Ola’s Twitter ambition; crypto bill may skip budget session

By Kevin Colleran On Jan 18, 2022

Scores of people who booked Ola Electric’s S1 and S1 Pro scooters, which have seen months-long delays, signed up to Twitter simply for updates on their purchase. But once there, they quickly melded into a community centred around Ola and their shiny new EVs, much like Tesla owners. Today we bring you the story of Ola and its accidental Twitter empire.

Also in this letter:

Centre may skip crypto bill in budget session
HCL’s ‘hire to retire’ strategy to arrest attrition
New D2C brands declined in 2021, but funding rose

Inside Ola’s Tesla-esque Twitter empire

Ola Electric is among the first auto manufacturers in India to have bypassed traditional dealerships and delivered vehicles directly to customers. But it has seen its fair share of teething issues with this distribution model and has already been forced to delay deliveries several times.

A package deal: Software engineer Syed Rabbani, one of the lucky few who have received their Ola S1s or S1 Pros at home, told us he waited months for his purchase. But it’s not like he had much of a choice. Living in the small town of Guntur in Andhra Pradesh, Rabbani didn’t have the option of going to a nearby showroom or travelling to Bengaluru to buy his scooter.

His only communication channel with the company is Twitter, which he joined to get updates on his booking. “I never really used Twitter [before this],” he said. “But I was worried about when I would get the scooter. Twitter was the place I went to because that is where all the updates come first. I follow (Ola CEO) Bhavish Aggarwal’s tweets closely.”

Come for the updates, stay for the chat: Rabbani isn’t the only person who rarely used Twitter before booking an Ola scooter. We spoke to half a dozen such customers across the country who became active Twitter users after booking their S1s and S1 Pros.

As more people signed up, the platform turned from a place for updates and complaints into a forum for meeting fellow customers and endlessly discussing the minutiae of their shiny new purchases.

This fledgeling community mirrors that of Tesla superfans on Twitter, which is centred around founder Elon Musk. The billionaire uses his Twitter account for—among quite a lot else— updates on all things Tesla. The company has even shut down its PR unit in the US, with Musk’s Twitter account becoming the primary source of information.

In a similar vein, Ola Electric now sends Aggarwal’s tweets along with press notes. ET has received many such statements with his tweets attached.

Chance for a fresh start: But Aggarwal’s Twitter account has not always been easy for the company to handle. Before the pandemic, every tweet he posted was met with a barrage of abuse and complaints about the ride-hailing business. Then came the pandemic, which decimated Ola’s revenue. Aggarwal then decided to focus on electric vehicles.

Varun Dubey, chief marketing officer of Ola Electric, said Ola upped its social media game, especially on Twitter, in January 2021. A media event at the Ola Electric factory in February 2021 was a grand success, and Aggarwal is said to have doubled down on Twitter ever since.

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Centre may skip crypto bill in budget session

The government is unlikely to introduce the long-awaited cryptocurrency bill in the upcoming budget session of parliament.

Why? It wants to hold more discussions and build consensus on the regulatory framework, officials with knowledge of the matter told us. The government also wants to wait for the pilot of the Reserve Bank of India’s digital currency, which is expected in a few months, and is looking to hold more discussions with stakeholders to firm up a view on the policy.

“The crypto bill may not be introduced in the budget session. It is a complex subject. This will require more time,” a senior finance ministry official said.

A legislative framework for virtual currencies will also require some existing laws to be amended. The government also wants to wait for technical inputs from the Reserve Bank after the pilot launch of its digital currency, the official said. The RBI has raised concerns about private digital currencies, citing macroeconomic and financial stability issues.

Taxing issues: Another reason for the delay may be the lack of consensus on a taxation framework for virtual currencies, sources told us. While there is consensus on treating crypto as assets, not currencies, and the government may provide some direction on taxation in the upcoming budget, a full-fledged tax framework for crypto is still a work in progress, they said.

We had earlier reported that the finance ministry has sought inputs from tax experts. While the revenue department has received multiple tax proposals from various stakeholders, it is yet to finalise the rules, officials said.

Tweet of the day

HCL’s ‘hire to retire’ strategy to arrest attrition

HCL Tech CEO C. Vijayakumar

HCL Technologies Ltd. is revamping its internal tech interface to gauge employee sentiment better and provide an advanced tool for onboarding or training, to stem its soaring attrition rates.

The “Hire to Retire” platform aims to improve the entire employee lifecycle from recruitment, onboarding and training and right up to retirement.

“We are revamping all of our IT landscape because the existing ones have been developed incrementally over the past 30 years…we feel from an employee experience perspective they are not great,” Chief HR Officer VV Apparao said.

HCL Technologies is using techniques like gamification as well as AI/ML tools to track and address dissatisfaction levels related to work.
It has also set up a program to develop future leaders within a bucket of 600-odd employees in the age group of 35-45 years.
The Noida-based firm is planning to double freshers’ hiring in the next fiscal. It will be hiring around 20,000 freshers by the end of FY22.
Last year, India’s third largest IT firm spent nearly $20 million on employee welfare services such as vaccinations and hospital tie-ups.

During the third quarter, HCL Technologies reported an attrition rate of 19.8%—up from 15.7% in the preceding three months—due to the massive industry demand for technology resources.

Also Read: HCL Tech CEO sees ‘huge value in getting people back to work’

New D2C brands declined in 2021, but funding rose

The number of new direct-to-consumer companies fell to nearly a third last year, reversing the aggression seen in the space over the previous couple of years.

In 2021, 77 D2C brands surfaced in India. That compares with 215 each in 2019 and 2020, according to Tracxn data.

But funding into the sector has surged. D2C companies raised $493 million last year, more than twice the amount the segment raised over two preceding years.

Quote: “From an investment point of view, investors would be interested in brands that have a mobile-first approach with personalised offerings as it creates a repeat and loyal customer base,” said Gaurav VK singhvi, founder of The Founder Circle that invested in nearly 30 startups last year. “Also, profitability would be a key factor on which investments would be made as we expect many of them to take a public route going ahead. This would fetch us better valuations.”

D2C brands are businesses that have the majority of their revenue or customer acquisition from direct-to-consumer online channels or started with an online-first distribution before going omnichannel.

Infographic Insight

ETtech Done Deals

■ Agritech startup Arya.ag has raised $60 million in a Series C funding round led by Luxembourg-based Asia Impact SA at a valuation of $300 million.

■ Online wealth manager IndMoney has raised roughly $75 million from Tiger Global and others as part of its ongoing Series D round.

■ Goat Brand Labs, a Thrasio-style venture run by former Flipkart executive Rishi Vasudev, has bought a 90% stake in The Label Life to enter the women’s fast fashion sector.

■ Chingari has raised $15 million in a funding round led by Republic Capital to bolster the technology on its short-video app and for hiring.

■ IndiaFilings, a bootstrapped compliance and regulatory services provider, has executed a secondary sale to bring on board BeeNext and Udtara Ventures as investors.

Oyo is said to seek $9-billion valuation in IPO

Oyo is said to target $9-billion valuation in IPO

Oyo founder Ritesh Agarwal

Oravel Stays, the parent company of Oyo Hotels & Homes, is eyeing a valuation of about $9 billion in its initial public offering after preliminary conversations with potential investors, Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

The SoftBank-backed startup is expected to get the green light to proceed with the offering this week or next after filing preliminary documents last year, said the people. A formal roadshow will begin after regulatory approval and determine final pricing.

The valuation Oyo is targeting would be lower than the $12 billion initially reported in local media last year and probably lower than the $10 billion level the startup hit in 2019.

Such muted expectations reflect Oyo’s financial struggles and a more measured appetite for IPOs in India following the disastrous stock market debut of Paytm.

Oyo’s offering will be among the biggest IPOs since Paytm’s. In its preliminary filing, the company said it planned to raise Rs 8,430 crore through the sale of new shares and some secondary shares.

Also Read: Oyo IPO Details: The DRHP, Decoded