Rakuten wesentlich besser als Rocket

- und daher habe ich mir nach dem Einstieg bei Alibaba, die inzwischem mehr als 20% gut gemacht haben, auch einige Rakutens gekauft.

Look Out Amazon, Here Comes...Rakuten?
Japanese e-commerce firm Rakuten announced on Tuesday it is acquiring Ebates for $1 billion.

The acquisition, which Rakuten hinted at last week, is part of the Japanese company’s push to grow its base beyond its domestic market and hopefully, become a global player. Having made some $1.2 billion acquisitions to date along these lines, this is Rakuten’s most ambitious move to date.

However, investors are dubious that the company can absorb yet another foreign acquisition, much less one the size of Ebates, despite Rakuten’s strong cash position.
Then there is the ever-present Amazon, which dominates the e-commerce market in the U.S. Few believe it will falter in the face of Chinese giant Alibaba, much less a Rakuten-Ebates combo.

Rakuten Goes Forth

Not surprisingly, Rakuten says it is undaunted. For starters, it has assembled a very interesting mix of acquisitions. There is messaging app Viber, which it purchased for $900 million in February, the Canadian ebook offering Kobo, Spanish video service Wuaki.tv, Viki, a digital content platform and Buy.com.
Now it has picked up Ebates.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikamorphy/2014/09/...ere-comes-rakuten/  

Viber’s Eyal on communication’s importance in the digital age, discusses Viber’s role

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MmSiS72AXtM&t=5s
 

Mobile VoIP Market Size to Surpass USD 184.19 Billion by 2032, Owing to Increased 5G Deployment and High-Speed Internet Expansion

Pune, April 02, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Mobile VoIP Market Size Analysis:

“The Mobile VoIP Market size was USD 50.18 billion in 2023 and is expected to reach USD 184.19 billion by 2032, growing at a CAGR of 15.59% over the forecast period of 2024-2032.”

Major Players Analysis Listed in this Report are:

Apple Inc. (FaceTime, iMessage)
Google LLC (Google Voice, Google Meet)
Microsoft (Skype, Microsoft Teams)
RingCentral, Inc. (RingCentral Office, RingCentral Video)
Nextiva (Nextiva VoIP, Nextiva Video Conferencing)
Grasshopper (Grasshopper VoIP, Virtual Receptionist)
Cisco Systems, Inc. (Cisco Webex, Cisco Jabber)
Aircall (Aircall VoIP, Aircall Integrations)
Mitel Networks Corp. (Mitel MiCloud Connect, Mitel VoIP Phone Systems)
Meta (WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger)
Zoom Video Communications, Inc. (Zoom Phone, Zoom Meetings)
CX (3CX Phone System, 3CX WebRTC Phone)
8x8, Inc. (8x8 Voice for Microsoft Teams, 8x8 Video Meetings)
GoTo Group (GoTo Connect, GoTo Meeting)
Twilio (Twilio Voice, Twilio Video)
Citrix Systems Inc. (Citrix Workspace, Citrix ShareFile)
Ribbon Communications (Ribbon SBC, Ribbon Analytics)
Rakuten Group, Inc. (Rakuten Mobile, Rakuten Communications Platform)

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/...-market-size-surpass-140000936.html

 

und nach der Reduzierung und Neuordnung der Verschuldung wurde auch das Risiko deutlich reduziert, sodass für mich der übermäßige Kursverfall der letzten Tage nicht nachvollziehbar ist.  

Rakuten Symphony counted 31 customers a year ago, a figure that has grown to 45 today. By the end of 2025, officials expect more than 100 Rakuten Symphony customers.

https://www.lightreading.com/open-ran/...hosts-2025-mwc-victory-party
 

14 Analysten haben ein Rakuten Kursziel 2026 abgegeben. Das durchschnittliche Rakuten Kursziel beträgt 1.006,29 JPY.

https://aktien.guide/kursziel/Rakuten-JP3967200001
 

From human to machine-centric, deterministic networks

And then there is what comes next. And here he has a “very strong opinion” – which is that the next phase of mobile networks will move from being human-centric to being machine-centric, with deterministic latency and throughput. That can’t happen, of course, without the open, cloud-native and software-defined network. And here, the “biggest piece of the puzzle is in the RAN”.

https://the-mobile-network.com/2025/03/23287/
 

Fever valued at €2.1B
October 28, 2024
Atresmedia has sold a 2.7% stake in Fever, generating €59M in proceeds and a 7X return. This sale, valuing Fever at over €2B, follows a prior partial exit in 2023 when Fever was valued at €1.6B. Despite these sales, Atresmedia still has a 5% stake in Fever.
https://dealflow.es/issue/438/...ued-at-2-1b-matteco-raised-15m-ptalo


Fever secured $35 million from Rakuten Capital, Atresmedia and Accel.
15 July 2019
Fever, a Madrid, Spain and London, UK-based company operating a business based on a mobile app for social events raised $35 million.
The investment round was led by Rakuten Capital, the investment arm of Japanese internet giant Rakuten, and included Atresmedia, Accel and Michael Zeisser, the former chairman of U.S. investments for Alibaba Group. Zeisser will also join Fever’s board together with Oskar Mielczarek, partner of Rakuten.
https://nordic9.com/news/...ital-atresmedia-and-accel-news2143843847/
 

Rakuten Ecosystem in Action: Product Development Through Shared Assets

April 07, 2025

"Rakuten Ecosystem in Action" is a series launched by RNN to understand how the Rakuten Ecosystem is utilized by Rakutenians in their work. In this video, we introduce a case where an ECC (E-Commerce Consultant) who joined in 2022 connected a merchant, ROOM, influencers, and the community to collaborate on product development. While paying attention to the elements of the Rakuten Ecosystem featured in the video, we invite you to watch the story that could only be realized at the Rakuten Group.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q37NJE5oocw&t=41s
 

Nagaoka City and Rakuten Reignite Region through Data and Hometown Tax Program

March 31, 2025

Nagaoka City in Niigata Prefecture and Rakuten are working together to revitalize the region through the Rakuten Furusato Nozei ("Hometown Tax") program. During the city's major event, the Nagaoka Fireworks Festival, visitor marketing data obtained from the introduction of Rakuten Ticket as well as assets from Rakuten Ichiba and Rakuten Travel were leveraged to promote the Rakuten Hometown Tax program, local products, and tourism. The aim is to bridge the deep affection visitors feel towards Nagaoka City when they watch the fireworks with the Hometown Tax program. In this report, hear from two Rakutenians who have continuously supported Nagaoka City, as well as comments from city officials, local sake breweries, and food producers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=izOcIGVkexg
 

Looking at Rakuten's History and Mickey's Mission

March 11.03.2025

This is the video broadcast during an internal surprise event on the birthday of Rakuten Group CEO Mickey Mikitani. It is a "Rakuten History" video chronicled through "Mickey's mission." Please take a moment to watch it if you’d like.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sfD0af5Zmk0
 

April 01, 2025

In this session from MWC 2025, Global Head of Sales, Udai Kanukolanu, shares his insights into the customer journey and how Rakuten Symphony is looking to work closely with mobile network operators across the world to deliver better telecom outcomes. Watch the full session here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wYQuhuWAbTg&t=287s
 

How Google and Rakuten are Transforming Operations at the Edge

April  08, 2025

In this fascinating partner session from the Rakuten Booth at MWC 2025, we gain insight from one of Rakuten’s most important global partnerships. For the past few years, Rakuten Cloud has been working in partnership with Google Distributed Cloud to deliver sophisticated better operations and outcomes that go beyond telecom. To explain in further details, James Dartnell, Senior Director, Corporate Communications at Rakuten Symphony, sat down with Anirban Chakravartti, SVP Sales, Rakuten Cloud, Rakuten Symphony and Eli Tabchouri, Director, Google Distributed Cloud, EMEA, Google

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wk5Bh95sDcQ
 

April 08, 2025

In this session, Anshul Bhatt, Head of Sales, Americas and Product Strategy at Rakuten Symphony is joined by Salvatore D’Oro, Co-Founder, CTO at zTouch Networks, Tommaso Melodia, Director, Institute for the Wireless Internet of Things, and William Lincoln Smith, Professor at Northeastern University, to discuss the work that Rakuten OSS is doing with zTouch on slice management and provide an introduction to Rakuten’s intelligent operations portfolio.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0BzhJZxguJw
 

Rakuten Card Sets Ambitious Profit Goal In B2B Payments

Rakuten Card is aiming to boost its annual profits to 100 billion yen by stepping into Japan's booming B2B payments market.

Rakuten Card, Japan's largest credit card issuer, is leveraging the country’s digital boom in financial services. Despite its shrinking population, Japan holds significant potential in its payment sector. Credit card transactions are just a slice of the vast B2B payments market, valued at an impressive 1,100 trillion yen. With over 30 million cards in circulation and a solid 62.1 billion yen operating profit last year, Rakuten Card aims to grow through partnerships with small businesses on its e-commerce platform, Rakuten Ichiba. The strategy also involves tapping into Mizuho Financial Group's client base, following their recent stake acquisition and joint credit card initiative. By collaborating on new services and marketing, Rakuten and Mizuho aim to revolutionize Japan's B2B transaction landscape.

https://finimize.com/content/...ambitious-profit-goal-in-b2b-payments

 

April 09, 2025

The Rakuten Travel Awards 2024 ceremony celebrated Rakuten Travel-registered hotels and ryokans that achieved remarkable results and earned high praise over the past year. We bring you a digest of the inspiring awards ceremony, symbolizing the theme of "United."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOGP93sQ3t4
 

Rakuten Mobile Debuts Nothing Phone (3a) in Japan

1d ago

Rakuten Mobile has become the first mobile carrier in Japan to offer the Phone (3a), a device designed by U.K.-based Nothing. The device will go on sale at 9 a.m. on April 15 and will be priced from 54,890 yen. It will be available in white, black, and an exclusive blue color only from Rakuten Mobile, through their website, physical stores, and Rakuten Ichiba online marketplace. Additionally, the Nothing Ear (a) wireless earphones will be available from the same day on the official Rakuten Mobile store on Rakuten Ichiba for 14,800 yen.

https://www.thefastmode.com/smartphones/...-nothing-phone-3a-in-japan
 

Rakuten Card x Kiki & Lala is a dream collaboration!

To commemorate the 50th anniversary of Sanrio's popular character, Little Twin Stars (Kiki & Lala), Rakuten Card Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "our company"), applications will begin accepting and issuing two types: "Rakuten Card Kiki & Lala Starry Night Wish Design" and "Rakuten Card Kiki & Lala Aurora Retro Design" from Tuesday, April 1, 2025.

In addition, to commemorate the issuance of this card, running a campaign where you can win original limited edition Kiki & Lala merchandise (not for sale) by applying and using the eligible Rakuten Card .

https://companydata.tsujigawa.com/en/press-20250401-004/
 

Rakuten Symphony Adds Highly-Scalable, Kubernetes-Ready Object Storage to Rakuten Cloud-Native Storage

TOKYO, April 9, 2025 – Rakuten Symphony, Inc. today announced the addition of object storage to the Rakuten Cloud-Native Storage Platform. Kubernetes-ready, highly scalable and cost effective, object storage brings greater durability, flexibility and simplification for managing large volumes of data in use cases including data lakes, cloud-native storage, and machine learning. Object storage will be generally available to any Rakuten Cloud-Native Storage customer in May 2025.

https://symphony.rakuten.com/newsroom/...loud-native-storage-platform
 

Rakuten Symphony Adds Highly-Scalable, Kubernetes-Ready Object Storage to Rakuten Cloud-Native Storage Platform

"We're operating the world's first telecom edge cloud deployment with Rakuten Mobile in Japan, deploying Open RAN and core services on the cloud while serving more than 8.5 million subscribers and growing," said Ryota Mibu, General Manager, Cloud Platform Department at Rakuten Mobile, Inc. "Rakuten Cloud and its suite of solutions including cloud-native platform, orchestrator and storage enable Rakuten Mobile to run virtual network functions and cloud network functions 30 percent faster while massively reducing deployment time and costs. With object storage, we can deploy cloud-native applications and microservices faster, at a lower cost, while reaching more subscribers."

Rakuten Cloud-Native Storage provides industry-leading features and flexibility with ease-of-use, automation and a rich suite of Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery (BCDR) capabilities. It offers a platform and data footprint optimized solution with robust data access controls, and encryption mechanisms to protect sensitive data. It provides immense scale for the core cloud backups, but it's small footprint also makes it ideal for edge environments. Rakuten Cloud-Native Platform provides these advantages using an intuitive, declarative interface, with advanced automation, that reduces deployment complexity, timelines and human error, with high availability which ensures no single point of failure.

https://vmblog.com/archive/2025/04/09/...native-storage-platform.aspx
 

Alle zu Beginn des Geschäftsjahres 2024 festgelegten Ergebnisziele für den "konsolidierten Non-GAAP-Betriebsgewinn für das Gesamtjahr", die "EBITDA-Rentabilität von Rakuten Mobile, Inc. für einen Monat" und die "Eigenfinanzierung auf Konzernebene" erreicht.

Im Geschäftsjahr 2025 strebt das Unternehmen an, "den konsolidierten Non-GAAP-Betriebsgewinn zu steigern" und "das EBITDA von Rakuten Mobile Inc. für das Gesamtjahr profitabel zu machen".

https://corp.rakuten.co.jp/news/press/2025/0214_01.html
 

bereits verwirklichten Erfolge wurden im Kurs von Rakuten bisher auch nicht ansatzweise eskomptiert.  

Rakuten Cloud at Next 25: Unleashing the Edge with Google Distributed Cloud connected

by Brooke Frischemeier
Head of Product Management, Unified Cloud Rakuten Symphony

I truly believe Rakuten CNS is at the forefront of the edge revolution. Our integration with Google Cloud and our focus on key edge use cases are enabling businesses to unlock new opportunities and improve their operations. If you're looking for a storage solution that can help you take advantage of the power of edge computing, I encourage you to learn more about Rakuten CNS. We're excited to continue working with Google Cloud and our customers to drive innovation at the edge.

https://cloud.rakuten.com/blogs/...google-distributed-cloud-connected
 

By Dhruv Sood
Global Digital Marketing Manager Rakuten Symphony

April 8, 2025

A key theme at this year's KubeCon was the growing momentum around edge AI workloads. At the heart of this is Rakuten Cloud-Native Storage (CNS) — our persistent, software-defined storage solution built to support stateful applications at the edge. Recognized for its innovation, it also powers Google Distributed Cloud connected servers, demonstrating its role in enabling resilient and scalable infrastructure for real-world AI use cases.  

https://cloud.rakuten.com/blogs/6-highlights-from-kubecon-europe-2025
 

Open RAN Market Poised to Reach USD 41.5 Billion by 2032 Driven by Demand for Network Flexibility and Cost Efficiency

Rising demand for flexible, cost-efficient networks drives Open RAN growth as operators seek vendor diversity and lower costs.

April 11, 2025

“The SNS Insider report indicates that the Open RAN Market was valued at USD 5.1 billion in 2023 and is projected to reach USD 41.5 billion by 2032, growing at a CAGR of 26.24% during the forecast period from 2024 to 2032.”

https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2025/...y-SNS-Insider.html
 

More than $2.5 billion through advertising business

Published by Statista Research Department, Mar 6, 2025
In the fiscal year 2024, Rakuten Group generated over 221 billion Japanese yen in revenue through its advertising business.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1369442/...p-advertising-revenue/