Ways to Keep

Remember when someone paid an astounding $28 million for a seat aboard Blue Origin’s first crewed spaceflight? It is okay if you do not, especially since that person did not turn up in time to be part of history and the topic seemed to have slipped from people’s minds. However, the mystery behind the winner of the auction held to secure a seat aboard Blue Origin’s New Shepard spacecraft has finally been solved, and the name of the winner has come to light. It is none other than Chinese cryptocurrency pioneer H.E. Justin Sun, the founder and CEO of blockchain platform TRON, and Grenada’s representative to the World Trade Organization in Geneva. The surprises do not end here. While Sun had not been able to be a part of the crew due to scheduling conflicts, flying into space is still an option for him as he, along with five others chosen by him, will be going to space on Blue Origin’s flight next year. The New Shepard flight had taken off successfully in July and returned to Earth safely,

India-focused healthcare venture capital firm HealthQuad announced the pre-final close of its second fund after it raised ₹1134.5 crores (nearly $150 million). The number exceeds the target fund size of ₹550 crores by more than twice and goes on to show the ever-increasing appetite for investors to continue banking on world’s fastest growing internet market. The healthcare industry has been technologically accelerated by the pandemic. People have gone online for telemedicine and booking hospital appointments like never before, something that was witnessed in rare cases (less than 10%) in the pre-pandemic period. Research shows that over 85% of doctors used teleconsultation methods during the pandemic, and more than 45% of patients from non-metropolitan cities used the teleconsultation method during the pandemic. This adoption of digital methods to access healthcare (and the subsequent rise of healthtech startups) has not been restricted to India alone but spread to other countries as

Like the other sectors this year, the quick commerce sector has risen to new heights in 2021. A major reason behind this rise is the pandemic, which triggered several supply chain disruptions and ensured that the quick commerce segment has room to grow. Consequently, this has attracted the attention of investors, who have poured in capital to further fuel the growth of the sector. Mumbai-based Zepto is a commerce startup that has come up in recent times, and now, it raised $100 million in its Series C funding round led by Y Combinator’s Continuity Fund. The latest investment in the quick-commerce segment puts the valuation of the 10-minute grocery delivery firm at $570 million, an increase of over two times from $225 million two months ago (it had raised $60 million back then). The funding round also included participation from Glade Brook, Nexus, Breyer Capital, Lachy Groom, Global Founders Capital, and Contrary Capital. Founded by 19-year-old Aadit Palicha and Kaivalya Vohra, Zepto i

In what is an addition to the long list of acquisitions made this year, Oracle Corporation will be buying healthcare records systems provider Cerner Corporation through an all-cash tender offer for $95.00 per share, approximately $28.3 billion in equity value. The two companies have reached an agreement for the acquisition. This acquisition is the biggest one made by Oracle to date (eclipsing its acquisition of PeopleSoft back in 2004) and will strengthen its cloud computing and database businesses. The deal is expected to close in the calendar year 2022. After the transaction, Cerner will be organized as a dedicated Industry Business Unit within Oracle. “We expect this acquisition to be immediately accretive to Oracle’s earnings on a non-GAAP basis in the first full fiscal year after closing—and contribute substantially more to earnings in the second fiscal year and thereafter,” said Safra Catz, CEO, Oracle. “Healthcare is the largest and most important vertical market in the world—$3

Amid the rather gloomy environment that Indian public markets have been experiencing for a few days now, geopositioning tech upstart MapMyIndia, has listed at a 54% premium to its IPO price . That is a strong market debut by all means, and also a validation of how India’s investors have adapted relatively quick and with ease, to new tech companies and their business models. Shares climbed to as high as 1,590 rupees a share before retreating to about 1,400 rupees or about 35% higher than the IPO price. Grey Market had already provided certain sense of strong market debut for MapMyIndia (CE Info systems). The shares were exchanging hands at a ₹780 premium over the issue price. What has also helped the company, is the fact that it is profitable — a rarity in new-age tech companies globally. The startup reported a 31% profit margin for the last fiscal year, with revenue of 1.92 billion rupees ($25 million) and net profit of 594.3 million rupees. The 29-year-old MapmyIndia offers Navigation

Mumbai-based business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce and supply chain management platform Bizongo became the latest name in a long line of startups to raise capital from investors this year – it raised $110 million in its Series D funding round led by Tiger Global, which has invested in quite a number of Indian startups this year. The fresh funding round elevated the valuation of the company to $600 million. The round included participation from CDC and IFC EAF (who came in as new investors) as well as exiting investors B Capital, Chiratae Ventures, Schroder Capital, Add Ventures by SCG, and Manish Choksi, a member of Bizongo’s advisory board and vice chairman at Asian Paints, who invested in his personal capacity. Bizongo had raised $51 million in its Series C funding round earlier, and the company has raised around $187 million to date. Bizongo, in this funding round, issued 10 equity shares and 121,510 series D2 compulsorily convertible preference shares (D2CCPS) at ₹67,890 apiece to

With startups making acquisitions left and right, raising record amounts of capital, expanding across borders, evolving into unicorns, or making their debuts in the public markets, 2021 has truly been India year. And it seems that we are not done yet. This time, the e-commerce platform for pre-owned vehicles Cars24 raised $400 million in fresh funding from Alpha Wave Global (formerly known as Falcon Edge Capital). The funding round included $300 million in equity and $100 million in debt from investors such as the Commercial Bank of Dubai and IFM Investors in Australia. The round places the valuation of Cars24 at $3.3 billion, a jump of over 80% from its previous valuation just 3 months back in September ($1.84 billion). The proceeds from the current funding round will be utilized to fuel global expansion in the Middle East, Australia, and Southeast Asia, improve its current technology and deepen its footprint in the domestic market (this includes using it for the large-scale refurbish

This year has been full of highlights and milestones for the startup sector in India, whether it is spectacular IPOs, the number of unicorns, or the amount of capital raised from investors. The fintech and edtech sectors have received the greatest slice of the pie, and even as the new year is around the corner, they keep on conquering new heights. This time, it is fintech major Razorpay, which became the most valued private-held fintech startup and the second-most valued fintech startup (after Paytm) in the world’s second-largest internet market. The feat came in after it raised $375 million in fresh funding. The funding, a part of its Series F funding round co-led by hedge and private equity firms Lone Pine Capital, Alkeon Capital, and TCV and included participation from existing investors like Tiger Global, Sequoia Capital India, GIC, and Y Combinator, puts Razorpay’s valuation at $7.5 billion, a jump of over seven times in the last 15 months and the fastest increase in valuation fo

During its annual WWDC conference this year, Apple had announced several features, one of which had been Universal Control for its new version of macOS – macOS Monterey, as well as iPadOS 15. Universal Control was slated to let users use their Mac’s mouse or trackpad to control the cursor on an iPad or another Mac’s screen, reaching into and across multiple devices. This would allow users to effortlessly work across several screens and Apple products wirelessly. Earlier this month, Apple released the macOS 12.1 beta 4 for developers and public testers, which led many to hope that the Universal Control feature, which had been conspicuously absent during the beta testing and on iPadOS 15, would be arriving soon. However, that does not seem to be the case. Apple had released macOS Monterey this October (October 25, to be precise), and said that Universal Control and SharePlay would arrive in the fall. Now, we can see that the statement is partly correct – while SharePlay (which will allo

The name of Sachin Tendulkar is not an unfamiliar one – the Master Blaster is most well-known for his exploits in the world of cricket. This time however, the former Indian cricketer is once again venturing into the startup investing domain, and has joined Spinny, the pre-owned car retailing platform. That’s right, Tendulkar will now be joining Spinny as a strategic investor and lead brand endorser. It is not known how much Tendulkar invested in Spinny. However, Tendulkar is not the first sportsperson to be involved with Spinny. The pre-owned car retail platform had, earlier this year, entered into a partnership with Indian professional badminton player and double Olympic medallist PV Sindhu. 2022 will witness Squad Spinny’s captains, along with other celebrated Spinny customers, lead a series of marketing initiatives that are focused on realizing the aspirations of a “billion car dreams.” The Gurgaon-based Spinny provides a completely online used car buying and selling experience acro

For the third time, e-commerce behemoth Flipkart has invested in Ninjakart, the agritech startup, after it (along with its parent company Walmart) pumped in $145 million on Monday to mark the biggest deal in the growing agritech sector in India. Flipkart had earlier invested in Ninjacart back in 2019 (for the first time) and later invested around $30 million in late 2020 in Ninjacart. The proceeds from the current investment will be utilized towards building world-class teams and scalable tech platforms to organize and grow its network. It will also accelerate Ninjacart’s journey towards building technology and infrastructure to organize, empower and enhance the lives of millions of Agri value chain participants including farmers, resellers, retailers, consumers, and supply chain participants. “With this investment, we are further able to strengthen our grocery footprint and offering as consumers across the country throng to e-grocery for quality and affordable options in the fresh ca

If you have been following us, then you have gathered an idea about how the EV sector has gained traction in recent times and attracted the names of some of the biggest players in the game (such as Amazon). However, it is not only foreign companies that have made the most progress into this rapidly-growing sector, and Indian startups are catching up as well. OBEN EV, the homegrown EV startup, raised $1.5 million in a seed round from We Founder Circle. The round included the participation of notable investors such as Rakesh Somani (co-founder of Life Element), serial investor Gaurav Juneja, Eminent Cars, Siddharth Shah (Managing Director at Rajesh Motors), as well as prominent angel investors Sumeet Pathak, Dr. Milan Modi, and veteran technologist Dr. Aloknath. It is mostly in other countries that the EV market has gained traction – it is still in its infancy in India. Still, the market is expected to be around $46Bn by 2026. Coming at a time when the necessity of such technology is ste

The quick e-commerce segment has been steadily growing in recent times – the sector is expected to reach $5 billion by 2025, in India. It has gained traction and attracted the attention of several investors and companies across the world. E-grocery unicorn Grofers is one of them, and it rebranded itself as Blinkit to reflect its focus on quick commerce and as it continues to compete in the fast-growing sector. Grofers has rebranded itself with a purpose. Blinkit, the company, will be focussing on instant commerce which is promised to be “indistinguishable from magic.” “Once upon a time, a few months ago, we started on a journey to build the future of commerce with 10 minute delivery of most of the stuff our customers need in their daily lives. Today, we already process over a million orders a week, across 12 cities in India. And this is just a start,” Albinder Dhindsa, founder and CEO, Grofers said in a blog post. Backed by names such as Zomato and SoftBank, the eight-year-old Grofers

Nobody is invulnerable to getting hacked when it comes to social media, even the people at the top of the chain. More than one celebrity has found that out the hard way, but few people have imagined that the list would go on to include the Prime Minister of India. Unfortunately, that has been the case, as the personal Twitter handle of Prime Minister Narendra Modi had been hacked for a short period of time during the early hours of Sunday, and even shared a tweet promoting cryptocurrency. The account has been restored, though, and the tweet has been deleted. The official handle of the Prime Minister currently has over 73 million followers. India has been known to have a hard stance against cryptocurrency. Even as several countries have started to warm up to it ( El Salvador for one), India has continued to forgo accepting it. After the Prime Minister’s account had been hacked, it posted a tweet promoting cryptocurrency and saying that the country has officially adopted bitcoin as leg