87.85, available at Amazon

Featuring a patented footrest design that helps young kids find their center of gravity, this bike builds the confidence needed to transition to riding a proper bike. The ergonomic, adjustable handles and seat will get kids comfortable and ready to ride right away. The bike weighs only eight pounds and the puncture-free tires never need air. 

A beach towel that gives back

Sand Cloud Turkish Towel, $39.99, available at Amazon

This beautiful 100% Turkish cotton towel also works as a throw or wall tapestry. It's thin and compact, but durable. Plus, the company donates 10% of profits to help preserve marine life.

A sturdy, inflatable paddle board

Tower Inflatable 10'4" Stand Up Paddle Board, $629.99, available at Amazon

Gift an avid outdoor adventurer this premium paddle board and you'll have a difficult time getting them to return to shore. Its design provides for better balance and stability, while a bottom fin makes it easier to maneuver. It inflates and deflates quickly, so it can be brought anywhere — but unlike many other inflatable boards, it's strong and rigid. 

Note: May arrive after Christmas 

High-fidelity earplugs to protect their ears during concerts

Vibes High Fidelity Concert Earplugs, $23.98, available at Amazon

If they plan on attending a lot of loud shows as soon as concerts are safe again, their eardrums may be facing the consequences. Wearing these comfortable earplugs can reduce decibel levels by up to 22 decibels, but they don't cancel out noise completely. Instead, they only filter out certain frequencies, so your recipient will still be able to enjoy the crisp vocals and instrumentation of their favorite band. 

The famous "Comfy" sweatshirt that they'll never want to take off

The Comfy Sweatshirt, from $33.99, available at Amazon

You can practically feel the comfortable softness and warmth of this oversized blanket sweater just by looking at it. Cozy up in The Comfy by the fireplace, at sports games, or while watching rom-coms. 

A memorable 3D card

Lovepop Star Wars Pop Up Card, $15, available at Amazon

The cards are available in seven different "Star Wars" designs, or you can visit Lovepop's Amazon page to find other types of themes. Don't worry — there's still room to write an actual message for your recipient in the included notecard. 

Adorable leather moccasins

Freshly Picked Kids' Soft Sole Moccasins (Newborn Baby), $39, available at Amazon 

The creator of the cutest little baby shoes you've ever seen got her start picking up yard sale leather scraps and selling on Etsy. Today, parents everywhere are obsessed with the unique and comfortable 100% leather designs that infuse style into their baby's every step. 

A better protein mixing bottle

Ice Shaker 26-Ounce Stainless Steel Protein Mixing Cup, $35, available at Amazon

The problem with traditional plastic protein powder shakers is that they tend to absorb odor and won't keep the contents cold. Former NFL player Chris Gronkowski's stainless steel water bottle is double-insulated, spill-proof, and odor-free — the upgrade that fitness enthusiasts deserve.

Note: May arrive after Christmas 

A funny card game that tests the financial limits of various outrageous scenarios

Pricetitution Card Game, $19.99, available at Amazon

Every card begins with the prompt, "How much money would it take me..." followed by a funny situation. It was a big success on both "Shark Tank," with four Sharks giving offers, and on Kickstarter. 

A smart video doorbell

Ring Video Doorbell Pro, Works with Alexa, $169.99, available at Amazon

Ring may not have secured a deal with the Sharks, but it did strike up a deal with Amazon for over $1 billion in 2018, so it's doing just fine. The smart security system has two-way talk, sends motion-activated alerts, and works with Alexa, giving homeowners the peace of mind that their house will be safe, regardless of whether they're home. 

Note: Arrives after Christmas 

A pair of lightweight running sandals

Xero Shoes Barefoot-Inspired Sport Sandals, Men's Z-Trek, $64.99, available at Amazon

Xero Shoes Barefoot-Inspired Sport Sandals, Women's Z-Trek, $64.99, available at Amazon

After constantly getting injured while running, cofounder Steven Sashen switched to barefoot running and loved the effects, so he created a thin running sandal. These comfortable and supportive shoes are great for runners and could inspire them to kick-start their 2021 running goals. They can also be used for outdoor activities like hiking and kayaking. 

Note: Some sizes may arrive after Christmas 

A suction silicone place mat

Ezpz Happy Mat, $24.44, available at Amazon

Parents will appreciate any help. The placemat stays right in place on any flat surface, making it that much easier to get food from the plate into their child's mouth.

A temperature-regulating machine that goes under their bed

BedJet 3 Climate Comfort for Beds, $399, available at Amazon

As an engineer who developed the heating and cooling systems of NASA spacesuits, the creator of BedJet has the perfect background to improve the sleep experience. Since temperature often impedes a good night's sleep, the BedJet blows hot or cold air onto the bed and over their body and creates "biorhythm sleep sequences" throughout the night. 

A drink accessory that keeps their beer cold

BottleKeeper The Standard 2.0, $34.99, available at Amazon

Is there anything more frustrating to an avid beer drinker than a cold one that's less than cold in just half an hour? The insulated stainless steel BottleKeeper, complete with bottle opener, keeps their beer colder for a longer period of time. It's also a smart way to protect against drops and spills. 

A rapid ramen cooker

Rapid Ramen Cooker, $10.49, available at Amazon 

What seems like a gag gift has actually come in handy for many busy students, parents, and office workers because it takes away the need for a stove and dish-washing session, cooks the noodles more quickly, and requires less water. It's the perfect size for a block of ramen and a faster, more reliable alternative to stovetop cooking. 

Life insurance may not be thought of as the hottest area for tech innovation, yet one ad executive is seeking to disrupt it.

Aaron Shapiro spent 13 years leading design and marketing agency Huge, working for big-name brands like Nike, Goldman Sachs, and CNN. But he said the clients that needed the most help were old-school life insurance providers.

Dayforward, the company Shapiro incorporated quietly in late 2019 and pitched to investors as the first DTC life insurance provider, announced a $20 million Series A funding round in December.

Investors included tech-focused private equity firms Tusk Venture Partners and Juxtapose, which also led its seed round, as well as insurance specialty arms Hudson Structured Capital Management and Munich Re Ventures.

Shapiro said insurance companies are used to sealing deals with handshakes on golf courses but are "paralyzed" by a fear of change. After leaving Huge in 2018, he researched areas where he could make a societal impact and settled on life insurance, seeing how families without coverage can be economically devastated by an unexpected death.

Industry association Insurance Information Institute reported the life insurance business brought in $922.3 billion last year.

Shapiro said the coronavirus pandemic disproportionately hurt low-income people, who are less likely to have coverage than wealthier people are, leaving them more at risk if a spouse or other family member dies. He saw an opportunity to make it easy for average people to get coverage online by cutting the brokers and agents out of the equation.

Shapiro recruited former colleagues from Huge and other tech and marketing companies and created an in-house marketing team led by Tim Nolan, former top creative at Mike Bloomberg's digital ad agency Hawkfish, letting Dayforward avoid relying on an outside agency.

The company has been approved to sell its own policies in Texas by early 2021 and applied in several other states. Shapiro said Dayforward's focus is now defining itself as competition heats up from the likes of Bestow, a digital insurance agent, which recently raised $70 million and announced plans to acquire a third-party provider to sell plans online.

Below is Dayforward's fundraising deck.

SEE ALSO: WPP presentation deck shows how the world's biggest advertising company plans to reverse declines by pushing into tech and e-commerce

Dayfoward's name is meant to convey a positive message, as in "from this day forward."

The company sees itself as a Casper for life insurance, catering to young adults who otherwise might not be interested in its products.

Its messaging focuses on making financial planning easier.

CEO Aaron Shapiro said he's still shocked by how many children lose a parent and the impact of the loss.

More people are uninsured, which Dayforward says shows the need for more coverage.

The company says policy holders may not realize how much coverage they need.

The company says the industry has not adapted to e-commerce.

The company contends that most people don't understand how life insurance works or trust the process.

The company points to reasons that the industry hasn't evolved.

Dayforward says Munich Re's investment in the startup shows that the industry wants to evolve.

Dayforward says it's the first full DTC provider since competitors sell third-party policies.

Dayforward plans to market itself state by state and develop new products along the way.

By removing the agent and broker, the company says it makes a complex process simple for consumers.

Dayforward claims it will let people buy policies online in minutes and get health tests at home if needed.

DTC auto and home insurance startups Root and Lemonade went public this year with multi-billion-dollar valuations.

Dayforward execs formerly worked at Huge, Apple, Hawkfish, and health tech co Collective Health.

Its board includes execs from insurance giants like MassMutual who started as advisors.

The world's largest advertising network WPP laid out a presentation to investors and analysts showing how it plans to return to growth by pivoting to tech and e-commerce services.

The five-year plan, developed with McKinsey & Co., has WPP streamlining global operations, moving away from traditional ad campaigns that have become less lucrative, and doing more consulting work for advertisers.

"We don't just want to be the biggest," CEO Mark Read said. "We want to turn being large into an advantage [for clients]."

The company plans to grow e-commerce, customer experience, and tech work to 40% of its global business by 2025 from 25%. This means less focus on the ads that made WPP famous, despite a slide that promised it had "renewed our commitment to creativity."

The presentation came days after WPP and Deloitte acknowledged in a regulatory statement that they undercounted losses from 2017-2020 by around $409 million.

A WPP spokesman said the accounting adjustments go back more than 10 years and do not affect operating profits, though they did increase the record pre-tax loss WPP reported in August from about $3.54 billion to $3.94 billion.

Below are key slides from the 88-slide presentation.

SEE ALSO: Ad giant Dentsu is going through a massive culling of its agencies — here's what we know about the winners and losers

Key growth areas across WPP's business include digital communications and PR.

WPP says the key areas of growth include digital services and practices like healthcare marketing, ecommerce, customer experience design, and public relations, that have grown during the pandemic.

WPP also says 80% of its business comes from integrated networks formed by agency mergers.

Creative agencies have faced bigger challenges than media and digital for years.

Read said WPP had gone through four negative quarters when he took over in 2018 and ranked fifth among the six major holding companies by growth because of the struggles of its creative agencies.

Old-school names like Y&R and J. Walter Thompson struggled to grow while digital firm VML and media network GroupM remained strong.

The company was too complex, leading him to merge many of its agencies.

CEO Mark Read argued that agency consolidation has been a winning strategy.

Read has overseen several major agency mergers, combining VML and Y&R to form VMLY&R, Wunderman and J. Walter Thompson to form Wunderman Thompson, and AKQA and Grey to form AKQA Group.

He argued that this strategy has been a success, citing growth of VML and Y&R.

In a further sign of confidence, Read merged retail marketing agency Geometry into VMLY&R last month to create VMLY&R Commerce.

Media network GroupM remains at the center of WPP's empire.

WPP called GroupM, the world's largest media planning and buying firm, "a jewel in the crown of our business."

GroupM has increased its share of the global digital ad market as digital overtook other forms of advertising for the first time this year.

Read said WPP handles $10 billion in annual spending across Google, Facebook, and Amazon, making it those companies' single largest client.

WPP will separate its business into four practice areas.

 WPP will separate its business into four key practice areas in the second half of 2021:

• Communications, or traditional advertising and PR
• Experience, or customer experience management and design
• Commerce, with a core focus on online shopping
• Technology, or martech and adtech

The company is racing to catch up with advertisers that are focusing on tech and less on traditional advertising.

WPP wants to win new business in areas like healthcare and financial services.

Read sees a growing number of accounts going up for review in the coming months.

Most recently, Coca-Cola launched a massive pitch for its multi-billion-dollar global business.

WPP sees opportunity for growth with packaged-goods, tech, and healthcare companies that have seen sales increase during the pandemic as well as financial services.

Media, customer experience, and martech companies are possible acquisition targets.

Read has said WPP is ready to start investing again.

The company wants to recover from the pandemic within the next two years so it can fund around $300 million to $650 million in annual M&A.

It plans to focus on companies that could be fully integrated into WPP's business and provide newer services like e-commerce and martech consulting as well as traditional creative work.

Overseas markets China, India, and Brazil will be key investments for WPP.

WPP gets 30% of its business is outside the US, UK, and Western Europe, and that share is growing.

The company plans to invest more in these countries as they continue to account for a larger share of the global digital ad market.

Tech platforms Xaxis and Finecast will be big winners in WPP's new lineup.

As an example of tech investments, WPP execs highlighted Xaxis, which manages programmatic ad spend, and a new partnership with Finecast, which targets viewers of streaming and live TV services with personalized ads.

Read said Xaxis doesn't rely on cookies, so it can help clients navigate a privacy-focused world.

For example, the presentation featured a campaign where Xaxis and WPP agency Grey used AI to create more than 2,300 separate ads targeted to individual users.

A data-focused project for Walgreen's is one example of how WPP's work will look moving forward.

Read said WPP wants to help clients manage their own customers' data rather than acquiring a massive "legacy data business" like Dentsu's Merkle, IPG's Acxiom, or Publicis Groupe's Epsilon.

He cited a project in which several agencies worked with tech partners Microsoft and Adobe to create a custom app for Walgreen's Boots Alliance, which retained WPP as its agency of record after a recent review.

The company plans to save $815 million per year by cutting real estate and other costs.

WPP wants to save around $815 million annually by 2025 by cutting travel and personal expenses by one-third, slashing real estate costs by 15% to 20% through investment in centralized "campuses," and sharing services like IT and finances across agencies. It also plans to automate some operations.

New business reports show WPP outperforming rivals during the pandemic.

WPP touted a new report from management consultancy R3 that showed WPP outperforming rivals Omnicom and Publicis Groupe in terms of revenue and new business wins on the creative and media side through new or expanded relationships with brands like Alibaba, Uber, Unilever, and HSBC.

The company is developing a new career hub to retain top talent.

The company said it's developing a platform called Career Explorer to retain talent and reinforced its commitment to diversity goals while acknowledging it needs to do more on gender and racial equality efforts.

• The music lover in your life can always likely be found listening to or playing music. 
• Here are 21 gift ideas to fuel their passion for songs, bands, instruments, and genres of all types. 
• For more last-minute gift ideas, check out all of our gift guides over here.
• Sign up for Insider Reviews' weekly newsletter for more buying advice and great deals

Most of us listen to music in some capacity and can say we like it.

But there are the people who just listen casually to whatever happens to be on the radio, and then there are the people who spend hours carefully curating playlists, filling their calendars with concerts to attend, and even playing music themselves.

This gift guide is for the latter group, who argue that they don't just like music, they love it. 

To fuel their passion, you can gift something that elevates the listening experience, teaches them something new about music, or puts them right in front of their favorite singer. Due to the impact of the novel coronavirus pandemic on the music industry, we also suggest looking at their favorite local music store or live event venue for merch and gift cards. Or, you can make a donation to local musician funds and venues in your recipient's name.

The top 5 gifts for music lovers:

1. A cocktail recipe book that pairs good music with good drinks, $22.49
2. A vintage band tee, $39
3. Pencils they won't be able to stop drumming on their desk, $7.85
4. A cool custom plaque of a song they love, $23.99
5. A vinyl record membership, $119

The 21 best last-minute gifts for music lovers:

A cool custom plaque of a song they love

Custom Music Album Cover, $23.99, available at Etsy

Submit your recipient's favorite song to make this eye-catching acrylic plaque. You can even submit a custom photo instead of the album cover so the gift feels extra personal. 

Note: Arrives after Christmas

Pasta shaped like music notes

Pastabilities Music Pasta (2-Pack), $12.99, available at Amazon

If they like playing music as much as they like playing with their food, here's a fun, edible gift they can cook right away. 

A vintage band tee

The Rolling Stones Tie-Dye Tee, $39, available at Urban Outfitters

Urban Outfitters offers tons of graphic T-shirts featuring the logos and designs of classic artists and bands like Def Leppard, Nirvana, Prince, and Snoop Dogg. 

Note: Arrives after Christmas

A pair of warm socks

Foot Traffic Novelty Socks, $11, available at Amazon

These soft and comfortable socks come in a variety of music-themed patterns, from a simple but striking piano keyboard to an ensemble of orchestral musicians. 

A poster of famous guitars

A Visual Compendium of Guitars 18"x 24" Print, $30, available at Pop Chart

Can they identify all the guitars held by famous rockers in this eye-catching print? They'll find the musical companions of  Jimi Hendrix, Tom Petty, Kurt Cobain, and Joan Jett, among many other iconic musicians. 

Note: May arrive after Christmas

A vinyl record membership

Three-month Gift Membership, $119, available at Vinyl Me, Please

Record owners experience no greater joy than when they get to add to their collection and play a new vinyl for the first time. Your recipient will choose from three different types of tracks each month and will also receive extra goodies in each package. The three-month membership includes one bonus record. 

A cocktail recipe book that pairs good music with good drinks

Booze & Vinyl: A Spirited Guide to Great Music and Mixed Drinks, $22.49, available at Amazon

Combining two great pastimes, the fun guide features 70 albums from the '50s through the '00s and an A-side and B-side cocktail for each one. They're organized by mood, so your recipient will know just what pairing to use for the night.  

A cool music mixing game

DropMix Music Gaming System, $44.99, available at Amazon

DropMix is a fast-paced game that challenges them to make new and unexpected mixes with popular tracks we already know and love. It'll be a hit among competitive music lovers and experts.

Note: Arrives after Christmas 

A pair of stylish over-ear headphones

Bowers & Wilkins PX Active Noise Cancelling Wireless Headphones, $229, available at Amazon

A music lover wouldn't be caught dead without a pair of headphones, whether they're just running a quick errand across the street or settling into a long-haul flight. These Bowers & Wilkins ones not only bring out the best of each song and have three noise-cancelling modes, but also simply look great. 

High-fidelity earplugs to protect their ears during concerts

Vibes High Fidelity Concert Earplugs, $23.98, available at Amazon

Once concerts are safe to attend again, they'll want to protect their eardrums. Wearing these comfortable earplugs can reduce decibel levels by up to 22 decibels, but they don't cancel out noise completely. Instead, they only filter out certain frequencies, so your recipient will still be able to enjoy the crisp vocals and instrumentation of their favorite band.

A pair of wireless earbuds

AirPods with Charging Case, $129.99, available at Best Buy

Apple AirPods are far from perfect, but we have to admit they're really convenient. They're the easiest earbuds to pop into their ears since they're light and pair automatically with their phone, and they'll stay in surprisingly well. 

A high-end visual speaker

Cotodama Canvas Lyric Speaker, $1,900, available at Amazon 

This sleek WiFi-enabled speaker, which integrates seamlessly into their living room or bedroom, recognizes and artistically displays the lyrics of the song as it plays (see how it works here). The sound quality is also top-notch, which isn't a surprise since the company behind it is part of an incubator run by the famous Abbey Road Studios.

Pencils they won't be able to stop drumming on their desk

Suck UK Drumstick Pencils, $7.85, available at Amazon

These clever pencils are an easy stocking stuffer for budding and experienced drummers alike. 

An online class taught by a film-scoring legend

Hans Zimmer Film Scoring Class, $90, available at MasterClass

Unless you've been living under a rock, you've heard the work of film score composer Hans Zimmer. Through lessons on tempo, character themes, sound palettes, and more, the composer of over 150 movies including "Inception" and "The Lion King" shows students how he makes movie score magic. 

A waterproof portable speaker

Ultimate Ears Boom 3 Portable Waterproof Bluetooth Speaker, $149.99, available at Amazon

The loud and powerful UE Boom 3 delivers 360-degree sound and has a long battery life, perfect for outdoor hangouts. They can even continue being DJ at the beach or in the tub because the speaker is waterproof. 

A book about why humans love music

This Is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession, $15.30, available at Amazon

This fascinating book delves into why music is so important to us and is written by someone with a firm grasp on both the artistic and scientific sides of it: a neuroscientist who previously worked as a session musician, sound engineer, and record producer.

A smart speaker

Amazon Echo (4th Generation), $69.99, available at Target

They'll be able to stream music from Amazon Music, Apple Music, Spotify, Pandora, SiriusXM, and more, without even lifting a finger. The newest version of the popular Echo device has even better audio features than before: 360° Dolby-powered audio, dynamic bass response, and personalized equalizer settings. 

Note: May arrive after Christmas

Wine glasses they can play songs with

Major Scale Musical Wine Glasses (Set of 2), $68, available at UncommonGoods

These special wine glasses have lines labeling different notes of the scale, so they can play a tune with their finger while enjoying their favorite red or white. 

Note: Arrives after Christmas

A way to organize their concert ticket stubs

Just the Ticket: Ticket Stub Organizer, $10.45, available at Amazon

Videos and photos aside, a way to remember their concerts, down to the exact seat in the venue, is this ticket stub diary. There's also space on each page to jot down notes and memories to look fondly back on later. 

Note: Arrives after Christmas

Cufflinks shaped like a sixteenth note and treble clef

Cufflinks, Inc. Music Notes Cufflinks, $55, available at Cufflinks.com

These small accessories are the perfect finishing note on his ensemble, whether he's heading to work or the symphony. 

Note: May arrive after Christmas

Tickets to see their favorite singer or band

Gift Card, $25-$500, available at Ticketmaster

Singing along in the car or shower is fun, but singing along with the band live and in concert is another experience entirely. Once it's safe to attend concerts again, they'll hopefully invite you to whichever concert they buy with this gift card. 

• A reliable bike lock should give you the peace of mind to leave your bike almost anywhere and that it'll still be waiting for you when you return. 
• The best locks do this by using thick steel shackles or cables that are hard to cut through, making the act of actually stealing a bike an arduous (or impossible) task.
• Our top pick, the Kryptonite New York Fahgettaboudit Mini Bicycle U-Lock, features anti-theft protection, is easy to mount to your bike, and has a useful double-bolting system.

Whether you live in the country or in a major metropolitan area, there's no bike lock system capable of stopping a well-equipped thief. However, there are a number of locks that will either slow down or completely discourage a criminal.

Though some thieves will try to drill the lock, the most common way bikes are stolen is when someone cuts through a lock's shackle, cable, or chain. Of these options, the shackle of a U-lock is the hardest to cut through. The thicker the steel, the longer it takes to get through. Also, if the lock has a double bolt system, a potential thief would then need to make two cuts to free the bike.

But bike locks aren't exactly a one-size-fits-all type of device. While some offer bulked-up protection for a wide range of use cases, others are designed for when you just need to quickly lock your bike or as a full-on attachment to your bike frame — and we've tested dozens of them. 

Over the course of several different rides, including mountain bike trips, e-bike outings, or just casual rides around the neighborhood, we tested locks from brands like Kryptonite, Hiplok, and Lobster Lock, intent on finding the best. Here are our favorites. 

Here are the best bike locks:

• Best bike lock overall: Kryptonite New York Fahgettaboudit Mini Bicycle U-Lock
• Best bike lock on a budget: Titanker Bike Lock Cable
• Best D-lock bike lock: Hiplok DX
• Best U-lock/cable bike lock combo: Kryptonite Kryptolok Standard Bicycle U-Lock w/ 4-foot Flex Cable
• Best on-bike bike lock: Lobster Lock

Updated on 12/22/2020 by Rick Stella: Updated the section on how we test bike locks, added more to the copy for the Hiplok DX and the Lobster Lock, checked the availability of each recommended bike lock, and updated the prices where necessary. 

Best bike lock overall

If you live in a high crime area, the Kryptonite New York Fahgettaboudit Mini Bicycle U-Lock does an excellent job of warding off criminals and protecting your bike.

Pros: Takes longer to cut through than any other lock

Cons: Small, heavy

Kryptonite is the top name in the bike lock industry. That's why we've included three of its locks in our guide. One of the factors that set Kryptonite apart is its Anti-Theft Protection Offer. Basically, when you get your lock, you must register it with the company right away. Then, if your bike is stolen while it is covered by the anti-theft protection, the company will pay to replace your bike. For the Fahgettaboudit Mini, the first year of registration is free. After that, it is $24.99 for five years of coverage.

The New York Fahgettaboudit Mini offers the highest level of security of any of Kryptonite's locks according to the company. The shackle is made of 18-millimeter hardened "MAX-Performance" steel. For extra security, the crossbar has an oversized hardened steel sleeve. The lock comes with three keys, which disengages the lock using a high-security disk-style cylinder. The cylinder is protected by a sliding dust cover. And, the center keyway is designed to make leverage attacks difficult.

Best budget bike lock

For less than $15, the Titanker Bike Lock Cable is an affordable alternative that offers a variety of locking options.

Pros: 10,000 possible combinations, four-foot reach, flexible

Cons: Cable is relatively easy to cut

The Titanker Bike Lock Cable is made of flexible steel cables that measure a half-inch in diameter. The 4-foot cable is covered with PVC coating and recoils back into its original shape when not in use. The four-digit combination lock has 10,000 possible passcodes. This lock is the lightest option in this guide at 11.2 ounces, and it mounts to your bike with the provided bracket.

The cable design offers flexibility in what you can lock a bike to, and the combination key is also convenient. While a lock is a good deterrent in general, this option doesn't offer the level of protection as the other locks on this list. Still, the thick cable should deter most thieves.  

Note: We previously recommended the UShake Bike Lock Cable, which is nearly similar to the Titanker option. Although many reviewers also recommended the UShake, that lock is not available at the time of posting.

Best D-lock bike lock

The Hiplok DX is a heavy-duty D-lock designed to keep your bike secure no matter where you lock it up, and its lightweight design makes it easy to throw into a backpack or even to wear on your person.

Pros: Heavy-duty yet lightweight design, 14mm steel shackle prevents theft

Cons: Locking area might be small for bikes with bigger tires

Hiplok is one of the who's who in the bike lock industry (we've written about, and loved, its Z-Lok) thanks to its wide selection of dependable products. With the DX, Hiplok not only offers one of the most heavy-duty D-locks on the market, but it challenges the Kryptonite lock that nabbed our top spot. 

What makes the DX particularly stand out is its rugged and durable design, led by a double deadlock and 14mm hardened steel shackle that would take nothing short of a tank to break through it. This means you should feel comfortable locking up your bike anywhere and can rest assured it'll be there waiting for you when you're reading to ride again. 

It's also one of the most lightweight locks we've tested and can just as easily slip into a backpack or affix to our belt loops without seeming like we're dragging an anvil. The DX offers up a sizable locking area, as well, which can easily slide through your tire and around a pole. 

At $90, it's not a budget pick, but with bike locks, you pay for premium quality (and the assurance you won't have to spend hundreds on a new bike). Hiplok offers a lifetime warranty, so that $90 investment should last you a very long time. -- Rick Stella

Best U-lock/cable bike lock combo

The Kryptonite Kryptolok Standard Bicycle U-Lock w/4-foot Flex Cable is one of the most affordable locks, and the 4-foot cable makes locking up easy.

Pros: Easy to use, lightweight, inexpensive

Cons: Only requires one cut to defeat

The design of the Kryptolok Standard Bicycle U-Lock is fairly similar to the Kryptonite locks we covered in previous slides. It has a center keyway, high-security disc-style cylinder, reinforced hardened crossbar, and a hardened MAX-Performance steel shackle. However, there are some key differences. The shackle is 13 millimeters thick, the U-lock is 4 x 9 inches, and there is not a double locking mechanism.

Kryptonite rates the security of the Kryptolok as 6 out of 10 (versus 9 for the New York Standard and 10 for the Fahgettaboudit Mini). The company states that it should be secure enough in rural areas, in the suburbs, and when traveling with your bike on a car rack.

Remember to register your bike lock with the brand immediately after you purchase it to take advantage of its theft protection program.

Best on-bike bike lock

The Lobster Lock permanently attaches to your bike frame so you'll never have to worry about forgetting to grab a lock on your way out the door.

Pros: Attaches to your bike permanently so you'll never forget a lock, easy to lock/unlock, inexpensive $75 price tag

Cons: Can rattle on your bike a little bit while riding

We've all been there: You're getting ready for a ride, you've packed a backpack, grab your helmet, and jet out the door. As you get to your destination, you realize it; you forgot your bike lock. Now, you're left with a decision, do you leave the bike there and quickly run inside to get what you need, or do you ride back home? With the Lobster Lock, those forgetful moments cease to exist.

Thanks to a design that allows you to permanently attach it to your bike's frame, the Lobster Lock goes wherever your bike goes, all day, every day. By attaching to where you'd put a water bottle cradle, the lock is able to stay out of the way enough to avoid hindering you as you ride, yet is perfect for attaching to a bike rack (including through your wheel, too).

Using the lock is easy, too. By simply unlocking it with a key, two arms swing out from the base and attach to each other to create the lock. When you're reading to ride again, just unlock the two arms from each other, fold them back into the base, and lock it again with the key. Simple as that. 

Also, don't think you have to sacrifice the water bottle cradle — it basically acts as an extension of that area as you're able to affix a cradle to the lock itself. That's a ton of convenience packed into one bike lock. -- Rick Stella

How we test bike locks

Each of the following bike locks went through several rounds of field testing to make sure they not only provided a reliable method for locking up our bike but that they were easy to use, weren't a pain to lug around, and offered enough value regardless of their price tag. Specifically, we looked at these five categories: Ease of use, durability, security, and value. Here's how each category factored into what locks made the cut:

• Ease of use: Using a bike lock shouldn't be a headache each time you lock and unlock your ride. This means that it should be easy to affix to a bike rack while still being able to secure valuable parts of your bike (i.e. the wheel) without it feeling like solving a Rubik's cube. 
• Durability: What good is a bike lock if it starts to fall apart mere months after you purchase it? Bike locks take a beating, whether it be while getting throwing into a backpack or vehicle, someone attempting to disassemble it, or being stored at home in a garage or closet. You want any lock you purchase (especially since you're spending hard-earned cash) to last you several years, at the very least. 
• Security: If a bike lock is easy to break into, then what's the point? A reliable bike lock should be able to stand up to a variety of bike-stealing methods and not only continue to protect your bike but be able to continue to live up to its namesake. 
• Value: Value isn't just about how much a bike lock costs — it's more about how much return you get on your investment. If you pay a premium price, you should expect premium features. This is sort of like the sum of all the categories before it (while still considering its sticker cost).