Also in this letter:
■ Zomato Q2 results: net loss nearly halves to Rs 250.8 crore
■ Mass layoffs in the US could give IT firms a ready pool of talent
■ Amagi raises $109 million to expand streaming infra business
Union ministers, K’taka CM key guests at ETSA 2022 awards night
Union Cabinet Ministers Piyush Goyal and Ashwini Vaishnav, and Chief Minister of Karnataka Basavaraj Bommai will be the guests of honour at a glittering ceremony to celebrate the winners of The Economic Times Startup Awards on November 19.
The star-studded event in Bengaluru, which will also play host to a galaxy of business leaders, entrepreneurs, investors and policy makers, marks the eighth edition of the country’s most coveted awards for entrepreneurial excellence.
Goyal, union minister for commerce, industry and consumer affairs and Vaishnaw, union minister for railways, communications, electronics and information technology will join chief minister Bommai to engage with the high-powered gathering.
If the technology and startup sectors are to play a pivotal role in India’s quest to emerge as a $5-trillion economy by 2025, they will need to work in close collaboration with policy makers and the government.
Winners: The winners of these most elite awards for startup excellence were chosen at a virtual meeting that lasted more than two hours on October 28. A stellar jury led by Infosys CEO and MD Salil Parekh picked the winners in nine categories from a shortlist of 45 contenders.
Razorpay, the Bengaluru-based online payments solutions company, won top honours as the Startup of the Year, while Falguni Nayar, founder and CEO of Nykaa, bagged the newly launched CEO of the Year category. Shekhar Kirani, partner, Accel, won the Midas Touch Award for Best Investor.
Zomato Q2 results: net loss nearly halves to Rs 250.8 crore
Zomato’s net loss nearly halved to Rs 250.8 crore in the September quarter from Rs 434.9 crore in the same period last year, the company announced on Thursday. In April-June, the company reported a consolidated net loss of Rs 186 crore.
The online food delivery and restaurant discovery platform also saw its revenue from operations increase 62% year-on-year to Rs 1661.3 crore during the September quarter.
Billion-dollar run rate: It also reported total adjusted revenue growth of 48% year-on-year to Rs 21.07 billion, which translates to annualised revenue of $1.05 billion (at the average exchange rate for the quarter of $1 = Rs 80). “This is the first quarter where we have crossed the billion dollar annualised revenue mark,” the company said.
Zomato’s founder and CEO Deepinder Goyal said that even as the company’s food delivery business was growing and moving towards profitability, there was room for it to grow much faster.
Lenskart: Meanwhile, Lenskart’s consolidated operating revenue grew 66% to Rs 1,502 crore in the previous fiscal year (FY22), signalling a recovery in sales following the pandemic.
The SoftBank-backed company, however, reported losses of Rs 102 crore after clocking a profit of Rs 28 crore in the previous financial year, regulatory documents sourced from Tofler showed.
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Mass layoffs in the US could give IT firms a ready pool of talent
IT services and staffing firms in the US could find a ready reserve of potential employees following mass layoffs by technology companies such as Twitter and Meta.
Many of those affected by the layoffs are workers on an H-1B work permit. They will not be eligible to legally stay and work in the US 60 days after their employment contracts expire.
Antennas up: Staffing firm Quess Corp, which recently started its professional staffing business in the United States, said this was a good opportunity for companies to hire people who had been fired.
“We are mapping that … there are layoffs in many pockets, in startups and in mature environments. For someone who already has a visa and can migrate … this is a good opportunity,” said Guruprasad Srinivasan, chief executive of Quess Corp.
Most IT services providers have been increasing their hiring in the United States in a bid to be closer to clients, especially after two years of a remote working environment due to travel restrictions following the Covid-19 pandemic.
Amagi raises $109 million to expand streaming infra business
Amagi, a New York company that provides infrastructure to deliver streaming video content and ads, said it raised $109 million in funding – including $80 million in primary capital – from private equity firm General Atlantic.
The firm – which was a nominee for the Comeback Kid award at the Economic Times Startup Awards this year – said it plans to use the funds to bolster its support infrastructure for customers and invest in AI-driven personalisation, advertising and livestreaming solutions.
Valuation: The investment increases the company’s valuation to $1.4 billion from $1 billion in March 2022, when it bagged $95 million from Accel, Norwest Venture Partners and Avataar Ventures.
Indian Quotient returns cash to LPs: Meanwhile, India Quotient has returned its maiden fund in cash to limited partners, or sponsors, at a net multiple of 5.9x, founding partner Anand Lunia told us.
The rupee-denominated first fund, which began investing in 2013, had a corpus of Rs 32 crore (around $6 million), and backed 21 startups, including Sugar Cosmetics, LendingKart, IIMjobs and 91mobiles.
TWEET OF THE DAY
I-T Dept seeks Uber BV’s financial info from the Netherlands
The Income Tax Department has sought information from the Netherlands on Uber BV, the Dutch unit of US-based Uber Technologies, relating to the company’s finances, people in the know told us.
The department has also sought information from Uber BV on its accounts for FY19-20 and FY20-21, and transactions with Uber India Systems Pvt Ltd (UISPL), which manages the Uber cab-hailing app in India.
Probe: The department’s probe against UISPL has found that certain transactions between the two require a thorough examination, said one of the people. “While Uber BV is of the view that Uber India is not a dependent entity of Uber BV, certain transactions have been found which show otherwise and these are under the scanner,” the person added.
A dependent agency acts on behalf of a foreign enterprise and the income achieved by the foreign entity through the agency is taxed on the income earned from the country where the agency is located.
In 2013, the Uber group set up UISPL in India to market and promote the use of the Uber App here and provide support services. “If proven that the foreign entity is earning income through businesses here, it’s liable to pay taxes,” the person added.
Prime Video ropes in sponsors, advertisers for India-NZ series
Prime Video India is set to introduce advertising for the first time since its launch in the country in 2016 as a subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) platform.
The advertisements, however, will be limited to India-New Zealand cricket series, for which the OTT service has exclusive streaming rights for the subcontinent.
Details: Prime Video has signed Airtel Xstream Fiber as the presenting sponsor and MPL, Nescafé, Noise, OLX Autos, and Vida as associate sponsors. The company is in the final leg of negotiations to sign one more co-presenting sponsor, confirmed Chaitanya Divan, Head of Sports, Prime Video, India.
Prime Video has started investing in live sports globally, in addition to its catalogue of entertainment content including movies and original content. It has rights to NFL Thursday Night Football in the US, and the English Premier League in the UK, among others.
Other Top Stories By Our Reporters
FTX CEO apologises for ‘mishandling’ situation: Sam Bankman-Fried, chief executive of FTX, one of the world’s biggest crypto exchanges, apologised to his followers on Twitter after the company’s bailout led by rival Binance fell through. He said FTX, which is on the brink of insolvency, is looking to raise new capital and will also wind down trading firm Alameda Research.
Musk says Twitter will clamp down on fakers: Twitter will ‘vigorously’ pursue accounts that try to engage in misinformation, deception, impersonation or fraud of any kind, the company’s new owner Elon Musk said. Addressing advertisers and other stakeholders on a Twitter Space organised by the company’s employees, Musk said charging $8 a month for the blue tick verification mark raises the cost of making fake or malicious accounts.
Global Picks We Are Reading
■ This billion-dollar crypto collective is tearing itself apart (Wired)
■ Twitter’s moderation boss Is an unlikely ally of Elon Musk (WSJ)
■ Hackers are using a years-old Microsoft vulnerability to attack governments around the world (Rest of World)
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