  We propose that several of the anomalies that have been observed at large
angular scales in the CMB have a common origin in a cosmic bounce that took
place before the inflationary era. The bounce introduces a new physical scale
in the problem, which breaks the almost scale invariance of inflation. As a
result, the state of scalar perturbations at the onset of inflation is no
longer the Bunch-Davies vacuum, but it rather contains excitations and
non-Gaussianity, which are larger for infrared modes. We argue that the
combined effect of these excitations and the correlations between CMB modes and
longer wavelength perturbations, can account for the observed power
suppression, for the dipolar asymmetry, and it can also produce a preference
for odd-parity correlations. The model can also alleviate the tension in the
lensing amplitude $A_L$. We adopt a phenomenological viewpoint by
characterizing the model with a few free parameters, rather than restricting to
specific bouncing theories. We identify the minimum set of ingredients needed
for our ideas to hold, and point out examples of theories in the literature
where these conditions are met.
