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Micron pitches for stable policy environment to attract semiconductor investments

ThehindubusinesslineThehindubusinessline · 1y ago
Micron pitches for stable policy environment to attract semiconductor investments
Medial

Micron Technology's Executive VP for global operations, Manish Bhatia, emphasized the need for policy certainty in India to attract semiconductor investments. Speaking at a tech conference, Bhatia mentioned that India should establish a stable policy environment to attract semiconductor companies. He stressed the importance of creating a long-term and predictable policy for at least the next 25 years to attract more players to the country. Bhatia highlighted that countries like Taiwan, Korea, and Japan have succeeded in creating thriving semiconductor ecosystems due to policy predictability. Micron has already invested $825 million in India for building a semiconductor assembly and test facility in Gujarat.

Google agrees to temporarily restore delisted apps

EntrackrEntrackr · 1y ago
Google agrees to temporarily restore delisted apps
Medial

Google announced on Tuesday that it has agreed to temporarily restore applications it removed from the Play Store due to policy compliance issues. “In the spirit of cooperation, we are temporarily reinstating the apps of the developers with appeals pending in the Supreme Court. Google maintains its right to implement and enforce its business model, as established in various courts. We will invoice our full applicable services fees in the interim and are extending payment timelines for these companies. We look forward to a collaborative effort to find solutions that respect the needs of all parties,” a Google spokesperson said in a statement. The move, however, seems to have come after intervention by the Indian government. Last week, IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw strongly criticized the delisting of select Indian apps from the app store. Later, he revealed that he had called Google representatives and app developers to address the issue. This morning, Vaishnaw stated that the technology giant had agreed to relist the apps. “Google and start-up company, both have met with us. We have had very constructive discussions and finally, Google has agreed to list all the Apps as on the status which was there on Friday morning (1st March), that status will be restored. Google has been supporting our technology development journey and we believe that in the coming months, both start-up company and Google will come to a long-term resolution,” he told ANI. The move to delist select applications had drawn backlash from several Indian founders. Shadi.com founder Anupam Mittal said in a tweet, “Via its 30% #Lagaan, Google is attempting to wipe out the millions of developers who made its Play Store a success but it won’t be that easy. We will fight monopolistic designs against our economy, founders & country…” According to reports, Shaadi.com, ALTBalaji, KukuFM, Matrimony.com, Bharat Matrimony, Quack Quack, InfoEdge’s Naukri and 99 acres, and TrulyMadly were among the apps booted out by Google. Before delisting, Google posted a detailed blog explaining its position on action against platforms not adhering to its policies. Google stated that up to 10 companies have chosen not to comply with Google’s policies and have sought interim protections from the court. These developers adhere to the payment policies of other app stores, Google added. However, the company did not specifically name these 10 companies. Google, in its blog post, highlighted that allowing this small group of developers to receive differential treatment while the majority of developers comply creates an “uneven playing field across the ecosystem and puts all other apps and games at a competitive disadvantage.” It also pointed out that the company had granted developers more than three years to prepare for the new regime, including three weeks after the Supreme Court’s order. The company disclosed that over 200,000 Indian developers using Google Play adhere to its policies. Moreover, less than 60 developers on Google Play are subjected to fees above 15% as per its new tiered pricing programs.

Exclusive: Trading app Investmint halts services; explores M&A deal

EntrackrEntrackr · 1y ago
Exclusive: Trading app Investmint halts services; explores M&A deal
Medial

Signal-based trading app Investmint has halted its services as the company found it difficult to figure out a reliable business model, sources aware of the development told Entrackr. In October 2022, Investmint raised $2 million in Seed round led by Nexus Venture Partners, with participation from other angel investors. As per sources, the firm had decent traction with substantial money left from the last fundraise but the team couldn’t translate them into monetization. “Investmint has been exploring acquisition opportunities with well capitalized wealth management companies,” said one of the sources requesting anonymity. Founded in February 2022 by Aakash Goel and Mohit Chitlangia, Investmint used to assist users in arriving at investment decisions and managing wealth with data backed signals. “If the acquisitions talks won’t materialize, the company may return remaining capital to its backers,” said another source who also requested anonymity. The company’s spokesperson confirmed that the team has discontinued Investmint as a product and is re-evaluating its offerings. “We’re in late-stage talks with a few big players for M&A,” the spokesperson said. A clutch of startups have returned or are in the process of returning investors’ money after their startup failed to find a product market fit (PMF) or sustainable business model. Earlier this year, Nintee, a digital health startup launched by Wingify founder Paras Chopra, announced shutting down its operations. The firm also announced that it will return the majority of funding it raised from the investors. As per an ET report, fashion startups Virgio and Fashinz are planning to return most of the capital they raised from the investors after a failed pivot. Virgio has raised nearly $40 million while Fashinza has scooped up over $150 million in funding to date. While the majority of investors don’t like to exit out from a portfolio company with a slice of their original investment, the trend of returning capital by founders seems to be a progressive one. After all, there is no point in being stuck when things aren’t working out for long.

Eternal eyes 100% inventory play for Blinkit to improve margins

EntrackrEntrackr · 2m ago
Eternal eyes 100% inventory play for Blinkit to improve margins
Medial

Eternal eyes 100% inventory play for Blinkit to improve margins Eternal Limited, the company formerly known as Zomato, is gearing up for a strategic shift in its quick commerce arm, Blinkit, by planning to own inventory directly—a move enabled by its recent transition to an Indian-owned and controlled company (IOCC), according to a shareholder letter released by the company. The move will strengthen its operations and improve margins as it faces increased competition from both established players and new entrants in the quick commerce space. Eternal estimates that adopting a 100% inventory model would require less than Rs 1,000 crore in working capital. This amount is only about 5% of Blinkit's expected Net Order Value (NOV) of Rs 22,000 crore for FY25. In response to a question on how a pure-play inventory model could be achieved with Rs 1,000 crore, Eternal’s CFO Akshant Goyal explained that in quick commerce, inventory moves quickly. As a result, the company expects that working capital investments, relative to the overall scale of the business, will remain relatively low. The plan to keep inventory for BlinkIt comes on the back of its aggressive expansion in Q4 FY25, where it added 294 new stores and over 1 million sq ft of warehouse space, pushing its total store count to 1,301. However, such rapid growth led to widening EBITDA losses for Blinkit, from Rs 103 crore in Q3 to Rs 178 crore in Q4 of the last fiscal year (FY25). Even as short-term losses rise, Eternal remains bullish on the long-term profitability of the quick commerce space. The company is not planning private labels for now, but hinted that inventory control could eventually nudge EBITDA margins beyond the 5-6% of NOV it currently targets.

Datatribe builds data driven tech products for organizations across sectors

EntrackrEntrackr · 1y ago
Datatribe builds data driven tech products for organizations across sectors
Medial

Bengaluru-based Datatribe builds affordable and SaaS products for organizations that help them harness their own data. Its first two products are myLearn (an organizational learning platform) and Parcel (a product cycle management platform), and the company plans to release a performance management product later this fiscal year. Each of these products are Tier – iI ERP products, which founder and CEO Nikhil Chandra says are easy to deploy and provide real time tracking and analytics. We spoke to Chandra to learn more about Datatribe, what its business model is, and the roadmap ahead. Here are the edited excerpts: How did you come up with the idea of Datatribe? Datatribe came about based on our experience with taking our first two products (myLearn and Parsel) to market – for product details please see www.datatribe.co.in. While working with clients, we realized that a core problem for organizations across sectors and sizes was the inability to harness and utilize their down data that was being generated on a daily basis. This could be people-based data (like learning) or product data (like production, storage, delivery) or performance-based data (like productivity) and creates a strong need for data focused technology products. We also believe strongly that this wave of data focused technology has begun the world over and will fundamentally change the manner in which business is done. Please help understand how you generate revenues. (Explain business model). Since we are a B2B focused organisation, our revenue model is based on subscription charges from organisations. This could be a one time subscription or a recurring subscription amount depending on the product. For e.g. in myLearn we charge clients on a per enrollment/subscription basis for roll out of existing content on the platform and provide clear proving options on the platform itself. What are the key challenges in the industry that have not been addressed yet? And how do you plan to address this? The key challenge with respect to data is the lack of an easy system to access data and make it available to the right people within an organisation. This challenge can largely be addressed only by technology and current systems to do so are expensive and cumbersome to deploy (essentially large-scale ERPs). We are addressing this by providing the SME and enterprise market with affordable, SAAS based data driven products for multiple parts of their business. How are you using technology to solve challenges in the industry? Aside from being SaaS-based and easy-to-deploy, one of the key items for our products will be the enhancement provided by AI/ML tools. For e.g. in the Parsel product we have integrated an AI/ML fulfillment tool that ensures not only putaway and pick list generation but also efficient use of manpower in warehouses. Also, in myLearn we have a unique Dashboard that allows the organization to directly deploy and manage all their learning requirements while providing real time data. The Dashboard also allows an organization to track learning across SBUs, designations and teams to ensure that actionable data intelligence is available with them. How has your startup performed since inception? We have just taken both our products out of proof of concept, and this is the first year for Datatribe. During proof of concept, myLearn created learning outcomes for over 20,000 employees at multiple organizations including Hindalco Limited and the Tata group. Similarly, Parsel has between 400-500k monthly SKUs on the platform. What are your short-term and long-term goals in terms of product and business expansion and diversification? Our short-term goal is to build a pipeline of recurring revenue across our product portfolio. This has started well in this FY and we aim to be at a profitable MRR and over 4 million monthly SKUs on Parsel by H2, FY25. Our longer-term goal is to help SMEs and Enterprises become more productive and competitive using their own data along with scaling a profitable global business. Who are your nearest direct and indirect competitors? Which are the larger global players in the industry? Each of our products have specific competitors locally as well as globally. For e g. The primary competitors for myLearn are Coursera and udemy which provide organizational learning alternatives in a slightly different fashion.

XOBOX aims to tackle residential last-mile delivery hurdles

EntrackrEntrackr · 1y ago
XOBOX aims to tackle residential last-mile delivery hurdles
Medial

Last-mile delivery hasn’t been perfect. Not that the likes of Dunzos of this world haven’t tried to address this. Recently, we saw Zomato experimenting with last-mile delivery through a unique concept of ‘walkers’ for corporate parks. Bengaluru-based XOBOX is one of the few startups that is trying to fix the last-mile delivery challenges especially for people living in urban areas. The company handles packages for residents in apartment complexes. Some of the features are securing the packages in smart lockers and dropping them to customers’ doorstep when they are back to their homes, and home delivery of essential items. We spoke to XOBOX founder and CEO Kiran Shivappa about his startup, what distinguishes it from the competition and the roadmap ahead. Here are the edited excerpts: How did you come up with this idea? I live in an apartment complex and even before the Covid deliveries were left scattered in front of the door and stray cats use to destroy especially milk packet which cause everyone to talk about it hours in community Whatsapp group, this made me think to find/adopt a solution to secure the deliveries when residents not able to receive it or may be they are not around. How does the platform work? Please help simplify the process. When we started the service, we started taking the request from residents to handle their packages and we coordinated with delivery guys to take the package, pay them if it is a COD [Cash on Delivery], and secure them in the locker until they come back, then we deliver it to their doorstep. We went one step ahead and made a contract with 3PL [Third-party logistics] and ecommerce companies to take every delivery coming to the society and our dedicated resources would hand them over to the residents, if the resident is not available then secure the package in the locker and hand it over once they come back. What are the key challenges in the industry that have not been addressed yet? And how do you plan to address them? Ecommerce companies have tried many solutions to optimize the last leg of the delivery process and achieved the Kirana model also, but they never got a chance to be inside the society exclusively and take care of the deliveries and achieve the customer delight to bring the most convenience to them in their package receiving time. We have dedicated resources inside each society to carefully handle the package and interact with residents and elderly people and become familiar to them so they feel comfortable to receive us at the doorstep at any time and feel secured as well. Industry major players tried to introduce the lockers but these lockers operate as a complete unmanned and fully automated, for this reason the adaptation was a big challenge and education was also a challenge. We adopted a 70/30 model where, way the lockers were built, operated and how people would feel easy to adopt this because the “30” percentage is the resources we introduced along with “70” percentage technology, our dedicated resource will work with all stake holders in the gated community to educate and make every one understand how to use the service. What are your short-term and long term goals in terms of product and business expansion and diversification? In the short term, we are looking to expand the service to 35 more gated communities in Bengaluru in 2nd and 3rd quarters of 2024 and then go to other cities. As far as long-term plans go, we are going to sign contracts with major ecommerce and 3PL companies to increase the volume in each society and serve the needs of elderly population in the community. We would want to reach 700-1000 gated communities and generate 150-180 cr annually.

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