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In today’s newsletter: 

• Indian IT cuts H-1B visa use by 56% in 8 years
• MSMEs face mandatory annual cyber audits
• ONDC extends incentives as retail dips

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While Washington debates the future of the H-1B visa, Indian IT services firms have already cut their dependence sharply. 

Approved petitions for the top seven Indian IT firms plunged 56% to 6,700 in FY2023 from 15,100 in FY2015, NFAP data shows.

• In contrast, the top five American firms bagged nearly 28,000 H-1B approvals in FY2024, with one e-commerce major alone securing 10,000 in FY2025

Indian IT majors like TCS, Infosys, HCLTech, Wipro, and Tech Mahindra now employ over 50% local staff in the US.

• The shift began 7-8 years ago, aided by automation, offshore expansion, and local hiring

The pandemic accelerated offshoring and subcontracting, further reducing H-1B needs.

Analysts say the recent HIRE Bill and tariff threats add noise but may not immediately disrupt India’s $280 billion IT industry.

• The visa debate is tilting: US product giants such as Google, Apple, Meta, Microsoft, Amazon, are now the heaviest users of the programme, because of shortages of niche skills in AI, data science, and engineering

Meanwhile, Indian IT is diversifying delivery to Japan and LATAM, keeping regulatory risks in check.

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Small firms but big targets– CERT-In just gave MSMEs a cyber rulebook of their own.

India’s micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) will now need to comply with a minimum set of cybersecurity controls and undergo annual audits, under fresh guidelines issued by CERT-In on September 1.

Just weeks ago, CERT-In rolled out its July 25 Comprehensive Cyber Security Audit Policy Guidelines — the first to mandate annual audits across public and private organisations, including AI and quantum systems.

• The new MSME guidelines offer a structured baseline tailored to smaller firms

15 “elemental” cyber defense controls mapped to 45 security recommendations.

• Must-haves include updated IT asset inventories, timely patches, secured networks, strong password policies and retaining logs for 180 days in India

• MSMEs must report cyber incidents within six hours, run annual vulnerability assessments, and train staff regularly on cyber risks

Annual audits are compulsory, to be conducted by CERT-In empanelled auditors.

• Auditors must note that evaluations are only against minimum requirements and firms are urged to go further based on sectoral risks

Government-backed Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) is keeping its purse strings open for one more month, rolling out fresh financial incentives to sellers, buyers, and logistics partners until September 30.

The move comes just ahead of the festive season, at a time when retail transactions on the network are steadily sliding.

• ONDC had initially planned to end incentives on August 30, but has now extended its Financial Assistance Programmes (FAPs)

• Food and beverage sellers can receive reimbursements of up to Rs 25–30 per order, while D2C sellers can earn between Rs 125 and Rs 500 per delivered order

• Logistics players, too, are being nudged with rewards, up to Rs 5 lakh, for completing FIFO orders and scaling to 1,000 orders within two months

Importantly, ONDC has not yet implemented the planned Rs 1.5 network fee per order, which was supposed to kick in on July 1.

• By deferring this, sellers and mobility players have some breathing room to manage costs and stabilise volumes.
  
  
• Incentives for all categories are capped at Rs 40 lakh per participant

According to ONDC data, the network clocked 17.94 million transactions in August 2025, a 2.7% rise over July.

• The growth, however, is almost entirely driven by mobility (11.81 million rides) and logistics (2.35 million orders)
  
  
• Retail is losing steam, just 3.76 million transactions in August, sharply down from 6.1 million a year ago

While retail was once ONDC’s biggest growth engine, it has been sliding since October 2024, hitting a twelve-month low earlier this year.

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India’s fintech NBFCs expanded their loan books in FY25, but profits shrank as rising funding costs, provisions for MSME and unsecured loan stress, and higher compliance expenses squeezed margins.

• Players such as Neogrowth, Lendingkart, and DMI Finance saw profits collapse. With RBI rate cuts and GST reductions expected to spur demand, can NBFCs look forward to a recovery in FY26?

Find out more

• OpenAI has reportedly struck one of the world’s largest cloud deals, signing a five-year, $300 billion contract with Oracle for computing power as AI data-center spending soars despite bubble concerns.

• A new study shows enterprise adoption of Generative AI in engineering R&D is accelerating, with average pilot-stage project investments projected to rise to $4 million from $2.6 million at full-scale production.

It’s not paparazzi but pixels that worry celebs now.

Aishwarya Rai and Abhishek Bachchan have joined peers like Anil Kapoor in demanding judicial protection of their personality rights.

• With AI-generated deepfakes running wild, celebrities are treating their personalities like precious intellectual property

From fake merchandise to synthetic celebrity endorsements, the courts are becoming the new guardians of stardom in this digital wild west.

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