Tata's plans
Vernacular raises, Google's problems, and port traffic down.
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Things that matter ā
1ļøā£ Seeking emergency approvalāPfizer India is seeking emergency authorization for the use of the COVID-19 vaccine in India, becoming the first local pharma player to submit such a request. Itās the same vaccine that the UK had green lit few days ago and Pfizer claims itāll import batches from abroad and distribute them in India. Approval wonāt be hard, but distribution and working with government machinery to figure out who gets a dose and who doesnāt will be the real hurdle.
2ļøā£ Port Traffic no goodāIndiaās cargo traffic across 12 major ports nationwide declined for yet another month, down 10.5%, marking the 8th month of decline since the pandemic took the world down. Sequentially however, the drop in November is slightly (~2%) better than the last month, signaling modest improvementāperhaps because of easing consumer spending.
Aight, onto other thingsā¦
Vernacular day on Venture Street š°
Two really quick raises over the weekend. Kutumbāa venture building reddit for India, scooped up ā¹15 crores for its seed round from Sequoia, with angel investors, Kunal Shah, Rohit Bansal, Whiteboard Capital, AngelList, and others pitching in.
Taking a mobile only approach and adding a vernacular twist, the company is currently building communities (like subreddits) primarily in Hindi, with other languages to be added soon.
A team of ex-execs from Pratilipi (the vernacular publishing platform) are at the helm, which is giving investors a lot of confidence in their bid. The company had earlier raised some ā¹3.5 crore in its pre-seed round from prominent investors.Ā
Turning heads to the short-video storm,
Bolo Indya raised another $400,000 from Inflection Point Ventures, as short-video platforms continue to dish it out and capture user attention in the wake of TikTokās demise in India.Ā
Despite fierce competition for attention, some of the engagement stats coming out from these players are just mind blowingāthe company boasts a 6.5 million user base, 2.8 million of which are creators, with usage growing 150% each month. Content is accessible in 14 languages.
Theyāve put in place an exciting model that enables creators to charge money from viewers for live video sessions and so far it has been a hit. Fresh funds will be utilized to further attract more creators as well as to improve recommendation tech.Ā Ā
Worth noting: millions of creators live in Instagramās shadows, and tools like these can be extremely powerful, allowing people to directly monetize their following on their own terms. Also, Indian TikTok suffered from lack of high quality content, and this āpay for viewā model seems like a great way to enforce a filter that surfaces only worthy content. Sounds promising! š
From watches to phones š±
Rumors are, Tata Sons is sizing up its options to procure loans of upto $1 billion in the global markets, to set up a smartphone and component manufacturing plant in Tamil Nadu, eyeing plans to eventually manufacture parts for Appleās iPhones. š
The company is basically looking to leverage the governmentās PLI scheme and capitalize on Appleās agenda of increasingly migrating device manufacturing out of China.
Total spending will be about $1.5 billion in ramping up a production facility in Tamil Naduās industrial town Hosur, for which regulators have already allotted 500-acre land, with hopes of some 18,000 jobs to be createdā90% of which will be reserved for women.
Tataās subsidiaries in high-end engineering systems and the R&D people at Titan are set to offer the company expertise on the project.
Takeaway: the local semiconductor manufacturing industry is at an inflection point. The Govtās PLI scheme effectively catalyzed a spending wave, and the most enviable global players have committed to building in India. Tataās entry was inevitable. Given expertise is associated areas before, theyāre going to be okay nailing this game.
But making components for Apple may be a long shot as Tim Cookās cavalry is generally super selective when it comes to picking partners. š¤
Googleās date with organizational issues š„ļø
Last week, a prominent research scientist was let go from Google because of a dispute over internal approval of a research paper.Ā But the researcher claims she was forced to quit, misrepresented by her bosses and was systematically pushed out for publishing work that was counter to Googleās beliefs. FYIāher research basically focused around the ethical use of tech, inherent bias in AI, which was sometimes critical of Googleās practices.
News of the firing got out fast. A faction of engineers created a support group within the company, calling out management for broad mishandling of talent. Then a bunch of media publications ripped the companyās policies and managementās double standards. Tech land was consumed with the fallout for most part of the weekend.
Hereās a quick overview of the controversy, along with support claims from like a million Googlers, and then the researcherās comments.
Why we care: well the markets are watching. Google has been grappling with organizational issues for a while now, and Pichai has taken a lot of heat for mismanagement.
The company prides itself on giving the most talented people a free hand to pursue creative projects in tech, but oftentimes shepherding engineers becomes a problem. This has led to countless revolts, protests, resignationsāwhich many especially in the investing circles believe is the worst overhang on the companyās growth.
In any case, markets will be eyeing how management handles this as it may hold the key to Googleās ability to keep hiring the best minds going forwardāa competitive advantage theyāve held for decades.
Tweet of the day š¦
Motorsport fans are cheering the victory of Indian driver Jehan Daruvala, who clinched a win at a Formula 2 race yesterday in Bahrain.
What else are we snackinā šæ
š Vendata wants more women leaders - The mining group announced an initiative called āV Leadā to foster more women leaders from within its professional ranks. Some 60 middle and senior women staff will be groomed to fill in decision making roles to increase diversity from the current 30% levels.
š Indiaās answer to Fitbit - homegrown wearables company boAt has soared to become the 5th largest wearables brand worldwide, owning some 2.6% of the total global market, the same as Googleās Fitbit. The company sells earphones, smart watches, etc. and has won big from the digital selling boom.
š“ļø Uday Shankar to lead FICCI - The Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce appointed Disney exec as its president for the next fiscal year. Shankar leads Disneyās direct-to-consumer streaming strategy in over 30 countries including India.
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