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  • Clear – How Clear is Enhancing Tax-Filing and Making Returns Easy for India?

    Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by ClearTax.

    Tax filing is a tedious task! Be it a layman or a CA, it’s time-consuming and cumbersome to a great extent. Then came a startup in 2011 that made this process simpler for the people. Founded by Archit Gupta, Srivatsan Chari, and Ankit Solanki in 2011. ClearTax services range from tax preparation, e-filing, accounting, to investment planning solutions for individuals and businesses.

    ClearTax has been rechristened to Clear on June 28, 2021. The brand has decided on the name ‘Clear’ to represent the whole gamut of services that it offers, which has now expanded to embrace invoices, wealth management, and credit.

    Read this article to know more about ClearTax company, ClearTax founders, team, ClearTax journey, startup challenges, ClearTax competitors, ClearTax company details, ClearTax funding, and its investors.

    ClearTax – Company Highlights

    Startup Name ClearTax
    Headquarter Bengaluru, India
    Sector FinTech
    Founders Ankit Solanki, Archit Gupta, Srivatsan Chari
    Founded 2011
    Total Funding $140.3 mn (January 2022)
    Revenue $8 mn (around INR 60 Crore in FY20)
    Valuation ~800 mn (2022)
    Parent Organization Defmacro Software Pvt. Ltd.
    Website cleartax.in

    ClearTax – About & How It Works?
    ClearTax – Founders & Team
    ClearTax – How It All Started?
    ClearTax – Startup Launch
    ClearTax – Business Model
    ClearTax – Logo & Tagline
    ClearTax – Business and Revenue Model
    ClearTax – Funding & Investors
    ClearTax – Growth & Revenue
    ClearTax – Startup Challenges
    ClearTax – Acquisitions
    ClearTax – Competitors
    ClearTax – Advisors & Mentors

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    ClearTax – About & How It Works?

    ClearTax is built on the massive digitization process of the tax systems in India that the country is adopting. It is a Bangalore-based Financial Technology platform that provides solutions for income tax filing, GST, and mutual fund investments. ClearTax, with its tax and investment platform, aims to simplify the financial lives of the Indians. The Clear interface is designed in a way that the customers can easily find the services they want through an easy Cleartax login and a seamless operation.

    The ClearTax journey started out by helping individual consumers, CAs, and businesses to prepare and file their tax returns by easy and effective means. For individual users, the process at ClearTax India is super simple and easy to understand. The user simply has to upload the Form 16 pdf to begin tax filing. This software reads all of it and fills out the tax returns instantly via an automatic process. Thus, ClearTax company eliminates any human factor intervention in computing and filing tax returns.

    The customer gets fully prepared tax returns in just a matter of seconds. That’s not all of it about ClearTax. There’s more than the company brings to the table.

    The portal also helps users in complex scenarios like job transitions. In such cases, the users receive multiple form 16 so that the Clear software can help them accommodate the changes too. Say, for example, if one has forgotten to claim HRA, then it will take care of that as well.

    On the same grounds, the customer can apply for tax refunds, and calculate capital gain/loss if the user has sold stocks or MFs. Cleartax services help them carry forward losses to multiple years, incorporate companies, and also undertake service tax registrations easily, and efficiently.

    NIL GST Return Filling

    ClearTax has launched the all-new NIL GST Return Filling feature in December 2019. This will help the users including CAs and businesses file their NIL GST Returns without any hassles. Around 20 lakh MSMEs and other small businesses file GSTs each month, here a simple filling process in place would certainly make things really easy for them.

    To start filling their NIL GST Return, all that the user has to do is download ClearTax GST Desktop App. After it is installed, ClearTax GST Desktop App will help them file GSTR-1 and GSTR-3B seamlessly and in simple and easy steps. Thus, a taxpayer can avoid all unnecessary interactions with any other portal because they will get everything available on the ClearTax GST software including the submission of returns. Thus, the users can file GSTR-1 with minimal manual effort and directly on ClearTax, which will be supported by both Digital Signature Certificate (DSC) and Electronic Verification Code (EVC). It automates the entire process, making it 3X faster, thereby saving ample time. The ‘Nil return filing’ feature that ClearTax announced back in 2019, comes with important validations and a cautionary window too, which allows the users to reconsider their filing of GST returns with no data. This will stop users from erroneously submitting a Nil return that otherwise was not one.

    Cleartax, after being rebranded to Clear, has also included:

    • Cleartax GST – An all-in-one GST toolkit that is designed to simplify the GST filing.
    • ClearE-invoicing – A trustworthy e-invoicing solution that enables the users in bulk invoicing.
    • ClearServices – An expert consultation service to help the users identify their problems and attain their solutions.

    Some of the main products of Clear include:

    • Enterprise Products – Cleartax GST, E-invoicing, Max-ITC, E-way bill and more.
    • ITR Filing – Cleartax tax filing feature allows the customers to file ITR within 3 minutes or helps them to file their ITR by Clear experts.
    • ClearOne – Via ClearOne, Clear offers invoicing and payment solutions for businesses.

    Cleartax has announced that it will partner with crypto exchanges to help users manage their crypto portfolio effortlessly. As soon as the government announced a 30% tax rate and a 1% deduction at source for gains and transfers via virtual currency, ClearTax rushed to declare that it will aid the users in managing their current cryptocurrency portfolio and taxes. Founder and CEO of Clear, Archit Gupta mentioned that this particular offering was in the works for some time now and this makes ClearTax the first platform in India that offers this solution.

    Clear Products and Services
    Clear Products and Services

    ClearTax – Founders & Team

    ClearTax founders are Archit Gupta, Srivatsan Chari, and Ankit Solanki who were friends before starting the company.

    Owner of ClearTax
    Ankit, Archit, and Srivatsan | Founder, Cleartax

    Archit Gupta

    Archit Gupta is the founder and the current Clear CEO. Before setting up ClearTax, he worked at Data Domain Inc., which was acquired by EMC2. The ClearTax owner holds a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from IIT Guwahati and a Master’s in Computer Science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. This ClearTax founder worked in Silicon Valley for three years, and this is when he was exposed to the startup culture in the valley. He was pursuing a Ph.D. degree when he decided to drop the program and eventually founded Clear.

    Srivatsan Chari

    He is the Co-founder of ClearTax. This ClearTax founder did his Bachelor’s in Computer Science (Hons) from Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani.

    Ankit Solanki

    He is the Co-Founder of ClearTax. ClearTax founder holds a bachelor’s degree in Information Technology from the S.I.E.S. Graduate School of Technology.

    Ravi Sandepudi

    Ravi Sandepudi is ClearTax’s ‘Entrepreneur-in-Residence’. He is an alumnus of BITS-Pilani and The Wharton School (University of Pennsylvania). Prior to being appointed as Clear’s entrepreneur-in-residence, he was associated with PayPal, Google, and Simility.

    Clear has an employee strength of somewhere between 1001-5000 employees, as per their Linkedin profile.  

    ClearTax Team
    ClearTax Team

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    ClearTax – How It All Started?

    During his master’s and later years, Archit was living in San Francisco and used to visit home during the summers. The Cleartax journey started during one of his visits, in 2010, when he happened to have an informal talk with his father, a Chartered Accountant in Delhi. The conversation was about how doing taxes was a tedious and difficult task for both the individual consumers and CAs. Furthermore, they also discussed how the available computing software makes tax filing so problematic and complex leading to the genesis of the idea that the whole process is time-consuming and hectic.

    Within no time, Archit started fixating on the problem and started thinking to himself that it’d be great if he could figure out a way to create software for India to help ease the tax filing process. And in the following months, he moved to India to solve this problem.

    There were multiple layers of complexity to this problem and it wasn’t easy as it seemed from the top. Since he was from a computer science background, tax and finances seemed to be something new to deal with, and hence, it took him a while to get used to the rules of the game. It required Archit to spend a lot of time with the CAs, put together a lot of learning, understanding, and get deeper insights into the industry. It was like starting from scratch for Archit, but ultimately Clear was born.

    “When I started thinking about ClearTax, I was not thinking what the market would be or how big it would be. All I thought was it was a need that should be solved.” said Archit Gupta, owner of ClearTax.

    ClearTax – Startup Launch

    “I had no marketing budget at that time. So all I did was send emails to friends or people I knew to try the product. But within two hours of the website going live, somebody had filed a tax return. That was a crazy moment for us.” said Archit Gupta, ClearTax CEO.

    And that’s how he launched the ClearTax company. From that moment onwards, there was no looking back for Cleartax. In the coming 11 days after the launch of ClearTax services, more than 1,000 people came to the site to file their tax returns on the portal. The founder and the core team were on the edge all the time and kept working day and night to keep adding feature after feature at breakneck speeds as and when the consumers would call up and ask for more support features. Some of the examples of added features on consumer demand are rental income or provision for two salaries.

    In the year following the inception of the company, Cleartax had witnessed more than 30K-40K users filing their returns on the platform. The figures kept jumping from 100K to 300K, to 1 million, five years down the lane. From San Francisco to Delhi and from a cushy academic career to an entrepreneur, it’s been quite a journey for Archit Gupta.

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    ClearTax – Logo & Tagline

    Clear goes by the tagline “Save money. Save time,” which rightly represents its motto because it aims to simplify finances, save money and time for millions of Indian businesses and people. The ClearTax logo was a smiling robot along with ClearTax written in Black colour before it was rebranded to ‘Clear’.

    The current logo of the brand simply has the word clear, followed by “from makers of ClearTax”, to hint at the previous name of Clear, which the company is famous as!

    Clear Logo
    Clear Logo

    ClearTax – Business and Revenue Model

    ClearTax operates on the B2C, B2B, and B2G models. The company is known to charge its customers for filing. The ClearTax Revenue model is self-e-filing-based, while it operates on a freemium model. ClearTax has a Chartered Accountant-assisted service for filing individual tax returns. The company has a concierge-like service for NRI tax returns through which ClearTax’s revenue comes from.

    Its services and the Cleartax Business model are designed especially for freelancers and small businesses. The clear Business model helps these freelancers and businesses plan their expenses and claim them systematically, and this way, the company helps them save much more on their taxes than it charges.

    The Clear income tax returns (ITR) filing feature, which was free of cost, has now been declared as chargeable, after 10 years of being a free service. This feature would now charge a nominal fee from the users, effective from May 2022. Such a facility would also be included now among the revenue drivers of Clear from the next fiscal year onwards.

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    ClearTax – Funding and Investors

    Clear has successfully raised around $140.3 million in funding over 7 rounds. Clear raised its Venture Round on January 13, 2022, where it raised an undisclosed amount. The previous funding round that Clear raised was via a Series C round, which was raised on October 25, 2021, where the company raised around $75 million from its lead investors like Kora Capital, Stripe, Alua Capital, and others.

    The new funding that Cleartax has received will be used to fuel the company’s expansion into the B2B credit and payments space and into the international markets, as per the company’s statement in a recent press release.

    Founders Fund, Elevation Capital, Sequoia Capital, SAIF Partners, Composite Capital Management, Tiger Global, and Stripe are some of the lead investors of Clear.

    Here is a list of all the funding rounds of ClearTax:

    Date Stage Amount Investors
    January 13, 2022 Venture Round – –
    October 25, 2021 Series C $75 mn Kora Capital, Stripe and others
    October 23, 2018 Series B $50 mn Composite Capital Management
    June 17, 2016 Series A $12 mn SAIF Partners
    May 25, 2016 Seed Round $2 mn Founders Fund, Sequoia Capital
    April 26, 2016 Angel Round $1.3 mn Max Levchin, Scott Banister
    August 19, 2014 Pre Seed Round – Sumon Sadhu

    ClearTax – Growth and Revenue

    ClearTax revenue was recorded at Rs 60 crore in FY20, a 163% surge over the previous year’s (FY19) Rs 22.8 crore.

    Here are some of the key growth highlights of the Clear:

    • The company claims to process around $300 billion worth of B2B invoices annually
    • Clear claims to save more than Rs 1000 crore for the Indian businesses each year
    • Clear boasts of a 50 million+ e-invoices run rate
    • The company has saved over 1.8 million man-hours to date
    • ClearTax is featured in the World’s 250 Most Promising Fintech Startups by CB Insights. There are 2,174 fintech startups in India according to a recent MEDICI Global Report

    ClearTax launches feature of Nil GST Return Filing for CAs and Businesses
    ClearTax, India’s #1 Tax & Investing platform today announced the launch of itsnew feature called Nil GST Return filing, a unique feature that will help CAsand businesses do their Nil GST Return filing in just a few seconds. Currently, every month over 20 Lakh small businesses including MSMEs fil…
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    ClearTax – Startup Challenges

    As mentioned above, Archit had to start from scratch about anything and everything about tax filing and returns which were the initial challenges that the founder had to face. Secondly, Archit had to opt for bootstrapping because back then, the capital was very difficult to raise. Given that, he also had a very big challenge on hand, which was to build a product software company based out of India with almost no precedents to look up to in the field.

    ClearTax – Acquisitions

    ClearTax has acquired 6 organizations to date. Clear acquired CimplyFive in an all-cash deal for an undisclosed amount on July 5, 2022. CimplyFive, which is a cloud-hosted application that helps automate company laws and SEBI Listing Obligations and Disclosure Requirements (LODR) compliance, will help Clear with compliance risk management software that will help the enterprise customers of Clear eliminate numerous procedural non-compliance that occurs. After the acquisition, as per the deal, the CimplyFive team and founder will function as an independent platform.

    Xpedize was the previous company that (ClearTax) Clear acquired on March 16, 2022, for an undisclosed amount. Before that, Clear acquired yBANQ on July 7, 2021, in a cash and stock deal with which it forayed into the B2B payments space. Here’s a look at the Clear acquisitions:

    Acquired Date
    CimplyFive July 6, 2022
    Xpedize March 16, 2022
    yBANQ July 7, 2021
    Karvy – GST filing Services March 4, 2020
    Dose FM October 18, 2019
    Tootl April 12, 2018

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    ClearTax – Competitors

    Cleartax has competitors in individual services that it caters to. H&R Block and Webtel are the significant competitors in the tax filing space that ClearTax directly competes with. When it comes to the GST space, the startup directly or indirectly competes with Cygnet, Tally, and Computex. Its mutual fund platform competes with entities like:

    By stepping its foot into stockbroking and wealth management services via ‘Black App’, ClearTax has further expanded its list of competitors in India to include:

    ClearTax – Advisors and Mentors

    As ClearTax assumed this journey, they have kept on adding mentors and Investors like Max Levchin, founder of Paypal, Vijay Shekhar Sharma of Paytm, Neeraj Arora of Whatsapp, Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund, Sequoia, and Ryan Peterson of Flexport.

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    FAQs

    Who is ClearTax Owner?

    Cleartax is founded by 3 friends, Archit Gupta, Srivatsan Chari, and Ankit Solanki.

    How much is ClearTax Funding?

    ClearTax has raised a total of $140.3 million in funding over 6 rounds. Its last funding was raised on January 13, 2022.

    Who are the competitors of ClearTax?

    Some of the major ClearTax competitors include H&R Block, Webtel, Cygnet, Tally, Computex, Paytm Money, ETMONEY, Groww, and Zerodha amongst others.

    How much is ClearTax Revenue?

    ClearTax revenue is Rs 60 crore in FY20, which witnessed a 163% surge over the previous year’s (FY19) Rs 22.8 crore.

    Is ClearTax a unicorn?

    ClearTax is among 32 of India’s 3,500 fintech start-ups that are potential unicorns of India.

    Is ClearTax reliable?

    With bank-grade network security (128- bit SSL), security audits, and industry-wide best practices in security, we keep your data safe.

  • Forbes Business Model | How does Forbes Make Money?

    Forbes is a media and publishing firm based in the United States, formed in 1917. The company regularly covers business, technology, financial markets, financial planning, sports, and various other issues. It also publishes a magazine with the same name, eight times a year, and has a readership of 5.8 million as of spring 2020.

    Forbes is most well-known for its lists, which include rankings of billionaires, top 30 under 30, universities, celebrities, and self-made women, to mention a few. Former Republican presidential candidate Steve Forbes leads the organization.

    What is the Business Model of Forbes?
    What is the Revenue of Forbes?
    Forbes Figures of 2021
    How does Forbes Make Money?
    Is Forbes a Profitable Business?

    What is the Business Model of Forbes?

    CEO Mike Federle has revealed Forbes’ new business plan. According to Mike, it is built on an audience and business scale with 150 million individuals. With the focus on direct-to-consumer conversion, this investment [the SPAC] will allow the company to design bespoke products that address these distinct business cohorts.

    In other words, they are focusing on trying to convert the regular subscribers into buying additional material like educational products, etc.

    The company now wants to utilize its proprietary technology stack and analytics to convert readers into long-term, engaged platform users, including memberships and recurring subscriptions to premium content and highly targeted product offerings.

    What is the Revenue of Forbes?

    Forbes Logo
    Forbes Logo

    Forbes is excellent at estimating how much other people are worth, their global wealthy list of billionaires is currently updated in real-time and is a beautiful resource for those interested in such matters.

    The total value of the combined company is projected to be $630 million. When Hong Kong-based investor group Integrated Whale Media Investments bought a controlling stake in Forbes in 2014, it was valued at $475 million.

    In 2020, it generated $163 million in sales, with the expectation of about $193 million in 2021. However, the revenue for the year 2021 saw a rise of 40% to $259 million as compared to $185 million in 2020 and the net income stood at $38 million. This figure was beyond the expectations of the company.

    Forbes Figures of 2021

    The revenue for the fourth quarter of 2021, increased 51% year-over-year to $94 million, driven by contributions across Media and Consumer businesses. The net income was $18 million during this period compared to a net income of $10 million for the same period in 2020.

    The revenue for the year 2021 saw a rise of 40% to $259 million as compared to $185 million in 2020 and the net income stood at $38 million.

    The adjusted EBITDA saw an increase of 86% to $60 million in 2021 compared to the adjusted EBITDA of $33 million for the previous year.

    Every month, Forbes reaches more than 150 million people across all platforms – online, on social, through Live and virtual events, and through video and print. Forbes aims to use the content it publishes to introduce consumer-focused paid products to increase consumer revenue.

    How does Forbes Make Money?

    Single Purchases

    When the company started initially, its model was based on the fact that they were providing information that was verified and well researched. It was released eight times a year, so people were more intrigued.

    Subscription Model

    The subscription model is the most important way of revenue for the company. The company tried to make fixed customers when selling physical copies. Although when they shifted to the online platform, they followed a similar pattern. This way, they kept providing customers with daily information.

    Advertising Revenue

    Forbes Advertising Examples
    Forbes Advertising Examples

    It is an example of a traditional revenue model. Companies buy advertising space on your site or magazine, also known as the advertising business model. Organizations express their intended content in text or visual format in the purchased advertising space. Companies pay you to promote their ads using standard advertising space for a price in the magazine, pay-per-click (PPC), pay-per-view (PPV), and other agreed-upon strategies online.

    Live Events

    Live events have become a significant source of revenue. Forbes hosted more than 60 events worldwide in 2018, including marquee events like the Under 30 Summit, which debuted in Europe this year with an event in Amsterdam. The CMO Summit, which also extended into Europe, and the Women’s Summit are two other important events. Forbes will also host an Under 30 Global Women’s Summit in 2019.

    Promotion through Earned Media

    Individuals and firms recognized on a Forbes Ranking, Cover Story, or other feature can repurpose the content for use on their owned and sponsored media platforms to highlight their excellent publicity and industry leadership. Billboards, print ads, banner ads, social media displays, television ads, and so on are examples of these.

    Licenses

    Forbes also has 40 licensing agreements worldwide, including China, India, and Russia. The Forbes School of Business, an MBA program in collaboration with online Ashford University, and a Learn at Forbes online skills-training platform are other licenses. Because it is an annual annuity, the licensing company is almost profit-driven. Budget year after year, it was understood that the license agreement requires a minimum payment. In certain circumstances, it’s a one-time payment combined with a revenue share or an equity investment.

    Is Forbes a Profitable Business?

    Forbes is not required to declare profits because it is a private enterprise. However, Federle said in a December 2018 interview with Digiday that it had its most lucrative year since its inception. He wouldn’t give a particular sales amount but said overall revenues were up more than 18% year over year, with profits up to 42%.

    After the difficulties in trading during the pandemic in 2020, the company’s growth shifted towards profitability in 2021. The company claims a net income of $19.5 million for year-to-date 2021, compared to a net loss of $2.8 million for the same period in 2020.

    Conclusion

    In brief, Forbes is a company that has built a reputable brand in itself. Forbes has traditionally made money from subscriptions, single purchases, and advertising revenue. However, profiting from this paradigm is becoming increasingly complex and the entire media sector is affected.

    Forbes’ current income strategy entails increasing live events and utilizing its brand and readership to create scalable products. The revenue potential is being addressed in areas such as education and eCommerce.

    FAQs

    What is Forbes’s Business Model?

    Forbes is focusing on trying to convert the regular subscribers into buying additional material like educational products, etc. The company now wants to utilize its proprietary technology stack and analytics to convert readers into long-term.

    How does Forbes make money?

    Forbes makes money through the Subscription model, Single purchases, Advertising revenue, Live events, Promotion through earned media, Licenses, etc.

    How much does the Forbes website make?

    Forbes website estimated revenue is more than $48 Million. And it has a daily income of more than $44,000.

    Who is the CEO of Forbes?

    Steve Forbes, Mike Federle, and Michael Perlis are the CEOs of Forbes.

  • Beneficial Effects of Remote Working on the Environment

    The past two years implemented many changes in everyone’s life. Right from the way of living life to the working pattern, everything went into modification with time and circumstances.

    In India, the concept of working from home was not much practised. Yet, the time taught people to follow the practice of working from home without being under the surveillance of the company people.

    Many employees were forced to work from home in 2020 due to lockdown measures. At first glance, it might look like a better option to follow because of reduced uses of natural resources such as time and energy.

    There were many great changes taking place due to restrictions offered by pandemics. Let us learn more about the change in working pattern that is the normalization of remote working and its effect on the environment below.

    Effect of Pandemic on Working Pattern
    Is Remote Working a Better Option for the Environment?
    How to Continue With Remote Working Without Affecting the Quality of Work and Environment?
    Advantages of Remote Working
    Environmental Benefits of Remote Working

    Effect of Pandemic on Working Pattern

    Pandemic brought several changes with it. People started giving more attention to their lifestyle, habits, and mental health rather than following the same pattern every day. Apart from these basic things, there was another great thing to note about the lockdown effect and it was the reduction in scope 3 emission.

    Scope 3 emission stands for those greenhouse gasses that are indirectly caused by an organization without them being held accountable for them. The pandemic effect indirectly caused the reduction in scope 3 emissions by lowering the emission from business trips, internal operations, etc.

    The estimated percentage for reduced scope 3 emission was around 65% during the pandemic.
    The estimated percentage for reduced scope 3 emission was around 65% during the pandemic.

    Transportation contributes to about 25% of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in Europe and 28% in the United States. Reducing transportation use results in fewer tonnes of CO2 being emitted into the environment.  

    According to Daniela Friedli of Umweltarena, if 450,000 people in Switzerland continued to work from home after the Coronavirus, traffic would be reduced by 1.3 billion kilometres per year, resulting in a decrease of 100,000 tonnes of CO2. And by the restriction of covid-19, these things were almost made real.

    Yet, we can’t rule out reductions due to reduced capacity and the closure of some offices, though the energy savings were lower than expected due to Covid-19 health and safety requirements, which required HVAC (heating, ventilation, and cooling) systems to run 24 hours a day, 7 days a week to flush out any virus lingering in the offices.

    Is Remote Working a Better Option for the Environment?

    Living simply in our houses has prompted many people to reconsider their more materialistic and consumerist lives before the outbreak. Is it really necessary to have the most up-to-date fashion or the most up-to-date gadget?

    Throughout their life cycles, consumer goods contribute to climate change: raw material extraction, processing, shipping, retail, and storage, as well as consumer use and disposal, all result in carbon emissions. Perhaps we won’t be as susceptible to the intentional obsolescence that is inherent in fashion and many other commercial goods.

    As an impression of the above-stated facts and the advantages offered by remote working, it is still better to continue the practice of working from home even after the passing of the pandemic and its restrictions.

    Remote working does provide the needed support to its employees, but it is also understandable that not all jobs can be fulfilled by remote working. Remote working is for specified people and needs the same dedication as the other types of working patterns.

    Before completely agreeing to the practice, let us first consider a few points such as How to continue with the practice, the advantages of following work-from-home practice, the environmental benefits of remote working, and some other essential points.

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    How to Continue Remote Working Without Affecting the Quality of Work and Environment?

    • Maintain a comfortable working environment by controlling the temperature. Don’t use the air conditioner or heater excessively.
    • Printing documents on paper is not recommended. Some applications allow you to print and sign documents in digital format.
    • Instead of holding face-to-face meetings, hold virtual ones.
    • Cook your meals for the entire family at home to avoid wasting food.
    • Try to maintain a working pattern irrespective of the place and other factors affecting the workplace.

    Advantages of Remote Working

    Working from home in a “normal” scenario (i.e., without being responsible for the children) has not only favourable environmental consequences but also positive consequences in other areas:

    The home office shows an increase in work productivity by minimizing distractions from coworkers by setting proper work patterns.

    • It alleviates the stress produced by traffic on the way to work on an emotional level.
    • It makes it easier to strike a better balance between personal and professional obligations. It is, nevertheless, advisable to set definite working hours at home to avoid ‘working’ all day.
    • On the financial side, minimizing transportation costs can be achieved by purchasing fewer public transportation tickets or using less gasoline in your vehicle.
    • Remote working gives a better sense of comfort when compared with work from the office.
    • A person can look forward to accomplishing their task in both places without the need to compromise and ultimately improve their ability of multitasking.
    The above graph shows the different benefits of remote working and the percentage of employees in favor of different perks
    The above graph shows the different benefits of remote working and the percentage of employees in favour of different perks

    Environmental Benefits of Remote Working

    Switching from regular working patterns to remote working is surely one of the intelligent decisions to make. As remote working does not only have advantages for the employee but it is also known to benefit the environment. And what can be better than a healthy environment? The benefits of remote working in the environment are:

    • Remote working decreases the scope 3 emission as it does not require a person to travel daily.
    • Eventually, remote working decreases the greenhouse effect by the means of travelling, additional use of vehicles, and any other possible services that can easily be avoided by simply making a change.
    • Remote working is also recorded to decrease the use of plastic. As many employees are in the habit of having a drink in the office at a few intervals which indirectly increases the plastic waste count.
    • With the introduction of remote working, one can have higher chances of experiencing clean air by reducing the use of vehicles.
    • While working in an office, employees take the help of many free resources provided by the company. Such as the use of papers without keeping track of their use, etc. By shifting to a remote working pattern these wastes can be avoided and the pages can be used for better purposes.
    • All sorts of pollution can be avoided by remote working. People will not prefer to travel at the time of work as they can easily do the work from their own selected place. This will eradicate the need for travelling causing reduced traffic on roads and fewer crowds in public transport.
    • There will be less requirement for power consumption and they are after effect on the environment for generating power.

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    Conclusion

    Environmental hazards are very much dangerous to human life. A proper strategy and rules are required to decrease them. Yet, there is no 100% working technique found up to date to stop them completely.

    One major technique for improving the environmental condition is shifting from regular working patterns to remote working. The effect of remote working on the environment as well as its benefits has been shared in the above context.

    FAQs

    Does remote working reduce carbon footprint?

    Yes, remote working can help to reduce carbon footprint if proper measures are taken into consideration.

    How does remote work impact the environment?

    Remote work positively impacts the environment. It allows the environment to breathe clean air by reducing carbon emissions to some percentage.

    What are the benefits of remote working?

    There are many benefits of remote working. Some of them are that remote working provides better comfort to the employee. The employees can take care of the home as well as office work simultaneously, remote working also helps to reduce carbon emission, etc.

    Is working remotely sustainable?

    Yes, remote working is considered a sustainable working model. However, it might have changed as per the person applying the model. The sustainability of the remote working model is different for different individuals.

  • Top 10 VC in India | Best Active Venture Capital Firms in 2022

    Say you have got a brilliant idea for a startup that can change the way we see things, that solves a problem that everyone needs a solution or boosts the economy. But you do not have enough money to put your vision into being. Sure, there are a lot of ways in which a startup can get funding to establish the foundation of the business. But given the fact that three out of four startups fail, who would like to take the risk to invest in a newfound business?

    Capital and startup go together, that is where a VC (venture capital) firm comes into the picture. But if you are not very familiar with the term. Continue reading with us to get an idea of what a venture capital firm is.

    What is a VC Firm and How Does it Work?
    Stages of Funding Rounds
    Other Ways of Fundings for a Startup
    Top 10 Venture Capital Firms in India

    What is a VC Firm and How Does it Work?

    People involved in a Venture Capital firm include entrepreneurs, investors, investment bankers, and venture capitalists. A venture capital firm will invest in your business with the aim of a good ROI (Return on Investment) and have a stake which is usually less than 50% in the ownership of your startup. The other main goals include exiting the investment. Either by selling off their stake or through an IPO (Initial Public Offering) at a profit and giving back to its investors.

    A venture capitalist firm is run by venture capitalists who raise venture capitalist funds by taking money from other people and investing it into promising young companies. These firms could clearly outline which industry they want to invest in. Who are the people they are looking for? What kind of funding do they want to do? At what stage of your business? And how much money are they willing to pool in?

    Stages of Funding Rounds

    • Pre-seed funding round: ‌‌Investments in startups are known as private equity or venture capital. Despite their high risk, these investments also have a greater chance of exponential growth.‌‌
    • Seed funding: This is the earliest stage in the process of raising capital for your startup.
    • The A-series: Funding is for when the company has established product and market fit, started to make some serious buzz and its customer base is growing fast.
    • The B Series: This represents a period when the firm generates significant revenue in particular markets and looks to expand its reach.
    • The C series: Eventually, the company will expand and operate globally. If it is ready for an IPO, it may be purchased by another company or continue operating as a private company.

    Other Ways of Fundings for a Startup

    Besides Seed Funding, there are other ways too, by which a startup can collect funds, some of the common ways are:

    • Bootstrapping is a method of raising pre-seed funds. When a startup bootstraps itself, it means that it launches without the help of external investors. Thus, the cash flow produced by the business itself fuels internal growth. A bootstrapped business may raise capital through customer funding, personal debt, or personal savings in its initial stages, which works as an effective model for some new companies. However, bootstrappers may face cash flow issues due to high levels of personal stress.‌‌      
    • Governments or industry-specific organizations provide grants to these startups for entrepreneurs who do not wish to give up equity, grants are another alternative for venture capital.‌‌    
    • Family, friends, and relatives are usually the first ones to support and invest in your startup. When you haven’t achieved much success or haven’t done anything, that can prove a tangible return on investment. In this scenario, your stakeholders may have limited or no experience with venture capital. Known as the three F’s (Friends, Family, and Fools), this is considered the fourth type of pre-seed funding.‌‌    
    • Pre-seed accelerator programs are the fifth type. Through these programs, founders learn lean startup practices, develop a scalable and repeatable business plan, and show some product-market fit to attract early customers to their product. ‌‌    
    • Lastly, crowdfunding can be used for pre-seed funding, and here financing is approached differently. A crowdfunding campaign is a way of raising money from many individuals in small amounts, often online. The types of crowdfunding include equity-based, reward-based, debt-based, and donation-based.

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    Top 10 Venture Capital Firms in India

    Check out the Top 10 active VC Firms in India in 2022.

    Tiger Global Management

    Founder: Chase Coleman III

    Established: 2001

    Investment stage: Series A to pre-IPO stages of companies

    Industry: Software, Consumer, and FinTech

    Portfolios: 763

    Headquarters: Mumbai

    Tiger Global Management based in New York has affiliate offices in Hong Kong, Beijing, Singapore, and Bangalore. It is one of the most active global tech investors and follows a long-term-based investment approach to generate superior risk-adjusted returns for its investors. They started their public equity in the year 2001 and private equity in 2003 making investments in growth-oriented private companies from early to late stages.

    Last year it was listed under the list of the world’s biggest unicorns with most of the co-investors in the company being Accel, Coatue, and DST Global. Some of their notable investments include companies like Shein, Meta (formerly known as Facebook), Coinbase, AirBnB, Uber, SoftBank, and more. Their latest fund size as of March 2022 is $12.7 billion.

    Omidyar Network India

    Founder: Pierre Omidyar

    Established: 2004

    Investment stage: Early-stage enterprises

    Industry: Digital Society, Education, Emerging Tech, Financial Inclusion, Cities & Innovation, and Property Inclusivity

    Portfolios: 100+

    Headquarters: Mumbai

    Omidyar Network India
    Omidyar Network India

    Omidyar Network India is a part of the Omidyar Group, whose organizations and initiatives are supported by philanthropists Pam and Pierre Omidyar, founder of eBay. This period represents a period when the firm generates significant revenue in particular markets and looks to expand its accompanies to fast-track its growth. As well as giving access to the Center of Excellence Board for strategic and operational inputs.

    They have a total of 102 active investments, raising the combined fund size to around $417 million. Few notable clients of Omidyar Network India are 1mg, Quikr, WhiteHat Jr, Zest, etc.

    Accel

    Founders: Jim Swartz and Arthur Patterson

    Established: 1983

    Investment stage: Pre-seed, seed, early, and growth-stage investments

    Industry: Computing and Storage, Infrastructure, Consumer, Internet & Media, Enterprise Software & Services, Mobile Networking Systems, Retail Consumer, Security, Technology Enabled Services

    Portfolio: 1840+

    Headquarters: Bengaluru

    Formerly known as Accel Partners, Accel has backed up some of the most successful companies like Flipkart, Dropbox, Etsy, Facebook, Spotify, Slack, Vox Media, and many more over the past thirty-five years. Accel has a global community of entrepreneurs and has been‌‌ investing in private companies from their pre-seed, seed, early, and growth-stage investments.

    Founded in 1983, Accel has been one of the most active venture capital firms in Silicon Valley still going strong with their core principles, completing thirty-five years in the industry last year. The company values collaboration, placing the group above everything else, and creating‌‌ investors from within. Accel continues to move forward with its Silicon Valley state of mind. Their most recent investment made was $57M raised by Middesk in June 2022.

    3one4 Capital

    Founders: Pranav Pai and Siddharth Pai

    Established: 2015

    Investment stage: Early-stage venture capital fund

    Industry: Fintech, consumer products, SaaS, digital media, climate tech, and digital health

    Portfolios: 50+

    Headquarters: Bengaluru

    3one4 Capital
    3one4 Capital

    3one4 Capital is a venture capital firm based in Bangalore, India. Specialities include investment in startups based in early stages, seed capital and early investments. The firm works with the founding team, bringing in subject proficiency to find the best strategy for the product market for defensibility, revenue growth, and creating an impact. Focused on delivering uncompromised end-user experiences, curtailing risk, uncovering new growth opportunities, and yielding rewarding outcomes for all the stakeholders involved.

    Interested in the intersection of adjacency that is large, growing, and ready for unique products and services and select market categories, the VC firms’ investments are biased towards companies exploiting technology to create, grow, or dominate large markets in India. Notable investments by 3one4 Capital include companies like Licious, Darwinbox, Jupiter, Betterplace, Open, Bugworks, Koo, Dozee, and Tracxn.‌‌

    Kalaari Capital

    Founder: Vani Kola

    Established: 2006

    Investment stage: Seed and A Series

    Industry: Technology-oriented companies

    Portfolios: 110+

    Headquarters: Bengaluru

    Kalaari Capital
    Kalaari Capital

    Started in the year 2006 by Vani Kola and headquartered in Bangalore, Kalaari Capital is an early-stage technology-focused venture capital firm based out of Bengaluru, India. Kalaari continues to empower and work with visionary entrepreneurs that build unique solutions that reshape the way Indians live, work, consume and transact. Kalaari partners early with founders and works with them to navigate the inevitable challenges of fostering ideas into successful businesses.

    Kalaari believes in being authentic, perceptive, and responsive. Accelerate and enable your firm to give importance to your potential more than your pedigree.

    Blume Ventures‌‌

    Founder: Karthik and Sanjay

    Established: 2010

    Investment stage: Seed-stage and early-stage companies

    Industry: Business products, business services, consumer products, consumer services, financial services, healthcare, information technology, manufacturing, cybersecurity, big data, e-commerce, blockchain, cannabis, business-to-business payments, mobile commerce, Esports, TMT, gaming, and technology-based

    Portfolios: 100+

    Headquarters: Mumbai

    Blume Ventures
    Blume Ventures

    Bridging the gap in the Indian market between local angel networks and larger global venture capital firms, Blume Ventures is a key player in India’s startup ecosystem and has backed up and built many transformational networks ever since. Backing up ventures that trigger a fundamental change in consumer behaviour, impacting larger markets, and solving problems that are difficult and uniquely Indian in nature.

    The testimonials clearly treat companies as customers, not just as portfolios. Offering more than just financial help, being friendly, being open-minded, and collaborative in their efforts. Blume Ventures has managed over $280M+ in Capital, backed up more than 150 Startups, and made 24 Exits. Ventures like Purple.com, HealthifyMe, Dunzo, Turtlemint, Locus, and more have been backed by Blume ventures.

    Helion Ventures ‌‌

    Founders: Rahul Chandra, Ashish Gupta, Kanwaljit Singh, and Sanjeev Aggarwal

    Established: 2006

    Investment stage: Early to mid-stage venture

    Industry: Outsourcing, Internet, Mobile, Technology Products, Retail Services, Healthcare, Education, and Financial Services.

    Portfolios: 120+

    Headquarters: Bengaluru

    Helion Ventures helps organizations build based on strategies and in making strategic choices. It is a $605 Million India-focused VC firm. That supports early to mid-stage venture funds investing in technology-powered and consumer service businesses in sectors like Outsourcing, Internet, Mobile, Technology Products, Retail Services, Healthcare, Education, and Financial Services. Mainly focusing on making investments based in India. Some notable investments were made in ventures like BYJU’S, Gupshup, Ola, LivSpace, Toppr, and more. ‌‌

    India Angel Network ‌‌

    Founders: Padmaja Ruparel, Raman Roy and Saurabh Srivastava

    Established: 2006

    Investment stage: Early-Stage Venture, Seed

    Portfolios: 160+

    Headquarters: New Delhi

    India Angel Network
    India Angel Network

    The members of the India Angel Network ‌lead from the front, having strong operational experience as CEOs or a background in creating new and successful ventures. The advantages of working with the firm are they are willing to invest money and time, have the ability to leverage a vast network, and give quick feedback on investment decisions.

    Keen to invest in startups based in their early stages, the India Angel network provides quality mentoring, and vast networks give input on strategies and move ahead with its execution. Working with sectors as diverse as Agriculture, E-Commerce, Education, Financial Services Gaming Healthcare Hospitality, information, and more. A few notable investments of India Angel Network are WOW momo, Zippr, Wiwigo, Pikkol, etc.

    Mumbai Angel Network‌‌

    Founder: Nandini Mansinghka

    Established: 2006

    Investment stage: Early-stage investments

    Industry: Technology, consumer, life sciences, defence technology, space technology, electric vehicles

    Portfolios: 200+

    Headquarters: Mumbai

    Mumbai Angel Network
    Mumbai Angel Network

    The Mumbai Angel Network invests in a wide variety of domains such as—technology, consumer, life sciences, defence technology, space technology, electric vehicles, and hemp seeds. They have over seven hundred investors in more than sixty cities around the world and are focused on new venture investing. The premier private investment platform has invested more than 150 crores with a base of more than 700 investors.‌‌

    The portfolio of Mumbai Angel Network includes startups like Snackible, LegalKart, Barneys, Brainwired, etc.

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    Sixth Sense ‌‌Ventures

    Founder: Nikhil Vora (Ex-Managing Director of IDFC Securities), Swati Nangalia Mehra

    Established: 2014

    Investment stage: Seed, A Series, B series, and more

    Industry: Transportation, Logistics, Supply Chain, and Storage

    Portfolios: 60+

    Headquartered: Mumbai

    Sixth Sense Ventures
    Sixth Sense Ventures

    Known as India’s first domestic consumer-centric venture fund. The Sixth Sense Ventures combines foreseeing a trend together with deep insights and delivers a clear vision. The sixth sense has a focus on Indian start-ups and leads with an immensely powerful team. Having cumulative experience in the wider consumer domain, their core team has a strong Center of Excellence Board.

    The company creates value for both investors and invested companies. The firm has strong consumer-centric research and investment analysis in its ecosystem, making it easy for companies to fast-track their growth. As well as giving access to the Center of Excellence Board for strategic and operational inputs. The portfolio of Sixth Sense Ventures includes startups like Ethos, Bira 91, AVG Logistics, MyHealthcare, etc.

    Conclusion

    The venture capital firms in India are growing at a fast pace and supporting budding entrepreneurs with not only money but also guiding them by mentoring them and helping them grow in various aspects of different industries. Helping entrepreneurs and their startups achieve success against all odds.

  • Deloitte Business Model – How Does Deloitte Make Money?

    Deloitte is a large professional services network. It was considered the 3rd largest privately owned company in the United States in 2020 by Forbes. In FY2021, the company generated a revenue of US $50.2 billion. Over the years, Deloitte has widened its reach globally and boosted its revenue continuously.

    But, what exactly is the business and revenue model of Deloitte that has made it the biggest financial firm in the world? Read this article till the end to find answers to this question.

    What is Deloitte?
    Target Audience of Deloitte
    Business Model of Deloitte
    What Makes Deloitte Stand Out in the Market?
    How Does Deloitte Make Money?

    What is Deloitte?

    If you are living under a rock, let me tell you Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited which is popularly called Deloitte is one of the ‘Big Four’ accounting firms which is headquartered in London. The ‘Big Four’ is a nickname that is given to the four largest accounting firms in the United States. Deloitte offers audit and assurance, consulting, financial advisory, risk advisory, AI and analytics, cloud, tax, and legal services.

    Ernst & Young (EY), PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), and Klynveld Peat Marwick Goerdeler (KPMG) are the other three accounting firms. Deloitte operates in more than 150 countries. In 2021, Deloitte had a total of 3,45,374 working employees.

    William Welch Deloitte, a British accountant, founded this company in London in 1845. The company further made its footprints in the United States in 1890. In 1972, the company merged with Haskins & Sells and formed Deloitte Haskins & Sells. Later, in 1989 the firm merged with Touche Ross in the US to form Deloitte & Touch. In 1993, the firm was renamed Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu which is now popularly known as Deloitte.

    Deloitte provides its financial and legal services to Fortune 500 companies. But, the firm also provides its services to small and medium-sized companies and even startups. The firm’s major client base is in the American division.

    Business Model of Deloitte

    Let’s dive deep into the business model of Deloitte.

    Audit

    Apart from the traditional accounting and audit services, the firm also focuses on internal auditing, IT control assurance, and Media and Advertising Assurance. In FY2021, audit and assurance services resulted in a 6.1% increase in their revenue.

    Deloitte auditing services are more than just numbers. The company evaluates the relationships with your technology priorities, capital investments, inventory on hand, workforce, and growth strategies. This helps Deloitte in bringing valuable insights that connect with your brand vision.

    The firm explains where your company stands and how you can grow in the future. Working with Deloitte means that your company will get access to an experienced and highly skilled group of people that will provide you with deep insights. The firm uses cutting-edge modern auditing technology to deliver the most accurate results.

    Consulting

    The firm offers consulting in the following areas:

    • Strategy
    • Analytics and M&A
    • Customer and Marketing
    • Core Business Operations
    • Human Capital
    • Enterprise Technology and Performance

    The consulting team of Deloitte not only answers all your complex questions but gives you actionable strategies that boost your revenue and disrupts the market. According to Deloitte, the most important aspect of any business is people. So, the team will give you strategies that elevate your customer’s experience. It will make sure that your core operations are working smoothly. Their strategies will make technology your friend.

    Financial Advisory

    Risk & Financial Advisory

    Deloitte offers corporate finance services which include:

    • Commercial and personal bankruptcy
    • Advisory
    • Mergers & acquisitions
    • Forensics
    • e-discovery
    • Document review
    • Capital projects consulting
    • Valuation

    The highly skilled professionals will tell you the potential risks and opportunities for your business. The firm uses cutting-edge technology like cognitive intelligence, analytics, and robotic process automation to solve complex problems.

    Risk Advisory

    Risk advisory at Deloitte help you in evaluating the following risks:

    • Strategic and reputation risk
    • Regulatory risk
    • Project risk
    • Cyber risk
    • Enterprise risk management
    • Information security and privacy
    • Data quality and integrity
    • Business continuity management and sustainability

    The firm will help you in understanding the risk so that your company reaches its full potential.

    Tax and Legal Services in Deloitte include increasing the net asset value of the company, handling international tax activities, reducing the tax liabilities, undertaking the transfer pricing, and implementing tax computer systems.

    Specialists help private companies understand and plan effective business and tax strategies that help the company respond to the evolving market conditions.

    Artificial Intelligence and Analytics

    Deloitte’s artificial intelligence and analytics services reveal all the hidden relationships from all the data. Using the helpful insights the team will help you in implementing the right strategy at the right time using the advanced technology. The team will help you improve your outcomes in key areas of your business which will ultimately boost your revenue.

    Deloitte takes your data to the next level using the latest cloud-enabled platforms and big data architectures. The robotic and intelligent automation team will implement automated processes to make accurate decisions and judgments and find new ways to expand your business. AI insights and engagement tools will generate highly actionable predictions and insights using the data.

    What Makes Deloitte Stand Out in the Market?

    The four things which make Deloitte stand out in the market are their constant drive for innovation, highly skilled professionals, number of employees, and emphasis on making the customer experience more powerful.

    All their services revolve around finding creative solutions for their clients. To push the boundaries of innovation the firm has set up five innovation centers:

    • Deloitte U.S. Center for the Edge
    • Deloitte Center for Energy Solutions
    • Deloitte Center for Financial Services
    • Deloitte Center for Health Solutions
    • Deloitte Center for Regulatory Strategies

    The firm knows that if they have a huge workforce of highly skilled professionals they would be able to target a huge number of companies. Among the ‘Big Four’ Deloitte has the largest number of employees: 3,45,374.

    How Does Deloitte Make Money?

    As you saw above, the business model of Deloitte revolves around these 5 services: audit, consulting, financial advisory, risk advisory, AI, and analytics. They offer these premium services to Fortune 500 companies and earn huge revenue. Consulting is one of the major business units of Deloitte, accounting for 40% of total revenues in 2021.

    Half of their revenue comes from North and South America. In 2020, the financial giant generated 25.3 billion U.S. dollars from its Americas division. Deloitte has understood that its major client base is in the American region. To serve these clients the firm hired a lot of employees:156,000. Revenue from the Asia Pacific and Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) regions accounts for 25 billion U.S. dollars.

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    Conclusion

    If you see the business model of Deloitte closely you will understand that they provide a range of financial and legal services instead of just focusing on one service. This helps the company in earning a huge amount of profit. Most importantly, Deloitte has understood that the only way to thrive in the market is to constantly innovate.

    So, what did you learn from the business and revenue model of Deloitte? Hire specialized employees that have the courage to take risks. Remember, if you don’t have talented employees you will never succeed. Try to diversify your services. Always provide quality service to your clients and help them grow because if your clients make profits you will also make profits. You should always look for ways to innovate because this is the one thing that will help you grow.

    FAQs

    What is the core business of Deloitte?

    The core business of Deloitte revolves around audit and assurance, consulting, financial advisory, risk advisory, AI and analytics, cloud, tax, and legal services. Deloitte provides innovative solutions to their clients using advanced technology.

    Why is Deloitte so successful?

    Deloitte is successful because of its wide range of financial and legal innovative solutions, advanced technology, and a huge number of employees. Among the Big Four companies, Deloitte has the largest number of employees: 3,45,374. Their dominance in the American division is another reason why the company is still thriving in the market. In 2020, Deloitte generated 25.3 billion U.S. dollars from the American division.

    Who are Deloitte’s biggest clients?

    Deloitte’s biggest clients are:

    • Berkshire Hathaway
    • Microsoft
    • Starbucks
    • Morgan Stanley
    • Procter & Gamble
    • Apollo Global Management

  • Must-Read Books For Software Engineers | Best Software Engineering Books

    Today we are going to discuss a profession that is booming rapidly. We’ll be discussing “Software Engineering”. Many books for software engineering are available online but practical knowledge helps tremendously in this field. Software engineers have a bright future waiting for them. Nowadays, 74% of the students prefer e-books but reading e-books will never give satisfaction to readers.

    A software engineer needs to always stay updated with the rapidly changing trend. So, that’s the crucial part of the software engineer job. Especially, if you’re an interviewer or an interviewee for a software engineer job, then you need to be more alert. But how?

    Books are our best friends. In this case, they are the best friends of software engineers. By reading the must-read books you can stay updated with the changing trends of technology. To keep you updated with the trend, we have a list of the best software engineering books that are a must-read for every software developer.

    Working Effectively With Legacy Code
    The Mythical Man-Month
    Effective Java
    Dive into Design Pattern
    The Art of Computer Programming
    Refactoring
    Code Complete 2

    Working Effectively With Legacy Code

    Legacy Code
    Legacy Code

    Every product engineer once in their career has to face the legacy code problem and in that situation, this book can work wonders for you. The ‘Working Effectively with Legacy Code’ book written by Michael Feathers offers thorough methodologies for working more successfully with vast, untested legacy code bases. This software engineering book will do wonders for you and is a must-read for a software engineer.

    The Mythical Man-Month

    The Mythical Man
    The Mythical Man

    The Mythical Man-Month was written by Fred Brooks. It was made for software engineers to learn new things. If you are a programmer and have to work with new programming languages daily, then this book might solve numerous issues for you. So, programmers must read this book once in their lifetime.

    Effective Java

    Effective Java
    Effective Java

    Joshua Bloch wrote ‘Effective Java’. Java is a dynamic programming language and every software engineer needs to get a taste of this language once in life. This book will give you the right direction to learn the effects of this new language. Java is a very developing language and it’s very good to learn this cool language from a software engineer. This software engineering book is a must-read for any software engineer.

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    Dive into Design Pattern

    Dive into Design Pattern
    Dive into Design Pattern

    By Alexander Shvets, Dive into Design Pattern consists of solutions to commonly occurring problems in software design. To improve your coding and learn different strategies to approach a problem can be easily learned from this easy method of the book. So, design developers must give this book a read.

    The Art of Computer Programming

    Art of Computer Programming
    Art of Computer Programming

    Donald Knuth is the author of Art of Computer Programming. This is a very popular book to learn computer programming. This book is so popular that Bill Gates himself recommended this book. “On the off chance that you believe you’re a better than average software engineer… read [Knuth’s] Art of Computer Programming… You should send me a resume on the off chance that you can read the entire thing. – Bill Gates, Co-founder of Microsoft”.

    Refactoring

    Refactoring
    Refactoring 

    Refactoring was written by Kent Beck and Martin Fowler. This book is an excellent guide to how to transform code with a safe and rapid process, vital to keeping it cheap and easy to modify for future needs. This coding book helps new software engineers to learn the details of coding. The software engineer must read it before starting a new job in this field.

    Code Complete 2

    Code Complete
    Code Complete

    A classic book by Steve McConnell, that has been regularly updated. It is a very basic guide that will teach you all the fundamentals to write good code. This software engineering book will do wonders for you and is a must-read for a software engineer.

    Conclusion

    Well, these are just a few good books for software engineering available offline and online. The list of the books is very long, you can say that it is the tip of the iceberg, so don’t waste your time viewing a useless video tutorial on YouTube and gain some authentic knowledge from the experts.

  • List of All the Startups Acquired by Cred

    Cred is a popular fintech company founded by Kunal Shah in 2018. It is a reward-based credit card payments startup. Recently, Cred raised $80 million in its latest funding round at a $6.4 billion valuation. Even after making a loss of Rs 524 crore in FY21 why is this company getting so many investors? Is Cred more than just a credit card payment app?

    To find answers to these questions let’s see what acquisitions Cred has made in recent times. This will give us a clear idea of the future plans of Cred.

    HipBar
    Parfait Finance and Investment
    Happay

    HipBar

    HipBar Logo
    HipBar Logo

    In October 2021, Cred acquired HipBar, an alcohol delivery and payment startup. Cred was interested in this deal because HipBar has a prepaid payment instrument license (PPI).

    Now, what is PPI? It is a prepaid payment instrument that allows the payment of goods and services, including fund transfers against the value stored on the prepaid card. RBI has issued this license to only 37 firms in the country.

    Using the PPI licence, Cred can issue cash vouchers and prepaid cards and can facilitate digital wallets for the Cred community.

    Cred’s holding firm Dreamplug Technologies has held the share capital of Prasanna Natarajan, founder and CEO of HipBar and Rajalakshmi Natarajan, co-founder and director of HipBar.

    Kunal Shah and his brother Rohan Shah have joined the board of HipBar as directors. Rajalakshmi has resigned from the company. Although Prasanna is still a director.

    With this acquisition, Cred will now directly give cashback to the user’s wallet instead of their bank accounts. Users can then use the wallet to pay credit card bills and purchase products from its merchant partners.

    This is a smart strategy by the company to make the customers stay connected with their ecosystem.

    “It appears to be a smart move as the wallet would enable CRED to drive repeat transactions through its own payment instrument,” said one of the entrepreneurs who doesn’t want his name mentioned in the article.

    Parfait Finance and Investment

    In November 2021 Kunal Shah acquired a non-banking finance company, Parfait Finance and Investment. RBI has approved this acquisition and it will help the company to extend its lending services to its users.

    This acquisition is part of Kunal Shah’s plans to provide a range of financial services to its exclusive Cred community. The company is already providing loans through a partnership with IDFC First Bank.

    The company has also launched Cred Mint by partnering with LiquiLoans, an RBI-registered P2P non-banking lender. Cred Mint allows users to lend money to other Cred users.

    The company has also applied for a payments aggregator license. Using this license Cred can process the payment of merchants with consumers online. The merchants can accept payments in the form of debit cards, credit cards, e-wallets, or bank transfers.

    The payments aggregator license will help Cred to enable e-commerce on its platform.

    Happay

    Happay Logo
    Happay Logo

    In December 2021, Cred acquired Happay, a corporate expense management platform, in a cash-and-stock deal at a valuation of $180 million.

    Happay is a business expense, payments and travel management platform that manages work-related expenses for over 1 million users globally.

    This deal allows Happay to work as a separate company but its employees will work closely with Cred to help the company scale its business and add new financial services for the Cred users.  

    The 230 member team of Happay will get all the benefits that the employees of Cred get, including its ESOP program.

    “The move will bring in synergies between Cred, the majority of whose members are professionals who use it to manage personal payments across multiple credit cards, and Happay, the only unified platform for business expenses, payments, and travel bookings,” a statement by Cred said.

    Happay’s in-house payments system will help the Cred users to manage their expenses on their credit cards.

    “With professional expenses forming a significant portion of credit card spends, bringing professional expense management into the Cred ecosystem is a natural extension of our proposition,” Kunal Shah said.

    Conclusion

    As you can see Kunal Shah is making Cred future ready. The company is unveiling multiple revenue verticals in the form of house rental payments, lending and wallet payment business along with e-commerce.  

    These acquisitions show us that Cred in the future might become a banking institution for its exclusive users. It will make the platform an irreversible ecosystem for its exclusive Cred community.

    FAQs

    How many startups Cred has acquired?

    In total, Cred has acquired 3 startups. HipBar, which is an alcohol delivery and payment startup, Parfait Finance and Investment, which is a non-banking finance company and Happay, is a corporate expense management platform which will allow users to manage their expenses on their credit cards using the Cred app.

    Is Cred approved by RBI?

    The services that Cred offers to its users do not require the approval of RBI. The credit score of the users is verified by a credit rating agency which is also authorized by the RBI.

    Is Cred a unicorn startup?

    Cred entered the unicorn club in 2021 after raising $215 million in funding, at a post-money valuation of $2.2 billion.

  • List of All the Startups Acquired by Flipkart

    Within ten years, e-commerce business platforms are booming like anything. All the more, the pandemic seems to have given a push of 10 times more to these e-commerce sites. The given hectic life, and busy schedules, people do not have the leisure to go out and shop. With many reliable e-commerce websites available, people prefer to buy products online.

    According to sources, the Indian e-commerce market is expected to grow to $188 billion by 2025 from $6.2 billion (2020). It is also predicted that the market is expected to increase by 21.5% by the end of 2022.

    Flipkart, which is India’s one of the biggest players in the e-commerce market, is also considered the most valuable startup in the country today. This Walmart-owned company started its journey by selling books online and further expanded into selling other product varieties such as electronics, fashion, home essentials, and other lifestyle products.

    Through its journey of becoming the most successful startup, Flipkart has acquired several companies. Today, Flipkart has a revenue of 433 billion Indian rupees.

    In this article, let us discover the list of major companies acquired by Flipkart.

    1. ANS Commerce
    2. Yaantra
    3. SastaSundar
    4. Cleartrip
    5. Scapic
    6. Mecha Mocha
    7. Walmart India
    8. Upstream Commerce
    9. Liv.ai
    10. F1 Info Solutions & Services
    11. eBay India
    12. Jabong
    13. PhonePe
    14. FX Mart
    15. Appiterate
    16. AdIQuity
    17. Myntra
    18. Jeeves
    19. Letsbuy.com
    20. Chakpak
    21. MIME360
    22. weRead

    1. ANS Commerce

    Year of Acquisition – 2022

    ANS Commerce Logo
    ANS Commerce Logo

    ANS Commerce is a direct-to-consumer (D2C) SaaS startup. The company offers e-commerce solutions for online brands, such as brand-store tech, performance marketing, platform support, marketplace management, and more.

    Flipkart has acquired ANS Commerce for an undisclosed amount. However, the agreement is yet to be completed due to some closing conditions.

    2. Yaantra

    Year of Acquisition – 2022

    Yaantra Logo
    Yaantra Logo

    Yaantra is an electronic repair company that offers door-to-door electronic repair services for smartphones and laptops and sells refurbished products. The acquisition made by Flipkart is to improve its after-sale services in the smartphone segment and to maintain the recommerce platform. Yaantra was acquired by Flipkart for approximately $40-50 million.

    3. SastaSundar

    Year of Acquisition – 2021

    SastaSundar Logo
    SastaSundar Logo

    SastaSundar operates in online pharmacy and healthcare solutions such as e-diagnostics, and e-consultations with a network of more than 490 pharmacies. Flipkart was acquired to further improve the healthcare system by offering affordable pharmacies to consumers on a large scale. The Flipkart group has a 75.1% stake in the SastaSundar company.

    4. Cleartrip

    Year of Acquisition -2021

    Cleartrip Logo
    Cleartrip Logo

    Cleartrip is an online travel service company. The company offers booking services for flights, train tickets, and hotel reservations in India and the Middle East. The Covid-19 pandemic made a very stressful year for the travel sector, due to which, Cleartip had laid off around 500 employees. Flipkart acquired Cleartrip in April 2021 in a $40 million deal.

    5. Scapic

    Year of Acquisition – 2020

    Scapic Logo
    Scapic Logo

    Scapic is a cloud-based startup that deals in creating and publishing AR and 3D content through a web browser for clients across e-commerce and marketing platforms. The deal made by Flipkart is to enhance its user experience. Flipkart has a 100% stake in Scapic, however, the deal value is still undisclosed.

    6. Mech Mocha

    Year of Acquisition – 2020

    Mech Mocha Logo
    Mech Mocha Logo

    Mech Mocha is a mobile gaming platform that operates a live social game called ‘Hello Play’. This gaming app allows participants from tier II and tier III cities to interact with each other through its in game-video. Flipkart invested in Mech Mocha at an undisclosed amount.

    7. Walmart India

    Year of Acquisition – 2020

    Walmart India Logo
    Walmart India Logo

    Walmart India is a subsidiary owned by Walmart Inc., which is an American multinational retail corporation that has a wide variety of markets dealing mainly in departmental stores, and grocery stores. The reason for Flipkart to acquire Walmart India is to help expand its footprint in the food and grocery segment, which will further strengthen its supply chain.

    8. Upstream Commerce

    Year of Acquisition – 2018

    Upstream Commerce is an Israel-based retail platform that provides cloud-based automated-competitive solutions to help online retailers develop an analysis to boost their sales. Flipkart acquired Upstream commerce to further optimise its product pricing to compete with its rival Amazon.

    9. Liv.ai

    Year of Acquisition – 2018

    Liv.ai is the first Indian company that uses powerful neural network models that enable developers to convert speech into text supporting 10 Indian languages. They aim to give voice to billions of Indians, and the ability to express their language through the digital world. Flipkart acquired Liv.ai for $40 million.

    10. F1 Info Solutions & Services

    Year of Acquisition – 2017

    F1 Info Solutions & Services Logo
    F1 Info Solutions & Services Logo

    In 2017, Flipkart acquired F1 Info Solutions & Services, an IT products repair service provider of brands like Apple, HP, Samsung, Sony, Lenovo, Asus, and many more. The main reason for the acquisition of F1 is to expand Flipkart’s offerings towards after-sale repair services for its IT products and mobile phones.

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    11. eBay India

    Year of Acquisition – 2017

    ebay Logo
    ebay Logo

    eBay is an American multinational e-commerce platform founded in 1995. eBay started its operations in India in 2005 but was not that successful. Flipkart acquired eBay in 2017 for approximately $500 million.

    12. Jabong

    Year of Acquisition – 2016

    Jabong Logo

    Jabong.com is an online portal that sells products in categories like fashion accessories, footwear, apparel, home essentials, and other lifestyle products. Flipkart acquired Jabong through Myntra for $70 million.

    13. PhonePe

    Year of Acquisition – 2016

    PhonePe Logo
    PhonePe Logo

    PhonePe is a digital payment mode for online transactions in India founded by Sameer Nigam. The app operates around the Unified Payments Interface (UPI), regulated by the National Payments Corporation of India. The company was acquired by Flipkart in 2016, although it will function as a separate business unit. Flipkart bought the company for $20 million.

    14. FX Mart

    Year of Acquisition – 2015

    FX Mart Logo
    FX Mart Logo

    FX Mart is a company that offers payment services like digital or electronic payments,  remittances buying and selling of currencies, travel, and related services. The acquisition was made with an aim to enable Flipkart to have its own in-app wallet system and avoid paying a cut to external wallet providers. The deal value was around $6 million.

    15. Appiterate

    Year of Acquisition – 2015

    Appiterate Logo
    Appiterate Logo

    Appiterate is a mobile marketing company that engages in marketing automation to help e-commerce companies push their sales through push notifications and in-app messages. The details of the deal are undisclosed.

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    16. AdIQuity

    Year of Acquisition – 2015

    AdIQuity Logo
    AdIQuity Logo

    A global mobile ad network founded by Anurag Dod, AdIQuity was launched with the aim to facilitate ad agencies to acquire mobile traffic. Flipkart bought this company in hopes to increase its efficiency on the mobile platform.

    17. Myntra

    Year of Acquisition – 2014

    Myntra Logo
    Myntra Logo

    Myntra, initially sold personalised gift items but later on expanded into fashion and lifestyle brands in 2010. In 2014, the company was bought by Flipkart at a valuation of approximately $370 million. The acquisition was done in to beat Flipkart’s rival Amazon to create one of the largest e-commerce markets. To date, Myntra is one of the biggest acquisitions of Flipkart.

    18. Jeeves

    Year of Acquisition – 2014

    Jeeves Logo
    Jeeves Logo

    Jeeves is one of India’s leading third-party after-sales service providers with a network of 320+ service partners. It was during the same year, Flipkart launched its large appliance category.

    19. Letsbuy.com

    Year of Acquisition – 2012

    Letsbuy Logo
    Letsbuy Logo

    Letsbuy.com is an online retail shop selling branded computer technology and digital lifestyle products from top international and domestic brands. Flipkart acquired Letsbuy.com for $25 million.

    20. Chakpak

    Year of Acquisition – 2011

    Chakpak is an online media podium for films revolving around Bollywood, Telugu, and Tamil that enables users to find information regarding their timings, reviews, latest news, and information. Flipkart made this acquisition to let them offer user-generated content for a huge array of Indian movies to their customers.

    21. MIME360

    Year of Acquisition – 2011

    This was a Mumbai-based digital media distribution company. MIME is the short-form of Manoramic International Media Exchange. The company has ties with Saregama and Gaana.com and operates in Mumbai, and Delaware, USA. To improve their digital distribution technology platform, Flipkart acquired MIME360.

    22. weRead

    Year of Acquisition – 2010

    weRead Logo
    weRead Logo

    The first startup acquired by Flipkart is weRead.com. It is an online community for all book readers. The platform was available on Facebook, Myspace, Orkut, Hi5, and Bebo. Flipkart wanted to expand its customer base to further improve its customer book reading experience.

    Conclusion

    The list of startups acquired by Flipkart gives us a clear understanding of how ambitious Flipkart is. They aim to keep growing and compete with their rival Amazon. The group is in the mood to diversify its ecosystem through these various investments in multiple sectors.

    The company has grown tremendously in just ten years and continues to evolve every day by expanding its services for its consumers. Besides these acquisitions, Flipkart has made investments in Ninjacart, Aditya Birla Fashion Retail Limited, Shadowfax, and Arvind Fashions.

    FAQs

    What companies are owned by Flipkart?

    Ans commerce, Yaantra, Sastasundar, Cleartrip, Scapic, Mech mocha, Walmart India, Upstream commerce, Liv.AI, F1 info solutions & services, eBay India, Jabong, Phonepe, FX Mart, Appiterate, Adiquity, Myntra, Jeeves, Letsbuy.Com, Chakpak, MIME360, and Weread are owned by Flipkart.

    Is Flipkart an MNC company?

    Yes, Flipkart is an MNC company founded by Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal.

    What kind of company is Flipkart?

    Flipkart is an eCommerce company based in Bangalore.

  • 9 Unknown Facts About Walt Disney You Might Not Know

    Walt Disney was not just a cartoonist or an entrepreneur. He was one whole box of talent ranging from artist to producer. Even after these many years, Walt Disney is not someone that can be forgotten with time. Instead, his legacy is getting bigger and bigger day by day giving out much appreciation and recognition to him even after so many years.

    Walt Disney or Walter Elias Disney was born on 5th December 1901. He was an American actor, producer, entrepreneur, cartoonist, etc. He had achieved much fame and name in his course of life. Let us look at the 9 most intriguing unknown facts about him.

    1. In a School Play, Walt Disney Performed as Peter Pan
    2. Walt Disney Forged His Actual Birth Date to Do His Share of Work in WW1
    3. Walt Disney’s First Big Creation Was Not Mickey Mouse
    4. He Was Mickey Mouse’s Voice Actor
    5. Disney Land Has a Secret Apartment for Its Real Owner – Walt Disney
    6. Walt Disney Worked for the Government by Encouraging Them Through Propaganda Films During WW2
    7. Disneyland Was Conceived as a Small-Scale Project as First
    8. Walt Disney Created History by Winning the Highest Number of Academy Awards
    9. Walt Loved Trains

    1. In a School Play, Walt Disney Performed as Peter Pan

    Disney Peter Pan Cartoon
    Disney Peter Pan Cartoon

    The plot of Peter Pan had a particular place in Walt Disney’s heart because it was not only a hit film for him in 1953, but it also transported him back to his youth. The reason behind it was that Walt was required to play the character of a boy. A boy who would not grow up in a school production especially after witnessing Peter Pan on Broadway.

    Another memorable thing about that play was the collaboration of Walt Disney and his brother. The brother was responsible to take charge of the rope that was attached to give the mimic flying over the stage.

    2. Walt Disney Forged His Actual Birth Date to Do His Share of Work in WW1

    Walt quit school at the age of 16 to join the Red Cross Ambulance Corps in order to participate in World War I. Walt was just 16 years and the minimum age requirement was given a deadline of 17 years. In order to deal with this, Walt wrote a duplicate birthdate on his birth certificate.

    Walt Disney as a Red Cross Ambulance Driver
    Walt Disney as a Red Cross Ambulance Driver

    Disney was dispatched to France in late 1918. The armistice of the war was soon signed after the dispatch of Walt to France saving him from getting much involved in the actions of the war. Before being dismissed in 1919, he continued to assist where he could, driving Red Cross officials and conducting other jobs.

    3. Walt Disney’s First Big Creation Was Not Mickey Mouse

    Universal Studios commissioned Walt and his principal animator Ub Iwerks to develop a cartoon character for them in 1927, and Oswald the Lucky Rabbit was the result. Oswald was a great hit, with plenty of merchandise to go around.

    Oswald the Lucky Rabbit
    Oswald the Lucky Rabbit

    With his unique work, it didn’t take much longer for Walt to get fame for his work. With the fame on board, Walt decided to travel back to New York in 1928 in order to re-bargain with the producer Charles Mintz.

    Whereas on the contrary Charles Mintz was prepared with a different plan to deal with Walt Disney. He was fully prepared to slash the budget and was also working toward snatching Disney’s animator by the means of inappropriate ways without his knowledge of Walt.

    As a result, Universal got Oswald’s rights, and Disney left New York feeling like he’d lost practically everything. However, talent can be recognized anywhere. While on the way back to California, Disney came up with the idea of Mickey Mouse and drew him on the train journey. The character of Mickey Mouse actually created a way for Disney to gain back his fame and a way to surpass the popularity of Oswald.

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    4. He Was Mickey Mouse’s Voice Actor

    Mickey Mouse initially appeared in a short film called “Steamboat Willie” in 1928, which was one of the first cartoons to employ synced sound effects. Mickey Mouse clubs, goods, and a comic strip were all created as a result of the rodent’s rapid rise to fame.

    Steamboat Willie
    Steamboat Willie

    A year later to that, a voice was given to Mickey mouse in the tone of Walt. “The Karnival Kid,” was said in the tone of Walt. The actual reason behind having his own voice for Mickey Mouse was that Walt was quite dissatisfied with any other tried voice for Mickey.

    Walt was not fully agreeing with any other character sound imitating his phrase “Hot dog, hot dog”. So he went up to take the charge and gave his own contribution to the voicing of Mickey Mouse. He continued to do that until 1947  with the last work as “Mickey and Beanstalk”. After that Walt stated that he was too busy to do it.

    The famous scene responsible for Walt Disney to voiceover of Mickey Mouse
    The famous scene responsible for Walt Disney to a voiceover of Mickey Mouse

    5. Disney Land Has a Secret Apartment for Its Real Owner – Walt Disney

    It is, in fact, still visible over the fire station. Walt’s private abode is rarely available to the public, but VIPs are given visits on occasion. The abode is kept the same as before with no change in its construction or things kept inside it. Even for consideration, there still stands a lamp kept on the window that is visible from the street.

    Walt Disney Lamp
    Walt Disney Lamp

    As for belief, it is made a routine to keep that lamp always on. The lamp indicates the presence of Walt in the park.

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    6. Walt Disney Worked for the Government by Encouraging Them Through Propaganda Films During WW2

    During WWII, Disney employees developed educational films for a variety of federal agencies, including “The New Spirit,” a 1942 animated short commissioned by the Treasury Department to encourage citizens to pay their income taxes as a method of supporting the war effort.

    The picture, starring Donald Duck, was seen in hundreds of theatres and was even nominated for an Academy Award. The Disney studio also generated free-of-charge training films for the American military and over a thousand insignia for military units, with designs based on both old and new Disney characters.

    The New Spirit
    The New Spirit

    Although Walt was first hesitant to risk damaging his image as a non-political entertainer by making overtly political works, his crew finally produced animated pieces like 1943’s “Der Fuehrer’s Face,” which mocked the Nazis and included Donald Duck once more. Walt was also inspired by reading Major Alexander de Seversky’s 1942 best-seller “Victory Through Air Power.”

    Victory Through Air Power
    Victory Through Air Power

    In order to gain support for the book’s contentious beliefs regarding the strategic long-range bombing, he chose to adopt it as a 1943 live-action-animated feature film of the same name, propelled by his own patriotism. The picture was seen by both President Franklin D. Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and it is said to have left an influence on both of them.

    7. Disneyland Was Conceived as a Small-Scale Project as First

    The fragment for creating Disneyland somewhere belongs to the visits made by Walt Disney to the various amusement parks, especially with his daughters. At first, Walt wanted to create a small tourist attraction point.

    More precisely, he wanted to create an entertainment place for all those people who used to come to visit him. With the introduction of the idea, Disney purchased 160 acres of land near his studio Anaheim.

    The purchase was done in 1953 with its construction started in 1954. Apart from these, Disneyland was successfully launched in 1955. The introduction of the uniqueness of Disney was carried out by Walt during a television press broadcast by ABC  Television Network.

    8. Walt Disney Created History by Winning the Highest Number of Academy Awards

    Walt Disney standing with all of his oscar trophies
    Walt Disney has the highest number of Oscar win

    Disney is too famous in almost all parts of the world. Undoubtedly, the popularity earned by Disney has actually led it to achieve many successful awards and nominations.

    In fact, Disney holds the record for possessing the most individual Oscar wins and nominations (22) when counted in the whole history of academy awards (59).

    A poster of Flower and Trees
    Flower and Trees

    The first award appreciation owned by Walt was for “Flower and Trees”. The highlight for the same was that it used the new three-strip Technicolor technique, to stand out in the best short subject (cartoon) category at the fifth Academy Awards ceremony (1932). Coincidentally, Disney was recorded to win the same award for the following consecutive seven ceremonies.

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    9. Walt Loved Trains

    Trains have long been a source of curiosity for the renowned filmmaker. Walt’s father and uncle both worked on railroads, and as a teenager in Kansas City, he sold newspapers and snacks on trains for a short time.

    Another matching point between the train and Walt was that Walt learned about losing the right over his own cartoon creation Oswald the Lucky Rabbit was also informed to him on his train journey only.

    After that, Walt began working on the character that would become known around the globe as Mickey Mouse (contrary to popular belief, Walt did not have a pet mouse on which to base Mickey) on the train only. Later, as a method to relax from the stress of his job, Walt built extensive model train sets.  

    Walt found a unique yet therapeutic measure to get him distressed. He went on to build himself a steam locomotive at the end of 1940. Apart from that, after entering his new home in 1950, Walt again laid a half-mile of rails especially for his trains and around the property owned by him.

    Walt Disney Train in his backyard
    Walt Disney Train in his backyard

    He used to dress up as a train engineer and give tourists rides on his Carolwood Pacific Railroad, which was named after the street where he resided. His love of railways is evident in Disneyland, which has had its own railroad since its inception in 1955.

    Conclusion

    Walt Disney was a man full of talents. He was and is still counted amongst the great legends who are remembered and recognized due to their talents in the world. Walt Disney was counted as an artist, producer, cartoonist, and many other similar jobs. The 10 most intriguing facts about him are shared above.

    FAQs

    Who created Mickey Mouse?

    Mickey Mouse is an animated cartoon character invented by Walt Disney in the year 1928.

    Who owns Disney world now?

    Disney World is currently owned by “The Walt Disney Company”.

    What is Walt Disney’s full name?

    Walt Disney’s full name was Walter Elias Disney.

    Who was the first Disney character?

    The first Disney character was Oswald the Rabbit.

  • Doing Business Through Virtual Office Spaces – Key Benefits

    The budding idea of office spaces that took shape in the last decade was reimagined with the advent of the pandemic in March 2020. The hitherto notion of offline offices was expanded to virtual spaces where only a good internet connection was a prerequisite.

    Interestingly, after office spaces entered into a hybrid model, many startups mushroomed taking advantage of virtual spaces over physical spaces. This article will look into these aspects that have strengthened the popularity of online office spaces.

    1. Accessibility to Talent Pool
    2. Heightened Productivity
    3. Democratic Space
    4. Easier Expansion
    5. Environment Friendly
    6. Short-Term Commitments
    7. Better Business Support
    8. Cost Cutting

    1. Accessibility to Talent Pool

    Human resources are the prime factor that drives any business forward. When ideas and plans are worked out together, it leads to the efficient usage of technology and raw materials.

    When a business is limited to physical offices, the proximity of employees to the office is an important factor. In many cases, companies, especially startups are forced to compromise on recruitment just because of the incompatibility of locations of the parties involved.

    The prevalence of virtual offices has made a positive intervention in that regard. Companies with a virtual office now have the liberty to employ the best talents from anywhere in the world without location, transportation and accommodation becoming a problem.

    Many startups have made use of this benefit extensively during the time of the pandemic. This benefit has worked both ways as employees who otherwise had concerns with travel and accommodation were now able to get better opportunities as virtual offices thrived.

    2. Heightened Productivity

    Studies have shown that employees work better remotely in virtual spaces than in physical offices. According to a study by Stanford University, working from home has increased the productivity of employees by 13% as the number of calls per minute increases owing to quiet work environments.

    A similar study cites that 70% of people prefer hybrid meetings and work from home. Studies have also shown that since virtual offices cut the time spent on commutes and breaks, employee efficiency has also increased tremendously.

    3. Democratic Space

    It is a fact that certain places give specific facilities to the entities there. The reason why companies spent a fortune in setting up their offices in cities like Bangalore and Mumbai is due to the competitive edge that these places will give to the business. However, virtual spaces have been successful to a great extent in reducing the unequal opportunities that physical offices provide for various enterprises.

    Virtual offices mean that the organisation functions online. At a time when a business has become chiefly an online affair, there is nothing that an infrastructural facility at a specific location can add to the well-being of the company.

    Irrespective of where you are based, virtual offices provide an equal pedestal for all the competents in the market where the only criteria of growth become performance.

    4. Easier Expansion

    As virtual spaces waves off the burden of location and infrastructure, it becomes easier for companies to expand their business into newer places. All they would need is the technological backup and entrepreneurial vision to sustain in a new location.

    When compared to the traditional methods of expansion, virtual spaces allow a cost-effective, hassle-free and stress-free expansion. Even if the companies have the financial reserves and other necessary resources to set up a new office, it will only be wise, to begin with, a virtual office before expanding physically so as to understand the feasibility that the business in the new location would bring.

    5. Environment Friendly

    One of the biggest advantage that virtual spaces bring to the table is that it is environmentally innocuous. In fact, all of its benefits boil down to this major advantage.

    At a time when air pollution and land management are becoming grave concerns, the popularity of virtual office spaces will help significantly reduce the contribution of the business world to environmental degradation.

    Virtual spaces not only reduce the contribution of physical spaces in polluting the environment but also cuts down the carbon footprint of each and every employee of the organisation.

    The amount of difference that online office spaces can make is very significant in the face of humanity. At a time when the business world is trying to develop sustainable ways of doing business, prioritising virtual offices will be a great initiative.

    6. Short-Term Commitments

    Unlike physical office spaces, the companies are no longer required to enter into long-term contracts with real estate owners for office spaces. Most of the software services that support the functionalities of virtual office space are based on a monthly subscription or an ad-hoc basis. It gives the owners the flexibility to opt for better options more often. Such short-term commitments also mean that the companies need to pay for what they use and only for the time they need.

    7. Better Business Support

    There is no doubt in the fact that virtual spaces have made work easier. It also has the additional advantage of the tremendous amount of technical and business support that companies receive through these spaces.

    There are a plethora of other companies that specifically work for helping others set up their virtual office spaces to such an extent that such assistance cannot be found in a physical office. Co-working spaces and meeting rooms are two recent examples of such support. It helps companies focus solely on their business.

    8. Cost Cutting

    Virtual offices cut down the cost that companies have to spend on office spaces to a great extent. At a time when only physical office spaces were prominent, a large part of their revenue goes to the maintenance of infrastructure which includes rent. It further takes a financial toll on the company if these offices are in prime locations like Bangalore, Mumbai, Pune or Delhi.

    Virtual spaces, in that regard, are a big relief to the company as it only demands a technologically sound office space which in many cases is relegated to an efficient communication platform and Google services.

    Apart from that, virtual spaces also give the liberty to the companies to longer provide allowances for transportation for their employees. Thus, virtual spaces play a significant role in reducing the overall expenses of the company. In fact, such spaces have given an impetus to a lot of startups which would have never rolled out in the first place if they had to set up an offline office.

    Conclusion

    As the world inches into a global village with advanced technologies reimagining businesses by the minute, the possibilities of virtual offices have become abundant. If utilised properly it can even be a feasible alternative to physical office spaces. However, depending on the nature of businesses the opportunities that virtual spaces offer will differ.

    FAQs

    What is a virtual office?

    A virtual office is a space with a physical address but it is less expensive than maintaining a traditional office.

    Is a virtual office a good idea?

    Yes, a virtual office is great for small businesses. It also boosts productivity among employees as they don’t have to travel to the physical office.

    How do I start a virtual office?

    Focus on communication, invest in the right tools, hire the right people, and make sure you establish a proper organisational structure.