Jiomart B2B is the latest among organised supply-chain companies to bite the bullet, shutting down its warehouses, and asking its employees to leave. Why are companies finding it difficult to sustain the supply-chain business? Experts point out that gross margins in supplying fast-moving consumer goods (FMCGs) are very low.
Competition Commission on Monday ordered a detailed probe against food delivery platforms, Zomato and Swiggy, for alleged unfair business practices with respect to their dealings with restaurant partners. The order has come on a complaint filed by the National Restaurant Association of India (NRAI). The watchdog's probe arm -- Director General (DG) -- will investigate the case.
In a major relief to media major Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd (ZEEL), the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) on Friday stayed the insolvency proceedings initiated against it earlier this week. Admitting a petition filed by ZEEL Managing Director and chief executive Punit Goenka, the appellate tribunal issued notices to private sector lender IndusInd bank and the interim resolution professional directing them to file a reply in two weeks. NCLAT said the submissions made by both sides need a detailed hearing.
Fair trade regulator CCI on Friday ordered a probe against Google for its alleged abuse of dominant position. "In a well-functioning democracy, the critical role played by news media cannot be undermined, and it needs to be ensured that digital gatekeeper firms do not abuse their dominant position to harm the competitive process of determining a fair distribution of revenue amongst all stakeholders," CCI said. It added that the Commission is of prima facie view that Google has violated provisions of Section 4 of the Competition Act, 2002 which pertains to abuse of dominant position.
Future Retail Ltd (FRL) on Wednesday said it is "committed" to reversal of takeover of its stores by Reliance Retail and will take all such action as may be necessary to seek value adjustments. The Kishore Biyani-led firm also said the action of the Reliance Group has come as a "surprise" to it. Moreover, the action of taking possession of its stores has "complicated" the positive scenario which had started building up after a CCI order in December 2021, FRL said in a regulatory filing.
'We would love to have more players entering the market because that is how the business will grow.'
The chairman of the JSW Group of companies, Sajjan Jindal, whose stake in the group is valued at $14.5 billion (Rs 1.1 trillion), is betting $4.5 billion of his personal fortune in the firm's bid for Ambuja Cements. According to bankers, Jindal's contribution will be a combination of share sale and debts raised by pledging the stake of the target entities with private equities. The JSW Group chairman has offered $7 billion for Ambuja Cements, including $2.5 billion of investments from private equities, the Financial Times reported on Tuesday.
The National Company Law Tribunal's (NCLT's) declaration that Zee Entertainment is bankrupt adds a new measure of uncertainty to the proposed merger with Sony. Three entities -- Aditya Birla Finance, IndusInd Bank and YES Bank -- have filed appeals in the NCLT for recoveries of Rs 130 crore, Rs 90 crore and Rs 540 crore, respectively. The money was borrowed by a related party - Siti cable - and not returned. Zee was a corporate guarantor.
Among all the geographies where Amazon is fighting regulators, India is the only place where its lines are also tangled in a major corporate battle, this one with India's largest company by market capitalisation over the acquisition of Mumbai-based Future Group's retail chain, the country's second largest. No other corporate entity in any country offers a challenge to Amazon's hegemony in a way Reliance Industries does - and the final hearing of an arbitration case filed at the Singapore International Arbitration Centre between the two may decide at least some of these issues. This legal battle between one of the world's most powerful corporations and one of India's most powerful conglomerates could be complicated by a host of other developments.
However, in the last few sessions, the stock of Mukesh Ambani-controlled Reliance Industries Limited (RIL), hit its 52-week low level of Rs 2269.75, and has been one of the worst performers among the Sensex pack thus far in calendar year 2023 (CY23). Thus far in CY23, RIL has tanked nearly 11 per cent as compared to a fall of around 5 per cent in the S&P BSE Sensex. The fall in the stock, according to Gaurang Shah, senior vice-president at Geojit Financial Services is mostly due to the overall dip in the market sentiment, which in turn has impacted large-caps, including RIL.
IPO-bound hospitality major OYO has written to the Ministry of Tourism (MoT) requesting it to intervene and investigate the running of the Federation of Hotel and Restaurant Associations of India (FHRAI) and order eviction of erring executive committee members. The hotel aggregator urged the MoT to take necessary action against FHRAI's "illegally run" Executive Committee and its members who are working for self-interest instead of that of small hotel owners. The representation by OYO alleged that FHRAI's actions are detrimental to small hotel owners.
Ashes is steeped in tradition but India versus Australia Test matches are bound by emotion.
CCI decided to pursue investigation on two issues - these relate to "exclusivity regarding the mode of payment for the purchase of apps and in-app purchases" and "pre-installation and prominence of Google Pay on Android smartphones".
What seems to have changed over the last two-three years is that earlier the CCI considered online as another channel for retail sales, while it now seems dividing the retail market into two -- online and offline, and looking at them separately, say competition law experts.
The court ruled in a judgment running to over 100 pages that the commission can order an investigation into a complaint of an anti-competitive agreement or abuse of dominant position in the market.
Tata Group-owned AirAsia India, which is in the process of being merged with Air India Express, has taken short-term loans worth Rs 630 crore during the last six months to deal with cash crunch. AirAsia India has been making losses since its first commercial flight on June 12, 2014. Its net loss increased by 42 per cent to Rs 2,178 crore in FY22.
The order follows a complaint filed by Delhi Vyapar Mahasangh which accused the e-commerce firms of anti-competitive practices like preferential listing, exclusive tie-ups and private labels.
E-commerce giant Amazon and Infosys co-founder N R Narayana Murthy's Catamaran Ventures have "mutually decided" to not continue their joint venture (JV) beyond the end of its current term. The JV, Prione Business Services, which has been running successfully for the past seven years, was coming up for renewal on May 19, 2022. The JV enabled over 300,000 sellers and entrepreneurs to go online. It also enabled 4 million merchants with digital payment capabilities, providing these small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) and merchants access to millions of customers across the country.
Sunil Bhaskaran, AirAsia India's chief executive officer (CEO) and managing director (MD), is the front-runner to head the low-cost carrier that will take birth after the merger of Air India Express and AirAsia India, sources said. In a show of confidence, the airline's board extended Bhaskaran's tenure by three years -- until March 2025 -- in a meeting held earlier this year, according to the documents reviewed by Business Standard. Moreover, AirAsia India's board of directors has increased Bhaskaran's salary twice in 2022 -- first in January by 5 per cent and then in June by 7 per cent, the documents showed.
The Competition Commission of India (CCI) on Tuesday said that the proposed additional stake buy in United Breweries (UB) by Dutch major Heineken does not raise any competition concerns, effectively clearing the deal. In its order, the CCI said, "It is submitted that the proposed transaction does not give rise to competition concerns regardless of delineation of the relevant market for the purpose of this filing." UB is the country's largest beer company, while Heineken is the world's second-largest brewer after Anheuser-Busch (AB) InBev.
"It went up to 20-odd per cent in 2019 and to 25 per cent a year later. "That's when we decided to pull the plug; it was not sustainable for our business," says Chadha. Madison & Pike, instead, turned to Mumbai-based start-up Thrive, which provides third-party delivery services to restaurants at a much lower commission - three to five per cent.
The Tata Group-owned Air India has readied a five-year transformation plan, which is expected to take its domestic market share to 30 per cent, up from 8.4 per cent logged in June. IndiGo leads with a market share of 58.8 per cent. The transformation plan--Vihaan.AI-unveiled on Thursday revolves around tripling the domestic market share with investments in new aircraft, technology and improvements in customer service.
Ending its uncomfortable journey in India after eight years, Malaysia-based AirAsia Group on Wednesday said it has exited AirAsia India by selling its remaining 16.67 per cent stake to Tata Group-owned Air India for Rs 155.64 crore. Later in the day, Air India said it has begun the process of creating a single low-cost carrier subsidiary by merging AirAsia India and Air India Express. A working group consisting AirAsia India CEO Sunil Bhaskaran and Air India Express CEO Aloke Singh has been formed for the two carriers' integration, which is expected to take approximately 12 months, it added.
JSW had moved competition watchdog alleging Asian Paints threatened various dealers from dealing with the company.
A top Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) source confirmed that the The Indian Premier League (IPL) 2022 season will be held in India.
The Tata group has proposed to acquire more than 60 per cent stake in online grocery platform BigBasket, according to a filing, as the conglomerate seeks to expand in the fast-growing e-commerce space. The group plans to buy up to 64.3 per cent stake in Supermarket Grocery Supplies Pvt Ltd (SGS) through a combination of primary and secondary acquisitions, a filing with the Competition Commission of India (CCI) showed. The parties to the proposed deal are Tata Digital Ltd (TDL), SGS and Innovative Retail Concepts Pvt Ltd (IRC) -- which is engaged in B2C (Business to Consumer) sales through www.bigbasket.com and related mobile applications.
Whatsapp clarified before the bench that it would not limit the functionality for users who are not opting for new privacy policy in the meantime.
The RBI on Wednesday provided more time to exporters to collect payment of goods and software sold to overseas buyers and repatriate that to India, as the central bank announced more measures to deal with the economic fallout of the Covid-19 pandemic. The central bank has also decided to increase the limit of advances it gives to states and UTs by 30 per cent under the Ways and Means (WMA).
US e-commerce giant Amazon, which is said to be investigating alleged bribes paid by its legal representatives in India, spent a staggering Rs 8,546 crore or $1.2 billion in legal expenses for maintaining a presence in the country during 2018-20, sources said. Sources aware of the firm's public account filings said entities of Amazon - including Amazon Retail, Amazon Seller Services, Amazon Transportation Services, Amazon Wholesale, and Amazon Internet Services - paid Rs 3,420 crore in India during 2018-19 and Rs 5,126 crore during 2019-20 towards legal fees. Amazon is locked in a legal tussle over the takeover of Future Group and is facing a probe by the Competition Commission of India (CCI).
The open offers for the shareholders of Ambuja Cements and ACC will begin from July 6 and close on July 19, as per a tentative schedule published by the Adani family today. With an investment of $4 billion (Rs 31,139 crore), together these two open offers might constitute the biggest open offer in corporate Indian history. The mandatory open offer for the companies was made by a Mauritius based company owned by the Adani family after they acquired a 63 per cent stake in Ambuja and 4.5 per cent in ACC from Swiss cement major, Holcim for $6.5 billion. Ambuja owns a 50 per cent stake in ACC.
Future Retail on Saturday said it has missed the due date for payment of Rs 3,494.56 crore to banks and lenders as it could not sell assets due to its ongoing litigation with amazon, impacting its monetisation plans. Future Retail had last year entered into a one-time restructuring (OTR) scheme for COVID-19 hit companies with a consortium of banks and lenders and was to discharge "an aggregate amount of Rs 3,494.56 crore" on or before December 31, 2021. Kishore Biyani-led Future group firm would be "co-operating for completing the monetisation of the specified business within next 30 days" as per directions of the banks to resolve the current situation, said a regulatory filing by Future Retail.
A customer has filed a complaint before the Commission under section 4 of the Competition Act 2002
The interim report highlights key competition issues in the e-commerce space like deep discounting, the imposition of unfair terms and conditions, the growing dependence of brick and mortar establishments on online platforms, and opaqueness in search rankings.
The social audit of all childcare homes across the country was ordered in 2018 when cases of sexual exploitation of girls were reported from childcare institutions in Deoria in Uttar Pradesh and Muzaffarpur in Bihar.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday asked Amazon and Future group to request the NCLAT to decide the plea challenging the revocation of sanction to the US e-commerce major for its deal with Future group's firm by the Competition Commission of India. The suggestion was made by a bench headed by Chief Justice N V Ramana while adjourning to March 9 the hearing on Amazon's appeal against the January 5 order of the Delhi high court staying the ongoing arbitration proceedings before an arbitral tribunal over Future Retail's Rs 24,500-crore merger deal with Reliance Retail. The bench, also comprising Justices A S Bopanna and Hima Kohli, deferred the hearing after brief arguments on being told that the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) is hearing another appeal of Amazon related to the merger deal.
Both the new teams Gujarat Titans and the Lucknow Super Giants play their first match, against each other, at the Wankhede on March 28.
India women's coach Ramesh Powar was sacked as the head coach with less than two months to go for the T20 World Cup.
Flipkart has not been able to process with its plans of getting into the grocery vertical and is stuck on running pilots in select cities.
Amazon on Wednesday filed a writ petition in the Delhi high court seeking clarifications on the scope of Enforcement Directorate's (ED) investigations into alleged foreign exchange violations by the company, according to sources. Last month, Amazon had said it was in receipt of summons by the ED in connection with its deal with the Future Group. According to sources, Amazon in its filing said the ED is expanding the scope of its investigations by seeking privileged and confidential legal advice it received in ordinary course of business since it started marketplace operations and that such requests aren't related to the agency's probe into the Future-Amazon deal.
Looking beyond the lesser penalty regime, in its 10th year of existence, the CCI needs more branches, according to experts