Skip to main content

The context you need, when you need it

When news breaks, you need to understand what actually matters — and what to do about it. At Vox, our mission to help you make sense of the world has never been more vital. But we can’t do it on our own.

We rely on readers like you to fund our journalism. Will you support our work and become a Vox Member today?

Join now

Mary Meeker Takes You on a Tour of the 2015 Internet Trends Report (Video)

Here’s Meeker’s fast-paced jaunt through her latest massive Internet trends report, on the twentieth anniversary of her first one.

Asa Mathat for Re/code

Would you rather sift through 200 slides from the influential annual Internet Trends report or would you prefer a guided tour by the author herself? Here’s Mary Meeker, the creator of the technology industry’s annual Internet Trends report, sprinting through her latest big fat pile of slides in less than 30 minutes at our recent Code conference.

One more reason to tune in: It’s the twentieth anniversary of the first “Internet Report,” which Meeker first created as an analyst at Morgan Stanley in 1995.

Here are the highlights:

  • Meeker on the big picture: “So what’s happened since 1995? Internet penetration globally has gone from one percent to 39 percent. Mobile phone user penetration has gone from 1 percent to 73 percent. Public Internet company market capitalizations have gone from $17 billion in 1995 to $2.4 trillion today. User control of content has grown significantly.” But she says recent jumps have been less sharp in Internet user growth and smartphone subscription growth: “The incremental new users for Internet smartphones are harder to get because of where we are in the adoption cycle.”
  • On mobile ads: “I for one am really excited about Vessel’s five-second ad. Short-form video, making a point in five seconds, I think is a beautiful thing.” (How about making 50 kajillion points in 30 minutes?) Meeker says a promising up-and-coming feature is “buy buttons,” allowing direct purchase from places like Google, Facebook and Twitter: “We’ll look back two years [from now] and be surprised about just how pervasive they’ve become.”
  • On Slack, Square, Stripe, Domo, DocuSign, Intercom, Gainsight, Directly, Zenefits, Anaplan, Greenhouse, Checkr, GuideSpark and Envoy: “Enterprise computing is being reimagined one business process at a time.” Meeker observed that today’s enterprise founders are often working on relieving pain points they experienced at their prior companies.
  • The on-demand economy and beyond: “The average American spends 33 percent of their income on housing, 18 percent on transportation and 14 percent on food. The average individual needs shelter every day, drives 37 miles a day and visits a grocery store twice a week. These are high size and spending, high engagement markets that also have traditionally weak user experiences that we think are being reimagined.”
  • On bubbles and valuations: “The one rule of thumb is that very few companies will win, and those that do, win big.”
  • On diversity, which was Meeker’s final “one more thing” of the presentation, and a particularly acute issue at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers these days: “Diversity matters. It’s just good business.”

Here’s the full video:

And here are the slides again:

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

More in Technology

Podcasts
Are humanoid robots all hype?Are humanoid robots all hype?
Podcast
Podcasts

AI is making them better — but they’re not going to be doing your chores anytime soon.

By Avishay Artsy and Sean Rameswaram
Future Perfect
The old tech that could help stop the next airborne pandemicThe old tech that could help stop the next airborne pandemic
Future Perfect

Glycol vapors, explained.

By Shayna Korol
Future Perfect
Elon Musk could lose his case against OpenAI — and still get what he wantsElon Musk could lose his case against OpenAI — and still get what he wants
Future Perfect

It’s not about who wins. It’s about the dirty laundry you air along the way.

By Sara Herschander
Life
Why banning kids from AI isn’t the answerWhy banning kids from AI isn’t the answer
Life

What kids really need in the age of artificial intelligence.

By Anna North
Culture
Anthropic owes authors $1.5B for pirating work — but the claims process is a Kafkaesque messAnthropic owes authors $1.5B for pirating work — but the claims process is a Kafkaesque mess
Culture

“Your AI monster ate all our work. Now you’re trying to pay us off with this piece of garbage that doesn’t work.”

By Constance Grady
Future Perfect
Some deaf children are hearing again because of a new gene therapySome deaf children are hearing again because of a new gene therapy
Future Perfect

A medical field that almost died is quietly fixing one disease at a time.

By Bryan Walsh