Yawn-worthy Albo news. Myer and Solomon Lew get closer. Local energy & EV startup opinions.

Fox Bites. Short, bite-sized news from the business, startup and finance worlds.

If you like it, share it. If you don’t, tell me how to be better!

— Marty Andrews

🏢 Business bites

Mainstream news this week has been filled with stories about whether or not Anthony Albanese got upgrades while flying Qantas. I could not care less about the issue. I find it ridiculous that this is an issue. We absolutely need the best business people in the country to aspire to lead it. The private sector does so much better on this front. Tall-poppy syndrome in Australian is so absurd. Let’s celebrate the success of people and the perks that come with it for them rather than set an example for the next generation that you should be embarrassed to succeed.

The LNP won the Queensland election last week, marking a shift away from the dominance of Labor in state governments on the mainland. Will the trend continue? (The Guardian)

Myer acquired (it’s really a merger) Premier Investments for a lazy $1b in stock this week, making Solomon Lew the biggest shareholder in Myer and giving him a seat on the board. (AFR)

🚀 Startup bites

I attended the All Energy Australia conference and exhibition recently. The expo has become completely overwhelmed with solar suppliers and installers. The conference also had 14 parallel tracks you could attend, making it impossible to see everything you wanted to. I naturally focussed a bit on the EV-related items and startups.

Best panel session of the day was organised by Megan Fisher, CEO at EnergyLab. She pulled together a group including representatives from a TNSP, DNSP, retailer and software business to discuss startups working in industry. Fantastic cross-representation. (All Energy)

Most interesting startup at all energy was Enaxiom. They use industrial waste water to help cool data centres, then also use the excess heat from those data centres to purify the water. Addressing multiple massive issues simultaneously. Genius stuff. (Enaxiom website)

I also went along to the Mobility Live exhibition this week, mostly to check out the new EV’s and see my old mates at Chargefox. There were multiple dual-cab electric utes on display and an SUV with a 1000km range. All coming soon to Australia.

The best startup surprise for me was the chat I had with Robert Dietz at Roev. They’re building an analytics platform for fleet managers to understand ICE and EV trade-offs. The team clearly has a talent for understanding data and presenting it in compelling ways. I’ll be watching with interest. (Roev website)

💰 Money bites

It’s reporting season in the US this week. Both Microsoft and Meta put out their reports in the last few days. Despite income beating expectations, both stocks fell a few percent each due to some other key metrics (Azure growth for Microsoft and capex for Meta) being a bit worse than expected. They’re such big companies that the S&P500 index overall was hit as well. (AFR)

🔋 Tech bites

Apple has started to deploy AI in some of its phone this week as the new iOS 81. update rolls out. Early reports are that it isn’t very exciting so far. This is perhaps coupled with some design changes and bugs that came with the iOS update.

🎧 No bites? Watch & listen instead

Last week I mentioned a Mark Zuckerberg interview that the Acquired podcast had done. This week they’ve actually released a full-length analysis on the history of Meta. It’s 6 hours long! I’m about 4 hours in so far, but as usual the team has great research and insights. (Acquired)

I went along to see Cold Chisel perform at Flemington in their 50th Anniversary Tour. For a bunch of old guys, they sure can rock. I absolutely loved it.

Finally, if you made it this far, you might also have noticed that there’s a US election looming in the coming week. Who’s going to win? I have no idea. One thing’s for sure though - it’ll be a chaotic news week either way. Like a slow-motion car crash, I’m finding it difficult to look away. Let’s see what happens.