Zusha Elinson wondered if the key to understanding the short-term future of the tech industry was to look at sales of ping-pong tables:

• For tech companies having ping-pong tables is a sign that they are a different and distinct place to work.
• When companies struggle to find funding or are uncertain about their future, it makes sense that expenditures on the tables – which can be very expensive and have little resale value – fall.
• The ping-pong table industry saw a 50% drop in sales in Q1 2016. Over the same quarter startup funding decreased by 25%.
• Until 2014 Twitter was a big purchaser of ping-pong tables. Since then the company has run into financial trouble.
• Intel stopped buying the tables last year. Last month 12,000 employees were laid off.
• No one really remembers when perennially crisis-ridden Yahoo last purchased a ping-pong table.
• Google, on the other hand, which saw an increase in profits in the latest quarter, recently made a big order for them.
• The tables will probably only work as a financial indicator in the short-term. During the previous tech-bubble it was pool, not ping-pong tables, that startups kept around for their employees.
• They seem to have realized, however, that not only are ping-pong tables cheaper, they can also double as meeting tables in a pinch.

Read what ping-pong table manufacturers think about all this, and other details here.

Source: The Wall Street Journal