Banking technology start-up Zeta is the latest entrant to the unicorn club after raising $250 million in its Series C round from SoftBank Vision Fund 2. Sodexo participated as an additional minority investor in the round. Founded by serial entrepreneur and billionaire Bhavin Thurakia, the startup is now valued at $1.4 billion. It is the 14th company this year to cross the $1 billion valuation mark after Meesho, Cred, Pharmeasy, ShareChat, Moglix and others.
Shortages of chips will impact the car market
As the deadly second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic rages on, startups and technology firms are realising the burnout effect it is having on employees. Many have shortened their work weeks to four days, while others have made provisions for more time off for employees to help them rejuvenate or care for loved ones.
The US government has removed a regulation proposed by former president Donald Trump's administration that sought to narrow the definition of "specialty occupation" under the H-1B visa regime. The change comes as a relief for Indian information technology firms, which are among the largest users of such visas. "The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has formally vacated a regulation that would have redefined the H-1B specialty occupation, restricted off site placement of H-1B employees, and otherwise increased employer compliance obligations. "The vacatur follows a federal court ruling that set aside the regulation because the agency did not have good cause to bypass notice and comment rulemaking, in violation of the Administrative Procedures Act," explained immigration law firm Fragomen.
From helping their employees infected with the Covid-19 virus to vaccinating them or supporting the families of those who might have succumbed to the infection, several companies in India are trying to do their bit in this difficult time. Some have even widened their support net to include all stakeholders as well as an extended community. To the families of the employees it lost to Covid-19, Noida-headquartered IT services and consulting company HCL Technologies is, for instance, paying salary for a year, medical insurance for three years and extending support for their children's education for five years.
Although the number of resignations came down at Cognizant in April and continued to slow in May, the impact of attrition would play out in the second quarter also because of the longer notice period in India.
With scrutiny that comes with a public listing, Deepinder Goyal's leadership could face its sternest test yet.
Zomato said it has consistently gained market share over the last four years to become the category leader in the food delivery space in India in terms of gross order value from October 1, 2020 to March 31, 2021.
To be able to manage any such uptick, Indian IT services players are hiring more locals, and relying on hybrid work models.
According to government data, the Centre procured only 35,179 ventilators out of the 50,000 originally ordered.
Home ministry asks IT ministry to order social media platforms to remove around 100 posts or URLs.
Amid oxygen shortage and a faltering health system in the country, India is seeing over 300,000 cases daily.
Attrition is driving the hiring effort on campuses.
Infosys, Facebook, Genpact, and Cognizant, among others, have reached out to employees and offered support in different ways as the second wave of Covid cases sees an exponential rise. Companies are asking employees to stay indoors and prioritise the health and safety of their families. This is of significance as several information technology firms were going to take a call on work-from-home from June and had plans to allow some employees to come back to work.
Domino's India data that included sensitive customer information such as their names, phone numbers, and credit card details has allegedly been breached and put on sale on the dark web. According to tweets by Israel-based Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer of cybercrime intelligence firm Hudson Rock, Alon Gal, the data is worth 13 terabytes (TB). He tweeted on Sunday that the data includes as many as 180 million order details, including 1 million credit card details. The data, said Gal, was up for sale on the dark web. The threat actor, he said, was asking for $550,000 for the data.
There seems to be no dearth of funds to fuel this growth, report Peerzada Abrar and Shivani Shinde.
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The IT services giant is also slated to hold a board meeting on April 13 and 14, to approve of and take on record the consolidated financial results of the company for the quarter and year ended March 31, 2021. Indian IT majors will be announcing their fourth quarter (Q4) and 2020-21 results starting April 12. At the end of the Q3 FY21 Infosys had cash and investment of $4.5 billion.
If the data breach is found to be genuine, and if the company is found guilty on the grounds of dereliction of duty, or misleading the general public and the RBI about the data breach, actions taken against it will be severe, the person quoted above said.