“Curly has neither a demand monopoly nor a supply monopoly, so there are too many substitutes. A platform that cannot monopolize the market has limited corporate value.”

“When I heard the news of Curly’s acquisition of ‘Planary (the operator of ‘Hey Joy’, a platform for women’s careers), an industry group chat room said, ‘Why?’ Opinions lined up.”

These are the words of the startup industry insiders.