The talks for a free trade agreement (FTA) between India and Canada may have taken a pause but will resume once the political row between the two countries is resolved as the pact has economic benefits for both the nations, trade experts and exporters said on Friday. However, they said that India may not hurry for the trade agreement as 60 per cent of New Delhi's exports are already entering Canada at zero duty. Earlier this month, India and Canada paused the negotiations for the agreement due to political reasons.
At a time when the tech sector witnessed a spree of layoffs and slowdown in new hiring, IT firms have opted for temporary jobs in order to turn some their fixed costs variable. Work fulfillment platform Awign has reported a 157 per cent rise in demand for such jobs in first half of 2023. Awign says most of the demand has arisen for highly-skilled tech professionals at mid-level and senior positions with 2-7 years' experience.
Beauty and Personal Care (BPC) e-retailer Honasa Consumer's initial public offering (IPO) has failed to find backing from analysts due to the company's weak financial track record and expensive valuation. T Manish, research analyst at Samco Securities suggests avoiding the IPO as the company's financial performance does not inspire confidence. "The profit has been inconsistent and advertising and marketing expenses are incredibly high at around 40 per cent of the revenues.
'We are focused on playing on our strengths, which are technology, and building a large profitable business by working with banks as well as non-banks and NBFCs for loans.'
Akshata Murty, the wife of Britain's Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, stands to earn Rs 68.17 crore in dividend income from her shareholding in India's second-largest IT firm Infosys. Murty, daughter of Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy, held 3.89 crore shares of Infosys at the end of December, according to company filings with the stock exchanges. Infosys declared a final dividend of Rs 17.50 per share for FY23 (April 2022 to March 2023).
'There is a huge risk of misinformation and disinformation, and targeted campaigns that could potentially happen against candidates or to push certain narratives.'
The chronology of events in cases against Alt News co-founder Mohammed Zubair in which the Supreme Court on Wednesday ordered his release:
'Try to obtain a secured personal loan or credit card by offering some collateral, such as a fixed deposit or gold.' 'Not only will this improve your eligibility, but the lender may even offer a lower interest rate.'
The British and Irish prime ministers assemble with a former American president at an event in Belfast marking the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement.
'The end of WFH has made achieving work-life integration more challenging for women.'
'There are multiple ups and downs.' 'You should be able to withstand all that.' 'You need to have the temperament to run a marathon.'
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Tuesday met top officials of the finance and corporate affairs ministries to review the implementation of various announcements of the Union Budget FY24. "The finance minister underlined the importance of continuous assessment of progress to ensure that various announcements are implemented in a time-bound manner," the finance ministry said in a tweet. Sitharaman also discussed in detail various issues on the digital competition laws with Rajeev Chandrashekhar, the minister of state for entrepreneurship, skill development, electronics and technology.
The new year will witness two unmanned missions under the "Gaganyaan" project, deep ocean exploration project, "Samudrayaan" and many more.
Sangwan said he made the generic remark on his YouTube channel and not during his lecture at Unacademy.
Funding winter and corporate governance woes separated the men from the boys in the country's startup space in 2023 that saw funds into the segment tapering to just around $8 billion. All said, investors are hopeful of strong growth of the maturing startup ecosystem in the new year. Edtech and health tech segments that grew exponentially during the pandemic plunged into an abyss of financial uncertainties, with several firms shuttering their business, and valuation of prominent players like BYJU'S and PharmEasy plummeting 85-90 per cent.
Fintech companies believe that the impact of Reserve Bank of India's order last week on unsecured loans will be visible in six to 12 months and prompt them to diversify and strengthen their secured portfolio. Fintechs which source funds through banks or non-banking finance companies (NBFCs) are looking at quickly building their secured portfolio options to at least 40 per cent of their total portfolio. "Over the medium to long term, as part of our product strategy, we are evaluating secured products which can be enabled over a digital platform" said Yogi Sadana, the founder of Zype, a lending-focussed fintech.
Fintech firm BharatPe on Wednesday said it has removed co-founder Ashneer Grover from all positions at the company. BharatPe has also found involvement of Grover family and relatives in extensive misappropriation of the company's funds. "The board will not allow the deplorable conduct of the Grover family to tarnish BharatPe' s reputation or that of its hard-working employees and world-class technology.
'Not sorry to any politician. Ever. No one. Any party. FIR kar lo (register an FIR). Case kar lo (register a case). Koi farak nahi padta (it doesn't make any difference) - I am not a pushover - won't be bullied. Don't make an issue where there is none. It might be an election year - but people are smart. Indori people - super smart. I'll come to Indore when I wish, as many times I wish - and am confident of Indori mehmaan nawazi (good hospitality)'
Has Vijay Shekhar Sharma given up on the bank? For now, he seems to be on a save-OCL mission. The bank will face its logical end, observes Tamal Bandopadhyay.
One needs to charge the device every four days, which can provide over 65,000 blood readings and counts.
Fintech and venture capital firms such as Recur Club, Razorpay and Trifecta Capital have come to the aid of homegrown start-ups caught in the crossfire of the Silicon Valley Bank fiasco. Alternative funding platform Recur Club said it was allocating $15 million to all Indian founders affected by the crisis. It will not charge any platform fee for the same.
Something is cooking in online food delivery. After 15 years of grappling with the demands of the business - read cash burn - Gurugram-based Zomato reported its first profit in the first quarter of 2023-24 (FY24). Not satiated, it reported a profit in the following quarter as well: Of Rs 36 crore in the second quarter compared to Rs 2 crore in the first. A year ago, in the second quarter of FY23, it had reported a loss of Rs 251 crore.