Innholdsfortegnelse for 25 December 2022 i Business Today

▶ THE OPEN OFFER for 26 per cent stake in New Delhi Television (NDTV) by the Gautam Adani-led Adani Group had its share of surprises. Of the 16.76 million shares which formed the open offer, 5.33 million or 32 per cent of the total offer size, was tendered. Interestingly, while the offer price was ₹294 per share, the prevailing rate in the market was ₹393.90, on December 5, the last day of the open offer. Post the offer, the Adani Group’s stake in NDTV is pegged at around 37.5 per cent, making it the single largest shareholder in the company. In August, the Adani Group had acquired an indirect 29.18 per cent stake in NDTV—a company promoted by Prannoy Roy and Radhika Roy—by acquiring the shares of Vishvapradhan Commercial Private…

PROLOGUE The Samurai sword-masters of Japan were legendary for their poise and calm in battle. They lived by Bushido, a code of ethics that stressed on loyalty, self-discipline, and respectful behaviour. While the Samurai don’t exist today, there are some in the Land of the Rising Sun that the ancient fighters would approve of. In the battlefields of the corporate world, Atsushi Ogata, 60, Managing Director, President and CEO of Honda Motorcycle & Scooter India (HMSI), would surely be one such. Let’s understand why. In December 2010, two-wheeler makers Hero Group of India and Honda Motor Co. of Japan went their separate ways after 26 years of a successful partnership. That year (FY11), market leader Hero sold 3.7 million vehicles more than Honda in India, according to data from Society…

2017 ▸ Global flexible workspace provider WeWork enters India; number of flex space players jumps in the country 2018 ▸ Flex spaces gain popularity among companies 2019 ▸ Over 10 million sq. ft of flex space leased out in the top seven markets 2020 ▸ With the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, occupancies decrease, flex spaces close down and expansion plans stall 2021 ▸ Centres reopen, demand for managed and hybrid spaces improves, continuous expansion of flex players across cities 2022 ▸ Growth in flex space footprint led by managed and enterprise operators; occupiers looking at flex space as a medium- to long-term solution…

TWITTER “Regarding Twitter’s reduction in force, unfortunately there is no choice when the company is losing over $4 million/day. Everyone exited was offered 3 months of severance, which is 50% more than legally required” ELON MUSK Twitter’s new owner, in a tweet on Nov 5 “I realise many are angry with me. I own the responsibility for why everyone is in this situation: I grew the company size too quickly. I apologise for that” JACK DORSEY Twitter Co-founder, in a tweet on Nov 5 WHAT IMPACTED EMPLOYEES GET An Indian team member says they are on a non-working notice period for two months and will get a month’s severance pay thereafter META “I got this wrong and I take responsibility for that.” MARK ZUCKERBERG Meta CEO, in a memo to employees…

YES! I WISH TO SUBSCRIBE TO BUSINESS TODAY Please tick your subscription choice and send the form to: We Care, Living Media India Limited, C-9, Sector 10, Noida-201301 (India) SCAN HERE TO SUBSCRIBE FOR MORE DETAILS ON THE OFFER, YOU MAY CONTACT THROUGH BELOW OPTIONS CALL us on Toll Free No. 18001800100 and (0120) 4019500 E-MAIL wecare@intoday.com LOG ON TO www.businesstoday.in Whatsapp "Hi" to +918597778778 Living Media India Ltd. reserves the right to terminate or extend this offer or any part thereof at any time. For other terms and conditions, please visit www.businesstoday.in IRS 2019 Q4 (TR)…

NON-BANKING FINANCIAL companies (NBFCs) are a major source of credit alongside banks. The tilt of India’s population towards youth—and their aspirations and desires—has made them access credit for a variety of requirements such as purchasing cars, white goods, housing, education, and the like. From the standpoint of an NBFC, there are risks in terms of processes and lending due to which there have been several failures (IL&FS is one example) in the past decade or so. The increasing size of NBFCs can also pose a significant challenge such as a credit contagion in case of systemic failure or even stress in one or a few NBFCs. It has also been the feeling amongst regulators that NBFCs have greater operational flexibility compared to banks, and that creates what is commonly referred…

The recent pandemic disrupted the global transport sector, the people, and businesses that rely on it in unprecedented ways. While the world economy is coming to terms with it, India is fast re-gaining it with a new momentum - multiple factors are contributing to an idea of the country turning into a developed nation in the coming decades. Infrastructure development, futuristic mobility solutions and strong e-Governance are all fast-tracking to a commitment of 7% GDP growth2. In short, India is firing up all its engines of growth. And what emerges in the prominence is its transformation in transportation and mobility solutions. Thus, electrifying how the country progresses is the top priority. What is even more astounding is how the railway transportation is synchronizing its modernisation dovetailed with urban metro rail…

THE FTX CRISIS has once again brought the matter of regulating crypto exchanges to the fore. Recently, Jean-Paul Servais, the new chair of International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO), talked about the urgent need to regulate the crypto sector. Closer home too, the absence of regulations for crypto exchanges has left investors vulnerable. Experts say it is imperative for crypto exchanges to build trust for their users by declaring proof of reserves—that allow users to monitor the balances of an exchange—publicly. Given the ongoing crises, 2023 could bring stricter norms for global crypto platforms.…

▶ SMALL TOWNS AND unbranded fashion brands have dominated the festive season sales this year on e-commerce platforms in India. Consulting firm RedSeer, in its latest report, has said that these sale events have largely become a ‘Tier II+ phenomenon’. Per RedSeer’s estimates, 64 per cent of the transacting shoppers were from Tier II and beyond cities this festive season. Fashion as a category emerged as the leader in Tier II cities, led by unbranded fashion apparel, wherein one in every five orders had a kurti or a saree in their cart. “When you look at India as a market, for any consumer-focussed sector, the next wave of growth would always come from Tier II+ cities because that’s where most of the population resides. We are seeing that happen with…

▶ COMPANIES OFTEN RISE from the ashes like the mythical phoenix. But in the case of airline companies, that has seldom happened. Once an airline goes down, it rarely takes to the skies again. However, when the Jalan-Kalrock Consortium (JKC) won the bid in October 2020 to revive Jet Airways, most thought that the impossible might finally happen. However, with both lenders and a staff association questioning the intent of the airline’s new owners, the carrier’s fate might already be sealed. Jet 2.0 was expected to take wings again from October this year. However, corporate circles suggest the plan is stuck owing to the non-fulfillment of payment obligations by the winning bidder, JKC. A JKC spokesperson tells BT that it has fulfilled all obligations outlined in the resolution plan ratified…

▶ SHARE BUYBACKS ARE set to be disrupted. While rules governing buyback offers were framed in 1998, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) has regularly amended and updated them. Now, the markets regulator has proposed a major overhaul. And, going by the discussion paper issued recently, it is all set to change the way buybacks are executed today. Buyback refers to a mechanism where-in a company buys back its own shares. It can be done in two ways—buy shares from the open market or through the tender route—wherein shareholders of the company tender their shares. Sebi has hinted that it is in favour of phasing out the open-market purchase route as it is prone to misuse. The paper also proposes changes to the tender offer route to streamline…

Nearly two centuries ago, a 30-year-old inventor named Werner von Siemens set up shop in an inner courtyard behind a building on Berlin’s Schöneberger Strasse. His first idea was a new design for the pointer telegraph. The company he set up has gone on to become a multibillion-dollar engineering conglomerate by the name of Siemens AG that recently celebrated 175 years at Berlin’s Siemensstadt Square, which is touted to be the German capital’s district of the future. While Siemens now focusses on industry, infrastructure, transport and healthcare, according to Matthias Rebellius—CEO of Smart Infrastructure and Member of the Managing Board at Siemens AG—it is a technology company. In an interaction with Business Today’s Tech Editor Aayush Ailawadi in Berlin, 57-year-old Rebellius talks about India’s smart cities project, EVs, the company’s plans in…

TRACXN FOUNDERS Neha Singh and Abhishek Goyal gave up their venture investing careers not because the husband-wife duo compulsively “wanted” to start up but because they came across a problem that was “compelling enough” for them to solve. Back in 2012, before Singh and Goyal quit their respective jobs at Sequoia Capital and Accel India, data discovery around start-ups, especially in India, was a huge challenge. The internet economy was still finding its feet in mainstream conversations. Even though venture capital (VC) and private equity (PE) firms were on the lookout for interesting start-up bets, there was no fool-proof way to ascertain a company’s financial and operational health. “Start-ups were beginning to create impact but discovery was broken. Everything was manual,” Singh tells Business Today. Echoing her, Goyal says, “The way…

CHOLE BHATURE IS not just a food item, but an emotion for the people of Delhi. But chole bhature is not the only delicacy that can claim a place in people’s hearts. There’s Lucknow’s tunday kabab, Hyderabad’s biryani, Kolkata’s rosogolla and many more such food items from across the country that can make food aficionados salivate just by their mention. Till now, the only way to savour the original taste of these delicacies was to visit very specific outlets in the cities which lend them their fame, and sample them. But now, Zomato is going the distance to bring these famous dishes from around the country to your doorstep with ‘Intercity Legends’, its latest venture. For instance, if you’re craving some good old chole bhature from the popular Sita Ram…

YES! I WISH TO SUBSCRIBE TO INDIA TODAY Please tick your subscription choice and send the form to: We Care, Living Media India Limited, C-9, Sector 10, Noida-2O13O1 (India) SCAN HERE TO SUBSCRIBE FOR MORE DETAILS ON THE OFFER, YOU MAY CONTACT THROUGH BELOW OPTIONS PHONE 18001800100 E-MAIL wecare@intoday.com LOG ON TO www.indiatoday.in/subscribe Whatsapp "Hi" to +91 8597778778 Living Media India Ltd. reserves the right to terminate or extend this offer or any part thereof at any time. For other terms and conditions, please visit www.indiatoday.in IRS 2019 Q4 (TR)…

SOURCE FIFA, S&P GLOBAL, MEDIA REPORTS $300 BILLION The amount Qatar has splurged to prepare for this edition of the tournament; Brazil had spent $15 billion—the second highest—in 2014 $6.5 BILLION The record amount of revenue this World Cup is likely to generate, compared to $5.2 $440 MILLION The amount FIFA has set aside for the prize payouts, with $42 million going to the winning team…

JioCinema, the official streaming partner for the FIFA World Cup 2022 in India, met its stiffest challenge when scores of football fans could not log in to its platform and/or faced continuous lags in the live stream during the opening match. JioCinema parent Viacom18 (owned by Reliance Industries) has paid $55 million for the streaming rights, but its inability to handle a large-scale live event has raised a lot of questions about its tech-readiness for IPL 2023. Can Jio deliver?…

▶ MARK ZUCKERBERG-LED social media giant Meta, formerly known as Facebook, is going through a tumultuous period globally. It has laid off around 11,000 employees across geographies while also dealing with decreasing investor confidence amid falling revenues and increasing expenditure. In India, while business has been good, with the social media giant reporting $2 billion in gross advertising revenues for FY22 (a jump of 74 per cent year-on-year), it has been hit by some top-level exits. First, Ajit Mohan, who was Vice President and Managing Director of Meta India, left the company in early November, after close to four years at the helm. A little over a week later, Abhijit Bose, who was Head of India, WhatsApp, also stepped down after a stint of nearly four years. Along with Bose,…

▶ IT WAS LONG in the works. A few weeks after Air India—now owned by the Tata group—bought a controlling stake in low-cost carrier (LCC) AirAsia India, the merger of full-service carrier Vistara was announced. The deal was set in motion the moment New Zealander Campbell Wilson was hired from Singapore Airlines’ low-cost subsidiary Scoot to head Air India. So, it came as no surprise when a delighted Wilson commended Vistara for achieving a lot ever since the 51:41 Singapore Airlines and Tata group JV commenced operations in November 2013. “The skills, people, systems and processes that have driven Vistara’s success will strengthen and accelerate Air India’s Vihaan.AI programme, and enable Air India to more quickly attain the size, reach and quality befitting of a world-class airline,” stated Wilson. The…

▶ THE WAIT HAS been long. The draft of the Personal Data Protection Bill 2019 was tabled by the government a few years ago. But it was withdrawn in August 2022 after it received a slew of amendments and recommendations. Three months after it was withdrawn, a new draft called the Digital Personal Data Protection Bill, 2022—that proposes stiffer penalties for data breaches and softer data localisation provisions—has been put in the public domain for consultation. The new Bill is in line with the ‘Digital India’ programme that aims to transform the nation into a digitally empowered society and knowledge economy and focusses on the processing of digital personal data in a manner that recognises both the right of individuals to protect their personal data and the need to process…

WHEN THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC HIT INDIA’S SHORES IN EARLY 2020‚ AWFIS WAS ALREADY ONE OF THE TOP THREE PLAYERS IN THE FLEXIBLE WORKSPACE MARKET. FOUNDED IN 2015, the New Delhi-based company had its footprint across 55 centres, with some 30,000 seats and a million sq. ft of co-working space under its fold. That, however, did not come to its rescue. As the country went under a stringent lockdown and confusion reigned over the impact of Covid-19, companies sent their employees back home, leaving co-working space providers like Awfis high and dry. Amit Ramani, Founder & CEO of Awfis, says the firm witnessed a significant drop in business. At the time, some 55 per cent of its business was coming from smaller customers, who had leased less than 100 seats each.…

THERE’S NEVER A good way to fire someone. But there are terrible ways, apparently, if you go by how several companies are doing it in droves lately. Taking the cake, of course, is social media platform Twitter that was recently acquired by the world’s richest man, Elon Musk. Twitter’s employees found out if they still had a job based on whether they were able to access their systems; an email from the company on the official email meant you still had a job and if the same reached you on your personal email, it was time to pack up! Last December, Indian-origin CEO of mortgage company Better.com, Vishal Garg, fired 900 employees over a Zoom call. The video of him in the act—that went viral on social media—had him saying:…

WILL YOU splurge $449,000 on a pair of sneakers? Let’s rephrase that: Will you splurge $449,000 on a pair of virtual sneakers that you cannot wear? You may or may not ‘just do it’ but someone did. Nike sold a pair of virtual sneakers from its Dunk Genesis Cryptokicks range—a line of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) priced between $2,500 and $449,000 for a pair. That’s not all. The iconic footwear brand has already earned revenues of $185 million through NFT drops. Dolce & Gabbana (D&G), Tiffany, Gucci, and Adidas have also joined Nike to rake in $240 million through NFTs so far, as they try to turn the digital asset into a serious additional revenue source. But what is a fashion NFT anyway, you ask? Sure, they may work for abstract…

BEAUTIFUL BEACHES, COLOURFUL markets, dream destinations—you’ve worked hard through the year, looking forward to your well-deserved vacation. But surging airfares and a depreciating rupee could be giving you sleepless nights. How, then, do you plan for leisure travel that won’t break the bank? “Travellers are always on the lookout for ways that can truly elevate their travel experience. But the real ‘aha’ moment for any traveller is when she finds an option that can help sweeten the deal. There are some definite ways that can help travellers save some extra money,” says Vipul Prakash, COO of online travel firm MakeMyTrip. Let’s start with air tickets. The golden rule is, the sooner, the better. Experts say that you should plan your travel in advance and ideally book your tickets 40-45 days…