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In today’s newsletter: 

• Google picks Tamil Nadu to make Pixel, drones
• Wipro chairman Rishad Premji takes a pay cut
• Virat Kohli, Anushka score 4X return on Go Digit

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Google is close to realising its manufacturing ambitions in India, which is the biggest market for several of its products.

Google is set to pick Tamil Nadu for its manufacturing push in India, people familiar with the matter told us.

• Foxconn, a partner of Apple, will be the contract manufacturer for Pixel smartphones. Dixon is also in talks to be another manufacturing partner

It doesn't stop there! Wing, the subsidiary of Google parent Alphabet, will also be taking flight with the local production of drones.

Google plans to expand its Pixel smartphone business in India, which it considers a priority market for these premium devices. 

• Pixel devices currently have a miniscule market share in India's premium smartphone market but its shipments are seeing a sizable growth.

This growth comes amidst rising demand for premium products, including smartphones, among Indian consumers.

• Google rival Apple has also been aggressively ramping up local production of its flagship iPhone devices in India for domestic use and exports in the past year or so. The company now reportedly assembles about 1 in 7 of its iPhones in India.

Google's move also highlights Tamil Nadu’s growing potential as an advanced manufacturing hub.

Many of Apple's manufacturing partners, including Foxconn, Pegatron, and Tata Group, have a presence in the country.

• Google also partnered with PC maker HP to manufacture Chromebooks at a Flex facility in Chennai last year.

Tamil Nadu currently leads in electronics exports with $9.56 billion, representing almost a third of the country's exports.

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When the going gets tough... the tough sometimes take a pay cut, right?  

• That seems to be the case at Wipro, which is currently facing a triple threat: declining market share, leadership changes, and shaky investor confidence

Rishad Premji, Wipro's Executive Chairman, saw his salary slashed by 20% in FY24, dropping to little less than $770,000.

There's more! Company policy dictates that Premji forgoes commission if there's no profit increase, and guess what? 

• This is the second year in a row that's happened

Thierry Delaporte, the recently departed CEO, earned a staggering $20 million (roughly Rs 166 crore) in FY24 – three times his closest counterpart.

• His severance package cost Wipro a whopping Rs 92.1 crore 

The irony? Delaporte was hired to lead Wipro during a period of stagnation, which continues even after his departure.  

• The company is still losing market share, and there's no clear end in sight for the current macroeconomic uncertainty

Wipro, in its annual report, expects growth in FY25 driven by massive investments in nascent technologies like AI and generative AI. 

• However, clients remain cautious about discretionary spending

Ace cricketer and actor couple Virat Kohli and Anushka Sharma might not be able to say '’Ee Sala Cup Namde' this year as RCB got knocked out of IPL, but they can surely cheer up and say 'Ee Sala Returns Namde'.

The celebrity duo reaped a multi-bagger return of nearly Rs 10 crore through the initial public offering (IPO) of insurance player Go Digit. 

Their initial investment of Rs 2.5 crore grew four-fold as the company's share price soared upon its market debut.

The breakdown? 

• Virat Kohli invested Rs 2 crore for 266,667 shares at Rs 75 each

• Anushka Sharma invested Rs 50 lakh for 66,667 shares

Other investors in Go Digit are also seeing big gains.

• A91 Partners' investment of Rs 247 crore has grown to Rs 890 crore, and TVS Capital's Rs 300 crore investment is now worth Rs 950 crore

Go Digit made a quiet debut on the stock exchanges, listing at Rs 286. 

• That's a premium of 5.14% over the issue price of Rs 272

The stock ended the day at Rs 305.75 on BSE, a 12.4% premium on the issue price. The shares had reached an intra-day high of Rs 314.

The private sector is expected to match the government’s over Rs 10,000-crore investment to kick start the India AI mission, Union Minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar told us in an interview. This would raise the total corpus for India AI mission to Rs 20,000 crore.

• He said the government would direct its resources to support use cases in areas like healthcare and agriculture, rather than building a foundation model

• The minister also said that use of deepfakes and misinformation in ongoing elections has vindicated government’s decision to create a fact-check unit

Watch the full interview here

• Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has set up a product advisory council to guide the company's AI and technology development.
  
  
• Amazon Web Services is partnering with Hugging Face to simplify running AI models on Amazon's custom chips.

Feeling intimidated by the AI revolution in education? Fear not!

Salman Khan, founder of Khan Academy, has a roadmap for navigating this exciting new world in his book, Brave New Words.

Khan dives into the educational revolution powered by AI and GPT technology, showing how it can transform classrooms and empower students.

• The book  goes beyond the tech, exploring the social and ethical implications of AI in education

Check it out

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