📄Company Profiles Archives - Page 104 of 115

JPMorgan – One Of The Largest Financial Holding Company

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 the organization it is based on.

JPMorgan(John Pierpont Morgan) Chase & Co. is an American multinational investment bank and financial services holding company headquartered in New York City. JPMorgan Chase is ranked by S&P Global as the largest bank in the United States and the seventh largest bank in the world by total assets, with total assets of US$3.213 trillion.

It is also the world’s most valuable bank by market capitalization. As a “Bulge Bracket” bank, it is a major provider of various investment banking and financial services. It is one of America’s Big Four banks, along with Bank of America, Citigroup, and Wells Fargo.

JPMorgan – Company Highlights

Startup Name	JPMorgan Chase & Co.
Headquarters	New York City, New York, U.S.
Industry	Financial services
Founded	December 1, 2000
Founder	Balthazar P. Melick(Chemical Bank), John Pierpont Morgan(J.P. Morgan & Co.), Aaron Burr(The Manhattan Company) and John Thompson(Chase National Bank)
CEO	Jamie Dimon
Areas Served	Worldwide
Website	www.jpmorganchase.com

JPMorgan – About and How it Works?
JPMorgan – Logo and its Meaning
JPMorgan – Founder and History
JPMorgan – Mission
JPMorgan – Business Model
JPMorgan – Revenue and Growth
JPMorgan – Investments
JPMorgan – Acquisitions
JPMorgan – Competitors
JPMorgan – Challenges Faced
JPMorgan – Future Plans
JPMorgan – FAQs

JPMorgan – About and How it Works?

JPMorgan Chase & Co. is a financial holding company. It provides financial and investment banking services. The firm offers a range of investment banking products and services in all capital markets, including advising on corporate strategy and structure, capital raising in equity and debt markets, risk management, market making in cash securities and derivative instruments, and brokerage and research.

It operates through the following segments: Consumer and Community Banking, Corporate and Investment Bank, Commercial Banking and Asset and Wealth Management.

The Consumer and Community Banking segment serves consumers and businesses through personal service at bank branches and through automated teller machine, online, mobile, and telephone banking. The Corporate and Investment Bank segment offers a suite of investment banking, market-making, prime brokerage, and treasury and securities products and services to a global client base of corporations, investors, financial institutions, government and municipal entities.

The Commercial Banking segment delivers services to the U.S. and its multinational clients, including corporations, municipalities, financial institutions, and non-profit entities. It also provides financing to real estate investors and owners as well as financial solutions, including lending, treasury services, investment banking, and asset management. The Asset and Wealth Management segment provides asset and wealth management services.

JPMorgan – Logo and its Meaning

Logo of JPMorgan Chase & Co.

The geometry of the emblem and its colours stood for confidence, loyalty, professionalism, and unity, and showed the bank as a strong financial organization with its customers as the main value.

JPMorgan – Founder and History

JPMorgan Chase, in its current form, has its roots in more than 1,200 predecessor banks, including major heritage firms JP Morgan, Chase Manhattan, Chemical Bank, Manufacturers Hanover, Bank One, First Chicago, and National Bank of Detroit. These entities all played a significant role in the growth of the US and global economies. The earliest of the Company’s predecessor companies was The Bank of the Manhattan Company, which was established in 1799 by Aaron Burr as only the second commercial bank in the US.

JPMorgan Chase is built upon numerous mergers and acquisitions. Arguably, the most significant of these was the 2000 merger between JP Morgan and Company and The Chase Manhattan Corporation, which effectively combined four of the largest and oldest banking institutions in New York City – JP Morgan, Chase Bank, Chemical Bank, and Manufacturers Hanover – to form JP Morgan Chase and Company.

JPMorgan is now one of the largest banking institutions in the world. It is ranked 23^rd in the Fortune 500 list and 5^th in the Forbes 2000 list. The Company trades its shares on the New York Stock Exchange and has a current market capitalization of $243.59 billion.

JPMorgan – Mission

JP Morgan’s mission statement says, “JPMorgan provides a range of banking and financial services to consumer, corporations and public institutions, with the aim of enhancing their financial wellbeing and helping to effectively manage their finances.”

JPMorgan – Business Model

JPMorgan Chase organizes its activities into core major reportable business segments

Consumer and Community Banking, which provides consumers and businesses with consumer and community banking services – such as deposit, lending and investment products – through personal service at bank branches and through automated teller machines, online, mobile and telephone banking;
Corporate and Investment Bank, which provides of banking and markets and investor services, including a suite of investment banking, market-making, prime brokerage, and treasury and securities products and services, to corporations and institutions worldwide;
Commercial Banking, which provides delivers industry knowledge, expertise, and advisory services to commercial clients, as well as financing to real estate investors and owners; and
Asset Management, which provides investment advisory and wealth management services.

JPMorgan Chase also operates a Corporate segment, which comprises the activities of corporate staff units.

JPMorgan – Revenue and Growth

JPMorgan Chase generates revenue through the provision of various banking and financial services and products. Revenue is derived principally through fees and commissions imposed upon customers in relation to the Company’s services, including advisory, investment banking, management, and underwriting fees.

The Company’s largest portion of revenue was derived from asset management, administration, and commissions, which amounted to $15.51 billion for the year.

JPMorgan Chase revenue for the quarter ending September 30, 2020 was $30.834B, a 14.79% decline year-over-year.

Year	Amount	Percentage Change from Last Year
2019	$142.422B	+9.5%
2018	$130.07B	+13.52%
2017	$114.579B	7.7%

JPMorgan – Investments

JP Morgan Chase has made 144 investments. Their most recent investment was on Nov 9, 2020, when NovoCure raised $150M.

Date	Organization Name	Round	Amount
Nov 9, 2020	NovoCure	Post IPO Debt	$150M
Jul 28, 2020	Pharmapacks	Private Equity Round	$150M
Jul 18, 2020	Contemporary Amperex Technology	Post IPO Equity	CN¥19.7B
Jun 25, 2020	Capital Markets Gateway	Series B	$25M
Jun 22, 2020	Cedar	Debt Financing	$25M
Jun 4, 2020	Cloud9 Technologies	Series B	$17.5M
Mar 23, 2020	iCapital Network	Venture Round	$146M
Mar 3, 2020	The Joint	Post IPO Debt	$7.5M
Feb 3, 2020	Launch NY	Grant	$300K
Jan 17, 2020	Arcesium	Corporate Boy	–

JPMorgan – Acquisitions

JP Morgan Chase has acquired 10 organizations. Their most recent acquisition was InstaMed on May 17, 2019.

Acquiree Name	Date	Amount	About Acquiree
InstaMed	May 17, 2019	–	InstaMed simplifies healthcare payments for providers, payers, and consumers
WePay	Oct 17, 2017	$400M	WePay is the payments partner to the platform economy
J.P. Morgan Cazenove	Nov 19, 2009	–	J.P. Morgan Cazenove is a leading investment bank focused on mergers & acquisitions, debt and equity placements and equity research
Washington Mutual	Sep 26, 2008	–	Washington Mutual is a savings bank holding company providing consumer banking and financial services
Bear Stearns	Mar 17, 2008	–	Bear Stearns is an investment banking, securities trading and brokerage firm
Xspand	Mar 1, 2008	–	Xspand is a provider of revenue solutions that focuses on purchasing, servicing and securitizing municipal tax liens
Collegiate Funding Services	Dec 15, 2005	–	Collegiate Funding is a vertically integrated education finance company that markets, originates, finances and services education loans
Neovest Holdings	Jun 23, 2005	–	Neovest Holdings an independently operated technology company providing a comprehensive suite of global broker-neutral financial services
Bank One	Jan 15, 2004	$58B	Bank One is a Chicago-based multibank holding company providing many banking and financial services
Hambrecht & Quist	Sep 28, 1999	$1.4B	Hambrecht & Quist is an investment bank that focuses on the technology and internet sectors

JPMorgan – Competitors

The top 10 competitors in JPMorgan Chase’s competitive set are Citi, Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Morgan Stanley, Capital One, Credit Suisse, Fidelity, Wells Fargo, American Express and HSBC.

JPMorgan – Challenges Faced

“We do not worry about the stock price in the short run,” Dimon (CEO) said. “If you continue to build a great company, the stock price will take care of itself.”

Economic risks on the horizon – The excessive disruption in the financial markets at the end of 2018 was “a harbinger of things to come,” as investor sentiment remained precarious.
Because of divisive politics, America was unable to keep pace in a new world – The federal government was becoming less relevant to what is going on in people’s lives, Dimon said. As a result, people lost faith in their politicians’ ability to deliver on their promises and meet societal needs.
American leadership and engagement on the world stage is “indispensable” – Dimon said one of the biggest uncertainties in the world is what role America is currently playing. He said that while there are many problems with international organizations, such as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the United Nations (UN), the world is better off with these institutions, and the U.S. should engage and exercise its power and influence “cautiously and judiciously.
Regulation isn’t all bad, but too much of it isn’t good – Dimon said current “excessive” regulation has reduced growth and business formation for the company, without making the economy safer or better.

“The ease of starting a business in the United States has worsened, and both small business formation and employment growth have dropped to the lowest rates in 30 years,” Dimon wrote.

JPMorgan Chase is “all in” on the cloud and AI, but not on stock buybacks – Dimon acknowledged that he was “partially responsible” for the bank being slow to adopt the cloud, because his early thinking was that it was just another term for outsourcing. He also said the power of artificial intelligence and machine learning is “real,” and are “rapidly being deployed” across virtually every aspect of the bank’s business. Since that makes some employees redundant, the bank is looking to retrain and deploy those employees for other roles inside and outside the company.

JPMorgan – Future Plans

17,000 Job Cuts- Even the country’s largest bank needs to cut back on employees. Executives said JPMorgan would eliminate about 17,000 positions over the next two years, including about 4,000 through attrition this year in its consumer bank.
13,000 to 15,000 Mortgage Cuts- Most of JPMorgan Chase’s job cuts will come through lay-offs and attrition in its mortgage operations over the next two years, as the industry moves past the worst of the foreclosure crisis and has less need for servicing employees.
100 New Branches- Even as it cuts some branches, JPMorgan Chase is expanding. The bank plans to add about 100 branches to its total over each of the next two years.
500,000 ‘Digital’ Customers- A growing number of JPMorgan Chase customers are opting for mobile and online technology over branch visits. About 500,000 bank customers per month are going digital, executives said.
New Partnership- JPMorgan used the day to announce a new partnership with Visa. Executives said the deal will allow the bank to negotiate directly with merchants over how they process Chase credit and debit cards.

JPMorgan – FAQs

What does JP Morgan do?

JPMorgan Chase & Co. is a global financial service that provides services including consumer banking, investment banking, commercial banking, and asset management for individuals, corporations, institutions, and governments globally.

Is JP Morgan and JP Morgan Chase the same?

JPMorgan Chase & Co. is the parent holding company of Chase(Commerical Bank) and JPMorgan(Investment Bank).

Is JP Morgan the largest bank?

JPMorgan Chase & co. is America’s one of the largest bank.

What is JP Morgan’s full name?

John Pierpont Morgan is JPMorgan’s full name.

How does JPMorgan make money?

The company operates through the following segments: Consumer and Community Banking, Corporate and Investment Bank, Commercial Banking and Asset and Wealth Management.

December 1, 2020

Honda – Firmly Standing From The Beginning

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 the organization it is based on.

Honda Motor Company, Ltd. is a Japanese public multinational conglomerate corporation primarily known as a manufacturer of automobiles, motorcycles, and power equipment. Honda Motor Co., Ltd. operates under the basic principles of “Respect for the Individual” and “The Three Joys” commonly expressed as The Joy of Buying, The Joy of Selling and The Joy of Creating.

Honda has been the world’s largest motorcycle manufacturer since 1959, reaching a production of 400 million by the end of 2019, as well as the world’s largest manufacturer of internal combustion engines measured by volume, producing more than 14 million internal combustion engines each year. Honda became the second-largest Japanese automobile manufacturer in 2001. Honda was the eighth largest automobile manufacturer in the world in 2015.

Honda – Company Highlights

Startup Name	Honda Motor Co., Ltd.
Headquarters	Minato, Tokyo, Japan
Industry	Automobile
Founded	24 September 1948
Founder	Soichiro Honda
CEO	Takahiro Hachigo
Areas Served	Worldwide
Website	www.global.honda

Honda – About and How it Works?
Honda – Logo and its Meaning
Honda – Founder and History
Honda – Mission
Honda – Business Model
Honda – Revenue and Growth
Honda – Investments
Honda – Acquisition
Honda – Competitors
Honda – Challenges Faced
Honda – Future Plans

Honda – About and How it Works?

Honda Motor Co., Ltd. engages in the manufacture and sale of automobiles, motorcycles, and power products. It operates through the following segments: Automobile, Motorcycle, Financial Services, and Power Product and Other Businesses.

The Automobile segment manufactures and sells automobiles and related accessories. The Motorcycle segment handles all-terrain vehicles, motorcycle business, and related parts. The Financial Services segment provides financial and insurance services. The Power Product and Other Businesses segment offers power products and relevant parts. The company was founded by Soichiro Honda on September 24, 1948 and is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan.

Honda was the first Japanese automobile manufacturer to release a dedicated luxury brand, Acura, in 1986. Aside from their core automobile and motorcycle businesses, Honda also manufactures garden equipment, marine engines, personal watercraft and power generators, and other products.

Since 1986, Honda has been involved with artificial intelligence/robotics research and released their ASIMO robot in 2000. They have also ventured into aerospace with the establishment of GE Honda Aero Engines in 2004 and the Honda HA-420 HondaJet, which began production in 2012. Honda has three joint-ventures in China: Honda China, Dongfeng Honda, and Guangqi Honda.

Honda – Logo and its Meaning

The stylized design of the capital H had a certain influence on the print. It is distinguished by the absence of decorative details and minimalistic design bordering on austerity. At the same time, chromium coating of the innovated logo’s font makes it quite prestigious and valuable. The line width helps it stand out clearly on the background.

Honda’s Company Logo

Honda – Founder and History

The engineer Honda Soichiro founded the Honda Technical Research Institute near Hamamatsu in 1946 to develop small, efficient internal-combustion engines.

It was incorporated as Honda Motor Company in 1948 and began producing motorcycles in 1949. The Honda C-100, a small-engine motorcycle, was introduced in 1953 and by 1959 was the largest-selling motorcycle in the world. In 1959 the company also established a U.S. subsidiary, the American Honda Motor Company, which began producing motorcycles in the United States in 1979 and automobiles in 1982.

While still Honda is a world leader in producing motorcycles, the bulk of the company’s annual sales comes from automobiles, which the company began manufacturing long ago. Among its lightweight, fuel-efficient passenger cars have been the popular Civic and Accord models. The company’s other major product areas include farm machinery and small engines. Honda is a major Japanese exporter to the United States and to other parts of the world. It also has assembly plants in a number of other countries and is engaged in joint ventures and technology-licensing agreements with several foreign companies.

Honda – Mission

Honda’s mission statement says, “Maintaining a global viewpoint, we are dedicated to supplying products of the highest quality, yet at a reasonable price for worldwide customer satisfaction.”

Honda – Business Model

Automotive (~71%) – Honda derives a majority of its revenue from the sales of its automotive units around the world. Per Bloomberg intelligence, 75% of the vehicles Honda sells in the US market are manufactured in the country itself. Additionally, the company does not expect a significant revenue impact from recently imposed tariffs in the US as it manufactures a notable quantity of its US volumes in the domestic market itself. We expect automotive sales of 5.35 million worldwide, translating into $104.7 billion in revenues from this division.
Motorcycle (~14%) – Honda derives $18.4 billion in revenues from the sales of its motorcycle units. This segment includes motorcycles, all-terrain vehicles (ATVs) and Personal watercraft (PWC). We expect higher sales volume of its motorcycle business to drive its top-line growth in 2019. The increased volume sales are expected in its key markets of Asia, including Indonesia, India, and Vietnam. Honda’s Activa and X-blade models continue to be the bestsellers in these markets in 1Q’19.
Financial Services (~13%) – Honda provides a variety of financial services – retail lending, leasing to customers and wholesale financing to its customers and dealers through its finance subsidiaries. Within the financial services segment, North America contributes about 90% of the segment’s revenue. We expect the segment to generate $19 billion in revenue in 2019.
Power and Other business (~2%) – HMC manufactures and markets a complete range of power equipment products for commercial, rental, and residential applications. Its comprehensive product line, which includes tillers, portable generators, outboard engines, water pumps, lawn mowers, snow throwers, general purpose engines, electric four-wheel scooters, is powered exclusively by advanced 4-stroke engines. These products are sold by the company in its markets, mainly in Japan, and are also sold to Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM).

Honda – Revenue and Growth

Year	Amount	Percentage Change from last year
2020	$137.365B	-3.94%
2019	$142.998B	+3.43%
2018	$138.25B	+6.19%

Honda – Investments

Honda Motor has made 12 investments. Their most recent investment was on Jul 18, 2020, when Contemporary Amperex Technology raised CN¥19.7B.

Date	Organization Name	Round	Amount
Jul 18, 2020	Contemporary Amperex Technology	Post IPO Equity	CN¥19.7B
Jun 28, 2019	MONET Technologies	Corporate Round	¥499.9M
May 14, 2019	Moixa Technology	Corporate Round	£8.6M
May 7, 2019	Cruise	Corporate Round	$1.2B
Mar 28, 2019	MONET Technologies	Corporate Round	¥498M
Mar 5, 2019	ubitricity	Series C	€20M
Oct 3, 2018	Cruise	Corporate Round	$750M
Nov 6, 2017	Mcity	Venture Round	$11M
Sep 19, 2016	Grab	Series F	$750M
Jun 8, 2010	Virent Energy Systems	Series C	$46.4M

Honda – Acquisition

Honda Motor has just one acquisition. Honda acquired ubitricity on Feb 27, 2019.

Honda – Competitors

Major names among Honda’s competitors include – Ford, General Motors, Toyota, Suzuki, Volkswagen, Hyundai, Nissan, FCA (Fiat Chrysler Automobiles), BMW and Mercedes.

Honda – Challenges Faced

The automobile crisis of 2008-2010 was the part of financial downturn, which affected automobile makers and suppliers around the world. The industry was weakened by the substantial increase in the prices of fuel linked to energy crisis of 2003-08 which discouraged purchases of automobiles with low fuel economy. In the year 2008 there were fewer fuel efficient models to offer to the consumers, the bigger automobiles including General Motors, Toyota, Ford, Chrysler, Nissan and Honda Motors experienced sliding sales.

Honda has used PEST and SWOT analysis to work harder to achieve the goal to make their sales go high, and have worked on the weakness in the market as well. Honda has studied their PEST analysis and the factors that are affecting their company, being the leading automobile industry has to know its strengths and weakness, when dealing with their customer. All they needed was to know their needs, wants and demands.

Honda – Future Plans

Honda is going bullish on its expansion plans. Honda currently holds the number two position in terms of domestic sales, behind Hero MotoCorp, and plans to become number one by December 2020. To achieve this, the company is expanding both, manufacturing and sales. Last year, the company added a fourth assembly line at their Narsapura manufacturing facility in Bengaluru. This move adds 6 lakh units to Honda’s current capacity of 64 lakh bikes and scooters per year. For sales, Honda has set a target of adding 500 retail outlets this year, to its existing 5,200 dealerships. Of these, Honda has already added 250 outlets from April to August and will be adding 50 more this month. Honda is specifically concentrating on rural areas with 70 per cent of the new outlets coming up this year to be situated there.

Honda has been recording strong sales with currently a 30 per cent overall domestic market share for two-wheelers. It is currently the market leader in scooter sales with a 69 per cent market share. While their scooter sales have been strong, Honda wishes to focus more on motorcycle sales now.

Honda is further accelerating its electrification plans for Europe by moving forward its goal for all of its European mainstream models to feature electrified powertrains by 2022. The bold new target announced during an ‘Electric Vision’ event in Amsterdam, is three years ahead of the previously announced 2025 goal, demonstrating the confidence Honda has in its electric and hybrid powertrain technology. This acceleration will see 6 electrified models launched over the next 36 months.

November 30, 2020

Alphabet – Making Interesting Pivots

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 the organization it is based on.

Alphabet, Inc. is a holding company, which engages in the business of acquisition and operation of different companies. It operates through the Google and Other Bets segments. The Google segment includes its main Internet products such as ads, Android, Chrome, hardware, Google Cloud, Google Maps, Google Play, Search, and YouTube.

The Other Bets segment consists of businesses such as Access, Calico, CapitalG, GV, Verily, Waymo, and X. The company was founded by Lawrence E. Page and Sergey Mikhaylovich Brin on October 2, 2015 and is headquartered in Mountain View, CA.

Alphabet – Company Highlights

Startup Name	Alphabet Inc.
Headquarters	Googleplex, Mountain View, California, U.S.
Industry	Conglomerate
Founded	October 2, 2015
Founder	Larry Page, Sergey Brin
CEO	Sundar Pichai
Areas Served	Worldwide
Website	www.abc.xyz

Alphabet – About and How it Works ?
Alphabet – Logo and its Meaning
Alphabet – Founder and History
Alphabet – Mission
Alphabet – Team
Alphabet – Subsidiaries
Alphabet – Business Model
Alphabet – Revenue and Growth
Alphabet – Investments
Alphabet – Acquisitions
Alphabet – Competitors
Alphabet – Challenges Faced
Alphabet – Future Plans

Alphabet – About and How it Works ?

Alphabet Inc. is an American multinational conglomerate headquartered in Mountain View, California. It was created through a restructuring of Google on October 2, 2015, and became the parent company of Google and several former Google subsidiaries. The two co-founders of Google remained as controlling shareholders, board members, and employees at Alphabet. Alphabet is the world’s fourth-largest technology company by revenue and one of the world’s most valuable companies.

The establishment of Alphabet Inc. was prompted by a desire to make the core Google business “cleaner and more accountable” while allowing greater autonomy to group companies that operate in businesses other than Internet services. Page and Brin announced their resignation from their executive posts in December 2019, with the CEO role to be filled by Sundar Pichai, also the CEO of Google. Page and Brin remain co-founders, employees, board members, and controlling shareholders of Alphabet Inc.

Alphabet – Logo and its Meaning

The Alphabet logo uses the language of visual symbols to explain the differences between the companies, Google and itself. In comparison with the Google logo, it looks more serious, like a grown-up in comparison with a teenager.

Logo of Alphabet

Alphabet – Founder and History

On August 10, 2015, Google Inc. announced plans to create a new public holding company, Alphabet Inc. Google CEO Larry Page and Sergey Brin made this announcement in a blog post on Google’s official blog. Alphabet would be created to restructure Google by moving subsidiaries from Google to Alphabet, narrowing Google’s scope.

In his announcement, Page described the planned holding company as follows:

Alphabet is mostly a collection of companies. The largest of which, of course, is Google. This newer Google is a bit slimmed down, with the companies that are pretty far afield of our main internet products contained in Alphabet instead. Fundamentally, we believe this allows us more management scale, as we can run things independently that aren’t very related.

Page says the motivation behind the reorganization is to make Google “cleaner and more accountable and better”. He also said he wanted to improve “the transparency and oversight of what we’re doing”, and to allow greater control of unrelated companies.

Alphabet still keeps Google’s stock price history and trades under its former ticker symbols. Its website domain is abc.xyz (xyz was introduced in 2014). When asked about the new name, CEO Larry Page said that it was chosen because the alphabet is the building block of language, one of the most important innovations. He also said that it is the core of how the firm indexes with Google Search.

On December 3, 2019, Page and Brin jointly announced that they would step down from their respective roles, remaining as employees and still the majority vote on the board of directors. Sundar Pichai, the CEO of Google, is to assume the CEO role at Alphabet while retaining the same at Google.

Alphabet – Mission

Alphabet’s mission statement says, “Empowering great entrepreneurs and companies to flourish. Investing at the scale of the opportunities and resources we see. Improving the transparency and oversight of what we’re doing. Making Google even better through greater focus.“

Alphabet – Team

CEO of Alphabet - Sundar Pichai — CEO of Alphabet, Sundar Pichai

Larry Page and Sergey Brin – Founders
Sundar Pichai – CEO
Andrew Urman – Program Manager
Thomas Insel – Google Life Sciences Team
David Drummond – Senior Vice President of Corporate Development
Eric Schmidt – Executive Chairman
Barnaby James – Principal Software Engineer

Alphabet – Subsidiaries

Few of the main subsidiaries of Alphabet are Google, X, Sidewalks Lab, Waymo, Calico, Verily, Fitbit, Deepmind, Wing and Firebase.

Alphabet – Business Model

Alphabet, Inc. is a holding company for Google and several other firms formerly owned by Google. The corporation operates two reportable business segments:

Google – Consists of various Internet products, including Search, YouTube, Maps, Commerce, Ads, Android, Cloud, Apps, Chrome, and Google Play, as well as hardware products such as Chromebooks, Chromecast, and Nexus. This segment accounts for the vast majority of Alphabet’s revenues.
Other Bets – Consists of various operating segments that the company deems “not individually material” (do not meet certain quantitative thresholds). These include the companies Access/Google Fiber, Google Capital, Calico, Verily, Next, GV, and X, and other initiatives.

Alphabet – Revenue and Growth

Alphabet has one primary revenue stream, online advertising from third parties. It is divided into two main categories:

Performance Advertising – Creates relevant ads that users click, resulting in direct connection with advertisers. Most of the third parties pay Alphabet when a user engages in the ads.

Brand Advertising – Increases users’ awareness of advertisers’ offerings through video, images, text, and interactive ads that play across different devices. Alphabet helps third parties display digital videos and other ad types to specific audience groups for their marketing campaigns.

Alphabet revenue for the twelve months ending September 30, 2020 was $171.704B, a 10.74% increase year-over-year. Rest of the years’ trends are :

Year	Amount	Percentage Change From Last Year
2019	$161.857B	+18.3%
2018	$136.819B	+23.42%
2017	$110.855B	+22.8%

Alphabet – Investments

Alphabet has made 11 investments. Their most recent investment was on Jul 15, 2020, when Cityblock Health raised $53.5M.

Date	Organization Name	Round	Amount
Jul 15, 2020	Cityblock Health	Series B	$53.5M
Jun 26, 2020	Oscar Health	Venture Round	$225M
May 7, 2020	Lime	Venture Round	$170M
May 7, 2020	Sidewalk Infrastructure Partners	Series A	$400M
Mar 2, 2020	Waymo	Venture Round	$2.3B
Aug 14, 2018	Oscar Health	Corporate Round	$375M
Jul 9, 2018	Lime	Series C	$335M
Jun 14, 2018	SpinLaunch	Series A	$40M
Jan 24, 2018	XtalPi	Series B	$15M
Nov 15, 2017	UnitedMasters	Series A	$70M

Alphabet – Acquisitions

An analysis of the company’s investments in 2017 suggested that it was the most active investor in that period, outdoing the capital arm of Intel and also its own best customer. Alphabet, Inc. acquired seven of its own capital-backed startups in the 2017 financial year, with Cisco second having acquired six of the company’s previous investments.

Flatiron Health, a startup founded by two former Google employees and backed by Alphabet, Inc., announced that it was to be acquired by health conglomerate Hoffmann-La Roche for $1.8 billion. The company provides electronic medical records and analysis to identify improved treatments for oncology patients

Alphabet – Competitors

Alphabet, Inc.’s top competitors are Baidu, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Facebook, Oracle, SAP, IBM, Salesforce, Sony, HP, SAS, Box, Dell, Samsung, HTC, Huawei, LG Electronics, Philips, ASUS, Cisco, Lenovo, AWS, Toshiba, Motorola, VMware, Adobe and Infor.

Alphabet – Challenges Faced

Growing Regulatory Risks – Alphabet formally acknowledged the government’s antitrust probe earlier this year, but it isn’t just U.S. federal law enforcement officials taking a harder look at Alphabet’s business practices. In addition to FTC and DOJ investigations, a coalition of state attorneys general are participating in an antitrust probe of the company. In Europe, Alphabet has faced record fines in recent years for antitrust violations, and the European Commission, the EU’s antitrust regulatory body, recently opened an investigation into Google’s data collection practices, and may include data related to local search services, advertising, ad targeting, login services, web browsers, and others, according to Reuters.

A recent Wall Street Journal investigation found that contrary to some of the company’s claims, it routinely intervenes in search results, even favouring the results generated by big businesses such as eBay over smaller ones. Any such activity is likely to draw the attention of regulators, as well.

Shoring Up Growth, Profits – For the third quarter, Alphabet posted a mixed earnings report that revealed better-than-expected revenue, but a hit to its earnings — earnings per share came in at $10.12 versus estimates of $12.42. One reason for that miss, as noted by RealMoney’s tech columnist Eric Jhonsa, was accelerating operating expense growth, along with spending on R&D, sales and marketing and other expenses. It also recorded a net loss in its equity investments last quarter, posting a loss of $1.53B loss versus a $1.38B gain in the third quarter of last year.

Alphabet’s reputation for secrecy often works against it when its updates to investors are mixed. After its first quarter earnings call, for example, Alphabet’s stock hit the skids for weeks — partly owing to management’s lack of clarity in explaining its missed quarterly revenue and how it might have been affected by changes to its ad products. Meanwhile, investors have expressed frustrations that Alphabet doesn’t break out YouTube revenue, although it’s been long presumed to be a top driver of ad revenue growth for Google.

Sceptical Employees – Alphabet is still one of the most sought-after employers in Silicon Valley. But a vocal contingent of its workers disagree with the company’s policies and direction. For instance, Pichai navigated Google through a worker revolt last year over Project Maven, a contract with the military to analyse drone footage. (Google did not renew the contract.)

Alphabet – Future Plans

Alphabet Inc., the parent company for the search engine Google, will look to become just the third US-listed company to enter the $1 trillion market cap club in 2020. The stock will need to rise by about 8% between now and the end of 2020 to join this exclusive club. It isn’t going to be an easy task for the equity, especially if earnings growth slows as analysts project.

The company has already made some interesting pivots heading into 2020. Most notably is at the very top, with Sundar Pichai the CEO of Google also becoming the CEO of Alphabet, taking over the position for co-founder Larry Page.

Google CEO Sundar Pichai says the company has offered a competitive platform that has lowered prices advertisers, giving consumers more choice, according to prepared remarks the executive made ahead of Wednesday’s hearing before the House Antitrust Subcommittee.

“A competitive digital ad marketplace gives publishers and advertisers, and therefore consumers, an enormous amount of choice,” Pichai stated. “For example, competition in ads — from Twitter, Instagram, Comcast and others — has helped lower online advertising costs by 40% over the last 10 years, with these saving passed down to consumers through lower prices.”

November 29, 2020

Listnr – Now Create Your Podcast without Recording!

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 the organization it is based on.

Podcasts are gaining popularity worldwide. As per Statista, while in 2006, only 22 % of the adult population in the USA was aware of podcasting, now in 2020, 75% of the adult population of USA knows about podcasting. Back home, in India also podcasts are slowly gaining grounds. According to a PWC report, by the end of 2018, there were 40 million podcast listeners in India, which is 58% more than the previous year. The increasing number of podcast listeners undoubtedly inspires many to create their own podcasts. However, there are many who finds the process of creating podcasts, like recording and editing audio etc quite cumbersome. To address this challenge, Listnr was founded.

Listnr super simplifies podcast creation, by allowing to create podcasts without the hassle of recording. StartupTalky interviewed Listnr founder Ananay Batra, to get and insight into the startup.

Listnr – Company Highlights

Startup Name	Listnr
Headquarter	Gurgaon, Haryana
Founder	Ananay Batra
Sector	Web/SaaS
Founded	2020
Parent Organization	Listnr Co.
Website	www.listnr.tech

About Listnr
Listnr – Founder
The Idea Behind Starting Listnr
Listnr – Business Model & Revenue Model
Listnr – Challenges
Listnr – Growth

About Listnr

Listnr is an amazing platform that lets you convert your blog posts or any other text to voice overs or podcasts. So now, you can start a podcast without the headache of buying recording equipment or the hassle of recording or editing any audio. The platform facilitates easy one click conversion, where you simply have to select the content (you want to converted to audio) from any website or just write the text in the dashboard, and Listnr converts it to the audio format which you can download and distribute to platforms such as Spotify, Apple podcasts and Google.

Through Listnr you can start a podcast in 30+ most spoken languages of the world including English ( US, UK, India, Australia dialects), Hindi, Russian, Mandarin, German, Spanish etc in different regional dialects. Also, users can easily embed the audio files created through Listnr into one’s blog post or website with code snippets.

Listnr uses state of the art Speech Synthesis + the company’s in-house Deep Learning Engine to make the voice sound very human like and get a sentiment analysis of the written content.

Our target Demographic is of people from 18 to 54 year old. 56% of Podcast Listeners are between the age of 18 to 34, where an average Podcast Listener consumes about 6hrs and 37 minutes of Podcast shows every week. Starting March 2020, there has been a noticeable diversion in the way people consume media. There has been a scattered shift from the most popular social media sources to Podcast hosting platforms and blogs. There has been a 30 – 40% increase in podcast consumption in the last 2 weeks – says Listnr founder Ananay Batra

Listnr – Founder

Ananay Batra is the founder and CEO of Listnr.

Ananay is a computer science graduate from York University, Toronto. Besides Listnr, Ananay also founded Que News, a subscription based News summarization platform.

The Idea Behind Starting Listnr

The idea of starting Listnr came to Ananay while working at Quenews. Quenews was almost like ‘Spotify for News’, where the team would summarize news from various credible sources, and offer it to the users as audio news. The company used a Speech Synthesis Engine to convert the news to audio format. Ananay realized that such text to speech conversion technology can be very helpful for someone who wants to start a Podcast, or one who wants to convert his blog posts to voice overs, which made him start Listnr.

While listening to the Joe Rogan Podcast, I thought – it would be so cool if people could start a Podcast without recording anything and it was as easy as writing a Tweet. The idea seemed pretty cool but in order to Validate the idea, I made a basic landing page with an email capture and started distributing it around various Social Media channels. 2 days later, I had 100+ people sign up and 20+ emails asking when I would release the product. I went around asking people about Listnr in my Inner Circle and Network, after a positive response, I went ahead with the development. says Ananay Batra explining the idea behind starting Listnr.

Listnr – Business Model & Revenue Model

Listnr operates on a SaaS business model. While Listnr is free for upto 10 conversions per month, the company will soon roll out attractive monthly and annual subscription plans .

Listnr – Challenges

Starting a startup all alone is undoubtedly challenging.

As Ananay quotes, “As a solo-founder, there is no one around to support you. You basically have to keep pushing yourself to do stuff. No one would care, if I don’t work on Listnr, people only start caring when you’re a success”

Besides, started in 2020 itself, the startup also got hit by the Covid crisis. The startup is currently finding it really tough to get development help and other resources given the Job uncertainty due to Covid.

Listnr – Growth

Listnr has been built to solve a real time issue, as it simplifies the process of creating voice overs and podcasts like never before. Given the popularity that podcasts are gaining, a platform like Listnr can surely be termed as the ‘need of the hour’. As for now, Listnr has been able to attract new customers through various platforms especially through IndieHackers and Reddit, and there are 100+ clients in the waiting list.

November 28, 2020

McKesson Unveils Insight Into Hospital Pharmacy Trends

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 the organization it is based on.

McKesson Corporation is an American company distributing pharmaceuticals and providing health information technology, medical supplies, and care management tools. The company had revenues of $231.1 billion in 2020.

McKesson is based in Irving, Texas and distributes health care systems, medical supplies and pharmaceutical products. Additionally, McKesson provides extensive network infrastructure for the health care industry; also, it was an early adopter of technologies like bar-code scanning for distribution, pharmacy robotics, and RFID tags.

McKesson – Company Highlights

Startup Name	McKesson Corporation
Former Names	Olcott & McKesson(1833–1853), McKesson & Robbins(1853–1999), McKessonHBOC(1999–2001)
Headquarters	Irving, Texas, U.S.
Industry	Healthcare
Founded	1833
Founder	McKesson, Charles Olcott
CEO	Brian S. Tyler
Areas Served	Worldwide
Website	www.McKesson.com

McKesson – About and How it Works?
McKesson – Logo and its Meaning
McKesson – Founder and History
McKesson – Mission
McKesson – Business Model
McKesson – Revenue and Growth
McKesson – Investments
McKesson – Acquisitions
McKesson – Competitors
McKesson – Challenges Faced
McKesson – Future Plans

McKesson – About and How it Works?

McKesson Corporation is a healthcare supply chain management solution, retail pharmacy, community oncology and speciality care, and healthcare information technology company. The Company provides medicines, medical products and healthcare services by partnering with pharmaceutical manufacturers, providers, pharmacies, governments and other organizations in healthcare.

It operates through three segments: United States Pharmaceutical and Speciality Solutions, European Pharmaceutical Solutions and Medical-Surgical Solutions. The United States Pharmaceutical and Speciality Solutions segment distributes pharmaceutical and other healthcare related products and provides pharmaceutical solutions to life sciences companies. European Pharmaceutical Solutions segment provides distribution and services to wholesale, institutional and retail customers. Medical-Surgical Solutions segment distributes medical-surgical supplies and provides logistics and other services to healthcare providers.

McKesson – Logo and its Meaning

The McKesson logo is a great example of how a simple strict word mark can look modern and stylish.

Logo of McKesson

The brand’s logo is composed of its word mark and the slogan beneath. The key role in the logo design takes the colour palette. Its main colour is common for the pharmaceutical industry design blue. But it has a small and bright accent, which changes everything – an orange line under the letter “C”.

This colour accent makes the logo look fresher and contemporary, even though the typefaces used in the word mark and slogan are both very classic.

McKesson – Founder and History

In 1833 Charles Olcott and his partner John McKesson founded Olcott & McKesson, a wholesaler and importer of botanical drugs. Twenty years later, with the death of Olcott and the addition of Daniel Robbins, the firm was renamed McKesson & Robbins. Over the next 100 years the company grew significantly by persuading other distributors of wholesale drugs to become its subsidiaries.

In 1967 the firm faced a hostile takeover by Foremost Dairies, being renamed Foremost-McKesson. The parent had no corporate strategy and began acquiring diverse businesses, from sporting goods to candy. In 1976, new executives worked to streamline its operations by selling low-profit units. They also reorganized it into four groups: drugs/healthcare, wine/spirits, foods, and chemicals.

The new leaders also aimed to redefine the firm’s “middleman” distributor role by making it more indispensable. They did so by offering data processing procedures that were essential for both customers and suppliers, enabling the company to act as part of their marketing teams. The value-added partnership was prized by small businesses that had difficulty competing with national chains.

The strategy made it a top wholesaler and led to annual profit increases of 20% on average. In 1979, it divested over one-third of its holdings to focus on retail and healthcare products. It also began acquiring much healthcare product distribution firms, including technology-related outfits, and shortened its name to McKesson in 1984. By 1990 it was the leader of the drug wholesaling industry.

McKesson – Mission

McKesson’s mission statement says, “To provide products, services and solutions of the highest quality and deliver more value to our customers that earns their respect and loyalty.”

McKesson – Business Model

McKesson is a distributor and provider of healthcare services and technology. The company operates two reportable business segments:

Distribution Solutions – Distributes generic and branded pharmaceutical drugs and other healthcare-related products, and provides practice management, clinical support, technology, and business solutions to community-based oncology and other speciality practices.
Technology Solutions – Provides enterprise-wide clinical, financial, patient care, strategic management, and supply chain technology solutions, as well as outsourcing, connectivity, and other services (including managed and remote hosting services) to healthcare organizations.

McKesson – Revenue and Growth

| Year | Amount | Change From Last Year |
| — | — | — | — |
| 2020 | $234.194B | +5.5% |
| 2019 | $214.319B | +2.86% |
| 2018 | $208.357B | +4.95% |

McKesson – Investments

McKesson has made 2 investments. Their most recent investment was on Mar 27, 2019, when Xealth raised $11M.

Date	Organization Name	Round	Amount
Mar 27, 2019	Xealth	Series A	$11M
Mar 29, 2017	SHYFT	Series B	$7.5M

McKesson – Acquisitions

McKesson has acquired 44 organizations. Their most recent acquisition was Echo on Jun 19, 2019.

Acquiree	Date	Amount	About Acquiree
Echo	Jun 19, 2019	–	Simplifying pharmacy, helping everyone get the medicine they need
Medical Specialties Distributors	Apr 25, 2018	–	Full service medical supply and biomedical equipment distributor
Well.ca	Dec 4, 2017	–	Well.ca is a Canadian online store for health, wellness, beauty and baby essentials
RxCrossroads	Nov 6, 2017	–	RxCrossroads Specialty Solutions is committed to connecting patients to therapy
CoverMyMeds	Jan 25, 2017	$1.1B	CoverMyMeds is a healthcare tech platform helping doctors and pharmacists complete PA and insurance coverage determination forms for drugs
HealthQx	Jul 12, 2016	–	HealthQx specializes in data analytics and decision support software to bring transparency to the healthcare industry
Vantage Oncology	Apr 4, 2016	$525M	Vantage Oncology, Inc., offers a comprehensive development, implementation and management solution for radiation oncology
Rexall	Mar 2, 2016	$2.1B	Rexall is a drugstore operator with a dynamic history of innovation and growth
Biologics	Feb 25, 2016	$1.2B	Biologics provides a patient-focused platform for managing the financial, emotional, and physical burdens of cancer treatment
UDG Healthcare	Sep 16, 2015	€408M	UDG Healthcare specializes in supply chain, packaging, medical, regulatory, and sales and marketing

McKesson – Competitors

McKesson top competitors include EMIS Group, Walgreens Boots Alliance, Owens & Minor, Henry Schein, AmerisourceBergen, Cardinal Health and Walgreens.

McKesson – Challenges Faced

Increasing complexity and growth in integrated delivery networks : The lines between care settings are blurring as hospitals integrate with medical practices, infusion centres and home care, to form sophisticated networks delivering comprehensive patient care. While the number of hospital mergers declined in 2018, mega mergers are the new standard. The need for business partners to help networks diminish complexity and streamline operations across the continuum of care has become increasingly important as leaders work diligently to do what is right for the patient.
Hospitals expanding speciality pharmacy footprint, swiftly : Speciality pharmacy has been a top trend for the past several years as utilization and drug spend have dramatically increased across healthcare. As hospital and health systems experienced nearly 20% growth in the speciality drug market in 2018, health systems continue to establish their own speciality pharmacies or expand their existing capabilities. Speed to therapy and ongoing patient support are still critical.
Out-of-pocket costs impacting patients and revenue : Speciality drugs have emerged as important treatment options for cancer and other complex diseases, but there can be significant access and affordability issues with speciality drugs. The cost of speciality medications and the increased adoption of high-deductible health plans (HDHP) have placed a higher financial burden on patients. As out-of-pocket costs increase – from higher costs or insurance denials – patients are more likely to abandon their treatment plans.
Finance and pharmacy leadership relying on data-informed decisions, not intuition : Pharmacy directors face increasing pressure from performance-based reimbursement and diminishing resources. To alleviate these pressures, pharmacists need to leverage data and analytics to reduce costs, help maintain a healthy bottom line and support quality patient care. However, not all health systems have the tools and resources to aggregate and sift through data in order to apply comprehensive, real-time analytics to deliver better care effectively while maintaining a healthy balance sheet.

McKesson – Future Plans

A new strategic planning solution for oncology practices is now available to customers through McKesson’s Business Advisory Services, a team of experts dedicated to helping speciality practices solve financial and operational challenges through consulting, analytics and technology.

“Tremendous change is happening in the healthcare industry, especially in oncology,” said Catherine Swick, VP of Speciality Provider Strategy at McKesson. “While practices cannot control the future, strategic planning can help them prepare for what may come, while identifying opportunities to remain strong and viable. As an advocate of community oncology, we are excited to offer our strategic planning solution to our oncology customers as it will enable them to grow and thrive in a way that’s meaningful and valuable to their practices.”

McKesson’s strategic planning process helps practices create a vision for the future, while equipping them with short-term tactical planning to drive momentum and results. The comprehensive planning process starts with an analysis of the practice’s data, so the McKesson team thoroughly understands its challenges and opportunities and the practice has baseline metrics to guide its discussion and decisions. This is followed by a facilitated retreat with physicians and key staff to align on top priorities and culminates in a detailed three-year action plan for each initiative selected by the practice, providing the structure to make daily decisions that follow the larger vision.

November 28, 2020

Happay – Business Expense Management Solution

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 the organization it is based on.

Managing expenses is crucial for the success of any business. However, keeping track of the expenses incurred is a cumbersome task. Bengaluru based startup Happay was founded in 2012, to take care of this very important yet complicated task. Happay is a business expense management solution that streamlines an organization’s expense workflow. It is an end-to-end solution that take cares of expense management to reporting and gives real-time visibility and control over business spending.

Happay – Company Highlights

Startup Name	Happay
Headquarter	Bangalore
Founder	Anshul Rai & Varun Rathi
Sector	Application Software
Founded	2012
Parent Organization	VA Tech Ventures Pvt Ltd.
Valuation	$53 Million – $55 Million (as of 2017)
Website	www.happay.in

Happay – About and How it works
Happay – Founders and Team
How was Happay Started
Happay – Business Model
Happay – Revenue Model
Happay – Funding and Investors
Happay – Name and Logo
Happay – Competitors
Happay – Revenue and Valuation
Happay – Growth
Happay – Future Plans
Happay – FAQs

Happay – About and How it works

Happay’s vision is making payments a happy experience for businesses and to develop a new product to support business expense management. Keeping in line with this vision, Happay has come up with a wide range of offerings. Happay’s business expense management solution includes Travel & Expense Management, Expense Report Automation, Petty Cash Management and more.

Happay has also introduced a Digital Marketing Expense card. Designed to suit the monetary requirement of a digital marketing team, the card is designed to process, track, monitor and control the marketing spends, giving the organisation detailed financial summary of the expenses by the team. The features of the card include– detailed financial summary of spends on a real-time basis ensuring transparency; setting limits and policies on marketing expenses; monitoring spends on multiple platforms along with single-screen data analysis on the spend pattern. This card also enables organisations to fill the card with only a specific amount allocated for digital marketing and link it to all the online tools and different ad networks.

Happay simplifies things both for the employees and the organization. Happay’s prepaid business expense cards and its cloud platform lets employees add and update business expenses on the go, doing away with the need for cash and paper. Again, company’s management can get a real-time visibility and control on expenses through the Happay platform . Also accountants can reconcile expense reports and can integrate the same into the accounting software.

Happay aims to make expense management cashless, paperless and mobile by simplifying the entire expense management workflow from recording of expenses to accounting. It allows organizations to replace manual business expense management processes which are costly and cumbersome with VISA cards, that auto-record and classify expenses on mobile as well as automate expense reporting and approval.

Happay – Founders and Team

Anshul Rai and Varun Rathi are the founders of Happay.

Anshul Rai

Happay co-founder and CEO Anshul Rai is a computer science graduate from IIT Kharagpur. After engineering, he landed a well paid job with Microsoft Research Lab, a dream job for many. During his days at Microsoft Research Lab, he filed 2 patents and published 4 papers in international journals. But he always craved to do more and do something to create a positive impact, which led him to start Happay . A self confessed coding lover, Anshul is also a vivid reader who loves to read about entrepreneurs. Travelling and listening to music are something this entrepreneur loves to do.

Varun Rathi

Happay co-founder Varun Rathi is also a IIT Kharagpur graduate. Born in a business family, Varun is naturally inclined towards starting his own business. After graduation, Varun took up a job with TATA, but for the ‘Marwari’ within him, doing a job was too comfortable, which made Varun join hands with Anshul to start Happay.

Through Happay, Varun and Anshul are working toward making a whole payment platform that worked in real-time for companies. They began by working on employee payment customization and are expanding to try to become the one-stop shop for all of a company’s business expenses. Anshul focused more on tech aspects of the job, while Varun focused on sales, marketing, and the startup’s presence.

How was Happay Started

Remembering passwords while making online transactions was one hell of a task. The co-founders came up with an idea – to become the ‘PayPal of mobile numbers’ and to make peer-to-peer (P2P) payments a happy experience. And with this very simple idea, they started Happay – short for ‘Happy + Payments,’ the company’s core belief. The company was started with a simple idea: paying someone, be it friends, family or colleagues should be as easy as sending a text message.

With this in mind, the founders built their first consumer product, the Happay mobile app– a mobile wallet that allows you to pay just about anyone, anywhere, with their mobile number. No bank account details required.

However, even with a user base of over 2 lakh, the Happay team was unable to find a profitable revenue model. Besides, while operating in the B2C segment, the Happay team realized that there was a serious need for innovation in the B2B payment segment, which led the company to pivot to a business expense management solution. Today, Happay boasts of working with most of the leading corporates, helping them manage their business expenses minutely.

Happay – Business Model

Taking a general perspective, a consumer business is considered more lucrative in terms of ability to reach and scale, rather than a B2B model. The founders of Happay initially thought the same when they began conceptualizing the initial idea of P2P lending. The duo took a year to understand the existing payment mechanisms and the regulations which govern them, before getting their first product out in 2013.

Happay – Revenue Model

The revenue model of the consumer-facing business was not strong, the founders soon turned towards a B2B model, with the aim of helping businesses and corporates manage their expenses minutely. While loading the wallet, the company would have to choose close to 2% as payment gateway charges. So, the founders had to earn this 2% plus their profit margin from the merchants.

Happay – Funding and Investors

Happay has raised a total of $21.57 Million funding till date (Nov 2020). Its most recent funding was led by the Greyhound Capital for $3 Million in May 2019.

Happay Funding details:

Date	Stage	Amount	Investors
July, 2013	Seed	$20K
December, 2013	Seed	$500K	Prime Venture Partners
April, 2015	Seed	$500K	Prime Venture Partners
July, 2015	Sries A	$7.2 Million	Prime Venture Partners & Sequoia Capital
December, 2017	Series B	$10.1 Million	Sequoia Capital
February, 2018	Series B	$250K	Cupola Venture Opportunities LLP
May, 2019	Venture Round	$3 Million	Greyhound Capital

Happay – Competitors

In the finance management space, Happay competes with a growing number of start-ups including ItzCash-backed Finly, Bengaluru-headquartered Fyle Technologies, Gurugram-based Numberz.in, SAP Concur, Zoho Expense, and Expensify are the top competitors to Happay.

Happay – Name and Logo

Happay – short for ‘Happy + Payments,’ the company’s core belief

Happay Logo

Happay – Revenue and Valuation

Happay reported 6x growth in gross transaction value in FY17 and processed transactions worth $372.2 Mn (INR 2400 Cr) yearly. The company clocks more than 1 Million transactions per month, worth around $31 Mn (INR 200 Cr).

Post money valuation of Happay after the funding round in 2017, Happay was valued around $53 Million – $55 Million.

It reported a threefold increase in revenue in FY17 to $1.5 Mn (INR 10.09 Cr) from $538K (INR 3.47 Cr) in the FY16.

Happay – Growth

Happay is currently catering to more than 5,500 businesses across the country such as Aditya Birla Retail Ltd, Health & Glow, YourStory, Subway, Ayurveda hospitals, Unnati NGO, Ibibo group, Uber, Grofers, Urban Ladder, Knowlarity Solutions, etc. The company has a workforce of more than 350 employees. Happay is serving over 40+ business verticals and claims to have over $1 Billion Yearly Gross Transaction Value.

Happay is also voted amongst the top 3 Expense Players in India as per G2 Asia Ranking.

Happay – Future Plans

Currently the leader in ‘card based expense management solutions’ Happay aims to consistently maintain more than 50% of the market share. Constant innovations and client satisfaction have made Happay an indispensable product and this is only the beginning of a successful journey.

Happay – FAQs

What is Happay?

Happay is a business expense management solution that streamlines an organization’s expense workflow. It is an end-to-end solution that take cares of expense management to reporting and gives real-time visibility and control over business spending.

Who are the founders of Happay?

Anshul Rai and Varun Rathi are the founders of Happay.

How much funding has Happay raised?

Happay has raised a total of $21.57 Million funding till date (Nov 2020). Its most recent funding was led by the Greyhound Capital for $3 Million in May 2019.

November 28, 2020

World’s Largest Retailer Walmart Plans To Grow Sales

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 the organization it is based on.

Walmart Inc. is an American multinational retail corporation that operates a chain of hypermarkets, discount department stores, and grocery stores, headquartered in Bentonville, Arkansas.

The company was founded by Sam Walton in 1962 and incorporated on October 31, 1969. It also owns and operates Sam’s Club retail warehouses. As of October 31, 2020, Walmart has 11,510 stores and clubs in 27countries, operating under 56 different names.

Walmart – Company Highlights

Startup Name	Walmart Inc.
Headquarters	Bentonville, Arkansas, U.S
Industry	Retail
Founded	July 2, 1962
Founder	Sam Walton
CEO	Doug McMillon
Areas Served	Worldwide
Website	www.walmart.com

Walmart – About and How it Works?
Walmart – Logo and its Meaning
Walmart – Founder and History
Walmart – Mission
Walmart – Business Model
Walmart – Revenue and Growth
Walmart – Investments
Walmart – Acquisitions
Walmart – Competitors
Walmart – Challenges Faced
Walmart – Future Plans

Walmart – About and How it Works?

Wal-Mart was founded by Sam Walton in Rogers, Arkansas, in 1962 and focused its early growth in rural areas, thereby avoiding direct competition with retailing giants such as Sears and Kmart.

Walmart, Inc. engages in retail and wholesale business. The Company offers an assortment of merchandise and services at everyday low prices. It operates through the following business segments: Walmart U.S., Walmart International, and Sam’s Club. The Walmart U.S. segment operates as a merchandiser of consumer products, operating under the Walmart, Wal-Mart, and Walmart Neighbourhood Market brands, as well as walmart.com and other e-commerce brands. The Walmart International segment manages supercentre, supermarkets, hypermarkets, warehouse clubs, and cash & carry outside the United States.

Walmart is the world’s largest retailer company by revenue, with US $514.405 billion, according to the Fortune Global 500 list in 2019. It is also the largest private employer in the world with 2.2million employees. It is a publicly traded family-owned business, as the company is controlled by the Walton family. Sam Walton’s heirs own over 50 percent of Walmart through both their holding company Walton Enterprises and their individual holdings.

Walmart – Logo and its Meaning

As for the hidden message of Walmart logo, it considered that it symbolizes 6 sparks. And each spark, in turn, symbolizes ideas, which are making the company successful. They also remind of Sam Walton, who believed in himself and his success.

Logo of Walmart

Walmart – Founder and History

Samuel Moore Walton, an American businessman and entrepreneurs is the founder of Walmart.

The history of Walmart, an American discount department store chain, began in 1950 when businessman Sam Walton purchased a store from Luther E. Harrison in Bentonville, Arkansas, and opened Walton’s 5 & 10. The Walmart chain proper was founded in 1962 with a single store in Rogers, expanding outside Arkansas by 1968 and throughout the rest of the Southern United States by the 1980s, ultimately operating a store in every state of the United States, plus its first stores in Canada, by 1995. The expansion was largely fuelled by new store construction, although the chains Mohr-Value and Kuhn’s Big K were also acquired. The company introduced its warehouse club chain Sam’s Club in 1983 and its first Supercentre stores in 1988. By the second decade of the 21st century, the chain had grown to over 11,000 stores in 27 countries.

Walmart – Mission

Walmart’s mission statement says, “We feature a great selection of high-quality merchandise, friendly service and, of course, Every Day Low Prices. We also have another goal: to bring you the best shopping experience on the Internet. “

Walmart – Business Model

Walmart can develop, open, and operate units at the right locations and to deliver a customer-centric omnichannel experience. That largely determines its competitive position within the retail industry. Walmart employs many programs designed to meet competitive pressures within its industry.

These programs include the following:

EDLP (everyday low price): items priced at a low price every day so Walmart customers trust that its prices will not change under frequent promotional activity;
EDLC (everyday low cost): effort to control expenses so that savings can be passed along to customers;
Rollbacks: pass cost savings on to the customer by lowering prices on selected goods;
Savings Catcher, Save Even More and Ad Match: strategies to meet or be below a competitor’s advertised price;
Walmart Pickup: customer places order online and pick up for free from a store. The merchandise is fulfilled through Walmart distribution facilities;
Pickup Today: a customer places order online and can pick it up at a store within four hours for free. The order is fulfilled through existing store inventory;
Online Grocery: a customer places grocery order online and has it delivered to home or picks it up at one of Walmart participating stores or remote locations; and
Money-Back Guarantee: ensure the quality and freshness of the fruits and vegetables in Walmart stores by offering customers a 100 percent money-back guarantee if they are not satisfied.

Walmart – Revenue and Growth

Walmart annual revenue for 2020 was $523.964B, a 1.86% increase from 2019

Year	Annual Revenue	Percentage change
2019	$514.405B	+2.81%
2018	$500.343B	+2.98%

Walmart – Investments

Walmart has made 12 investments. Their most recent investment was on Oct 12, 2020, when Ninjacart raised $30M.

Date	Organization Name	Round	Amount
Oct 12, 2020	Ninjacart	Corporate Round	$30M
Jul 14, 2020	Flipkart	Corporate Round	$1.2B
Dec 11, 2019	Ninjacart	Series C	$10M
Oct 15, 2019	Level Home	Corporate Round	$71M
Mar 9, 2019	Girls Who Code	Grant	$3M
Nov 6, 2018	WalMart India	Venture Round	$37.7M
Oct 25, 2018	FreshMart	Series B	–
Aug 8, 2018	Dada-JD Daojia	Corporate Round	$500M
Oct 20, 2016	Dada-JD Daojia	Funding Round	$50M
Apr 1, 2015	Triad Workforce Solutions	Grant	$320K

Walmart – Acquisitions

Walmart has acquired 24 organizations. Their most recent acquisition was JoyRun on Nov 23, 2020.

Acquiree Name	Date	Amount	About Acquiree
JoyRun	Nov 23, 2020	–	JoyRun is a community based delivery company
CareZone	Jun 15, 2020	–	CareZone makes it easy to manage multiple medications, organize health information, and access health services from your smartphone
Polymorph	Apr 11, 2019	–	Polymorph is a white-label SaaS monetization platform for publishers to maximize revenue, reduce costs and deliver better ad experiences
Aspectiva	Feb 25, 2019	–	Turn Product Reviews into a Smarter Shopping Experience
Art.com	Nov 20, 2018	–	Art.com is an online platform designed to sell wall art and decorative items
Bare Necessities	Oct 13, 2018	–	Independent boutique retailers of luxury lingerie, swimwear and accessories
Eloquii	Oct 2, 2018	$100M	Eloquii offers an online plus size clothing store featuring women’s plus size fashion, clothes, and accessories
Flipkart	May 9, 2018	$16B	Flipkart is an e-commerce marketplace that offers over 30 million products cross 70+ categories
Wim Yogurt	Jan 1, 2018	–	Wim Yogurt is a modern cooking appliances for healthy homes
Parcel	Oct 3, 2017	–	Parcel is the same-day / last-mile delivery company built for the age of e-commerce

Walmart – Competitors

The top 10 competitors in Walmart‘s competitive set are Amazon, Target, Costco, Kmart, Kroger, ALDI, Walgreens, Tesco, Carrefour, and Best Buy.

Walmart – Challenges Faced

Walmart has faced issues with its employees involving low wages, poor working conditions and inadequate health care. Approximately 70% of its employees left within the first year.

Walmart has been criticized by many groups and individuals, such as labour unions and small-town advocates, for its policies and business practices, and their effects. Criticisms include charges of racial and gender discrimination, foreign product sourcing, anti-competitive practices, treatment of product suppliers, environmental practices, the use of public subsidies, and its surveillance of its employees. The corporation denies any wrongdoing and says that low prices are the result of efficiency.

In 2005, labour unions created new organizations and websites to criticize the company, including Wake Up Walmart (United Food and Commercial Workers) and Walmart Watch (Service Employees International Union). By the end of 2005, Walmart had launched Working Families for Walmart to counter those groups. Efforts to counter criticism include a public relations campaign in 2005, which included several television commercials. The company retained the public relations firm Edelman to interact with the press and respond to negative media reports, and has started working with bloggers by sending them news, suggesting topics for postings, and inviting them to visit Walmart’s corporate headquarters.

Walmart – Future Plans

The world’s largest retailer plans to grow sales by $45 billion to $60 billion in the next three years and spend $20 billion buying back its own shares.

The growth targets, stock buyback program and an $11 billion capital expenditure program, down from $12.4 billion this year, were announced Wednesday morning in New York at the retailer’s annual fall investor conference.

“We are uniquely positioned to win with the future of retail,” Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., president and CEO Doug McMillon told attendees, echoing what has been a familiar omnichannel theme for the company in recent years. “We will be the first to deliver a seamless shopping experience at scale.”

Achieving that goal is key to the company’s long term growth, but to get there the company disclosed the significant investments it has made in technology, wages, pricing and a weak dollar will pressure profits. Walmart CFO Charles Holley said the company’s earnings per share, which are projected to decline this year compared to last year, will fall another 6% to 12% next year as investments in the business peak. However, within three years, profits are forecast to rebound and grow between 5% and 10%.

Investors were looking for a faster growth trajectory which explains why following the release of the three-year profit forecast shares dropped roughly $5 to hit a new 52-week low near $60. Anticipating such a negative reaction, Holley announced Walmart had authorized a new $20 billion share repurchase program and committed to spend those dollars within two years even though it had $8.6 billion in authorization remaining under the existing program.

November 26, 2020

Volkswagen – Investing Strongly In Its Future

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 Volkswagen.

Volkswagen Group is a German automobile manufacturer whose main brand is Volkswagen. With headquarters in Wolfsburg, Germany, it is the world’s biggest luxury vehicle manufacturer.

Volkswagen creates, produces, and distributes passenger and commercial cars, motorbikes, engines, and turbomachinery, as well as financial, leasing, and fleet management services. It overtook Toyota as the world’s largest carmaker in 2016, and held that position for the next three years, selling 10.97 million vehicles.

Volkswagen – Company Highlights

Company Name	Volkswagen
Headquarters	Wolfsburg, Germany
Industry	Automotive
Founder	German Labour Front
Founded	1937
CEO	Herbert Diess
Parent	Volkswagen AG
Website	vw.com

Volkswagen – About and How it works?
Volkswagen – Founder and History
Volkswagen – Logo and its meaning
Volkswagen – Mission
Volkswagen – Business Model
Volkswagen – Revenue and Growth
Volkswagen – Investments
Volkswagen – Acquisitions
Volkswagen – Competitors
Volkswagen – Challenges Faced
Volkswagen – Future Plans

Volkswagen – About and How it works?

Volkswagen is a premium automobile manufacturer and retailer located in Germany. Volkswagen is derived from the German word Volk, which means “people,” and so Volkswagen means “people’s automobile” or “people’s car.” It is divided into four sections:

Passenger Automobiles – includes vehicle and engine research, manufacturing and marketing of passenger cars, as well as the related authentic parts industry.
Commercial vehicles include light commercial vehicles, trucks, and buses, as well as the genuine parts sector and related services.
Large-bore diesel engines, turbo compressors, industrial turbines, and chemical reactor systems, as well as gear units, propulsion components, and testing equipment, are all part of Power Engineering.
Dealer and customer finance, leasing, banking and insurance operations, fleet management, and mobility services are all part of Financial Services.

Among the company’s brands are Volkswagen, Audi, SEAT, SKODA, Bentley, Bugatti, Lamborghini, Porsche, Ducati, Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles, Scania, and MAN.

Volkswagen – Founder and History

The German government, led by Adolf Hitler of the National Socialist (Nazi) Party at the time, forms the Gesellschaft Zur Vorbereitung des Deutschen Volkswagens mbH, a new state-owned automobile business, on May 28, 1937. It was renamed Volkswagenwerk, or “The People’s Car Company,” later that year.

Volkswagen was based in Wolfsburg, Germany, and was originally owned by the German Labour Front, a Nazi group. Aside from his ambitious plan to create a network of autobahns and limited-access motorways across Germany, Hitler’s favorite project was the creation and mass manufacturing of a low-cost, high-speed car that could be purchased for less than 1,000 Reich marks (about $140 at the time).

Hitler enlisted the help of Austrian automotive expert Ferdinand Porsche to develop this “people’s vehicle.” “This automobile has been developed for the wide masses,” the Fuhrer said during a Nazi rally in 1938. Its objective is to satisfy their mobility needs while also making them happy.” However, shortly after the KdF (Kraft-Durch-Freude)-Wagen (“Strength-Through-Joy”) was presented at the Berlin Motor Show in 1939, World War II broke out, and Volkswagen halted production. With the plant in ruins after the war, the Allies chose to concentrate their efforts on rebuilding the German automobile industry on Volkswagen.

Volkswagen – Logo and its meaning

The Volkswagen logo is made up of the company’s initials, with the “V” positioned above the “W,” and both letters interacting beautifully.

The Volkswagen Logo

The blue color of the Volkswagen emblem stands for quality, reliability, and class, while the white hue stands for nobility, purity, and charm.

Volkswagen – Mission

There is no formal mission statement for Volkswagen. Volkswagen’s objective, according to a spokesman, is to “provide beautiful, safe, and ecologically sound vehicles that can compete in an increasingly competitive market and establish world standards in their respective classes.” The corporate aim encapsulates all the organization undertakes to achieve its vision. Its focus is on maintaining a level of quality that outperforms all other rivals in every way.

Volkswagen – Business Model

Innovation-driven VW introduces new models on a regular basis. It adjusts to fit local needs and focuses on the unique characteristics of each country (esp. in growth markets). VW seeks to decrease costs through efficient manufacturing methods and economies of scale while stressing the requirement for quality. “Offer beautiful, safe, and ecologically sound cars that can compete in an increasingly competitive market and establish world standards,” says the organization.

VW secures control and exploits its scale by a degree of centralization, but its worldwide presence allows it to accommodate for local specifics: R&D (including worldwide trend reconnaissance and technology scouting) is headquartered in Germany, with subsidiary research hubs in the United States, Japan, and China. Similarly, Group procurement buys manufacturing supplies, services, and Capex in bulk to maximize negotiating power, but it does so from 39 sites in 23 countries.

VW develops sustainable, long-term relationships with a range of suppliers and requires a high level of quality and dedication to ensure steady and efficient flows of high-quality and innovative sourced components.

The Group’s multi-brand approach encourages internal competition, encourages switchers to try new brands, and appeals to a wide range of individuals. Because of its strict hierarchical brand design with sub-brands, internal cannibalism of sales is reduced. Passenger (VW), premium (Audi), luxury (Porsche), and commercial business holding firms are the four product categories in the corporation. The brands are translated into the corporate hierarchy and are used to arrange the business in order to represent customer preferences within the company.

Volkswagen – Revenue and Growth

Volkswagen AG reported $60.736 billion in revenue for the quarter ended March 31, 2020, down 10.89 percent year over year.

Year	Annual Revenue	Percentage change
2019	$282.948B	+1.58%
2018	$278.538B	+6.83%
2017	$260.74B	+8.45%

Volkswagen – Investments

Date	Organization Name	Round	Amount
Jun 9, 2021	Northvolt	Venture Round	$2.8B
Apr 28, 2021	IRP Systems	Series C	$31M
Mar 15, 2021	Northvolt	Corporate Round	–
Nov 30, 2020	TuSimple	Series E	$350M
Sep 29, 2020	Northvolt	Venture Round	$600M
Jun 16, 2020	Audi AG	Secondary Market	$267M
Jun 16, 2020	QuantumScape	Corporate Round	$200M
Nov 14, 2019	credi2	Series A	–
Aug 30, 2019	SeeReal Technologies	Corporate Round	–
Jul 12, 2019	Argo AI	Corporate Round	$2.6B
Jun 12, 2019	Northvolt	Corporate Round	$600M
May 7, 2019	Gett	Series E	$120M
Nov 12, 2018	ONO	Grant	$50K
Jun 21, 2018	QuantumScape	Corporate Round	$100M
Jun 7, 2018	Gett	Series E	$80M

Volkswagen – Acquisitions

Acquiree Name	Date	Amount	About Acquiree
WirelessCar	Dec 19, 2018	$122M	WirelessCar is a provider of manufacturers of cars and commercial vehicles with customized telematics services to end-customers
Porsche	Jul 5, 2012	–	Porsche is a German automobile manufacturer
Scania	Mar 3, 2008	–	Scania is a manufacturer of heavy trucks and buses as well as industrial and marine engines

Volkswagen – Competitors

The competitors of Volkswagen Automobiles are:

Ford
General Motors
Toyota
Suzuki
Hyundai
Nissan
Honda
FCA (Fiat Chrysler Automobiles)
BMW
Mercedes

Volkswagen – Challenges Faced

Economic volatility and greater competitiveness, as well as the costs of the current diesel crisis and new, time-consuming exhaust testing in the European Union, are among the issues.

According to chief financial officer Frank Witter, the cost of executing the Worldwide Harmonized Light-Duty Test Procedure (WLTP) testing surpassed €1 billion (S$1.6 billion). Production increased by 13.5 percent in the second quarter, more than twice the growth rate of deliveries, as the automaker prepared for the regulation change. Volkswagen warned earlier this year that inventories might pile up ahead of the WLTP’s implementation on September 1st.

VW is grappling with political issues as well as internal transformation in the aftermath of the three-year-old diesel scandal, which continues to haunt the industrial juggernaut.

The business incurred penalties of €1.64 billion, mostly due to a punishment imposed by German authorities, bringing the total losses to almost €27.4 billion. Mr. Rupert Stadler, the now-suspended chief of Audi’s premium division, was arrested by Munich prosecutors in June and is still detained.

As per a spokesperson, a subsequent partnership with Ford in light commercial vehicles would allow the companies to pool development resources for electrification, lowering one-time costs in areas such as battery-powered and self-driving cars, both of which are gaining pace at the same time.

“We cannot rest on our laurels because great challenges lie ahead of us in the coming quarters,” Mr Diess (chairman of the board of management of Volkswagen Group) said. “Growing protectionism also poses major challenges for the globally integrated automotive industry.”

Volkswagen – Future Plans

Between 2020 and 2024, planned investments and development expenses in future sectors such as hybridization, electric transportation, and digitization will reach over EUR 60 billion.
In Planning Round 68, the share of anticipated spend on future themes grew to over 40%, up from around 30% in the previous Planning Round.

The Volkswagen Group continues to make significant investments in its future. Planning Round 68 resulted in the creation of the investment plan for 2020 to 2024. The Group plans to invest over EUR 60 billion in hybridization, electric mobility, and digitization over the next five years. This amounted to around 40% of the company’s property, plant, and equipment investments, as well as all research and development costs, throughout the planning period. It’s a ten-percentage-point rise over the previous Planning Round for the Group. The Group expects to invest about EUR 33 billion in electric vehicles alone.

“We are resolutely pressing ahead with the transformation of the Volkswagen Group and focusing our investments on the future of mobility. This is part of our systematic and consequent implementation of the Group’s strategy,” said Hans Dieter Pötsch, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of the Volkswagen Group.

November 25, 2020

Toyota Motors Plans to Design Special Electric Vehicles

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 the organization it is based on.

Toyota Motor Corporation is a Japanese multinational manufacturer headquartered in Toyota, Aichi, Japan. In 2017, Toyota’s corporate structure consisted of 364,445 employees worldwide and, as of December 2019, was the tenth-largest company in the world by revenue.

Toyota is the largest automobile manufacturer in Japan, and the second-largest in the world behind Volkswagen, based on 2018 unit sales. Toyota was the world’s first automobile manufacturer to produce more than 10 million vehicles per year, which it has done since 2012, when it also reported the production of its 200 millionth vehicle.

Toyota Motor – Company Highlights

Startup Name	Toyota Motor Corporation
Headquarters	Toyota City, Japan
Industry	Automotive
Founders	Kiichiro Toyoda
Founded	August 28, 1937
CEO	Akio Toyoda
Website	www.global.toyota

Toyota Motor – About and How it works?
Toyota Motor – Logo and its meaning
Toyota Motor – Founder and History
Toyota Motor – Mission
Toyota Motor – Business Model
Toyota Motor – Revenue and Growth
Toyota Motor – Funding and Investors
Toyota Motor – Investments
Toyota Motor – Acquisitions
Toyota Motor – Competitors
Toyota Motor – Challenges Faced
Toyota Motor – Future Plans

Toyota Motor – About and How it works?

Toyota Motor Corporation (Toyota), incorporated on August 27, 1937, conducts business in the automotive industry. The Company also conducts business in finance and other industries. The Company’s segments include Automotive, Financial Services and others. Toyota sells its vehicles in approximately 190 countries and regions. Toyota’s markets for its automobiles are Japan, North America, Europe and Asia.

Toyota produces automobiles, and related parts and components through approximately 50 overseas manufacturing companies in over 30 countries and regions besides Japan. Toyota’s manufacturing facilities include plants in Japan, the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, France, Turkey, Thailand, China, Taiwan, India, Indonesia, South Africa, Australia, Argentina and Brazil.

The Company’s Financial Services segment consists of providing financing to dealers and their customers for the purchase or lease of Toyota vehicles. Toyota’s financial services also provide retail instalment credit and leasing through the purchase of instalment and lease contracts originated by Toyota dealers. Toyota’s subsidiary, Toyota operates financial services companies in approximately 40 countries and regions, which support its automotive operations across the globe. Toyota Motor Credit Corporation is Toyota’s principal financial services subsidiary in the United States.

The other segment includes the design, manufacturing and sale of housing, telecommunications and other businesses. Its information technology related businesses include a Web portal for automobile information.

Toyota Motor – Logo and its meaning

The overlapping of the two perpendicular ovals inside the outer oval symbolize “T” for Toyota, as well as a steering wheel, representing the vehicle itself. The outer oval symbolizes the world embracing Toyota.

Toyota Logo

Toyota Motor – Founder and History

Kiichiro Toyoda is the founder of Toyota Motor.

In 1933 Toyoda Kiichiro founded what later became the Toyota Motor Corporation as a division of the Toyoda Automatic Loom Works, Ltd. (later Toyota Industries Corporation, now a subsidiary), a Japanese manufacturer founded by his father, Toyoda Sakichi.

Its first production car, the Model AA sedan, was released in 1936. The following year the division was incorporated as the Toyota Motor Company, Ltd., headed by Kiichiro. (The company’s name was changed to Toyota, which has a more pleasing sound in Japanese.) Toyota subsequently established several related companies, including Toyoda Machine Works, Ltd. (1941), and Toyota Auto Body, Ltd. (1945).

Toyota Motor – Mission

Toyota’s corporate mission is “to make ever-better cars, to build a future where everyone has the freedom to move.” This mission statement is a combination of the company’s official statements regarding the mission of its business: “to build a future where everyone has the freedom to move” and “to make ever-better cars.” Toyota’s corporate mission statement has the following key elements that reflect the enterprise and the purpose and goals of its business:

Make ever-better cars
Build an inclusive future
Freedom to move for everyone

Toyota Motor – Business Model

Toyota’s operation has been analysed based on those 4Vs below :

Volume of Processes : Toyota manufactures numerous vehicles (8,736.5 thousand units in 2012, Toyota Production figures) and for such high output, there’s greater degree of repeatability in the process. The high volume of output has allowed Toyota in systematization of activities and Toyota believes in developing deep expertise in specialities among its workforce as an essential requirement to its product-development system. Such high volume process output helps Toyota gain economies of scale and thus reduces the unit cost of its production.
Variety of Processes : Toyota carefully chooses a variety to balance market demands and operational efficiency. The company is present in all the segments of automotive and at least 70 different models of vehicles are sold by Toyota (Automotive, 2014) making the portfolio with a wide range of products and this accounts for a higher variety of processes. High variety of processes enables Toyota to match a wider range of customer demands and be more flexible in the eyes of customers. This, however, accounts for higher unit costs and makes the process relatively complex but Toyota has advanced other productions methods to control such aspects.
Variation of Processes : With predictably constant demand, it’s easier to allocate resources to a level that is capable of meeting the demand Slack et al. (2012). The variation in demand for Toyota’s products is low in the past few years and the company’s production has integrated Just in Time production techniques to fulfil those demands. Low variation enables Toyota to implement stable, routine and predictable operation processes.
Visibility of Processes : Process visibility indicates how much of the processes are exposed to its customers Slack et al. (2012). Toyota has low process visibility, as most of its operation process is ‘factory-like’. Low process visibility means there’s a time lag between production and consumption of Toyota products but it enables the company for high staff utilization and enjoys low unit cost for its products. Few of its processes such as those of sales centre and test drive facilities, however, have some kind of contact with customers allowing limited visibility.

Toyota Motor – Revenue and Growth

The Toyota Motor Corporation’s net revenue contracted by one percent year-on-year and dipped to just under 30 trillion Japanese yen in the fiscal year ended March 2020. This figure is approximately equal to 278 billion U.S. dollars. Toyota’s revenue for the twelve months ending September 30, 2020 was $241.196B, a 13.59% decline year-over-year.

Year	Annual Revenue	Percentage change
2019	$272.031B	+2.88%
2018	$264.416B	+3.02%

Toyota Motor – Funding and Investors

Toyota Motor Corporation has raised a total of $243.6M in funding over 2 rounds. Their latest funding was raised on Jun 28, 2018 from a Post-IPO Equity round.

Date	Round	Amount	Investor
Jun 28, 2018	Post-IPO Equity	$201.6M	GT Capital Holdings
Apr 14, 1982	Funding Round	$42M	–

Toyota Motor – Investments

Toyota Motor Corporation has made 27 investments. Their most recent investment was on Feb 25, 2020, when Pony.ai raised $462M.

Amount	Organization Name	Round	Amount
Feb 25, 2020	Pony.ai	Series B	$462M
Jan 16, 2020	Joby Aviation	Series C	$590M
Dec 4, 2019	May Mobility	Series B	$50M
Oct 24, 2019	OPTIMIND	Series A	¥1B
Oct 15, 2019	LeapMind	Series C	¥3.5B
Jul 24, 2019	Didi Chuxing	Corporate Round	$600M
Jun 28, 2019	MONET Technologies	Corporate Round	¥499.9M
Apr 19, 2019	Uber Advanced Technologies Group	Corporate Round	$1B
Aug 27, 2018	Uber	Corporate Round	$500M
Aug 21, 2018	Getaround	Series D	$300M

Toyota Motor – Acquisitions

Toyota Motor Corporation has acquired 3 organizations. Their most recent acquisition was Daihatsu on Feb 12, 2016.

Acquiree Name	Date	Amount	About Acquiree
Daihatsu	Feb 12, 2016	–	Daihatsu is the surviving Japanese internal combustion engine manufacturers
Cascade Corporation	Mar 28, 2013	$760M	Manufacturers of materials handling load engagement devices
Hino Ottawa-Gatineau	Oct 28, 2010	–	A Japanese manufacturer of commercial vehicles

Toyota Motor – Competitors

Toyota Motor Corporation’s top competitors include FCA US, Mitsubishi Motors, Opel, Volkswagen, Nissan USA, PSA Group, Hyundai Motor, BMW Group, Ford Motor, General Motors and Daimler.

Toyota Motor – Challenges Faced

Toyota’s sales in its home market are going through a phase of stagnation.
Any weakness in the Japanese yen provides a competitive advantage to Toyota’s overseas business. Therefore, the company’s margins from the overseas business are highly dependent on the currency movement of the Japanese yen against major currencies, including the US dollar and the euro. Continuous strength in the yen against these currencies can significantly affect Toyota’s profitability.
Despite being an Asian automaker, Toyota is unable to stay ahead of GM in the Chinese market.
With increasing environmental awareness across the globe, a delay in Toyota’s ability to deliver mainstream eco-friendly vehicles may restrict its future growth prospects.

Toyota Motor – Future Plans

The demand for electric and hybrid cars is growing vastly. You might have heard of the self-driving vehicles running on the roads these days. That is a rough example of what modern technology demands from the automakers. Inbuilt software running the automobile is the need of the hour. The automotive industries are now racing for innovations to keep up the repo in the market. The modern era is the time of transformation. And that is what Toyota is battling for.

The manufacturers now understand that electric cars are the future. The company is now designing special electric vehicles in a partnership with Subaru. Toyota now has the dedication to built electric cars. Toyota future plans will help to increase global sales. They are now in a joint venture with the various battery supplying companies.

They not only have to design electric vehicles but also have to match the market needs. Numerous electric car manufacturing vehicles are in this race. The demand for electric cars is increasing all around the globe. The experts working on Toyota future plans will have to put all efforts possible. It is so to increase sales and reach the set target.

The automakers are working on hybrid and plug-in hybrid models as well. According to industry knowledge, the count of electric vehicles will still be less than hybrid cars. Electric vehicles are not the only focus for the company. They also want to increase global sales in hybrid vehicles. The company will design and manufacture electric vehicles as per the market demands. But the game will still be on the hybrid and plug-in hybrid cars.

November 25, 2020

NorthMist – Bringing in the Gorgeous Fusion of Fashion and Sustainability

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 the organization it is based on.

Recently we have been quite seeing a trend about using organic products. Also, there’s been a lot of buzz about how great these products are for human health and also society at large. Following the same insight, Smrity Gupta and Arijit Mazumdar launched NorthMist in 2018.

NorthMist primarily offers 100% organic cotton t-shirts, in three categories- polo neck, round neck full sleeves and round neck half sleeves. They are priced at INR 1199 each, INR 899 and INR 799 respectively.

NorthMist – Company Highlights

Startup Name	NorthMist
Headquarter	Bangalore
Sector	Clothing
Founder	Smrity Gupta and Arijit MAzumdar
Founded	2018
Website	NorthMist

NorthMist – About and How it works
NorthMist – Target Market Size
NorthMist – Founders and Team
NorthMist – How did it start?
NorthMist – Name, Tagline, and Logo
NorthMist – Startup Launch
NorthMist – Business Model and Revenue Model
NorthMist – Startup Challenges
NorthMist – Competitors
NorthMist – Funding and Investors
NorthMist – Advisors and Mentors
NorthMist – Growth
NorthMist – Future Plans

NorthMist – About and How it works

All the products at NorthMist are made of 100% organic cotton, sourced from exclusive and certified vendors, and manufactured in a pro-sustainability strategy. Also, all the products are ensured to be supremely authentic of being environment-friendly products. NorthMist procures raw materials in-house, from vendors, who are under the sustainability umbrella and supply only to it. Having multiple vendors for each of the raw materials, it picks the best and thus gets the best price in the industry. Moreover, it operates on a low inventory model with a turn-around time of 7 days. Through real-time orders and fast processing, which are pretty uncommon as well. Combined, this makes it stand apart from the present competitors.

Low inventory levels, less stock, a small and efficient team and faster turnaround time pull down chances of loss while promoting faster decisions and cost-cutting opportunities. And that’s how it works at NorthMist.

NorthMist – Target Market Size

The apparel landscape in India is believed to be ruled by startups in the near future and going by the consumer preference pattern, eco-friendly start-ups will soon be at a better position, compared to bigger brands. Indeed, these are the reasons behind this startup venture too.

NorthMist – Founders and Team

Smrity Gupta and Arijit Mazumdar are the Founders of NorthMist

“Smrity and I were co-workers. Shared philosophy and zeal to do something big allowed us to become friends.” Says the founder, Arijit Mazumdar.

Arijit has a master’s degree in power engineering and has excelled in many fields including business negotiations, business development, and sales. Smrity, the co-founder of NorthMist is a fashion technology graduate from NIFT and holds immense knowledge of the industry. Her insights about the industry, her keen eye for detail and her experience made the journey of starting a fashion business easier for this duo.

NorthMist has an in-house team that consists of about 15 people, encompassing different arena of expertise. It has a sales head, content marketer, visual designer, digital marketer, operations executives, and a production team. Eco-warriors as the venture identify the team. All decisions are taken by the in-house team of experts, who share a similar outlook towards sustainability. NorthMist also has an extensive network of freelancers working for it. At this moment, NorthMist has a strong team of 25 individuals.

When the founders hire people, they ensure that the candidates believe in the concept of sustainability or are at least familiar with the concept of sustainability. There is no hierarchy in the office. Though every individual has their own role to play, when required, everyone can contribute. Every Saturday the core team conducts “brainstorming” sessions, where every team member shares their ideas for brand growth. From birthday celebrations to team outings, playing games to fun sessions, the work environment at NorthMist is all about being happy and content.

NorthMist – How did it start?

“My co-founder and I shared the same philosophy- to make the world sustainable. This motivated us to come up with the idea of NorthMist.” Says Arijit Mazumdar. Both of them were working, however, their ambitions were different. All they wanted was to start their own brand. Since both of them were quite inclined towards adopting a sustainable lifestyle, their aim was to start something around it. And hence they started brainstorming on what they could do to bring about change in the world. And this motivated them to establish NorthMist.

During the inception days, they were just 2 people. They worked really hard, supporting each other through all hurdles, which honestly were in abundance. The founders worked hard to realize our dreams. The first few months were all about tight schedules and deadlines. They would conduct surveys and get direct feedback from the customers. The focus was to create awareness and they ensured to do so using various channels. They kept the product line limited to draw more attention to the quality of the same. It was difficult, but fun nonetheless. When you have your friend by your side, sharing similar ambitions, everything becomes easier!

NorthMist – Name, Tagline, and Logo

The etymology of NorthMist is such- “North” is the head of directions and “Mist” is often associated with nature. Put these two terms together and one gets “NorthMist”, which literally means ‘to head towards nature.’

The founders wanted a name that was simple and relatable, yet strong in its resolution. And let’s not forget, a name that would convey the concept of being eco-friendly perfectly. NorthMist fitted the bill effortlessly.

“It took us about a month, a self-determined deadline and suggestions from our friends to come up with an impeccable name for the brand. And today, we can say proudly that we have it.” Added Arijit Mazumdar

NorthMist – Startup Launch

After launching NorthMist in March 2018, the founders started participating in co-working events. We Work, CoWorks, Coho, 91 SpringBroad, they went everywhere to showcase the products. For the first eight to nine months, they were dedicated to doing events. This helped them to create a strong customer base. Then, they dedicated their efforts to retargeting these customers. They also started collaborating with marketplaces like Amazon and Flipkart to create more awareness.

The founder’s equally used social media platforms to garner the attention of the target audience. This helped them scale the brand and add visibility to the products. NorthMist’s journey from 50 to 5000 has been extraordinarily inspiring and only motivates the team to do better every day.

NorthMist – Business Model and Revenue Model

The business model of NorthMist follows can be classified broadly into B2B and B2C categories. Under the B2B model portion, it has wholesale, dropshipping and inbound corporate. B2C model, on the other hand, relies on its own website and e-commerce platforms like Flipkart, Amazon and The Better India for the sale of our products. NorthMist is also registering on national and international online marketplaces like LBB, Step Set Go, Ajio and more. In terms of offline presence, its products are available in Organic World and Go Native stores pan India.

NorthMist – Startup Challenges

Major challenges in the Indian apparel and fashion industry lie on factors like poor infrastructure, limited reach and unorganized market. Furthermore, for startups in India, the criteria to meet for Government funding are extensive and slow.

Another major challenge is to create awareness. Considering the fact that sustainability is a relatively new topic with very less exposure, convincing customers to make a switch is fairly difficult. Not impossible though. “Our motive was clear, to reach as many people as we can and motivate them to make a shift to sustainability.” Says Arijit. The process was time-consuming, but their constant efforts have ensured that they are reaching the right. Communication plays a major role in a business such as NorthMist’s, and the core team seems to have mastered it. Garnering attention can still be challenging yet they are doing it quite well.

NorthMist – Competitors

Competition is quite huge as more than 300 international fashion brands are expected to create a footprint in India. Besides, the Indian apparel market predicts growth to $124 billion by the end of 2020. Also, more startups are certainly on the pipeline as the apparel space in the country is projected to be ruled by startups in times to come. Eco-friendly startups will occupy a big share, as consumers these days are increasingly making sustainable choices.

When it comes to sustainability, the number of brands is quite limited; however, to name a few, NorthMist is in direct competition with No Nasties, Turmswear, and March Tee.

NorthMist – Funding and Investors

NorthMist has a set of angel investors, who have invested Rs. 1 crore inequity of the business.

The first round of our series of funding came from Sanjay Koul, Managing Director and chairman of a top US company; Birju Gala, CEO of a leading company; Soumendra Biswal, Head of Corporate Affairs of a leading export company; and Srinivasan Sarangpani, Director of Supply Chain at a US company. The majority of the funding has been invested in R&D of our products, hiring the right team for delivering the best, marketing and creating awareness among consumers about the brand identity and sustainability goal.

NorthMist – Advisors and Mentors

The list of advisors and mentors of NorthMist include:

Venkatesh Maheshwari
Sriram Sundaravadanan
Rajiv Mehta

NorthMist – Growth

In the last fiscal year, NorthMist has had a turnover of 30 lakhs. It has also got tremendous responses from conscious customers from cities across India. Metros and Tier 1 cities like Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai, Hyderabad, Pune and Bangalore have together recorded maximum sale figures for NorthMist.

NorthMist – Future Plans

Staying pivotal to the sustainability factor, NorthMist has plans to diversify. Adding to the existing men’s t-shirt categories, it will be launching women’s wear and a new range of sustainable hoodies soon.

As for short term goals, NorthMist looks forward to having a total turnover of 500 crores in the next five years; expand in terms of products under the sustainable lifestyle category. It wants to grow the business within India and beyond the geographic boundaries through different distribution channels and multiple branded outlets.

“We are a pro-sustainability company; hence, sustainability is our long-term vision. The planet belongs to each of us and saving it from further damage is surely our responsibility. Instead of combating against brands, a collaborative effort of all sustainable brands making conscious choices of environment-friendly products should be the future.” Concluded Arijit Mazumdar.

November 25, 2020

Tag: 📄Company Profiles

JPMorgan – Company Highlights

JPMorgan – About and How it Works?

JPMorgan – Logo and its Meaning

JPMorgan – Founder and History

JPMorgan – Mission

JPMorgan – Business Model

JPMorgan – Revenue and Growth

JPMorgan – Investments

JPMorgan – Acquisitions

JPMorgan – Competitors

JPMorgan – Challenges Faced

JPMorgan – Future Plans

JPMorgan – FAQs

What does JP Morgan do?

Is JP Morgan and JP Morgan Chase the same?

Is JP Morgan the largest bank?

What is JP Morgan’s full name?

How does JPMorgan make money?

Honda – Company Highlights

Honda – About and How it Works?

Honda – Logo and its Meaning

Honda – Founder and History

Honda – Mission

Honda – Business Model

Honda – Revenue and Growth

Honda – Investments

Honda – Acquisition

Honda – Competitors

Honda – Challenges Faced

Honda – Future Plans

Alphabet – Company Highlights

Alphabet – About and How it Works ?

Alphabet – Logo and its Meaning

Alphabet – Founder and History

Alphabet – Mission

Alphabet – Team

Alphabet – Subsidiaries

Alphabet – Business Model

Alphabet – Revenue and Growth

Alphabet – Investments

Alphabet – Acquisitions

Alphabet – Competitors

Alphabet – Challenges Faced

Alphabet – Future Plans

Listnr – Company Highlights

About Listnr

Listnr – Founder

The Idea Behind Starting Listnr

Listnr – Business Model & Revenue Model

Listnr – Challenges

Listnr – Growth

McKesson – Company Highlights

McKesson – About and How it Works?

McKesson – Logo and its Meaning

McKesson – Founder and History

McKesson – Mission

McKesson – Business Model

McKesson – Revenue and Growth

McKesson – Investments

McKesson – Acquisitions

McKesson – Competitors

McKesson – Challenges Faced

McKesson – Future Plans

Happay – Company Highlights

Happay – About and How it works

Happay – Founders and Team

Anshul Rai

Varun Rathi

How was Happay Started

Happay – Business Model

Happay – Revenue Model

Happay – Funding and Investors

Happay – Competitors

Happay – Name and Logo

Happay – Revenue and Valuation

Happay – Growth

Happay – Future Plans

Happay – FAQs

What is Happay?