Scrutiny of Google's code of conduct in the Indian Android ecosystem is far from over with several start-ups preparing to appeal against the company's revised policies of service fee on in-app purchases and subscriptions, according to sources in the know. This comes days after the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT) granted partial relief to the tech giant, reversing four of the 10 key non-monetary directives that would have forced Google to allow uninstalling of its pre-installed apps on Android devices. Paytm, BharatMatrimony, and ShareChat are among the start-ups that are likely to file grievances against the tech major for alleged non-compliance with the Competition Commission of India's (CCI's) cease-and-desist order on Play Store policies.
A special court in Mumbai on Saturday remanded ICICI Bank's former CEO and MD Chanda Kochhar and her husband Deepak Kochhar in the custody of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) till December 26 in connection with alleged cheating and irregularities in loans sanctioned by the bank to Videocon Group companies. The Kochhars were arrested by the probe agency on Friday night after a brief questioning session. The CBI has alleged that they were evasive in their response and did not cooperate in the investigation.
Amazon Web Services (AWS) will invest nearly $4.4 billion (Rs 36,000 crore) in India by 2030 and support more than 48,000 jobs externally through a new regional service launched on Tuesday, said the on-demand Cloud computing company. AWS Asia Pacific (Hyderabad) is the company's second infrastructure region in India, six years after it opened its first Cloud region in Mumbai in 2016. The Hyderabad region will give customers access to AWS technologies for data analytics, security, machine learning, and artificial intelligence.
Home-grown companies, including electronics manufacturing services (EMS) firm Dixon Technologies and mobile device maker Lava International, have started exploratory talks with Chinese sub-assemblies and component players for setting up joint ventures (JVs) in the country. Sources in the industry say many domestic companies have also had preliminary discussions with original design manufacturers (ODMs) in China to look at a JV model for manufacturing smartphones. Key ODM players in mobile devices in China include Longcheer, Huaqin, and Wingtech, which has already set up a plant in Tirupati.
Today, Anirudh Ravichander's name on a film's poster is enough to pull in audiences, notes Arjun Menon.
A disagreement between mobile operators and device manufacturers over e-SIMs has reached the government with the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) asking the DoT to order handset manufacturers to introduce eSIMs, in addition to the physical SIM slot, in all smartphones costing over Rs 10,000. The reason is the unprecedented global shortage of semiconductors which has severely impacted the supply of SIM cards across the globe and pushed up the price by four to five times. The shortage is not likely to improve before 2024.
India must be prepared to deal with climate disasters, geopolitical confrontations, and social strife linked to global events, asserts Jayant Sinha, chairman of Parliament's Standing Committee on Finance.
Only five of India's top 20 car models have seen a reduction in wait times over the past year.
The Tata group is planning to invest $90 billion in new industries such as mobile components plant, semiconductor, electric vehicles, batteries, renewables energy and e-commerce by 2027. The Tata group's investment in India is far higher than the $75-billion investments planned by Mukesh Ambani-owned Reliance Industries and $55-billion investment planned by the Adani group in the next five years in the country, the Economist reported recently. The investment by the Tata group is a shift in its strategy to focus more in the home markets instead of international markets where the group lost money.
The Union Cabinet on Wednesday approved a Rs 76,000 crore policy boost for semiconductor and display manufacturing ecosystem in the country in an bid to position India as a global hub for hi-tech production. Announcing the decision of the Cabinet, IT and Telecom Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw observed that electronics plays an important role in everyday life, and semiconductor chips forms a crucial part of electronics. Outlining the details of the scheme, he said the Rs 76,000 crore programme has been approved for the development of semiconductors and display manufacturing ecosystem.
Maruti's results and the investor response indicate that quite a few stocks in the auto sector could be on the verge of a big bounce, says Devangshu Datta.
'The Centre and state need to take a unified approach and take concerted action before this matter assumes menacing proportions because unemployment, the drug trade and the levels of frustration among the youth make them vulnerable to any maverick who promises something better.'
The government on Monday extended the period of production-linked incentive scheme for large-scale electronics manufacturing with a focus on mobile phones by a year until 2025-26. The base year of the scheme 2019-20 remains the same but the companies will have the option to choose their five-year period either from the base year or the year 2020-21 for calculation of the incentives under the scheme. "Now we have extended the tenure of the scheme from 2020-21 to 2025-26. "Earlier, it would have ended in 2024-25.
Two days after one of India's worst train accidents at Bahanaga Bazar in Odisha's Balasore district, two railway tracks have been made fit to carry trains after bulldozers and cranes removed capsized coaches on the main trunk line connecting eastern and southern India.
Indian start-ups breathed a sigh of relief after the UK government facilitated the acquisition of the now-defunct Silicon Valley Bank's (SVB's) British arm by HSBC. In a bid to allay fears, the US Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FIDC) announced recently that it had transferred all deposits of start-up-focused SVB to a newly created bridge bank and all depositors would have access to their money. President Joe Biden also sought to reassure jittery depositors that they can have confidence that the US banking system is "safe".
Earlier in the day, Sheezan was presented in the court by the Waliv police, which sought to get his remand extended.
Former ICICI Bank CEO and MD Chanda Kochhar and her husband Deepak Kochhar on Tuesday approached the Bombay high court, calling their arrest by the Central Bureau of Investigation in a loan fraud case illegal. The high court, however, refused to grant an urgent hearing and directed the Kochhars to mention the matter before the regular bench once it resumes after vacation. A lawyer representing the Kocchars said that no prior sanction, as required under the law, was obtained by the CBI before their arrest.
Reliance Industries Ltd will acquire German firm Metro AG's wholesale operations in India for Rs 2,850 crore as the conglomerate run by billionaire Mukesh Ambani seeks to strengthen its dominant position in India's mammoth retail sector. "Reliance Retail Ventures Limited (RRVL), a subsidiary of Reliance Industries Ltd, signed definitive agreements to acquire a 100 per cent equity stake in Metro Cash & Carry India for a total cash consideration of Rs 2,850 crore, subject to closing adjustments," said a joint statement. Through this acquisition, Reliance Retail will get access to a network of Metro India stores located in prime locations across key cities, along with a large base of registered kiranas and other institutional customers, and a strong supplier network.
Tamil Nadu Governor R N Ravi stoked a fresh controversy on Thursday, remarking that the anti-Sterlite protests in the state in 2018 had been fuelled by foreign funds and was aimed at hindering progress. His comment instantaneously drew an outcry from the ruling Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam and its allies.
India Inc is gearing up for a slugfest this year and from tech to paints, new battlegrounds are emerging, observes Indrajit Gupta, co-founder, Founding Fuel.
After a five-day long visit, Apple CEO Tim Cook left India with a note that he can't wait to return to the country. The visit of Cook coincided with 25 years of the iPhone maker's presence in India. Cook arrived in India on Monday. The visit started with the launch of the first official Apple store in Mumbai on April 18 followed by a second in the national capital on April 20.
India will have 1 billion smartphone users by 2026 with rural areas driving the sale of internet-enabled phones, a Deloitte study said on Tuesday. India had 1.2 billion mobile subscribers in 2021, of which about 750 million are smartphone users. It is poised to be the second-largest smartphone manufacturer in the next five years. "The smartphone market is expected to reach 1 billion smartphone users by 2026," according to Deloitte's 2022 Global TMT (Technology, Media and Entertainment, Telecom) predictions.
Mobile phones and TV sets manufactured in India would become cheaper with Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announcing cuts in Basic Customs Duty (BCD) on import of their components but smokers would have to pay more as the government has increased taxes.
The ED had arrested Chatterjee, who is also the Trinamool Congress secretary-general, on July 23 in connection with its investigation into alleged irregularities in the recruitment drives by the School Service Commission.
They are both electronic manufacturing services (EMS) companies, also known as contract manufacturers. One is Taiwan's Foxconn group, the undisputed global number one in this business with revenues of $223 billion. The other is Dixon Technologies, the biggest domestic player with revenues of over Rs 10,500 crore.
'Banning a game is not the solution, rather, there should be laws that restrict the number of hours spent a week playing a game.'
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) too, is going big on popularising e-Sport with Singapore being confirmed to host the inaugural Olympic Esports Week in June next year.
The automobile sector is considered a good indicator of economic health. It has a very long value chain, from primary materials, like metals, glass and plastic, to value-added high-end electronic components, specialised alloys, and software.
The Russian-Ukraine war can hit the global supply chains that are already constrained due to the pandemic and the worst impact will be on ongoing chip shortage because the warring nations brutally control supplies of key raw materials that go into making semiconductors, warns a report. Since Russia controls as much as 44 per cent of global palladium suppplies, Ukraine produces a significant 70 per cent of the global supply of neon -- the two key raw materials that go into making chips. The markets can expect the global chip shortage, that began with the pandemic, to worsen if the military conflict lingers on, says a Moody's Analytics report on Friday.
Mumbai-based Indian Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (ISMC) and Singapore-headquartered IGSS Ventures have one strategy in common: They have told the government in their application for semiconductor fabrication plants that they will export the bulk of the chips they make in India in the initial five or 10 years. The third applicant, Vedanta-Foxconn, which is also building a fab plant, has said it will concentrate on the needs of consumer electronics and mobile device markets, and earmark 80 per cent of output for domestic consumption, but has not specified its customers. Finding a viable domestic market could well be the biggest challenge for India's renewed tryst with semiconductors. Fab plants do not sell directly to end users but to intermediary chip design companies - such as Qualcomm or MediaTek.
The Bombay high court on Tuesday directed the Central Bureau of Investigation to file by Friday its affidavit in response to a petition of Videocon Group founder Venugopal Dhoot, seeking to quash an FIR registered in a bank loan fraud case, to declare his arrest as "arbitrary and illegal" and to be released on bail. When the plea came up for hearing, advocate Kuldeep Patil asked for one-week time to seek instructions on the same. A division bench of Justices Revati Mohite Dere and P K Chavan said the agency shall file its affidavit by Friday and posted the petition for hearing the same day (January 13).
'As long as businesses do not consider cyber recovery an integral part of their enterprise IT, they remain greatly vulnerable.'
Tata Group is in discussions with some major international companies, including those from Taiwan, for its foray into the semiconductor chip business. The Union government had earlier tried to bring in Taiwanese manufacturers Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) and United Microelectronics Corporation (UMC) for chip manufacturing in India. A person close to the development said the Tatas have now opened a separate channel for a possible tie-up. Currently, India mostly imports chips, which are fabricated and assembled to put into various applications, including automobiles, renewable power, mobile phones, televisions, and other electronic items.
Apple's three vendors in the country have hit the milestone of creating 30,000 new direct jobs since the production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme for mobile devices kicked off in April 2021. Based on the government's estimate that one direct job in the electronics industry helps to generate three indirect ones, Apple's vendors, Foxconn Hon Hai, Wistron and Pegatron, are close to creating 100,000 direct and indirect jobs. The direct jobs that the vendors have created account for a fourth of Apple's commitment to generate 60 per cent of the new direct jobs out of the 200,000 jobs targeted by the government under the PLI scheme within five years.
The Bombay high court granted interim bail to Videocon Group founder Venugopal Dhoot on Friday, nearly a month after he was arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in the ICICI Bank-Videocon loan fraud case. A division bench of Justices Revati Mohite Dere and P K Chavan granted bail to Dhoot on a surety of Rs one lakh. The court permitted him to furnish cash bail and then deposit the surety amount two weeks thereafter.
State industries minister Uday Samant alleged the previous Maha Vikas Aghadi dispensation was responsible for the loss as it sat on the project offer for seven months whereas the new government approved incentives worth Rs 38,831 crore in July.
Global tech major IBM, which employs over a lakh individuals in India, on Wednesday termed moonlighting an unethical practice. Moonlighting, the practice of taking up secondary jobs after the regular work hours, has been highlighted by many tech companies of late. IBM's managing director for India and South Asia, Sandip Patel said, at the time of joining, the company's employees sign an agreement saying they will be working only for IBM.
'It will send a very strong signal that it is now our time to grow.'
West Bengal's industry minister Partha Chatterjee, arrested in the SSC scam, should be removed immediately from his post and expelled from the Trinamool Congress, the party's state general secretary Kunal Ghosh demanded on Thursday.
The pharmaceutical and the consumer durables sectors, which depend on China for imports, have not been impacted yet due to unrest in China with people protesting against lockdowns. But the lockdown could have an impact on the supply of components used in consumer durables if it continues for the next fortnight. In the pharmaceutical industry, Indian players import 66-70 per cent of their bulk drug requirements from China.
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