TRENDS
At 95, Tintin's charm is undimmed
Tintin in the 21st century: The Blue Lotus cover by Herge was bought for $3.9 million in 2021 and the original of King Ottokar’s Sceptre went under the hammer for $12 million in 2016. Over half a million copies are still sold in France every year, and in Tamil Nadu, Prakash Publishers has a fresh translation for diehard comics aficionados.
BUSINESS
Boeing-Airbus duopoly is a pain for customers and a lesson for competition regulators
The duopoly of Boeing and Airbus has meant that the Indian airline industry has to depend entirely on them despite recent signs of shoddy production standards. This is a nightmare for competition regulators.
INDIA
The big challenge for leaders is knowing when to quit
It is the old cliché, you should go when people ask why and not when.
BUSINESS
BYD’s battle with Tesla offers a glimpse of the EV market’s future
BYD’s success comes at a time when American car manufacturing is already in retreat across the world. But while its ascent to the top isn’t a surprise, the pace at which it has done so is
TRENDS
100 years of EM Forster's A Passage to India: Viewing India through the lens of a Raj era classic
A Passage to India is a powerful assay into the muddled relations between the rulers and the ruled. Today, the passage of Forster’s book has come full circle.
BUSINESS
The Green Pivot: Booming EV sales are good for car companies but not so much for the climate
The laudable desire to save the planet from fossil fuel emissions as seen in the customer rush to buy EVs doesn't extend to using clean, convenient, and reasonably priced, public transport systems
TRENDS
Punjab’s crippling debt is an insult to the Partition era refugees who drove its success
Punjab’s accumulated debt in the past year-and-a-half has crossed Rs 47,000 crore, and its outstanding debt is now nearly 50 percent of its GDP. This is a state whose GDP per capita rank was No. 1 till about 1981.
TRENDS
Year Ender 2023 | Book lists are so last century
Year end lists of books read has enshrined itself in our minds and socio-cultural spaces as the intellectual ornament to be flashed to show supremacy. Yet even the best editors can't agree on which books to read and why.
BUSINESS
As Sajjan Jindal battles sexual harassment charges, the ball is in the board’s court
Hopefully, the Singhania family dispute will soon get resolved and Jindal will be cleared of the charges. But what happens in the interim? Should the two step down till such time as their personal issues are sorted?
TRENDS
Paint the town peach fuzz, says Pantone
For the last two decades the Pantone Color Institute based in New Jersey, US, has provided annual colour prompts to industry to tweak merchandise colours in its bid to marry business and marketing in one fell swoop.
BUSINESS
Sony faces Hobson’s choice with Zee merger
Does it go ahead with the deal and wait for the legal challenges to play out, is the question
TRENDS
KBC contestant Alolika Guha’s joie de vivre is the only life hack we need
Kaun Banega Crorepati TV show contestant Alolika Bhattacharjee Guha’s infectious laughter and joyful banter with show host and actor Amitabh Bachchan prove that money can't buy you happiness.
BUSINESS
The woes of Indian airlines threaten more pain for fliers
Despite a healthy growth in passenger traffic, Indian airlines are expected to close FY24 with losses of Rs 7,000 crore according to rating agency ICRA
TECHNOLOGY
Rising debate around Artificial Intelligence is the surest sign that it is here to stay
A safe and equitable future, is that what we can hope from AI? Maybe, with careful bioethics, yes, indeed.
BUSINESS
EV push stalls in America, but gains momentum in India
India, it would seem, has got its strategy of pushing sales of 2- and 3-wheelers and increasingly public buses, right
CRICKET
Loss aversion: The psychological inevitability of India’s loss in the World Cup final
There is an asymmetric relationship between loss aversion and winning, with the pain of losing being twice that of gaining.
BUSINESS
The chaos at OpenAI is less about AI and more about the money
Commercializing AI remains the ultimate goal of all the parties concerned
BUSINESS
Why India Inc's boardrooms need to look younger
Indian companies need younger board members who are more in tune with their markets, in line with demographic changes
INDIA
Remembering Indira Gandhi, a feminist before her time
By grabbing power and then proceeding to secure her position, Indira Gandhi laid the way for women in India in a way that is difficult to imagine today when women still need the support of male MPs to reserve a place for them in Parliament.
BUSINESS
A sad end to Subrata Roy’s rags-to-riches-to-rags story
Subrata Roy made a promising start as a high flying business magnate only to lose his way, descending into irrational excesses and breaking the trust of small investors wooed by the promise of exponential returns. Once the garden variety scam was exposed, all his attempts to raise funds and salvage his ventures floundered
TRENDS
Diwali 2023: Magic of marigolds in our midst
The yellow orange spectrum strums happy tidings in the human heart. No wonder the marigold flower has gone down very well as an augury of auspiciousness.
BUSINESS
WeWork’s insolvency is a warning to Indian startups like Byju’s
Any hopes of a recovery by WeWork have been dashed by its latest results which show that the company’s core business continues to be deeply loss-making
TRENDS
Wokeism takes a hit as Malala and Greta Thunberg weigh in on Gaza conflict
Why wokes around the world have been put on notice.
BUSINESS
Shrinking IT jobs reflect the sector’s refusal to take risks
Had IT firms embraced disruptive new technologies such as generative artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning, they would still need fewer people. The difference though is that margins would have remained unaffected
