As India's biggest Unified Payments Interface (UPI) app PhonePe prepares to list, the updated draft red herring prospectus (DRHP) shows the impact of regulations on the business, and concentration of payments-linked revenue even as UPI lacks MDR (merchant discount rate).
UPI has catapulted India into the forefront on the global digital payments landscape. Working hand in hand, the AePS payments system is making life easy for rural folks, notes Tamal Bandyopadhyay.
Non-banking entities such as fintech firms will have to tap into use cases beyond peer-to-peer (P2P) and peer-to-merchant (P2M) transactions to scale up the presence of the retail version of the central bank digital currency (CBDC), which is also known as the e, said industry players. These use cases will enable programmable transactions across domains, including the government's direct benefit transfer (DBT) schemes, with subsidies restricted to specific purposes such as food coupons, hospital bills, fertilisers, pesticides, and cross-border remittances.
The Reserve Bank has asked troubled digital wallet firm MobiKwik, which is facing data breach allegations, to get a forensic audit done without any delay. Though the Gurugram-based firm has been claiming that its systems are secure and that there is no basis to the allegations of data breach, a group of hackers on Tuesday said that they accessed personal and financial data of nearly 10 crore MobiKwik customers. On Wednesday, sources in the know of the development told PTI that the RBI has ordered an immediate forensic audit of the company's systems by a certified auditor. When contacted, an RBI spokesperson refused to comment. MobiKwik refused to give a direct answer to a query on whether the RBI has ordered a forensic audit.
MobiKwik employees exercised their ESOPs (Employee stock ownership) in a recently opened window by selling part of their shares in a secondary sale. "The secondary round was led by ex-Blackstone India head, Mathew Cyriac, who topped up his holding at almost double of his previous price," the sources said.
With the stock market turning choppy, fintech start-up MobiKwik, which had filed a draft red herring prospectus (DRHP) to raise around $250 million through an initial public offering (IPO), is now looking to raise money from the private market. "We will raise private money but we are not in dire need. "The business was profitable for the first time in the December quarter on a top line of around Rs 150 crore and that will be maintained in the March quarter also. We are generating cash," said Upasana Taku, co-founder of MobiKwik.
Hyundai Motor India Ltd (HMIL) has since 2019 saved around Rs 5,700 crore in foreign exchange (forex) by locally manufacturing or sourcing more than 1,200 components, including battery packs for electric vehicles, said a senior executive of the automaker. The company's efforts for Aatmanirbhar Bharat, the government's campaign for domestic manufacturing, have resulted in a localisation rate of 92 percent in India, said Gopalakrishnan Chathapuram Sivaramakrishnan, whole-time director and chief manufacturing officer at HMIL.
It is not just the secondary market that is witnessing a revival in fortunes. Even the initial public offering (IPO) market have roared back to life, with investors submitting bids worth over Rs 2.2 trillion on the three IPOs that wrapped up on Friday. Fashion retailer Vishal Mega Mart (VMM)'s IPO (fifth largest of the year) garnered 27.3x subscription, with bids exceeding Rs 1.6 trillion.
Many people posted screenshots of the alleged MobiKwik user data, which, according to sources, was up for sale for 1.5 bitcoin or about $86,000.
Fintech firm MobiKwik on Monday filed a draft red herring prospectus (DRHP) with the markets regulator, Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi), for its initial public offering (IPO). According to its DRHP, the company plans to raise Rs 1,900 crore, which includes a fresh issue of Rs 1,500 crore and an offer for sale of Rs 400 crore. The selling shareholders include American Express Travel, Bajaj Finance, Cisco Systems and Sequoia Capital India, besides founder Bipin Preet Singh. MobiKwik is the latest among tech majors wanting to list on stock exchanges. Food delivery start-up Zomato will launch its IPO on Wednesday.
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.
'Son believes India has a significant opportunity in chip design, especially in creating IP that will be uniquely Indian.'
New entity is likely to get a top-up of $200 million from a Chinese investor
InMobi helps companies target the users of phones.
In the backdrop of the crisis brewing at Paytm Payments Bank, major fintech companies are ramping up their workforce and inducting new faces in their leadership teams, industry sources said on Wednesday. Users will not be able to add funds to their Paytm Payments Bank Wallet after February 29, though they will still be able to use the services and the existing balance in the wallets, according to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) diktat. Industry sources said that competitors to Paytm are investing heavily in offline payments while doubling their salesforce.
Link your UPI app to a separate bank account or wallet that has only a limited sum.
Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Friday permitted banks and non-banking institutions to issue pre-paid instruments for making payments across various public transport systems. With the introduction of these instruments, commuters will have more options to pay for tickets besides cash mode.
Walking around InMobi's office, it is hard not to compare what you see here with the images one has seen of Google's global offices.
'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.'
Equity fundraising through initial public offerings (IPOs) rose 20 per cent during the financial year 2023-24 (FY24). During the period, 76 Indian corporates raised Rs 61,915 crore through main board IPOs, compared to Rs 52,116 crore mobilised by 37 IPOs in 2022-23, as disclosed by PRIME Database. However, if one excludes the mega Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) IPO, which came out in 2022-23, IPO mobilisation increased by 58 per cent from last year.
Equity fundraising through initial public offerings (IPOs) rose 20 per cent during the financial year 2023-24 (FY24). During the period, 76 Indian corporates raised Rs 61,915 crore through main board IPOs, compared to Rs 52,116 crore mobilised by 37 IPOs in 2022-23, as disclosed by PRIME Database. However, if one excludes the mega Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) IPO, which came out in 2022-23, IPO mobilisation increased by 58 per cent from last year.
Food delivery major Swiggy has received approval from its shareholders for a $1.25 billion initial public offering (IPO), according to filings made with the Registrar of Companies sourced by Tofler. The Bengaluru-based firm plans to raise as much as Rs 3,750 crore (around $450 million) via a fresh issue and up to Rs 6,664 crore (around $800 million) through an offer-for-sale (OFS) component, the filings stated.
rediffGURU Krishna Kumar, founder and CEO of GoMoTech, offers expert advice on how to scale up in your career and life.
'Given that the market is now demanding disciplined growth, well-run companies should be able to demonstrate profitability with the cash on hand.'
'We went from zero to about 10 million users in three months. Paytm came out with the wallet play and we came out with the UPI play.'
SoftBank-backed Inmobi has fired about 50-70 people on performance metrics. According to a source, the employees impacted are from Inmobi and the firm's lock screen-based content provider Glance. This comes even as the company announced that it will skip increments for CY23 and also undertake recruitment only when required. The Inmobi group has a total headcount of 2,600.
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.
Bengaluru-based InMobi and Microsoft combine their powers to break the stranglehold of Google and Facebook in the digital advertising space.
While players like Paytm, MobiKwik, and PhonePe allow you to buy gold for Rs 1, Amazon Pay has kept the minimum amount at Rs 5. Digital gold is essentially an avenue for investing in physical gold.
Since then, 129 startups have joined this star status, of which 100 were added from January 2019, generating a total value of $535 billion. Entrepreneurs are building bigger enterprises at a faster rate -- 50 per cent of the 130 companies reached unicorn status in the first five years after their initial institutional fundraising.
Media company New Delhi Television (NDTV) recorded its highest-ever consolidated profit at the group level in over a decade for financial year 2021-22 (FY22), said co-chairpersons Radhika Roy and Prannoy Roy in the firm's latest annual report. Addressing shareholders, the Roys, founder-promoters of NDTV, said the company had emerged financially strong in FY22, continuing the turnaround of recent years. "Both the television and digital branches of the NDTV group reported their highest-ever profit. NDTV Ltd (television arm) recorded a profit of Rs 59.18 crore.
The three companies have been issued observations by the watchdog, according to the update on the processing status of draft offer documents as on October 8. An observation letter is mandatory for an initial share sale. In Sebi parlance, the issuance of observations implies its go-ahead for the IPO. One Mobikwik Systems Ltd is a leading mobile wallet (MobiKwik Wallet) and Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) player in India.
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.
With the arrival of new players such as Amazon Pay, Google Tez and Flipkart's PhonePe, digital money companies are now changing their business pitch.
The last few months have been hard on digital wallets which had a short-lived dream run post-demonetisation.
Mutual funds aspirants have the option of snapping up smaller AMCs or applying for a new licence.
Over 10 Indian start-ups with total valuations of $84 billion (some are planning fresh fund-raising) are bracing to launch initial public offerings (IPOs) in the next 36 months. While the size of their IPOs is under discussion, estimates are that they would together raise a minimum of over $8-10 billion during the initial listing.
India is the next major breeding ground for start-ups.