you don't see that every day. introducing wifi pro, wifi that helps grow your business. comcast business. built for business. carol: welcome to bloomberg businessweek, i am carol massar. we are here in new york, coming up in this issue how to make , millions from snapchat. also, software helping donald trump get ahead, and the hollywood divorce lawyer that everybody wants. ♪ carol: i am here with alan pollack, the editor of limerick businessweek and this is the room where he put the magazine together. ellen: it is. during the course of any week, we put layouts on the walls and this room gets unbelievably crowded with people in our arts department and editors and , we all go over all of the layouts and discuss what they , look like, how they should

change, and how changes in the storyline about going to change the layout. so it is a lot of people in this room, hashing out problems, having a good time, too. carol: you put magazine puzzle together right now. allen: we put it right together here. carol that includes what is in : the future section. this week, you talk about valeant ceo, in the news a lot this week. ellen: he was in the news a lot this week. if you remembered last year, he kind of vanished after a scandal involving valeant raising drug prices a lot. it caught the attention of hillary clinton. and it became kind of this big, sort of public outrage over raising prices, partly because martinin's gurley, -- scarily who then was indicted for other reasons and then he got sick and went on medical leave and vanished. this week, he reappeared, he went back to work, and lo and behold, almost immediately, they announced that there was an sec investigation into the company. carol: it is a story that just gets more and more interesting.

another story that i think is very interesting and you have it in the company section this week, and that is etsy. it is kind of growing up finally. , ellen: it is growing up. it went public. they had to figure out how to go from a platform that just sold homemade stuff, to factory made items. -- inally it was only about carol: so the homemade stuff, right? ellen: this actually be made here. this could be made on etsy. this is the one i made into the magazine and this is the one that did not. but, we were trying to show us that items like this are now factory made, they're coming off of a manufacturing line. and we use this to sort of show that in the magazine. and for this one, did not quite make it. carol it could be something : that's on snapchat. that is your cover story this

week. talk to us about it. snapchat has been around for a while, but you decided to put it on the cover. ellen: snapchat is been around for a while. a year ago, they announced they would change their business model, and they have sold advertising. it has completely taken off during super bowl weekend this year. pepsi was on, amazon was on, budweiser, and they were all paying $1 million to be on snapchat. it is sort of a platform that you need to know about but you , you don't understand, and we explain it for you. carol: speaking of snapchat, i actually talked to the reporter who wrote this story. reporter: snapchat has been hundred million daily users which actually sounds quite a bit smaller than facebook. facebook has one billion daily users. what is so amazing about snapchat is the audience.

they are very young. they are very engaged. max: it is basically just the ideal audience for advertisers. advertisers are paying to be a part of it? max the money is pretty : surprising. there were rumors in the early days that advertisers paying tv like a rates. -- like rates. may not be that crazy expensive, but the money is very real. for the super bowl, for instance, there were four major advertisers, well-known brands, and altogether, they paid over $1 million to be in one snapchat super bowl story. so, it is not quite super bowl ad money, but it is not quite super bowl tv money, but it is real, and definitely growing. carol: it is interesting you say that. talk to me, you mention about how many people a day -- audiences in some cases, depending on who is on snapchat, some of those folks, they have some pretty big audiences, comparable to what you see on television? max yes. : big network sitcoms have sometimes tens of millions of viewers, but what happens is, many of those viewers are very

old. not very old, but older. carol: old enough. max then, if you are an : advertiser trying to reach people in their 20's, or late teens, it is very hard. and so, snapchat comes in and may have 86% of their audience is under 35. it is very clear that these are young people that are not necessarily watching television, so advertisers look at it, and even though they do not maybe totally understand it because it it is so new, it seems valuable. carol: i feel clear talking about snapchat and we've not mention the founder and the ceo, evan steagall. he is such a big part in terms of them momentum behind us. -- the momentum behind this. max it's a great story, and what : is kind of amazing about it is that this company has been mocked at every turn. originally, snapchat was kind of dismissed as kind of a thing for sending lewd pictures or what have you. carol: we all remember that. max that could not be a major

: advertising vehicle, that is for sex. no advertiser would want to be associated with that. and then, they created this sort of media play where they were charging very high advertising rates, and he was made fun of for that. he was reportedly offered something like $3 billion from facebook, turned it down. and yet, despite all of these sort of seemingly counterintuitive, not quite straight down the middle moves, snapchat is doing amazingly well. and you know, this media play, which looked insane, like why would you want to read the wall street journal next to your sex? people, first of all, there's a lot more happening than dirty pictures. and secondly, apparently these people do want to read the wall street journal and there is on -- it is on snapchat along with , cosmopolitan, vice, and a bunch of sort of mix of new media brands and old media brands.

carol: speaking of this, if you want to read about the king of snapchat, the electorate or we will have to review article in bloomberg businessweek this week. we will not give it away. i am here once again with the editor ellen pollock. , something that caught my attention is bill collectors in russia. this is really scary. ellen: it is really scary. russia is in a devastating recession. mostly because of the price of oil dropping so dramatically. that means that people are in tremendous consumer debt. something like 1.2 trillion rubles, which is a lot of debt. but, even if you are just a little bit in debt, you might find yourself coming up against these very scary bill collectors. you can come out of your house and find on your car, debtor written in huge graffiti with your apartment number. they'll write on your apartment walls, and they have even thrown bombs and hurt children. carol: destroying baby carriages. allen: destroying baby carriages -- ellen: destroying baby

carriages. it is crazy. it is really, really rough. and some of these cases, there have been prosecution, but a lot of them have not. carol: interesting, think you so much. coming up, the software that may donald trump's run for the white house possible. and the many, many, and i mean many donald trump like , politicians in power across europe. also a divorce attorney every hollywood star wants, and what is the worst business decision that you have ever made? we will talk about all of that ahead on "bloomberg businessweek." ♪

carroll: welcome back to "bloomberg businessweek," i'm carol massar. in the magazine's opening remarks this week, reporter stephen ferris writes, you're it may sound horrified by the rise

of donald trump, but the truth is, he'll be right at home in paris or berlin. after all, europe has given rise to nationalistic politicians such as france's jean marie le pen, and so promoting media personalities. in fact, donald trump and immigrant brand is shared by numerous political parties across the continent from finland to greece to switzerland. in other words, europeans want to remember that old proverb do , not throw stones in glass houses. but will this transmit in will this movement have legs in america? you can read the article about week'ss trump in this "bloomberg businessweek." donald trump stays in the spotlights in this week's politics section. would you believe that trump's political rise is partly thanks to a software design by antiwar activists? the software is called nation builder. i spoke to adam in san francisco. adam: nation builder is a software that serves as kind of a digital hub for a campaign.

so you can build a website, send e-mail, monitor social networking, and you can ingest all of this other kind of data that campaigns nowadays gather on voters. basically, the thing you are trying to do here is put together a profile on voters so that you can appeal to them about things that they care about in hopes that they will vote for you, donate some of their time, give money. many different things. it is a way which campaigns can slice and dice the electorate to their benefit. carol: talk to us about the individual who actually put this together. because he has an interesting background. adam: jim gilliam who created nation builder is a really fascinating person. he grew up in a christian fundamentalist family. he belonged to jerry falwell's churches. and he went to liberty university in virginia.

and then, when he was at school he became ill and got sick and his mother at the time also got sick. and he ended up losing his faith and going to work in software. he was always kind of a techie. he started to work for a startup. carol: you know, when i started reading your story, adam, i thought this would be for outliers, big campaigns are not going to get involved, but actually big campaigns like donald trump's are using this. adam: campaigns like barack obama's in 2008, 2012, really, they built, they spend a lot of money to build customized software to do all of these different things. and so here, what nation builder has done, is sort of build a turnkey approach to this. -- built a turnkey approach to. -- to this. it is not as sophisticated as what you can build with an unlimited budget that a lot of these presidential campaigns have, but it does give you a lot of these capabilities that just 10 years ago, or a few years ago

were not possible. carol: speaking of innovative technology, in the company and industry section in this week's "bloomberg businessweek," dana holding's about one of google's next big ideas. self driving cars in big demand from senior citizens. dana: inspiration for the story came from google. i was in detroit in january for the international auto show and i went to a presentation that the chief executive of the self driving car project gave, and he talked at length about how google is really trying to develop this technology with stranded seniors in mind. that was kind of the genesis for the story. i discovered that all of the automakers are basically doing the same thing. really researching how the elderly live, and what their mobility needs are. carol: have the automakers, have google figured out what the size of this market might be? dana: i think it is pretty significant. we have 43 million baby boomers in the united states already. they are aging at a rapid pace. it'll be a pretty significant

chunk of the population by 2030, which is the time from that a lot of people are looking at for when self driving cars, in the -- self driving cars will be on the market. i think that for those of us to do drive, car keys of always represented independence, when you lose your ability to drive, your quality of life really suffers, particularly if you live in a suburb or rural communities, which is where most of our seniors actually do live. carol: do we have to be worried about adoption rates? you highlight some questions for baby boomers, and then wanting to adopt self driving cars? dana: nobody has really set up on a business model yet. it is not clear the elderly will actually be purchasing these cars, or if it will be a ridership model. one example might be that the retirement community that currently has a bus driver to take their residents to doctors appointments, maybe they will use a self driving car instead. so, i think we're still waiting for the business models to be hashed out. carol: waiting for the business models, also waiting for the cars to actually hit the road.

when you talk to these individuals, do they have any idea when this will happen? dana: i think the technology is here, but the regulatory and insurance issues need to be ironed out before this can be adopted at a wide scale. between 2020 and 2030, you are going to see a lot of activity. carol: time for a check -- -- -- what is the worst business decision that you have ever made? that is a survey and the magazines etc. section this week. we are joined with more. you guys devote a whole page took, what was the worst idea that summary had? brett: to be successful business means that you failed a few times. we did an informal survey with entrepreneurs and we ask them a question. the first thing we learned as a woman who tried to do a kid hair care line, originally packaged the materials in a see-through bottle, which he thought was great, everybody else advised against it because when the media went to go photograph the bottle, they cannot actually read any of the text. it cost her $75,000. that was obviously a mistake. another mistake we learned is that when you are in business with something that is trendy, you do not want to think all of

-- sink all of the profits that you make back into the craze because when the craze dies down, you'll be stuck with a lot of cash tied up and stuff that nobody wants anymore. carol: check out the survey on this week's "bloomberg businessweek." coming up, biotech has a sugar daddy and his name is alaska. plus, the application will make your divorce a little less stressful, at least on your wallet. and the do's and don'ts of karaoke with coworkers. all in this week's issue of "bloomberg businessweek." ♪

carol: welcome back to bloomberg businessweek, i am carol massar. in the companies and industry section of this week's boomer

-- bloomberg businessweek, reporter donnie bloom hotels is why alaska's $50 billion wealth fund is showing money on startups, specifically biotech startups. hey donnie, you write about alaska being a biotech sugar daddy. what is going on? donnie: alaska made its money from oil, obviously, starting in the 1960's. they got a $50 billion sovereign wealth fund. what is interesting is that in the past couple of years they have been throwing this money into biotech in somewhat risky early-stage companies. and throwing a lot of money, even up to $150 million in two a -- into a single company. carol: that is a lot of money. has it made sense for alaska to spend their money in this way? donnie: one of the things they like about it is that these investments are liquid, so they actually make it a high return in the long run by getting more of a company and taking some of the risk that other investors are not willing to take. they made an investment in a company called juneau

therapeutics. name, by the way, is not a coincidence. that investment has turned out really well. they invested $129 million between 2013 and 2014. now the control by 25% of the -- about 25% of the company and that is a billion dollar plus stake right now. that investment turned out very well for them. to be seen about whether these other investments in biotech companies will turn out quite so well. carol: there are a few other biotech companies. who are they that they have invested in? donnie: there is juneau, kodiak and denali. carol: i like the alaska connection. donnie: you might notice the alaska connection, yes all of , them do have an alaska thing. juneau is the capital of alaska. denali is a mountain. kodiak is the brown bear of alaska. clearly, they like having these -- companies when they invest that much money in them. it's sort of an inside joke. carol: with oil prices coming down, alaska has had some financial problems. let's get to some of the

lawmakers, regulators noticing money being made in biotech. donnie: they are noticed how much cash they have in the fund. right now the governor said that , even if they fired every single state employee, they would still have a budget shortfall. so, they are incredibly desperate for money, and they're thinking about possibly tapping the funds for a couple billion dollars a year. right now, part of it is used to kind of give money to alaskans, just as a kind of handout for living in alaska. and of course for investing but , it looks like the governor and potentially the legislator is considering tapping it, just to make the math work. carol: that was bloomberg businessweek's donnie bloomfield. back once again with editor alan -- ellen pollack, and there many more must read in a magazine, and there's a great payment app. tell us about it. ellen: this an application for divorced couples, and i do not know why it was not created

before. it allows parents to keep track of who is spending what on their kids. it is very clever. it means that you do not have to speak to your ax, -- ex, which for some people is extremely important. carol: limit the conversation. ellen: limit the conversation. and, you know the spend money on dance classes versus french classes. there is no mixing it up. it is there. you do not have to fight about it. carol: that's great, limit interaction. we cannot talk about divorce without mentioning another story in a magazine, you talk about a divorce attorney laura wasser, , well known in hollywood. everybody wants her when they need her. ellen: this is a divorce lawyer who is in demand constantly in hollywood. carol: high profile names have used her. ellen: britney spears is one. and this is the story that tells you the secrets of hollywood divorce. it is a business story. it is all driven by money. of course. and she tells you in the story,

all kinds of secrets, that never would have occurred to you. for example, i will give you one or two. there is a reason that most hollywood divorces take place in march. and that is because it is after the academy awards, and people don't want to walk on the red carpet without someone. and then there is another reason, which i won't explain why hollywood divorces come in groups. that you have to read the story for. but it is really inside a world, big-money world, that you know nothing about. carol: ellen, who knew they were so many interesting nuances when it comes to hollywood divorces? a great read. one more thing we want to talk about, karaoke. i want to bring in sam of the magazine to talk about this area -- this. you actually looked at karaoke with a lot of businesses and workers, they go out and have fun. sam it is an opportunity to : boost morale, it is a fun time you can have with people that you are normally sitting at a desk with. carol: but you can make mistakes. sam sure, doing karaoke with : your colleagues. carol: have you done it?

sam: we are working on it. alcohol helps. some people are not necessarily naturally inclined to doing karaoke, but maybe after a couple of drinks, they are a little more open to the suggestion than they would have been when they were stone cold sober. carol: i'm not a great person karaoke, but are there certain songs you should never seeing? -- sing? reporter: i would argue that there are songs that have long instrumental breaks, that are bad because you don't know what to do. and you definitely want to avoid obscure, personal favorites. it is an opportunity to pick some crowdpleasers. go with "we built this city." go with a song by journey. go with freedom 90 by george michael. don't pick a deep cut from the smashing pumpkins album that only you love that nobody else will appreciate. carol: what about if you're really good at singing, do have to play nice? sam yes, if you went to : juilliard or tish in another life and you still can sing along to the entire album of

"chorus line," you might want to play down a little bit. you don't to be too much of a show off. same rules as an work, you want to get along and have a good time, and you don't want to take yourself too seriously. carol: so if you went out and did karaoke with sam, what kind of song would you saying? -- sing? ellen: i would think something very easy. very easy. so far i have not gone, and i broke one of your rules. the boss is allowed to go, but only stay for 30 minutes, which i did not know. sam: a role for a lot of functions. you want to get out of things before they get too risque or dicey. it puts everybody and uncovered -- an uncomfortable position. carol: last time i wear the -- heard the word karaoke, i left. ellen pollack, sam, thank you very much. it is all in this issue of "bloomberg businessweek." check it out on newsstands and also online. thank you for joining us.

we'll see you next week. ♪

announcer: from our studios in new york city, this is "charlie rose." charlie: "whiskey tango foxtrot" is the new film starring tina fey. it is based on journalist, kim barker's acclaimed 2011 memoir "the taliban shuffle." tina fey stars as a cable news copywriter who upends her life when she volunteers to becoming war reporter in afghanistan. the "new yorker" calls it a blustery, comic drama. here is the trailer for "whiskey tango foxtrot." >> are you ok? >> i have to pee.