>> welcome to the best of "bloomberg west." every weekend, we bring you the top interviews with global power players and technology and media and the reshaping our world. coming up, interviews and insight from strause zelnick. sam shank and matt maloney. but we're going to start with twitter. perhaps no tech ceo coming under such fire and constant

speculation. but he's been busy shuffling his c suite, tweaking twitter's product, and focusing on revenue. costello spoke with us. topic number one, twitter's acquisition of nearby project a company that connects social media stars with advertisers. >> it's absolutely the very beginning of providing opportunities to viners who have done such great work at building this unique community of creators and connecting them to brands we think is just going to be a usome for the brands who want to leverage the great work they do to create stories and then build a career off the fun things. >> do you find yourself competing with snap chat with this new generation of video creators?

>> i think about it more as this unique platform we've developed and this awesome -- there are these stop motion animation experts, there are these comedians, there are these sort of vine magicians through some of the frame by frame animation work they do. and being able to leverage their talents to help brands and companies tell their stories across the system we think is really cool. and by bringing niche on board we think we're going to be able to do that not just on vine but within twitter itself as well. >> there's so much energy it makes me wonder whether you tube has squandered some of the opportunity around mobile video. do you see them in the mobile video? >> i think they're going to be lots of players in this native mobile video space. and again, by native mobile i say that a lot. and what i mean when i say that is video primarily produced for consumption on mobile. we led the way there with vine. we just think there's an

enormous amount of opportunity there. and buying niche was part of realizing that opportunity. we're going to do a lot more there as well. >> a couple weeks ago my and -- android twitter app updated itself to allow for mobile video. as those tools have rolled out what kind of consumption have you seen? >> we've seen great usage of them. i think one of the things we've been fascinated about is how much people are using native mobile video to reply to tweets. so someone will text -- write a text tweet and mention another user on twitter, and that user will reply with a short video. we've seen that from individual users like gary vanerkek's been doing that a lot. we've seen it from companies. medium has been doing that. it was a q&a using native mobile video in their responses. we just did a q&a today with amy schumer, the comedian who has written and starring in this

movie that is coming out this summer "train wreck." she did all her responses via video. it wouldn't be the first case we anticipated but it seems to be blowing -- but it seems to be blowing up. we had the benefit of having seen what was happening in january. >> you expressed a company's revenue would come back up to a level from previous quarters. >> we did that in the first week of february. so we had the benefit of having seen what was happening in january. as we mentioned, that outlook based on seeing a return to organic growth, growth initiatives we have had inside the company that are delivering results and then some seasonality where it is higher than q4 traditionally. >> you increased the cadence of product launches. a big one is instant time. talk about that. >> one of the things that i've

been talking about since we were on the ipo road show is bridging that gap between awareness of twitter and really engaged on twitter. part of that gap is new users are coming to the platform. they just saw it on tv. they just saw, this thing is happening. it's all on twitter right now. head over there. they sign up for the platform and then they can't find the right accounts to follow. they don't understand how to use it. instant timeline is about delivering immediate value to these users the moment they sign up, removing the follow friction the way they get value and getting them a great timeline of 20, 40, 90 accounts to look at immediately and show them how to use the platform not try to teach them how to use the platform. >> you've had some instability. on the team some managers coming , and going. has that situation stabilized? >> the short answer is yes. i love the team that we've had in place. i've also been particularly enthused by the way my direct reports are building out their bench and strengthening their bench and bringing other leaders

into the company. we've just had a couple more additions to our engineering leadership, just in the last week. so that's something i'm enthusiastic and excited about. organizations are always going to evolve and change over time. i really like the team we have now. >> do you feel you made mistakes in previous incarnations of the team? >> i always tell my leaders inside the company, it's your job to always be improving your team. and there are all sorts of things you can do to improve your team. your job is not to defend your team, your job is to improve your team. so that's something i focused on and paid careful attention to. i love the way it is now. >> i was struck by the internal statement that you made about trolling on twitter. you said that the whole world knows that this bullying happens on the network. we haven't done enough to stop it. what you want to see the organization do? >> that was the first time i used the word we suck at this and used crass language like that in a companywide email. of course that's the one that gets leaked. not one of my more sophisticated

writing memos. look, the point of writing that note to the company was to let them know i take responsibility for that. we're not just going to go ahead with the status quo anymore. we're going to get a lot more aggressive. it's on me to make sure we do that, and we're going to be aggressive and fast about making changes. so that was about me putting the sort of weight on my shoulders if you will, and letting the rest of the company know we're going to get more aggressive here and quickly. >> e commerce on twitter. i feel like amazon has been trying to sell me the same portable usb charger since they introduced the charger. what's the goal? >> we're still experimenting there. i've said a number of times that i think the opportunity for twitter is to really be the place for in the moment commerce, now commerce. in the context of seeing some public conversation, oh, yeah

i want that and i get it now. as different from other kinds of commerce such as here's a catalog of stuff. we have a number of experiments. we're learning a ton. we don't have anything new to announce. i think you'll continue to see us explore with different kinds of, what does now commerce really mean in the coming months? and we'll see what happens. >> a long-term question. facebook has 1.2 billion users eight $200 billion market cap. is your vision for twitter -- is it on the same par? is it facebook scale? >> i think our vision for twitter is to have the largest possible audience, the largest daily audience in the world. we believe that twitter is of value and can be of value to every connected person on the planet, and that's the strategy we're delivering against. >> twitter ceo dick costolo. up next, take two is evolving. the company hoping the new game "evolved" could become the next

big thing following the steps of grand theft auto. ♪

>> tht this is the best of "bloomberg west." cory action has built its franchise but now the company is betting on a first person shooting game called evolve which pits human against monsters just like in real life. "evolve" went on sale just recently.

check on the interview with the take two ceo. >> it's pretty unique in that you have an opportunity to play either as a monster or team of four fighting the monster. and as far as we know that's novel. the game won best of show at both e3 and gamescon. that's never happened before. we'll know very soon. >> how do you make plans to launch such a thing to try to figure out what the scale is going to be? because you do not really know how the game is going to take off. >> i think that's true of every entertainment business. certainly of the movie business where you spend your money and create a marketing budget. and until the picture opens you basically don't know. we have a little more insight because we interact with retail and they order product from us and they tend to be very expert. our retailers really know the market and can signal to us through their analysis about how our launch is going to look. said another way it's unusual we , would ship product and be disappointed how it sold through although it occasionally does happen. in this instance the retailers are very enthusiastic. that said it still remains to be

, seen and we never like to claim victory until it occurs. >> talking about you coming on the show today, there was a lot of talk about sex and violence. i said i just don't care about sex and violence as long as i know it's going to be there or not there. is that morally bankrupt or is that just the market is bigger? >> i think you said it right. you want to know it's there. it's incumbent upon us to deliver a rating, to stand by the rating and to market appropriately to the right audience. the rating system used is the most robust in the industry. that is, it has the highest level of compliance as measured by third parties. so when a parent goes to the store to buy a video game for his or her child, they know to buy something that's rated e for a child. and if an adult goes to buy an m-rated game they know that there's likely to be sexual content or violent content. the same way if you go to an r-rated movie or watch an action television show you know what to expect.

i'm a big believer that the right to bring what a publisher wants to the public is a terribly important right in america, one we need to stand behind. equally, we have a social responsibility to do what we think is right and only to market to appropriate audience and to let people know what's in the box before they get it home. and i think both are important. our ability to do what we think is right is important, our social responsibility to market appropriately is equally important. >> let me ask you about the demographic work it. -- demographic bucket. how do you see who your user is? do you put them into a small sort or big groups? how do you try to decide who they might be? >> we typically look at it as concentric circles with the core being sort of hard-core gamers. people who love video games and people for whom it's their primary entertainment activities. >> who is it? >> it's all across the board. a bit more male than female but

not that much. the median age of one of our gamers is 37. so really adults. and older adults. i think the reason for that is that one consumes for the rest of one's life the entertainment about which you're passionate about in your late teens, and that never changes. that's why our cohort is growing so rapidly and aging. obviously as the video game business has been around 35 years, every year that goes by our median cohort is going to increase in age, which suits us just fine. people don't stop playing video games once they play them. typically, they love them and keep loving them. then the second circle would be people who play video games but for whom it is not their most important activity. then the third is broad audience who is sort of interested but it's not their primary or even secondary activity. in the case of grand theft auto five, with 45 million units sold today you have to believe you've , addressed the entire market

and in other titles you might just address the core market. certainly our goal is to address the broadest market possible. we do that by creating a title that is beautiful to look at and compelling to play. >> you have this partnership in china, with 10 sent. tell me -- with tencent. tell me how that works. >> we've been in business with tencent for some time and they were our partner as we ought to develop it on line in china, which is is a free to play multiplayer game in the chinese market and we entered with ten cent because they are the premier company there, how to do it and prepared to mitigate a gool deal of our risk. it's been a great partnership. we have a lot of people on the ground in china. it's still to this day the number one sports title in china for massive multiplayer game. i think we have 24 million registered users and it generates revenues and profits every month. >> in terms of the way showing profits already. what's the growth like and does it sort of latch on to the same kind of growth we see with tencent writ large?

>> that is a great question. i am not sure. certainly tencent's own growth is a nice backdrop, but the game has to stand alone. it continues to grow and we hope it will continue to grow. but right now it's month to month. we can't predict what's going to happen. but it's looking very positive. >> consoles are now legal in china. you're saying the xbox. what does that mean for you? there are people who love games, but it is a brand-new market. >> you said it exactly right. people love games in china, but are used to free to play online games. that's a big market for people who love games but is a brand new market. so this is a brand new business. so far only the xbox has launched. it's a relatively small installed base. we are seeking to get government approval to sell our basketball title there. that would be our first title for the x box in china. it's a massive market, 300 million people in the middle

class, entire state of america's consumer population could fit inside china's middle class. this remains still a very small market so far. >> what do you expect in terms of timing? do you have any idea what the process will be or might it favor local developers of content? >> so far the content has been sort of balanced with local and international. ubisoft is actually on the ground in china. that gives them an advantage. all of us need government approval for what we do and that is a bit challenging as you know. >> but you've already got the nba game playing on tencent. does that give you an advantage? >> i hope so. and basketball isn't controversial. >> that was the ceo of take two interactive. competition in the online delivery business is hotter than ever. we will talk to the ceo of a publicly traded grubhub next. ♪

>> i'm cory johnson and this is the best of "bloomberg west." the hungry market for food delivery is spurring competition. online food services are inching closer to your plate. yelp just ate up online food service eat 24, spending $134 million, and grubhub announced two acquisitions recently. so which company is in a position to win? the ceo of grubhub spoke with bloomberg about the yelp competition. >> it's just business as usual for us. eat 24 has been around for a while. in fact they had a business partnership with yelp for years. i'm wondering why they pulled the trigger on the acquisition when all the benefits of working together already existed. but for us it's about the opportunity ahead of us. there's $70 billion in takeout spent domestically and we

processed 1.8 billion last year. that is dramatically more than anyone else in the space. there's a lot left to go in front of us and that's what we're focused on. >> it must be validating for them to look at your market and find it appealing. >> i want to build the best product and service and that's why we acquired the two rdf companies, restaurant deliveries to now deliver, 15 major markets. that's what i see as a real opportunity to increase service levels in this industry. >> let's talk about those. you were once in the business of facilitating an online purchase and then a restaurant went and delivered the food themselves. now you want to control the value chain, make those with a grubhub contractor or employee? why? >> sure. first start the majority, the vast majority of our business is still the restaurant delivers it themselves. what we found is that we can increase the level of service and make it more consistent for the diner if we're owning the last mile. we can maintain the heat of the

food. we can make sure the delivery gets there really fast. so by leveraging our technology and scale we think we can bring a better experience to the diner and add a bunch of new restaurants that didn't deliver before. that's the value we're going after. >> how does it work? are these grubhub employees that are making the deliveries or spin off a kind of uber like service? >> we're definitely looking around the world and seeing how other people are deploying vast amount of individuals -- independent contractors is a very strong way to go and we definitely have a lot of those. >> do you see the ubers and the side car and uber like company here in san francisco getting into the business this week of making delifferies. do you see them as partners or ultimately, over the long-term competitors? , >> you know we're going to leverage whatever we can to get the food there as fast as possible as hot as possible as high quality. the transportation company, it's a different use. they pull over to the curb somebody gets in. there's new packages. we'll see if that gets to the place where you can put someone who goes and gets the food from the restaurant make sure the

order is accurate, brings it back, delivers it, rings your doorbell. we'll see if that can get there. for now we're going to do it because we can do it really well and if in time they can do that, of course we'll go with that. >> let's talk about the value proposition for restaurants. as i told you before, i am a grubhub user. love the service. but it's incomplete even here in san francisco. not all restaurants are on the platform. how do you convince restaurants that they're not leaching commission to you guys and two that they're not losing the relationship with their customer to an intermediary? >> restaurants want to make money. that's what they're there to do. they want to process orders and they will leverage whatever they can to do that effectively. so what we bring them is a very low risk, very high reward opportunity. we say, bluntly, we only make a dime when you make a dollar and then it's on us to make them more successful. we help them manage their data help them think through pricing. what are the options?

what are delivery boundaries? what times are they delivering? these are things we are thinking through. we give them a tablet to make them more efficient to process more orders and then we drive those orders through our 5 million plus active diners in a hundred cities across the country. so if you are a restauranteur in a major market especially, and in tier two, three, and suburban markets, you're crazy if you're not on grubhub because you make a lot of money. >> to what extent has open table been a model for you? it does remind me of open table which got a start by providing technology to restaurants to help them manage their inhouse inventory. >> opentable was a pioneer in the networks, absolutely. the difference between open table and grubhub is grubhub has a vastly bigger addressable market. so currently, $70 billion in annual takeout sales of which were doing $2 billion. in reservations it's much, much smaller. so we're looking at our opportunity and really evolving

our product. we're trying to figure out how can we add transparency, control, increase the level of service proactively to give diners a better experience so they order more. >> so as you know for me no conversation is complete without a mention of amazon. amazon fresh, the grocery delivery service rolling out nationwide. in some markets they are integrating restaurant delivery. to what do you see them a partner or competitor? >> amazon is a very interesting company. you look at what they are doing -- they are unique. they are powerful. they have a lot of resources. but let's be clear. nobody is doing what we are doing at scale. we are processing over 200,000 orders per day, more than a million per week. there is nobody who is delivering restaurant deliveries at our level of scale. amazon is testing the waters for sure, but we are going to stay out ahead of everyone else. >> that was grubhub ceo matt maloney.

the new net neutrality proposal -- is it a plan to keep the internet free or open? or is it a secret one to regulate the web and tax it? ♪

>> you are watching the best of "bloomberg west." i am cory johnson. fcc head tom wheeler says his net neutrality proposal will protect the open internet by subjecting it to more regulation. that has some republicans live it. one said the proposal to open the door to new taxes, new legislation more litigation, and less innovation. he joined me on "bloomberg west. >> the worst thing is that it micromanages virtually every aspect of how the internet operates.

it opens the door to billions of dollars of new taxes on broadband that consumers will have to pay. it opens the door to trial lawyers filing class-action lawyers across the country. the final not become public until after the fcc vote on it. >> let's talk about these and go there goes objections one by one because he listed a handful of them. let's start with micromanagement. at some point, if it is happening at this place, at the moment in which a user is trying to get the information, isn't that the place where the regulation has to happen and get involved if there is to be any regulation? >> there are two responses to that. nowhere in this document does the agency ever identify any problem.

they may say the competition is limited but they do not give any -- secondly, this document goes well beyond last mile. for the first time, the agency would insert itself into debates over interconnection. the negotiations between service providers and hedge providers. not only the requirements set companies physically connect with the rates they would have to adopt and it would open up the complaint assess. more litigation that would allow the commission or courts to second-guess all of these decisions which currently are made in the free market. that is not something a the agency or courts are equipped to do. >> this edges on the principles. he talked about this commercial reasonableness and his evolution

of what he thought about that. essentially, he said i believe the fcc could figure it out. he said i became concerned this new concept might interpret what it means not for consumers. what do you think it's admin? should the rules be there to promote what is reasonable for business or the users of the internet itself? >> i view our role as medicating the public interest. in my opinion, the public interest is driven primarily by what is good for american consumers. putting that to be sad, the question about commercial reasonableness is something we have applied in many contacts. -- contexts. what happened was the president directing the sec in early november to change course, to adopt his plan to regulate the internet.

that is what is driving this. >> you mentioned heavy taxes. isn't there already a rule in place? the union tax freedom act events there from being any taxes on the internet. how can that lead to more taxes? >> that act only applies to a sales tax on the access. it is not apply to the fees that would follow from us reclassifying broadband as a telecommunications service which is what we're on the brink of doing. it's easy see that universal service the, this order is fully leaves the door open to us raising the federal fees under the fund and letting states to the same. that is why ended -- one independent study says $11 billion at least in these will have to be increased as a result of this. that is something consumers will have to pay for. >> their republican member of the federal to medication's

division post -- federal communications commission. is this growing wave of consolidation mean more for me all my travel industry? we answer that question next. ♪

>> this is the best of bloomberg west. dealmaking takes off in the online travel industry. weeks after reaching a deal with travelocity, expedia is at it again striking a deal to acquire orbitz. the press, 1.6 billion -- the price, $1.6 billion. it gears up to take on the rest of the industry and tries line of particular. what are the implications? i spoke with sam shank.

>> the space has become a duopoly. there are 10 million plus market cap names. they may well look to buy more vertical plays like hotels. the space is consolidating. they do it in a way that is usually pretty smart. they are setting up deals rolling up assets. it is a multiyear trend. >> you wrote there is probably no one to trust these issues at all because orbitz is how big a share? >> it is a pretty small share. politely put, it is a pretty weak asset. they are too heavily dependent on the u.s. market heavily dependent on the air market. this is what is called a life vest. >> the air market stinks and what terms of referrals. like all of the economics are in the hotel market.

>> the smart thing would be to start a hotel business. you did start a hotel business. what is the trend that you see orbitz having to unlock annoying -- having to deal with? >> the shift to mobile is the big trend in all my business. the starting point for all my travel is google. that is where people go to start their travel. in the mobile world, people are going directly to apps bypassing google. that plays well to someone like expedia who is gathering up all of these starting points. >> in the case of expedia, why would an expedia at -- why wouldn't that be the most exact full -- successful thing they could be doing? lacks there are other things people are starting. there are other flavors of apps

that resonate better with consumers. we have carved out a nice market for ourselves. >> from a design standpoint, you offer there a different services. expedia is like a smaller version of the website where you scroll her things. is designed an important -- scroll through things. his design an important aspect? >> when we started, we started with a clean slate. our back end, front end was reimagined and invented specifically for the mobile use case. it is very fast to book a room. the design is really crisp and makes to a mobile audience. because of the ways hotels compete, our rates are 10% lower you would find anywhere else in the world. >> it is a fascinating business. i know the members -- numbers are growing so fast.

when you look at expedia mobile do you see it as a problem? >> usually, when you have these huge shifts commit great opportunities for new innovators to come in editor requires expedia and is trying to pay that well. there certainly but the effort in to make sure all of their apps work well. there are opportunities especially when you have these big shifts like this. >> when i talk to the travel industry, they talk about google and not in very kind ways. there have been antitrust issues. how big of a threat is google? >> google is the biggest player in travel. it is always going to be the biggest player because i think of a ba required marketing challenge. -- it will always be a required marketing challenge.

you have to pay the piper and the piper here is google. they will stay at the top and they will reap very nice economics. i doubt they will get deep into the bookings. they have made halfhearted efforts for years and not had much traction. their business model works just fine. blacks -- >> google traded a new high-end robot named spot. you might what to think about what the robot dog means to the world of big data. that is next on the best of bloomberg west. ♪

>> welcome back. i'm cory johnson. is burglary to about google rolling out a ridesharing service? -- uber worried about google? there were some tough words for google and their projects. >> a lot of the large companies have done a good job of distracting the press by profiling self driving cars or drones. how many large market companies have done a drone er event? -- pr event? they want to appear innovative. ask any analyst covering google where the revenue is for these cars in 10 years and i know what

the answer is. it is zero. >> google is certainly putting some mind capital on. boston dynamics, the innovation is far from slowing. they released a video of a brand-new robot dog. it is a 160 pound robot. it is climbing stairs, handling rugged terrain and standing after it has been kicked. what does google plan to do with this robot? i spoke with dan carol. >> it is important to make this robot walk or do research on this because there are a number of other capabilities that can be built out of this. that is. think about google working to develop robotics products and take of it in terms of google developing a robotic solutions stack. that is research which generates new products and new marketplaces tied in with data.

this is not a hardware play. what they had done by purchasing boston dynamics and before they announce that purchase, they announced they were purchasing seven other companies. they are acquiring the best researchers and roboticsists in the world. that ties in with robot operating systems. yes, this is eye candy for robotics and most of the people in the public but there are substantial things that can be built out of this. >> one the guy kicks the dog, that is teaching the robots the future to take over. this is the beginning of the terminator. i understand about the data. what kind of data will they gather from these robots they could not get any other way? >> it might not be gathering

data but it might be a use of data. if you look at these robotic systems, there is only so much they can keep on the individual platforms themselves in terms of intelligence. they need access to other things. if you have an index internet which is what google does, you can have indexes of things like object models to recognize people or objects or to recognize things like that up and up certain doors or move up to certain levels of stairs or how to drive in traffic. there are piles and piles of data which drives intelligence for these types of systems. so that is where the data component comes in. it is important to notice that the director of google's robotics initiatives, the first time i heard him speak was on the subject of cloud these the robotics. this is where it is going. the intelligence is being actualized in robotics systems. >> i don't see the place where

you have this cow that runs across a parking lot leading to more impressions for advertising. is it about understanding the context of movement so you can somehow perform better, display better ads? am i too small minded? >> i don't think they actually know how this will all play out but what you can do with his -- this type of robot, think of it more in terms of a research platform. do see how these robots handle that dynamic walking and ability to recover, but also how do you interact with humans, how to work in the physical environment with a type of device out there. once you are able to work in this environment, you are gathering more information then is limited to the virtual world. think of these things in terms of a mobile sensor as opposed to

a robotic system. a device in the home that acquires information and data that can be monetized in a number of different ways. >> so, they will do the new street maps with robot driving around and self driving cars and know where people are our and what they do so they can be in a position to better contextualize things like advertising? >> it might move beyond that. i cannot release the to that. i do know they have these acquisitions and a whole heap of small people doing basic, core research to develop this that ties into data with a number of different ways. not just what people are doing or what they are clicking on that -- but, images of different types of varmints. you can build maps from taking

photos with cell phones. you can build the equivalent of a functional map on the learning how people move or their physical environment. it is how to move from one place to another or how to move upstairs or what that person's face means. are they smiling, happy? who is that person? one way to gather this information is through actuated sensors that can move and physical environments. >> dan cara. need a date for valentine's day? need to pretend you do? we introduce you to a business that is behind make-believe relationships. pretend boyfriends and girlfriends. that is coming up next.

>> this is the best of bloomberg west. i am cory johnson. it's valentine's day weekend and if you don't have a date you can always pretend to have one. the technology is here to help invisible girlfriend. the st. louis startup that provides make believe boyfriends and girlfriends. here is the cofounder. >> one thing that we found is the whole judgment is that your worth is based whether you're in a relationship or not there's -- or not. there are a lot of people who don't want to be in a relationship who want to have cover because they want to have cover at a job or they might be getting hit on at the office. >> $24.99 a month. you get 100 text messages. from a real invisible boyfriend or girlfriend. you get handwritten notes, voicemail and expanding soon to gifts and perhaps even flowers at work. >> wouldn't you go through that really fast? how many tweets or social media messages? >> we're not using social media.

we realize most interaction people have is through their phone so we're using text messages. >> on the other hand, there is someone who is sending -- i'm thinking of the movie "her," which is a movie that i loved, where this person had this actual relationship with this computer. >> you know, we're in a position where we're not trying to convince you you're in a relationship. we're trying to give you believable social prove. but we find our users are starting to use the service for conversation. they're talking to their invisible boy friends and girlfriends at a higher clip than we anticipated. >> so beyond the person getting hit on at work, who else would need this kind of service? >> a soldier overseas without a girlback home. might be someone who is living a -- gay or lesbian and have the conservative parents in the bible belt. we found that we have lots of people using it for different reasons. we have one person trying to make their ex jealous. so there's lots of different possibilities.

>> if i signed up, my wife might be jealous and give me better presence on about times a day? -- presents on valentine's day? >> she might give you more presents. >> i'm not going to try that. >> you have a lot of users already. >> i do. >> give me a sense. >> we launched three weeks ago. in those three weeks over 50,000 people have created boyfriends and girlfriends from all over the world. >> when we talk on the phone you won a big startup contest in st. louis? >> it was november of 2013 we won the startup weekend competition and got a little bit of attention right then so we've been working to build the services that we launched three weeks ago. >> who are the people on the other side of sending these messages? do they have boyfriends and girlfriends? are they pollyamorous? >> exactly right. >> who are they? >> we have a roughly 500 person workforce in the united states. we're partnering with a company in st. louis that helps us kind of generate these microtasks whether it's through amazon's o desk. there's people who are doing

these small tiny tests for us so they're able to respond to the text messages. >> so web services, is it's a distributed model not unlike uber without you needing to go out and hire them? >> that's exactly right. >> we have so many other businesses like that. are you also hosting an amazon web service? >> not yet but what we've found is we've seen such an immediate influx that we're focusing on scaling the business to handle those sort of traffic. >> what are you doing for valentine's day? >> i'm spending it here in san francisco with my wife who is in the room next door. >> invisible girlfriend cofounder. that does it. catch us monday through friday at 10:00 and 3:00 on the west coast. we'll see you tomorrow. [captioning made possible by bloomberg television] ♪

>> i am courtney thorne smith. don't change the channel because in the next few minutes you will learn about a breakthrough product that can help take years off your appearance. here's the thing. you don't put it on your face. want to learn more? stay with us. next, a paid presentation from perricone for cold plasma sub d. the first of its kind treatment for the area of your body that can actually age most. your neck. hosted by network television star courtney thorne smith, and