The move will establish a level-playing field for domestic investments in start-ups compared to foreign-based sources.
Falling valuations, slowing funding rounds and faltering investor sentiment seem to have prompted many start-ups to lay off employees in a bid to conserve cash. The latest to do so is SoftBank-backed Cars24, a leading e-commerce platform for pre-owned vehicles, which has laid off over 600 staff, according to sources in the know. The move, they said, is aimed at conserving cash amid cautious investor sentiment and a slowdown in funding.
E-commerce companies are seeing an increase in demand for products such as fresh fruits and vegetables, milk, flour, rice, and lentils, and personal hygiene items like sanitisers and soaps and household cleaning products. Other products include instant noodles, baby food and Ayurvedic items. "There is even a huge spike in pet food," said a person.
Experts believe more efforts would be needed in future funding rounds.
India is on its way to become a mobile app-first market and e-tailers and start-ups have begun their race to capture the next set of users in India - those who access vernacular content.
Flipkart faces intense competition from larger global rival Amazon and local rival Snapdeal.
The threat may be a decade away, but it has brick-and-mortar sellers rethinking their strategies and banking on the govt to regulate online companies.
'For how long can investors fund loss-making companies?'
It all started with Flipkart and Amazon trying to outdo each other - after Flipkart announced $1-billion fund-raising in July.
Set up by three former NDTV executives, the company is targeting premium restaurants in Delhi-NCR
E-commerce companies typically stick to the gross merchandise value run rate to calculate sales.
At that time, co-founders Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal had made a public announcement at a Bengaluru hotel, about a $1-billion fund raising, largest so far in the Indian e-commerce sector. A day later, Amazon issued a statement that it was investing $2 billion in India.
Vijay Shekhar Sharma, head of Paytm, says they'd achieve their 500-million user target by 2018, two years before the earlier aim.
It will take years for faster Internet to reach this population and those who aren't even connected so far
Becoming a unicorn is surely a marker for a company in its growth story, but it's not a major achievement nor is it a turning point of any significant worth.
Flipkart has seen 33 per cent growth in past 6 months despite slowing e-commerce business and stiff competition from Amazon.
Ratan Tata has invested an undisclosed amount in startup research platform Tracxn.
Prosus-backed fintech firm PayU is set to acquire India's earliest payment gateway BillDesk in an all-cash transaction of $4.7 billion. This will be the largest acquisition in India's digital payments space. The deal will also give exit to investors General Atlantic, TA Associates, Temasek, Clearstone Ventures, and Visa. The proposed acquisition will help PayU, the payments and fintech business of Prosus which operates in more than 20 markets, become one of the leading online payment providers globally by total payment volume (TPV).
Globally, the viability of on-demand businesses is being questioned
From mass layoffs to acquisitions, here's how the Indian start-up industry kept us on our toes.
Loses notional value by 37.5% because of markdowns by investors
Amazon has seen its India sales growing four times this year.
It is Tata's fourth such investment in an e-commerce co.
'For the next three months or so, the market will go down.' 'Traders do not have Rs 100 notes.'
His presence matters more than the money he brings.
Industry watchers say while it's completely possible for a firm like SoftBank to step in and take control of Ola, it's usually one of the least favoured options.
Continuing his investment spree in India's hot start-ups, Ratan Tata on Friday invested in Kyazoonga.
This is Tata's seventh investment this year.
IIM-Ahmedabad has written to Flipkart co-founder Binny Bansal on the issue, saying the students felt cheated for no fault of theirs for choosing the company over other brands and will suffer as they have to re-pay their education loans.
India's tech start-ups are following Silicon Valley's lead and embracing the "fail fast" culture.
The People's Choice Survey is an annual report by CashKaro.com, which identifies key trends in online shopping in India.
E-commerce is awash in money, raising concerns about whether this is just another unsustainable internet trend headed for a bust.
Today, India is one of the fastest-growing eCommerce markets in Asia/Pacific along with China.
Venture capital investments in India's start-ups nearly halved to $1.5 billion in fourth-quarter 2015
After raising $2.5 billion from SoftBank's Masayoshi Son and his Vision Fund, Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal are back in the driving seat at Flipkart, the company they founded over a decade ago.
It's aimed at new-age sectors like e-commerce and other startups so that they can spend less time in their recruitment processes
Online retail is increasing market share rapidly.
This was only four days after many aggrieved buyers chose social networking sites to attack Flipkart's 'Big Billion Day' discount this Monday (October 6), followed by an apology from the company's co-founders, Sachin and Binny Bansal.
CCI investigation into predatory pricing likely
Flipkart claims to have more than 90,000 sellers on its platform.
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