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Tata to rethink Starbucks' outlet expansion strategy amid lower footfall

VCCircleVCCircle · 6m ago
Tata to rethink Starbucks' outlet expansion strategy amid lower footfall
Medial

Tata to rethink Starbucks' outlet expansion strategy amid lower footfall An employee takes a customer's order at a Starbucks' outlet in New Delhi | Credit: Reuters India's Tata Consumer Products "will calibrate" its plans to open Starbucks stores in the near term at a time when fewer customers are walking into its cafes in the world's most populous country, its top boss said on Monday. City dwellers in India are cutting spending on everything from cookies and coffee to fast food as persistently high inflation squeezes middle class budgets, with wages failing to keep pace. Tata Starbucks, a joint venture between U.S. coffee brand Starbucks SBUX.Oand the Indian conglomerate, operates the largest cafe chain in the country with more than 450 outlets. Advertisement Starbucks has more than 40,000 stores globally. "We will calibrate for the short term ... In the near term there will be pressure," Tata Consumer CEO Sunil D'Souza told Reuters, adding that its Tata Starbucks joint venture is still focused on reaching its 2028 goal to operate 1,000 stores by 2028. However, Tata Consumer's CEO still expects its bet on coffee to pay off in the longer run as the country's coffee culture grows and cafe density is still low compared with other Asian countries such as Indonesia, Vietnam and the Philippines. Advertisement Separately, D'Souza also said Tata Consumer's revenue would increase in the double-digit percentage range in the second half of the financial year, with profit coming under pressure due to higher prices of raw materials, including tea. Share article on Leave Your Comments

Elon Musk just threw down the gauntlet at Sam Altman, and there's no going back

Business InsiderBusiness Insider · 1y ago
Elon Musk just threw down the gauntlet at Sam Altman, and there's no going back
Medial

Elon Musk has sued OpenAI, a research lab that he was once a part of, on the grounds that the company violated its mission by putting profit before open-source technology. Musk alleges that OpenAI's partnership with Microsoft goes against their agreement to make technology available to benefit humanity. While legal experts suggest Musk's case is weak due to the lack of a written agreement, they also point out that the lawsuit could still have negative consequences for OpenAI, including distracting the organization from its day-to-day operations and damaging its reputation. A win for Musk could set a precedent for other donors to seek returns from non-profit organizations.

Groww receives RBI approval to operate as payments aggregator

EntrackrEntrackr · 1y ago
Groww receives RBI approval to operate as payments aggregator
Medial

Fintech unicorn Groww has received approval from the Reserve Bank of India to operate as a payment aggregator. The firm has joined several fintechs which recently received similar in-principle approval from the central bank. RBI has granted the licence to Groww Pay, the UPI payments platform of broking firm Groww. The licence will allow the Tiger Global and Peak XV Partners-backed firm to facilitate e-commerce transactions through its UPI app. Launched in July last year, Groww’s UPI app allows bill payment services such as making loan and credit card repayments, paying electricity and water bills and DTH recharge, among others. In October last year, Groww surpassed its arch rival Zerodha for the first time in terms of active users. Further, Groww ended 2023 with 7.5 million monthly active users whereas Zerodha and AngelOne had 6.7 million and 5.3 million MAUs, respectively. In terms of valuation, Zerodha stood at the top with $3.6 billion followed by Upstox and Groww with $3.4 and $3 billion, respectively. Last week, Groww’s Mutual Fund also received SEBI’s approval to launch the Nifty Non-Cyclical Consumer Index Fund through a new fund offering (NFO). Groww registered more than 260% jump in its operating revenue to Rs 1,277 crore in FY23, according to startup data intelligence platform TheKredible. The company also posted Rs 448.7 crore profit against Rs 239 crore loss in FY22. Like several fintechs, Groww is also planning to move its domicile to India. Entrackr exclusively reported the development in May last year. Other companies on the list include KreditBee, Pine Labs, Groww, Razorpay, Meesho and Zepto. Most recently, PayU received in-principle approval from RBI to operate as a payment aggregator. Besides PayU and Groww, fintech firms Razorpay, Cashfree, Open, EnKash, Juspay, and Infibeam also received PA licence from the apex banking body.

uEngage aspires to be Shopify for restaurants in India

EntrackrEntrackr · 1y ago
uEngage aspires to be Shopify for restaurants in India
Medial

If you’re a new restaurant owner, you will probably get your joint listed on Zomato and Swiggy at the earliest. The listing helps with instant discoverability in the operational area and access to the delivery fleet among other benefits. The catch, however, is the steep commission charges restaurant owners have to pay these food aggregator platforms. This is one of the reasons why you see different pricing on Zomato and restaurants’ own menu cards. Chandigarh-based uEngage is looking to fix this exact problem for restaurant owners in the country. The startup offers a wide range of services such as Edge (which lets you start your own ordering app), Flash (which helps manage deliveries and riders), and Prism (which helps automate marketing). The startup is also active on ONDC, enabling businesses to join the open network for digital commerce. We spoke to uEngage CEO and founder Sameer Sharma to learn more about his platform, what it is trying to accomplish, and future roadmap. Here are the edited excerpts: What are the key problems that uEngage is trying to address? When Zomato, Swiggy, and other aggregators entered the picture, we couldn’t understand why they kept increasing commissions and pressuring merchants. Initially, it was 14%, which seemed high. Now, it’s beyond 22% for a major list of merchants, with some newer brands facing rates up to 32-35%. But that’s just the beginning. Beyond base commissions, there are additional costs like payment gateway charges, marketing click payments, often without clear, and cancellation charges without go ahead from the merchant. Recently, I met a leading Zomato-listed restaurant in Chandigarh. Despite generating sales worth Rs 30 lakh, they received only Rs 14.91 lakh, over 50% of their revenue. This has been happening for a while, and this is why we started uEngage. While aggregators offer great technology, demand generation, and modern logistics, there are downsides. Merchants lose control over brand positioning, customer relationship and face significant financial constraints. While aggregators aren’t necessarily evil, there’s much at stake for restaurants in the given circumstances. Please touch upon how the platform works, and how your growth has been so far? uEngage is Like Shopify for restaurants. Being a food-specific platform, we have been able to go deeper and offer extensive plug n play solutions to our restaurant partners. Initially launched as digital ordering platform for restaurants, uEngage has extended the platform into 3 different products covering: Direct Ordering (Mobile Apps, SEO First Websites, WhatsApp Ordering and KIOSk Ordering) – uEngage EDGE Customer Marketing and Omni Channel Loyalty – uEngage PRISM Last Mile Delivery and Tracking (Self Delivery and 3PL) – uEngage Flash At one end we have integrated industry leading POS and Billing Players like Petpooja , POSIST, Urban Piper, TM Bill, etc. to make life simpler for outlet staff, on the other end, we work closely with leading logistics players such as Dunzo, Zomato Xtreme (Zomato’s B2B service), Shadowfax, Loadshare, and Rapido. Together, they form a comprehensive Direct Ordering stack, including commerce, marketing, and logistics components. This ecosystem enables us to provide a holistic solution to our clients. As far as our financial growth goes, last year, our revenue stood at Rs 5.7 crore. This year, we anticipate closing it around Rs 13 crore to Rs 14 crore. This year, we’re projecting a GMV of around Rs 310 crore rupees for our brands. Orders from partner platforms to our revenue; they belong to the respective brands. However, they contribute to the GMV we generate for them. Our focus as a bootstrap company remains on profitability, and we’ve been profitable for more than two years now. Regarding our partnerships, we currently work with close to 4,000 outlets for our Direct Ordering Business and overall 15000+ Outlets for all our offerings including ONDC. What are your plans for the ONDC network? The ONDC is still at a nascent stage but a significant contributor to our revenue. Currently, we have around 15,000 outlets. Our target is to reach 50,000 outlets within the next three to four quarters.

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