Breaking: In its “year of efficiency”, Facebook parent firm Meta is facing another round of layoffs. The social networking giant is reducing its workforce by another 10,000 people and withdrawing about 5,000 open roles, just four months after cutting 11,000 jobs.

Scoop: Skill gaming unicorn Mobile Premier League (MPL) has launched its NFT marketplace Good Game Exchange (GGX) amidst a digital asset downturn led by the crypto rout. There is also a legal dispute involved. Read more.

In today’s newsletter: 

• Govt to help startups tide over SVB storm
• Error 404: Unicorns not found
• Zoho's Sridhar Vembu clears air on family feud

Was this newsletter forwarded to you? You can sign up for Tech3 here

The Indian government has stepped in to help the country’s startups affected by the collapse of the Silicon Valley Bank. 

• Union Minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar said that he will suggest a list of measures to the Finance Ministry so that startups can move their money easily to the country

In a virtual meeting with more than 450 startups today, he heard from distressed entrepreneurs and investors about the challenges they face in recovering their deposits and transferring money back to the country.

“We need a financial airlift by the government in this situation,” said an investor, while describing how international fund transfers from the US to India were not going through.

While the startup founders suggested a slew of measures to the minister, Chandrasekhar said it was important to first take care of the immediate crisis.

• He asked the startups to consider shifting the money to bank accounts at GIFT IFSC in Gujarat which has benefits akin to a foreign jurisdiction for financial services

• The minister’s suggestions to the FM will include a credit line for affected startups, easier rules for account opening in GIFT City, and mirroring credit products available in the US

With the startup ecosystem still trying to get a grip on things, we thought it would be a good idea to let our readers hear it straight from the horse's mouth. So, we've published a first-person account of the crisis by the founder of SuperOps.ai.

“The greatest lesson I would say is that you can’t plan for everything – a lot can be achieved by staying calm and knowing that you can’t control everything…,” Arvind Parthiban writes.

Read Arvind Parthiban’s column

There was 2021, when India saw a new unicorn being minted every week, and then there is 2023, when we haven't seen a new unicorn at all!

Does this suggest that the unicorn frenzy is dying?

India has not seen a new unicorn for nearly six months, the longest drought in seven years, thanks to the much-talked-about funding winter.

• Mobio Diagnostics was the last company to achieve the unicorn status in September last year
  
  
• Prior to this, the longest unicorn drought lasted 17 months, from August 2016 to January 2018

With central banks around the world raising interest rates, the cost of money increased, resulting in investors negotiating hard with founders and settling for much lower valuations than in 2021.

The last six months have been in stark contrast to 2021, when India added 44 unicorns and another 23 in 2022.

• Investors now believe that this drought will last longer, especially with revenue expected to grow at a slower pace in coming quarters.

Will that lead to down rounds? Watch this space to know how 2023 pans out for the world's third-largest startup ecosystem.

It wasn't a pleasant week for Zoho's cofounder and chief executive officer Sridhar Vembu! There was a lot of buzz in the SaaS and startup industry since Forbes magazine published a report accusing him of abandoning his wife and his son, and that he transferred some of his shares of Zoho to other family members. 

• Vembu took to Twitter to explain his side of the story and called the allegations ‘a complete fiction’.

In a divorce case in California, Vembu's estranged wife alleged that he intentionally disposed of a significant portion of his Zoho stake through a complex transaction that moved  Zoho's intellectual property to India, the report said.

Vembu denies the allegations.

"I never ever transferred my shares in the company to anyone else. I lived in the US for the first 24 years of our 27-year history and much of what constitutes the company was built in India. That is reflected in the ownership," he wrote on Twitter.

Vembu is accused of abandoning his wife and settling in India, however, it was reported earlier that the founder had been focusing on opening more rural offices in India after employees were forced to return to their hometowns during lockdowns at the onset of the pandemic. 

• Vembu said that his personal life, in contrast to his business life, has been a long tragedy. "Autism (of his son) destroyed our lives and left me suicidally depressed," he said in a tweet

(Note: If you are aware of anyone facing mental health issues or feeling suicidal, please provide help. Please find helpline numbers that can offer support below: Aasra's 24x7 Helpline: 9820466726. Helplines across India can be found here.)

The concept of a 15-minute city has gained popularity in cities worldwide. Now, India’s tech hub is joining the conversation with proposals for a 30-minute city model. Yes, you read it right!

• The Karnataka government is planning 12 "good life" clusters as part of its action plan to make the state a $1 trillion economy by 2032

Residents of Bengaluru living in tech corridors like Koramangala, Electronics City, Hebbal, HSR Layout, Sarjapur, Whitefield, and surrounding areas may soon have access to a variety of services within a 30-minute walk, bike ride, or public transit trip.

Find out if your neighbourhood is on the list.

Today is a special day for math lovers as Pi Day is celebrated worldwide every year on March 14 to recognise the famous mathematical constant, Pi. The date is written as 3/14 in the month/day format, which resembles Pi's approximate value of 3.14.

Quick trivia: It also happens to be Albert Einstein's birthday and Stephen Hawking's death anniversary.

• Facebook parent Meta is discontinuing support for digital collectibles or non-fungible tokens (NFTs) on its platforms less than a year after launching it. 
  
  
• The US Justice Department is reportedly investigating the collapse of the TerraClassicUSD stablecoin, which contributed to a $40 billion wipeout in the Terra ecosystem last May.

Looking for an out-of-this-world adventure but don't want to break the bank? Well, hold onto your seats because a Japanese space development startup called Iwaya Giken has announced an exciting new venture in commercial space tourism!

That's right, you could soon be soaring high above the Earth's atmosphere in a sleek, drum-shaped cabin complete with several large windows for breathtaking views. Attached to the cabin is a helium balloon that can lift you and your pilot up to 25 km into the stratosphere.

Sure, the initial cost of the flight might make your wallet cry out in agony at around $180,000. But, fear not! Iwaya Giken plans to make this incredible experience accessible to every one by bringing the price tag down to a more manageable five-figure range.

Find out more

Note: By subscribing to Tech3 you have already made the right choice. Top it up with a premium offering, the Moneycontrol Pro Panorama, a newsletter that gives you a sharp take on macros, markets, business and finance. Sign up for Pro from this link to get this newsletter in your inbox and also a host of content enjoyed by 500,000+ subscribers.