Google India has launched ‘Shopping’ tab to enable users to flip through the products and direct them to the merchant websites or e-commerce platforms when searching for products to buy. Similar to the News and Image tab on Google, the shopping tab allows users to seamlessly control their search by putting necessary filters and browsing the desired product through listing in different websites. Google has collaborated with e-commerce players such as Flipkart,Paytm Mall,Myntra and Koovs, etc. to join the company’s shopping tab initiative.
“We are always exploring options to help consumers find the products they want to buy more quickly and efficiently from local merchants,” a Google spokesperson said.
The Google spokesperson confirming the latest initiative in an email response claimed that the feature will facilitate customer online shopping more efficiently from the local merchants as well along with e-commerce players. Reportedly, Google has collaborated with the leading e-commerce platforms including Flipkart, Snapdeal, Myntra and Paytm Mall on board in their latest project.
Besides, the search giant also intends to tap the SME space from local Kirana stores( like JioMart) to expensive art collection stores whose merchants are not necessarily listed on the e-commerce players’ websites. The ongoing talks between Google and retailers both big and small will help the search giant understand the country’s shopping trends. These local merchants need not necessarily list on platforms like Amazon or Flipkart.
Another Google spokesperson said, “ They (Google) will partner with retailers of all sizes. It can tell the user where the product is available, is it available online, etc. For now, this service is being provided free of cost.”
Through Shopping Tab, Google lists products through its ‘product listing ads’, the Shopping tab will give users a lot more control. For instance, users can filter the product they are looking for based on price or any other attributes such as price, seller, delivery, department, colour, shape & so on while also getting more details of the product by going to the ‘details’ page.
Google Shopping Tab allows users to filter Products
In the same way, Facebook has also initiated the trials for the Shopping tab for its mobile app with Facebook marketplace. Responding to the development, the melno park based networking platform, stated that
On Facebook, we’ve seen that people are coming to our platform not only to connect with friends and family but also with products and brands. We want to build native experiences that make it easier for both people to discover products on mobile and businesses to drive more sales.
With the decline in Google’s revenues due to Amazon gaining market shares on product, the search giant is eyeing to establish an e-commerce marketplace. On the ongoing tussle over Amazon’s dominance in the retail market, Arpan Sheth, a partner at consulting firm Bain & Company commented, “In the US, 50-60% product search begins at Amazon, bypassing Google and cannibalising its market,” he further added, “Google is losing online shoppers because of this and it is taking a hit at their advertising revenue.”
Currently, the search giant- Google is functioning the Shopping tab in 30 countries. On the merchant side, anyone with a product feed can plug into Google’s merchant centre to be listed on the shopping tab. On the user side, the tab has also seen high rates of engagement, largely due to the specificity that product search allows filter by attributes. With 80-85 million online shoppers, India is an important market for Google.
India is fast becoming a home for startups. With several initiatives that were undertaken by the Government to strengthen the economic state of the country, startups have witnessed a growth in mobility, food tech, gaming, and many other fields. The Confluence of social as well as technological factors has deeply impacted the investment scenario in the country. With the private sector underutilized, investments in the Indian market have increased.
The 21st century is all about Technologies like augmented reality and IoT, the new addition to the family being Blockchain Technology. This technology is not only limited to the creation of Bitcoin but has other applications too, which has raised a hype on the market. If explored its full potential, this technology can bring about revolutionary changes in various segments.
Investment Trend in India
Over 22 major languages are written in 13 different scripts and over 19, 500 dialects, that’s India, a culturally and linguistically diverse nation. These numbers clearly indicate a massive opportunity in the Indian market for vernacular interface and content. It aims at accommodating non-English speaking users with internet access and a medium to pitch in their ideas. People are making investments in different industries that are trending in the startup world. Let’s take a look at the industries that are trending and are becoming hot zone for investments.
Esports has exploded with popularity and is one of the fastest-growing industries in the world. Esports and gaming took off with the release of Xbox in early 2000, even though the concept of video games had been there since the 1970s. Realizing the potential in this segment, developers pitched in this virtual world. By the year 2024, the global revenue of this industry is set to reach $1.08 billion
Social Commerce
Through social commerce, a user can browse and compare products on social networking sites, say Facebook, and then make the purchase on Facebook itself rather than going to the company’s website to make the purchase. Currently, there are three social media sites that own the social commerce space: Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest. It is revolutionizing the face of online shopping and moulding e-commerce to give the customer a more social experience involving friends, family and peers.
Live Streaming
By providing real-time content, live streaming is a new way to attract and engage users by enabling them to connect instantly. The viewers can also communicate with each other on this platform. It gives the product or the service immediate feedback. This is a powerful marketing tool that the users find interactive and more engaging.
Fintech
With global giants zeroing on this space, financial technology is on the roll due to several reasons. With vast discrepancies in the country’s banking system, growing smartphone ownership, increasing access to the internet, a booming e-commerce market, and availability of a large talent pool with knowledge of both technology and financial services.
Direct-to-Consumer
Direct-to-consumer brands are transforming conventional and established marketing solutions by causing a fundamental change in the relationship of the brand with the consumers. Global suppliers are accessible now and consumers are willing to experiment with new brands that they discover online. Consumers are quite discerning in the quality of items they purchase, this is exactly what the DTC offers, a risk-free online shopping experience.
Blockchain Technology
Blockchain Tech has attracted the attention of people and has extreme potential to go big in the future. Apart from cryptocurrencies like Bitcoins, it has many other potentials in the field of healthcare, insurance, artist royalties, voting and welfare benefits. NFTs are also peeking its head through this technology and people are taking an interest in them.
Conclusion
The startup ecosystem in India is growing every day, people are finding this enigmatic and are keeping their interest in these fields. It is quite natural that investors are going to follow the trends as they give hints about which market is in for the long run. Investors create their strategies according to them and invest in those fields.
FAQs
What is Blockchain Technology?
Blockchain Technology is a public ledger that exists across the network and is decentralized in nature and it can be distributed digitally.
What is a Market trend?
A market trend is the moving of the market in a particular direction and it can be identified by price action.
Is Esports popular in India?
Esports is quite popular in India, the gaming industry has rapidly grown over the years.
In the context of artificial intelligence, Natural Language Processing (NLP) has emerged as a key to improving customer experience across industries. This is particularly evident in the retail, banking, and airline industries where NLP is transforming customer relations, improving performance, and spurring change.
As a top professional in this field, Gaurav Kashyap has been able to make a great impact in the enhancement of the domain-specific AI solutions especially by the continued development of the NATAS (Natural Language Assistant) NLP system. In this area, he has effectively implemented the NATAS system to handle multiple types of customer engagements.
Since the web application was designed to have an additional text/SMS interface, he expanded the applicability of this tool to include more users. This customisation was also applied to the development of domain-specific ontologies and pre-packaged canned query sets for sectors such as retail banking and finance that offered customers a more natural, targeted, and immediate query experience. These improvements not only shifted the focus of the tool to the customers but also contributed to the growth of the product to the level of enterprise visibility and engagement of clients from various industries, who were encouraged to test the system.
His contributions have benefited the organization in several ways. By frequently demonstrating the product as well as conducting pilot installations, his team managed to present the product to a specific user group, which greatly enhanced its recognition within the company and among its permanent stakeholders. After the production version was released, customers observed increased team effectiveness in their communication with business applications. This allowed the solution to save a significant amount of time for database queries, which improved their user experience.
It helped not only satisfy customers but also put the product into a category that other industries would value. The modification of the NATAS system interface and its dataset for individual clients was a significant project. This was a process of working closely with customer business analyst and architects to fine-tune the solution for customers. It also required constant evaluation and multiple versions of the product to be integrated into live business settings. The onboarding of these clients was a success in that it proved the viability and applicability of the solution in different industries.
The benefits of such projects can also be assessed by the extent of awareness and adoption in the various sectors. The organization became widely known not only due to the NLP tool but also because of other research works, such as AI enhancements for face detection. This visibility led to several new projects being signed on and helped cement the tool as the market leader in its category.
However, transferring a research-based product to a business environment was difficult. In the beginning, the product only provided a small amount of data; it was then decided that further enhancements had to be made to feed the customer’s data requirements. Furthermore, the customer’s application database was very large, and the IT infrastructure from the server side to the business rule engine had to be redesigned. These enhancements made it possible to process big data and produce accurate ontologies relevant to a specific domain for the best performance.
Through his work, “AI For Information Retrieval: Advancements in Search Engines and Chatbots through Deep Learning-Based Query Understanding”, Gaurav Kashyap has highlighted recent advancements in deep learning and natural language processing that have revolutionized information retrieval, enhancing search engines and chatbots to better understand and respond to user queries.
As suggested by industry experts like him, even more potential for the future of NLP in customer service can be observed further on. The current evolution towards automation in customer support using chatbots and virtual assistants is changing the nature of business-consumer relationships. With the help of NLP, understanding customers’ intentions, and providing the appropriate response to them, customer service has become faster, more efficien,t and more personalized.
In conclusion, the industry is experiencing the growth of multimodal conversational interfaces, which use both text and voice for effective communication. This trend coupled with improvements in emotional intelligence and speech recognition will only further entrench NLP in the development of better and user-centric AI systems.
Latest Indo-china border face-off lifted the #boycottchineseproduct trend insanely. Thus it becoming a serious headache for all the Chinese funded Indian Companies. Hence, we have noticed a major change in Paytm’s shareholding Pattern on Wikipedia.
In March 2015, Alibaba took 40% stock in Paytm as a Part of the strategic agreement. As the pressure building up, Paytm changed the shareholding pattern in Wikipedia on yesterday by replacing “Alibaba” with “ANT Financials”. ANT Financials is formerly known as Alipay which is an affiliate group of Alibaba. As the Twitteratis claiming, Paytm did that to sound non-Chinese.
Paytm changes Shareholding pattern on Wikipedia
Twitteratis asking people to stop using Paytm, as they have more shares from Chinese. Some of them putting screenshots of uninstalling the Paytm app. Instead, they are asking to use BHIM and Other Indian UPI apps as an alternative to Paytm.
At the same time certain group of people still showing support towards Paytm as it is an Indian Company. According to them, there are other eCommerce giants in India who have large numbers of Chinese investments. They have stakes on Flipkart, Ola, Oyo, Swiggy, Snapdeal, Zomato and the list goes on. Hence, What are you gonna do with them as well?
Tweet in Support of Paytm
As a result of the increasing heat between India and China, it will be interesting to see how Chinese funded top Indian brands deal with this #boycottchineseproduct trend.
Due to the ongoing military standoff at the Indo-China border, Chinese funded startups may face challenges in raising capital for their businesses. Chinese investors have found Indian startups valuable and deeply invested in top startups like Paytm, Zomato, BigBasket, and many more but soon these startups may face challenges in capital investments for their businesses due to the ongoing military standoff between two countries.
The military standoff may affect the Chinese invested startups in India and Chinese funded businesses, as per the reports Chinese investors have funded over 18 out of 30 unicorns in India which is roughly around $3.9 billion of investments in 2019.
Chinese investments in India
Businesses that already have Chinese investors deeply invested cannot afford to back out at this moment and will not, but early growth stage startups in India which are looking out and rely on foreign investments may find it difficult to find foreign capital investments for their startups.A startup founder said “While investments from china have slowed down, other avenues have open up from countries like the United States, UK, and the middle east”.
Foreign investors find investing in India attractive because India has an attractive risk-return trade off and India remains the second-fastest growing economy in the world.
The Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) through a Press Note No.3 of 2020, has announced that any of India’s neighboring countries will require the Indian Government approval in case of any FDI investments in India. Many have speculated that this move is aimed to restrain Chinese investments in India.
The companies that are going to be affected the most by the foreign direct investment (FDI) norms are Big basket, Ola and payments platform Paytm, these startups have so far received billions of dollars investments from Chinese companies.The FDI makes it compulsory for all the investors including Chinese direct and indirect investors to seek government approval before investing in Indian companies. This will create a hurdle for the Chinese investors such as Alibaba and Tencent who have invested billions in Indian startups.
“The new FDI guidelines essentially imply Chinese capital would require prior government approval. In effect, given the uncertainty around approval, startups will shy away from Chinese capital. In the immediate future, this could impact PhonePe and potentially Paytm at a later date,” said Ashneer Grover, CEO and co-founder, BharatPe.
lately Bigbasket was backed with a funding close to $50 million from Alibaba. The amount was funded to the company when it was struggling to meet the operations requirements due to restrictions imposed by the lockdown.
Top Chinese funded startups in India
According to the data gathered by Tracxn, C Chinese investors have backed unicorns like Byjus, Paytm, Ola, Oyo, Swiggy, Zomato, Dream11, and Udaan, while some investors have also invested in soonicorns (a term used for potential unicorns) such as Practo, ShareChat, Meesho, and CarDekho.
Top Chinese funded startups
The new FDI guidelines is going to affect the current investments as well as the investments by neighboring countries who are interested in investing in Indian startups.
Telecom Ministry of India has taken a major step against the boycotting of Chinese goods movement. They have given orders to the MTNL, BSNL and other big private companies to ban all the Chinese based deals and all the equipment they have been using. This has been a major economic decision that has been taken by the government after the India China standoff which led to killing of 20 Indian soldiers being an act of deceit by China.
Telecom Ministry orders MTNL BSNL to Ban Chinese Equipments
The Telecom Industry has told the service providers to make changes in their condition accordingly. They have also told them to cut off all the previous tenders and to rework on that too.
This critical decision which has been taken by the Indian government can also play a very major role in the 4G upgradation which has been done and the industry which was looking forward for the introduction of 5G networks can be also affected too. While Huawei was asked to perform a 5G rollout in India, but due to these changes this thing looks unlikely to happen.
Indian telecom market has been dependent on China based providers since the beginning. This has been a very crucial step and a very important one too. This can cause harm to the Chinese market a bit more. While, this being a first economical step between two countries, the relation is worsening.
The government has also said that any new brand deals will also be banned and all the equipment will be stopped in our country.
India and China relations worsening day by day
This step is clearly taken by the government as an answer to the killing of 20 Indian soldiers who were martyred at the LAC in Galwan Valley in Ladakh. The Indio-China relations have been in very bad terms for quite a while and has worsen after this incident.
This is the first time government has taken any major step regarding the India China conflict and providing them with a major setback. At a hard time like this, the step taken came immediately after a month long protest of banning of the Chinese based application in our country.
CAIT Generated a List of 500 Items Should be Banned Immediately
Also, the CAIT(Confederation of All India Traders) has also asked the people to boycott all the China based goods in our country. They have listed around items 500 which includes bags, textiles, furniture, watches, footware apparel and kitchen item too. The CAIT said in a statement, “By calling for the boycott of these Chinese products, the objective is to reduce import of Chinese finished goods by $13 billion or about Rs 1 lakh crore, by December 2021”.
They have also asked the Indian celebrities who endorse the Chinese products should also come forward and support this cause as the soldiers of our country are dying fighting against a cruel country like China.
A Very Tense Situation At the Ladakh Border
The situation at the Ladakh border is very much tensed after the Chinese soldiers crossed the borders even after the talk of not harming each other. They took a coward step against the us as it was “pre-meditated and planned action” by China.
People Also Breaking The China made Television
People in India have also shown their anger by throwing away the television sets which were made in China and breaking them. Effigies are also being burned of the Chinese leader Xi Jinping in many of the Indian cities.
These steps are very important to show the Chinese government our solidarity against the use of any of their products and what harm can be done to them without even picking up any weapons. It is high time now and taking these important decisions should be necessary. China has created a very big impact in the Indian market and it will be very difficult to abolish all their products but at the same time it has become very important for us to take these kind of steps.
Can Pave The Way For Atmanirbhar India
Well, some positives can also be taken from this step taken by government as people will start working inside India more and the dependency will lower for sure. It will be a tough road but the results can be fruitful. Atmanirbhar campaign will get more of the support through this and now Indian based services can boom up helping India to become a strong economy.
The telecom industry will shortly require some different alternative and then these industries will start to look up to the Indian based startups and the millennial of our country. Indians are working on them and this could be a big help in terms of economic front.
Decisions are hard and time consuming. Taski helps you make right decisions every-time. Taski is trying to cater to this problem by providing a web app which helps you take better and faster decisions with a wide number of frameworks like SWOT, RICE, etc. It has been featured as #3 Product of the Day on Product Hunt.
Read this article to know about Taski, products, founder, business model, startup launch, challenges and future plans.
Taski works in the productivity domain. The market is growing highly as more and more people get on internet and want to sort their busy lives.
Some research shows that every person takes around 70 important decisions and over 35,000 simple decisions daily. Surely, this domain is going to expand much more in coming years with daily increasing internet users.
How was Taski Started?
Taski originated from a simple problem. We all make decisions! Sometimes it’s as simple as tea vs coffee and can be as complex as deciding new product features.
Taski founder Mohit personally faced a lot of problems in making decisions on which framework to choose, which companies to apply to, and which features to build first for his ideas. He did some research and read some brilliant articles on taking decisions.
After browsing through multiple articles, he found there are so many frameworks that work perfectly in certain scenarios like SWOT and Eisenhower Matrix.
Taski SWOT Analysis
Unfortunately, there are no proper tools for people to use frameworks to make decisions. Mohit Khare did some research and asked around many product managers on how they make decisions. Many did use such frameworks, but mostly on excel or on paper, which is not the best solution. He even got a very good response and interest in the idea of improving decision making.
Taski Ikigai
Finally, he decided to build something clean and simple which almost anyone can use across any platform (web/mobile). Mohit’s idea for the MVP was to keep it as simple and intuitive as possible, give users a way to make and share their decisions.
Taski is a simple responsive web app which works both on mobile and web platform. As you go to usetaski.com, you see a set of tools to make your decisions. Head over to the “how it works” page to learn more about each of the available frameworks. Suppose you start with the SWOT framework, you see a list of predefined sections where you can add your tasks, you also have the option to mark them as done, Ability to delete the task and easy task addition with just enter key.
Taski website snapshot
Taski also provides an option to share your decisions and research in multiple formats like Image, PDF, Markdown, and Document.
Founders of Taski and team
Mohit Khare is the founder and maker of Taski.
He is currently focusing on building core features of Taski. Although a lot of people have reached out to collaborate, he will be focusing on expanding team as the platform gets more users.
Since the product was focused around increasing productivity with decision making and at its core, it uses the task model, Taski came up as a short and subtle name for the product. Most importantly, Mohit could find a good domain for this.
Taski Logo
The logo again is highly inspired by the task and checklist model. Since essentially Taski uses a checklist to get work done, the logo signifies that with 2 symbolic checkmarks.
Taski – Business Model and Revenue Model
Currently, Taski is free for everyone. The founder initially wanted to see how people respond to it. There have been multiple feature requests, some of which will come up with a pro plan where you can save your decision in a personalized dashboard and have access to many other frameworks. Stay tuned, a lot of features are already in development.
The plan is to go with the Freemium business model, core features of Taski will remain free for use but you wouldn’t want to miss out on the Pro version. You will see the pricing and details around it soon.
Taski has got over 10K page views in its first week and over 3000 users have already tried the platform. Right now, the only platform Mohit used for marketing was social media like Twitter, Linkedin, Facebook, and product launch sites like Product Hunt, Betalist, etc.
Taski – Startup Challenges
One of the challenges was actually figuring out which frameworks and decision tools people actually use and how do they use it right now. You need to find the problem before building a solution. There were minor tech blockers as well but that is always there and you get past them eventually.
Taski – Future Plans
Future plans include launching a personalized dashboard for users for easy management. They also have a plan for launching a team-based version for Taski.
Tourism and Travel never fail to fascinate people, and it never goes outdated. In 2018, Indian travelers took approximately 2 billion domestic and international trips, and spent over $94 billion on transportation, accommodation and consumption during travel. The travel and tourism sector in India is growing fast and another trend we see is the increasing share of online travel bookings. As per reports, the share of online travel booking was 25% in 2018, and is expected to increase to 35% till 2021, with increase in internet penetration. Keeping up with this trend, many Online Travel Agencies have come up, of which Make My Trip, Yatra, Cleartrip etc are some well know names, but there are also some other players that are quietly but fast gaining a higher position for itself in the online travel booking segment. One such company that is now posing threat to the market leaders in the OTA segment is ‘HappyEasyGo’. Founded in May 2017, this company has achieved quite a lot just within three years of its inception. Let’s have a look at HappyEasyGo’s journey so far.
Gurugram based HappyEasyGo offers flight and hotel booking services at very modest rates. Founded by Boris Zha, HappyEasyGo initially started only with booking tickets for domestic and international flights, and later it incorporated hotel booking facilities across India. It provides convenient booking solutions for customers in its mobile application and through their website, with easy cancellation and rescheduling options, which helps the customers to save more in their travel packages.
Boris Zha founded HappyEasyGo in 2017, with the vision to provide convenient ways of reservation for business and leisure travelers at affordable prices. Boris who is from Singapore also founded Lvbanx.com in 2012, which is now one of the top top B2B OTAs in China. Prior to venturing into the online travel segment, Boris made a mark in the education sector too. Boris Joined Neworld Education Group in 2006, as a founding member of Sakura International Japanese. Boris also served as the CIO of Neworld Education Group.
HappyEasyGo Founder & CEO Boris Zha
Vivek Prabhakar is the co-founder of HappyEasyGo . An alumni of Jawahar Lal Nehru University (Chinese Language and South East Asia Studies) and Harvard Business School, Vivek founded VINI Group prior to joining HappyEasyGo as the cofounder.
HappyEasyGo Co-founder Vivek Prabhakar
The three main directors of HappyEasyGo are Rajesh Kumar Dathik, Zhou Lei, and YanqiuZha. As per LinkedIn, HappyEasyGo has around 500-1000 employees.
HappyEasyGo – Growth & Revenue
Within a short span, HappyEasyGo has become the leading online travel platform in India, and has over 10 million user base. As reported in 2019, HappyEasyGo was doing around 25,000 air ticket transactions daily, while it did a little over 1000 hotel bookings as day, as revealed by the HappyEasyGo CEO Boris Zha. HappyEasyGo’s annual revenue is estimated to be around $3 M per year (as per Owler), and has an authorized capital of INR 15 Cr. As revealed by Boris, till April 2019, 80% of HappyEasyGo’s air ticketing volume comes from individual consumers, while only 20% came from corporations and business accounts.
OTAs like HappyEasyGo earns revenue from various sources like-
Commission – Here the company earns commission when customers purchase air tickets or book hotels through their platform. In case of hotel booking, merchant model is also followed. In the merchant model, OTAs like HappyEasyGo books hotel rooms in bulk at discounted price, and sells the same to the customers at market price and thus earns profit.
Advertising Revenue – OTAs also lets Hotels advertise on their platform and earns money from it.
Earnings from Tie-ups – OTAs also ties up with banks and financial institutes to provide various facilities like travel insurance, for various offers on travel bookings etc, and earns commission when consumers buy insurance or avail services from banks or financial services through their platform. For example, HappyEasyGo tied up with MobiKwik, whereby customers can avail offers on making payment through MobiKwik, and also HappyEasyGo earns commission on the same.
HappyEasyGo offers discount on making payment through MobiKwik
HappyEasyGo – Competitors
The major competitors of HappyEasyGo are MakeMyTrip, Yatra, Cleartrip, Ixigo and Paytm. Though there are a lot of competitors in the travel industry, HappyEasyGo with its great performance is fast and steadily rising above the competition. As reported in 2018, i.e just within one year of its inception, HappyEasyGo went ahead of Paytm (Paytm started its travel business in 2014). In 2018, HappyEasyGo was doing around 1,80,000 to 2,00,000 flight ticket booking a month, which is more than that of Paytm which then was doing 100,000 to 120,000 flight ticket bookings a month. While, during the same period, Yatra and Cleartrip were processing between 2,30,000 – 3,00,000 flight tickets every year.
HappyEasyGo intends to extend the hotel booking allocations across the country and to build up its air ticketing services with increased market shares. With the motto of sustaining the lowest price, the company ascribes with popular brands to expand its services. Amidst the current Corona Virus Crisis, HappyEasyGo is not only letting its customer reschedule their travel dates without paying any rescheduling fee, but has also tied up with healthcare brands like 1mg, Medlife, Himalaya etc, whereby the company will provide discount coupons of these brands to its customers.
As said by HappyEasyGo founder Boris Zha, the company is looking forward to closing 3000 hotel bookings a day and aims to become the best online travel aggregator in India.
“India is the third-largest air travelling country in the world and we are confident to utilize the fresh funds towards gaining a commanding position in the cluttered online travel market in India”, added Boris after HappyEasyGo’s latest round of funding raised in December 2019.
Reliance Jio is not just a telecom network, it is an entire ecosystem that allows Indians to live their digital life to the fullest. It was founded by Mr Mukesh Ambani who has been working on the JIO Infocomm Ltd since 2010. The idea is said to have come into existence when his daughter Isha Ambani complained of Low data speed (She is to thank for the fast downloads we are availing using JIO now).
Jio Platforms is a next-generation technology platform focused on providing high-quality and affordable digital services across India. Jio Platforms has made significant investments across its digital ecosystem which is powered by leading technologies like broadband connectivity, smart devices, cloud and edge computing, big data analytics, artificial intelligence, Internet of Things(IoT), augmented and mixed reality, and blockchain.
Jio’s vision is to enable a Digital India for 1.3 billion people and businesses across the country, including small merchants, micro-businesses, and farmers so that all of them can enjoy inclusive growth together. With these investments, Ambani plans to drive Jio ahead in the competition with giants like Amazon.com Inc. and Walmart Inc., both of which have investments in.
In this article, we will talk about the companies that have invested in Reliance JIO in 2020. So let’s get started.
The social media giantFacebook had announced on April 22 its plans to invest $5.7 billion which is Indian INR 43574 Crore for a 9.99% stake in Reliance Industries Limited’s(RIL) telecom business, Reliance Jio. By partnering with Jio, Facebook plans to take advantage of its popular WhatsApp messenger to offer digital payment services to small grocers in India.
With a 9.9 % stake in Reliance Jio, Facebook gets a firm foothold in a fast-growing market in India. Also, it helps Reliance Jio to significantly cut down its debts. The deal valued Jio at Rs 4.62 lakh crore ($65.95 billion). It was Facebook’s biggest deal since the $22 billion buyouts of WhatsApp in 2014.
Three days later, Reliance Retail signed a commercial agreement with Facebook’s WhatsApp to further the reach of its online venture JioMart as it went live on WhatsApp on April 26.Jio Mart began offering its services in sub-urban Mumbai areas like Navi Mumbai, Thane, and Kalyan. These services will be extended all over the country.
This deal is expected to show the capacity for scaling due to a heavy user base comprising 400 millionWhatsApp users and Jio’s 388 million subscribers. JioMart uses WhatsApp to bring in high-speed information and digital cash. JioMart and Whatsapp will empower nearly 3 crores of small Indian Kirana shops to digitally transact and take on giants such as Amazon India.
Silver Lake Partners and Jio Deal
Jio-Silver Lake deal came less than two weeks after the Facebook deal. On the 4th of May, Silver Lake Partners, an American private equity giant, bought a 1% stake in Jio Platforms for INR 5,655.75 crore($750 million). This deal took Jio’s enterprise value to INR 5.15 lakh crore and represents a 12.5% premium to the equity valuation of Facebook’s investment again hitting the investing road with Jio, they invested around INR 4,546.8 crore taking around 2.08%of the company stake. Now the aggregate investment by this firm is around INR 10,202.55 crore.
"Silver Lake Partners has an outstanding record of being a valuable partner for leading technology companies globally. We are excited to leverage insights from their global technology relationships for the Indian digital society’s transformation."- Mukesh Ambani, Chairman, Reliance Industries Limited
These deals will help Reliance use Facebook’s tech in its new businesses. It will give the US tech giant’s Indian reach a massive boost through a partner in Ambani who is widely perceived to be influential in government circles. Silver Lake’s investment highlights Reliance’s ability to monetize its digital services business and strengthens Reliance’s already strong financial flexibility.
Silver Lake Partners (SLP) was launched in 1999 as a specialist firm to focus on technology company investments. SLP made headlines after acquiring PC maker Dell Inc in conjunction with Michael Dell in 2013. Its portfolio of investments collectively generates revenues of more than $204 billion annually. Its portfolio includes Twitter, Airbnb, Alibaba Group, Ant Financial, Didi Chuxing, Motorola Solutions, and City Football Group.
Vista Equity Partners and Jio Deal
On the 8th of May, Vista Equity Partners, a US-based private equity firm running the world’s largest exclusively tech-focused fund, bought a 2.32 % stake in Jio Platforms for INR 11,367 Crores. The deal made it the third high-profile investment in the Reliance Industries Ltd’ (RIL) unit and highlights Jio’s status as a next-generation software and platform company.
This deal valued Jio Platforms at an equity value of Rs 4.91 lakh crore and an enterprise value of Rs 5.16 lakh crore. Vista’s investment is at a 12.5% premium over the deal with Facebook. It will be Vista’s biggest investment outside of its home country and it’s first in Asia. With this deal, Jio has become the fourth most valued entity in India after HDFC Bank, TCS, and RIL.
“In Robert and Brian, whose family hails from Gujarat, I found two outstanding global technology leaders who believe in India and the transformative potential of a digital Indian society. We are excited to leverage the professional expertise and multi-level support that Vista has been offering to its investments globally for the benefit of Jio.” – Mukesh Ambani, Chairman, Reliance Industries Limited
The investment from Vista will be used by Jio to buy back RIL’s optionally convertible preference shares. The Vista deal will further help in fixing the equity value of Jio and improve RIL’s cash flows. This will accelerate RIL’s deleveraging exercise as RIL plans to eliminate Rs 1.75 lakh crore of net debt by the end of this financial year. Through Jio, Vista hopes to earn good returns as and when the telecom and technology company goes public, which is part of Ambani’s plan.
“Mukesh’s vision as a global pioneer, alongside Jio’s world-class leadership team, has built a platform to scale and advance the data revolution it started. We are thrilled to join Jio Platforms to deliver exponential growth in connectivity across India, providing modern consumer, small business, and enterprise software to fuel the future of one of the world’s fastest-growing digital economies.” -Robert Smith, Chairman, Vista
General Atlantic and Jio Deal
Billionaire Mukesh Ambani extended his fund-raising streak for Jio Platforms Ltd. by selling a 1.34% equity stake to General Atlantic on May 17. Reliance Industries Limited and Jio Platforms Limited announced an investment of ₹ 6,598.38 crores ($873 Mn) stake by General Atlantic, a leading global growth equity firm that has invested in Airbnb Inc. and Uber Technologies Inc.
This investment values Jio Platforms at an equity value of ₹ 4.91 lakh crore and an enterprise value of ₹ 5.16 lakh crore. The deal will consolidate backing for Jio’s plan to use its almost 400 million mobile phone subscribers as a base for an e-commerce drive to use India’s vast consumer markets—from retail to education and payments. The deal will also support Ambani’s vow to pay down more than $20 billion of net debt at Reliance earlier than an initial March 2021 deadline.
“We are delighted that a renowned global investor like General Atlantic is partnering with us in our journey to digitally empower India and Indians. Jio is committed to making a digitally inclusive India that will provide immense opportunities to every Indian citizen.” -Akash Ambani, Director, Reliance Jio
General Atlantic is a leading global growth equity firm with a 40-year track record of investing in the Technology, Consumer, Financial Services, and Healthcaresectors. It operates across 14 locations as an integrated team under a global investment platform. To date, General Atlantic has invested in prominent entrepreneurs and companies around the world such as Airbnb, Alibaba, Ant Financial, Box, ByteDance, Facebook, Slack, Snapchat, Uber,and other global technology leaders.
KKR & Co. Inc. and Jio Deal
KKR is an American private equity firm and has also been one of the key investors by buying around INR 11367 crores around 2.32% of the stake.
“We are looking forward to leveraging KKR’s global platform, industry knowledge, and operational expertise to further grow Jio.” -Mukesh Ambani, Chairman, Reliance Industries Limited
KKR was founded in 1976 by Henry Kravis and George Roberts and since then has been a prime equity firm of the US market.
“Few companies have the potential to transform a country’s digital ecosystem in the way that Jio Platforms is doing in India, and potentially worldwide.” – Henry Kravis, Chairman, KKR
Mubadala Investment Company and Jio Deal
Striking a deal of Rs 9093.6 crore with the Abu Dhabi based investment company will surely help Reliance Jio to expand its reach towards the gulf countries. It will help them expand their venture globally. While so many US-based firms investing now Abu Dhabi based firms also becoming important investors.
Mubadala Investment Company founded in 2017 in Abu Dhabi, UAE has been one of the key investing companies which have helped in growing up UAE economy on a global front. Investments like these can play a key role in developing Jio hold all around the world.
Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA) and Jio Deal
Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA), one of the world’s biggest sovereign wealth funds, will pump Rs 5,683.5 crore into Jio Platforms joining the list of global tech investors that have invested millions of dollars on the Reliance Industries unit due to its unique potential to dominate India’s booming digital economy.
“I am delighted that ADIA, with its track record of more than four decades of successful long-term value investing across the world, is partnering with Jio Platforms in its mission to take India to digital leadership and generate inclusive growth opportunities. This investment is a strong endorsement of our strategy and India’s potential.” -Mukesh Ambani, Chairman, Reliance Industries
The decision by ADIA, a globally-diversified investment institution, in exchange for a 1.16 % stake, is an unprecedented eighth investment in Jio Platforms in less than seven weeks and marks the largest continuous fundraising action by a company anywhere in the world. RIL, the oil-to-retail-to-telecom conglomerate, has now sold a little over 21 % stake in Jio Platforms through a flurry of fundraising deals and raised as much as Rs 97,885.65 crore, or $12.96 billion.
“Our investment in Jio is a further demonstration of ADIA’s ability to draw on deep regional and sector expertise to invest globally in market-leading companies and alongside proven partners.” -Hamad Shahwan Aldhaheri, Executive Director, ADIA
TPG and Jio Deal
TPG Captial is going to invest 4,546.80 Crores for a 0.93% stake in the Jio platform, making it the ninth deal in just a span of seven weeks taking the combined fundraising in the Reliance Industries unit across the 1 lakh crore mark. TPG has previously invested in Companies like Airbnb, Uber and Spotify.
“Today, I am happy to welcome TPG as valued investors in our continued efforts towards digitally empowering the lives of Indians through the creation of a digital ecosystem. We have been impressed by TPG’s track record of investing in global technology businesses which serve hundreds of millions of consumers and small businesses, making the societies we live in better.” -Mukesh Ambani, Chairman, Reliance Industries
In TPG’s more than 25 years of history, it has successfully built an ecosystem made up of hundreds of portfolio companies and a value-added network of professionals, executives and advisors around the world. By offering institutional support and global resources, TPG enables these companies to reach their full potential and unlock greater possibilities.
“We are excited to partner Reliance to invest in Jio. As an investor in growth, change, and innovation for over 25 years – and with a longstanding presence in India — we are excited to play an early role in Jio’s journey as they continue to transform and advance India’s digital economy. Jio is a disruptive industry leader that is empowering small businesses and consumers across India by providing them with critical, high-quality digital services. The company is bringing unmatched potential and execution capabilities to the market, setting the tone for all technology companies to come.” -Jim Coulter, Co-CEO, TPG
L Catterton and Jio Deal
The world’s largest consumer-focused private equity firm L Catterton is going to invest Rs 1,894.50 crore in Jio Platforms for a 0.39% stake in Reliance Jio. With this Reliance, Jio has made a historic record with 10 investments in just seven weeks and has raised INR 104,326.95 Crores from leading global investors since April 22nd, 2020.
“I am delighted to welcome L Catterton as a partner in our journey to unleash the power of digital for India while providing a consumer experience that is among the best in the world. I particularly look forward to gaining from L Catterton’s invaluable experience in creating consumer-centric businesses because technology and consumer experience need to work together to propel India to achieving digital leadership.” -Mukesh Ambani, Chairman, Reliance Industries
L Catterton is a preferred investment partner for several leading consumer-focused brands around the world. Having a 30-year track record of leveraging its operational expertise, deep sector insights, a global network of resources, and its unique partnership with LVMH and Groupe Arnault, L Catterton has successfully invested in and helped build some of the most innovative brands at the forefront of the evolving consumer landscape, including Peloton, Vroom, ClassPass, Owndays, FabIndia, and more.
“Over our more than 30 year history, we have established a track record of building many of the most important brands across all consumer categories and geographies, from retailers, omni-channel and digitally native brands. We are strong supporters of fostering growth through product development, enhanced digital capabilities, and strategic alliances. We look forward to partnering with Jio, which is uniquely positioned to execute on its vision and mission to transform the country and build a digital society for 1.3 billion Indians through its unmatched digital and technological capabilities" -Michael Chu, Global Co-CEO, L Catterton
Saudi Arabia’s PIF and Jio Deal
Saudi Arabia’s wealth fund Public Investment Fund (PIF), one of the world’s largest sovereign wealth funds is all set to pick up a 2.32 per cent stake in Indian oil-to-telecom conglomerate Reliance Industries’ Jio, for an estimated $1.5 billion. With PIF coming on board, Jio Platforms has diluted 25 per cent of its equity. That’s the maximum they intend to dilute to financial investors, which includes Mark Zukerberg’s Facebook. Any new investors coming on board in future will have to be “strategic investors, a tech giant, for instance,” said a source who was part of the deal-making process.
Conclusion
The secret behind Jio’s success is that it’s customer-centric and has a webscale mentality. Reliance Jio made it look easy when it successfully swooped into the jam-packed and super competitive mobile market with free 4G voice and data service. So in short Reliance Jio aims at harnessing the full potential of the internet to create a digital revolution through its technologies. Innovative services and long-term planning will radically bring the world to one’s fingertips much faster and also transform the way Indians think, work, live, and are entertained.
FAQs
Who is the founder of Reliance Industries Limited?
Dhirubhai Ambani is the founder of Reliance Industries Limited.
Who is Mukesh Ambani?
Mukesh Ambani is the managing director of Reliance Industries Ltd.
Google announced the names of 10 startups from 10 countries selected for Demo Day Asiahosted by Google for Entrepreneurs in Shanghai on September 20, 2018. the tech giant. Google has brought a group of well-founded and investable companies from around the world. Out of 305 applications from entrepreneurs across the world, 10 ventures were chosen as finalists. Good news is that an Indian startup SigTuplehas managed to outshine the flock.
This international startup pitching event, Google Demo Day, being organised for the first time, will provide a crash course to selected early stage startups. Also it will provide them mentoring to help sharpen their pitch, which will later be delivered to venture capitalists and other investors from Google’s entrepreneurship network.
The startups selected are from India, Indonesia, Sydney, Japan, Pakistan, China, Bangkok, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Korea. They are working across sectors such as agriculture, entertainment, healthcare. Bengaluru-based SigTuple has been selected from India, among the selected startups. They will get funds and guidance from distinguished investors from the Google for Entrepreneurs network, China-based VC firm Sequoia Capital and Venturra Capital.
Top 10 Startups at Google’s Demo Day Asia
SigTuple
Founded by Apurv Anand and Rohit Pandey in the year 2015, SigTuple aims to automate medical diagnosis in the country by creating AI solutions. Bengaluru-based medtech startup SigTuple was presented with the “Judges’ Choice” award at the Google’s first Demo Day Asia programme held in Shanghai, China. The startup aims to incorporate Artificial Intelligence in the Indian healthcare system.
Apurv Anand, Co-Founder SigTuple, thanking the entire team back home in a statement said, “It’s really wonderful to be recognised at the first Google Demo Day Asia! This one is all for our team back home. This award is dedicated to the entire SigTuple family.”
The startup’s flagship programme and AI-driven platform- Manthana, helps to study visual medical data efficiently such as analysis of peripheral blood smears, urine microscopy, semen, fundus and OCT (optical coherence tomography) scans and chest X-rays.
Marham
Marham is Pakistan-based healthtech startup founded in 2015 by Asma Salman Omer. The digital healthcare platform bagged the “Audience Choice” Award. It helps users connect with health practitioners, doctors for various medical services. The startup assists people to seamlessly search, book appointments, and consult with doctors online in three cities namely Lahore, Islamabad and Karachi.
Indonesia-based startup DycodeX was founded in 2014. It focuses on the development of smart hardware, embedded systems, Internet of Things for livestock farming. The startup presented its latest developed SMARTernak that is an IoT-based smart cattle-farming solution technology to help cattle-farmers monitor the well-being and location of their herd.
Selected Startups will get funding from Sequoia Capital
FreightExchange
Australia-based FreightExchange was founded in 2014 by Cate Hull and Martyn Hann. This online logistics platform offers freight carriers to sell their unused space to shippers. Its solution provides a simple, automated way for carriers to connect with shippers allowing people to manage freight services.
GITAI
Japanese Robotech startup that specializes in building humanoid robots that can help humans conduct scientific experiments in space. The Avatar robot will be placed at the International Space Station and controlled with a Virtual Reality Head-Mounted Display (VR HMD), a motion capture suit and a haptic glove.
OneStockHome
Thailand- based OneStockHome was founded in 2009 by Anawach Kimhasawad. OneStockHome offers an e-commerce platform for construction materials. The platform offers a seamless shopping experience for users, offering them the best products at the lowest cost. With the help of dropship method, contractors can efficiently deal with different suppliers.
Origami Labs
Hong Kong-based Origami Labs was founded in 2011 by Emile Chan, Marcus Leung-Shea and Johan Wong. Origami Labs makes voice-powered smart rings that allow people to hear and send text messages without taking out their phones.
Miotech
China-based MioTech was founded in 2016 by Jason Tu. It is an AI-based platform that empowers financial institutions to better manage and draw insights on their data. Shanghai headquartered fintech startup is developing artificial intelligence-based software for financial services firms.
Singapore-based SkyMagic was founded in 2015. SkyMagic produces drone swarming technology for live entertainment and traffic management systems. Drawing on years of experience in the live entertainment market, its agile team delivers a full turnkey service to ensure quality and excellence throughout a project.
Swingvy
The Korean startup Swingvy founded in 2016 by Jin Choeh, Kit Hoong. Swingv aims to assist the office-workers through modern HR automation technology by revolutionizing HR practice in Southeast Asia. Swingvy aims to replace paperwork or spreadsheets and help customers to manage all their HR in one place.
