BUSINESS
Around 300 employees impacted at Zepto amid cost efficiency drive at the quick commerce company
A total of around 1,000 Zepto employees have been impacted since the beginning of the year, sources told Moneycontrol. Zepto is also cutting back its spends on AWS and other software and the company will go "very tight" on hiring.
BUSINESS
Zepto and DMart at the same juncture, CEO Aadit Palicha in employee town hall a day after $450 million fundraise
“We have cracked proximity, but yet to crack value and DMart, the retail giant, has cracked value but not proximity,” Palicha is learnt to have said, per employees Moneycontrol spoke to.
BUSINESS
Quick services startup Snabbit relocates from Mumbai to Bengaluru’s Koramangala to tap tech talent
Snabbit is moving to Bengaluru at a time when industrialists and the state government are at loggerheads over infrastructure issues, traffic woes and other challenges that are crippling the city’s growth.
BUSINESS
Govt leans on quick commerce for real-time price checks after GST rate cuts
Platforms like Blinkit, Swiggy’s Instamart, and Zepto have also been asked by the government to showcase savings made on account of the GST rate cuts, sources said, adding that this strategy is key to ensuring that tax reductions are leading to lower retail prices on a daily basis.
BUSINESS
Lenskart shares touch Rs 510 apiece in grey market, signals $10 billion valuation ahead of IPO
Lenskart is expected to file its red herring prospectus (RHP) in the week of October 22 and plans to list on the stock exchanges no later than November 12, a source told Moneycontrol
BUSINESS
Prosus to buy additional ixigo shares from Peak XV Partners and Elevation Capital to increase stake to 15%
Peak XV Partners will sell about 3 percent to Prosus and Elevation Capital will sell another 2 percent to Prosus, taking Prosus' total holding to 15%, up from 10.1% as of October 10 for a total consideration of around Rs 1,900-2,000 crore, sources told Moneycontrol
BUSINESS
Tough luck? Astrotalk’s $100 million deal with Hornbill Capital comes unstuck over NSFW content flagged during due diligence
"All this is completely baseless as we never signed any term sheet with any investor," Anmol Jain, co-founder, Astrotalk, said in response to Moneycontrol's detailed queries.
BUSINESS
Fidelity-backed VC firm Eight Roads Ventures consolidates Asia investments, lets go of a dozen executives
It is also likely Fidelity, the sole limited partner of Eight Roads Ventures, will become the anchor of fund and ask other LPs to co-invest in the startup, moving away from the original strategy
BUSINESS
SEBI clears Lenskart IPO; eyewear startup to raise Rs 2,150 crore via fresh issue
Among the promoters, Peyush Bansal will offload 2 crore shares, while Neha Bansal, Amit Chaudhary, and Sumeet Kapahi will each sell a smaller stake.
BUSINESS
Zepto nears $450 million funding at $7 billion valuation led by US pension fund Calpers
A bulk of the $450 million, around $350-$380 million will be in primary capital that will go directly into Zepto's coffers. The remaining, $70-100 million, will be in the form of secondary share deals where early investors will sell shares, sources told Moneycontrol.
BUSINESS
California Burrito raises Rs 120 crore from Elevation Capital
The eatery, also backed by Kumar Vembu, the brother of Zoho founder Sridhar Vembu, had engaged with Elevation Capital around 18 months back for a fundraise but negotiations had paused back then. The two parties have now agreed on favourable terms, as per sources.
BUSINESS
Prosus to pump $350 million in Uber rival Rapido; Accel likely to join as investor
As it happens, both Accel and Prosus are key investors in food and grocery delivery platform Swiggy, which just sold its entire stake in Rapido to avoid any conflict of interest.
BUSINESS
Urban Company IPO: SBI MF booster shot, stronger governance, transparency, leaving money on the table make investors lap up shares
Spending time in Mumbai and Gujarat to convince HNIs to invest, detailed roadshows, speaking for long and with clarity all helped UC reach here. Where the share lists remains to be seen, but the grey market premium signals a 50 percent jump which should augur well for the firm.
BUSINESS
WestBridge leads $40 million round in Flipkart-backed FinBox to expand B2B digital lending platform
Of the $40 million, $35 million went directly into the company’s coffers in the form of primary capital and the remaining $5 million was through secondary share sales where early angels exited to make way for new investors.
BUSINESS
Warburg Pincus eyeing exit from IndiaFirst Life Insurance post 2018 bet
Investment bank Barclays has been roped in as an advisor to find a buyer for the PE major’s 26 per cent stake
BUSINESS
Swiggy to launch Toing, a standalone app for affordable food options
Toing, which will go live in Pune first, aims to tap demand from students, young professionals and will be an extension to Swiggy’s Rs 99 store. It will be the seventh app from the house of Swiggy. The aim is to increase its base of transacting users and maintain the company’s pace of growth.
BUSINESS
Over a dozen AI startups in India set to raise seed rounds amid surge in investor appetite
A bulk of the startups negotiating deals are developing AI agents or are creating tools to facilitate their development. Investors are also spending time on AI companion companies, sources told Moneycontrol.
BUSINESS
Instamart service at all-time high, outlook for quick commerce overwhelmingly positive: Swiggy Group CEO Sriharsha Majety
Instarmart CEO Amitesh Jha told Moneycontrol that Swiggy will run a Quick India Movement sale event later this month. It is likely to rival Amazon's Great Indian Festival and Flipkart's Big Billion Days signalling that the lines between e-commerce and quick commerce are blurring.
BUSINESS
Former IndiaAI mission advisor Aakrit Vaish to launch Activate, an AI fund with a $75 million corpus
General Catalyst, Aravind Srinivas of Perplexity, Vijay Shekhar Sharma of Paytm, Harsh Jain of Dream 11 are among the notable limited partners (LPs) of the fund, sources told Moneycontrol. Activate has already signed its first term sheet.
BUSINESS
Quick commerce firms set to clock 1 billion orders by Diwali this calendar year
The meteoric rise of quick commerce, still a sunrise sector, comes at a time when the Competition Commission of India (CCI) is currently reviewing the operations of companies to assess whether they follow anti-competitive practices.
BUSINESS
Walmart-owned Flipkart appoints former Google executive Balaji Thiagarajan as its chief technology and product officer
Thiagarajan holds nine U.S. patents, an MS degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Syracuse University, and an MBA in Finance & Operations from the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.
BUSINESS
Kitchens@ weighs acquiring Popo Ventures that runs Pizza Bakery, Paris Panini, Smash Guys for Rs 800 crore
The deal hinges on whether Kitchens@ is able to raise the capital required to fund the acquisition this size, sources told Moneycontrol. The cloud kitchen startup has been looking to raise Rs 2,000 crore for about a year now.
BUSINESS
Flipkart Minutes helped bring 50 million new visitors onto our platform, says SVP Hemant Badri
That is a significant addition especially because Flipkart has around 200 million annual active users and a total customer base of 500-600 million.
BUSINESS
Elevation Capital raises $400 million to foray into late-stage investing via Elevation Holdings
Elevation Holdings will write $20-50 million cheques and focus on new-age companies that are close to a public market listing. It will continue to stay invested in these firms even after their IPO.
