The History of Groupon

This article was written by Samuel Phineas Upham

Groupon is a daily-deal website that has been both universally praised and scorned for its dealings. The idea began in 2006, when Andrew Mason was attempting to get out of a cell phone contract. At the time, Mason was working on his venture “The Point.” He was headed toward failure and scrambling to cut costs and salvage what he could from the business.

The goal of The Point was to help organizations build their fundraising process into something more efficient. This early form of Kickstarter outlined what the founders called “the Tipping Point,” or the amount of money it would take to actually get a plan off the ground. This helped to alleviate the issue of giving money to a cause that would not produce, and it also helped donators see that they were not alone during this process.

Unfortunately, The Point couldn’t get to the point.

It was on the heels of that failure that Mason noticed something crucial: the most successful campaigns gave the contributors buying power.

So Mason combined the idea of the tipping point with group buying power to create Groupon. The site would feature incredible deals, but those deals would only kick in if there were a specified number of users who participated in it.

Mason managed to grow the customer base aggressively by allowing consumers to sign up for a newsletter that broadcasted future events. The belief was that users would find a deal they wanted and be more active than those who were forced to check the site every day.

However, since Groupon went public the company stock has been a disaster. The email list stopped being productive for the company since Google’s changes to Gmail, and it is currently struggling to turn a profit.

A Brief History of Airline Mergers

This article was written by Phineas Upham

The past 15 years of American commercial aviation has been wrought with mergers. Reasons range from consolidation to fierce competition. Whatever the reason, these mergers have fundamentally altered the landscape of air travel for both businesses and consumers. Here are a few highlights of noteworthy mergers that have taken place.

US Airways and American West

The terrorist attacks on September 11^th had put US air travel in a bind. People still needed to get from point A to point B, but there weren’t many vacationers in the air. US Airways had already been experiencing difficulty when the attacks hit, and the company filed for bankruptcy in 2002. It took two years for US Airways to find a buyer. They found American West, who pumped cash into the company and kept the branding.

Delta and Northwest

On the heels of a merger between Southwest and ATA, the merger of Delta and Northwest briefly created the world’s largest airline. It took a full two years for integration of both companies to be complete, and by the end there was no more Northwest. Today, you can easily book a Delta flight to just about anywhere in the world.

Continental and United

Mere months after Delta became the world’s largest airline, Continental announced it would merge with United Airlines. The deal took months to close and the airline took the United name, creating the largest airline in passenger traffic by 2011.

How NBC Started

This article was written by Samuel Phineas Upham

It was November of 1926 when NBC first aired a radio program from the ballroom of the Waldorf-Astoria in New York City. It was the product of three large media groups: Radio Corporation of America (now known as RCA), American Telephone and Telegraph (now known as AT&T), and Westinghouse Electric (which would become CBS/Viacom).

It was David Sarnoff, the general manager of RCA, who facilitated the creation of NBC and became its sole owner by 1930. Sarnoff wanted to build a vast information network, but NBC found a lot of popularity with shows like Amos N’ Andy and The Jack Benny Program. It also owned “The Blue Network,” which it was forced to sell in 1943. The FCC feared a monopoly, so NBC sold off the undervalued asset and The Blue Network became known as ABC.

CBS and NBC were bitter rivals for a period. In 1948, NBC had a small crisis when its rival network made a talent raid. They took George Burns, Gracie Allen and the stars of the Amos N’ Andy Show amongst others.

But NBC was not down and out. It began television broadcasting with the World’s Fair in April of 1939. That kicked off a coast-to-coast bid to be on the sets of every television owner in America. A goal they all but reached by 1951.

Though NBC pioneered innovations like color TV, and had great success with stars like Milton Bearle and Sid Ceaser, they perpetually came in second place beneath CBS. NBC has always been the leader in technology though, helping the FCC to adapt color television as the standard and introducing taped broadcasts to its repertoire.

About the Author: Samuel Phineas Upham is an investor at a family office/hedgefund, where he focuses on special situation illiquid investing. Before this position, Samuel Phineas Upham was working at Morgan Stanley in the Media & Technology group. You may contact Samuel Phineas Upham on his Twitter page.