One quick thing: NCLT defers Glas Trust's plea to halt Byju's CoC meetings 

In today’s newsletter: 

• Women trump men in tech wages
• Premji Invest doubles down on AI with Galileo bet
• Banks hesitant to ditch OTPs for 2FA

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For a long time, the corporate world has committed the wrong of paying men more than women employees. Now, things might be changing — at least in the tech sector.

In India’s listed tech unicorns, the median wage of female employees was higher than their male counterparts in FY24.

• The highest difference is in fintech major Paytm, where the median wage of women was 160% more than men

• Other unicorns such as Zomato, Delhivery and Mamaearth also paid their female employees more, although the differences were smaller

However, the median pay of women in cosmetics and fashion marketplace Nykaa — which boasts Falguni Nayar as its founder and chief executive officer — was 27% lower than their male counterparts.

But, Nykaa fared well on another metric where others came out very poor. 

• It had the largest share of female employees — employing 1.79 men for each woman

While this ratio is the worst for Delhivery at 17.5 male workers for every female worker, Paytm is only slightly better at 16.5, Zomato is at 3.29 and Mamaearth at 2.64.

FY24 was a year when salaries in the tech sector remained suppressed due to a funding winter — reflected in the listed tech unicorns’ annual reports.

• The median pay of Zomato employees reduced by 16.8% during the financial year, while Delhivery and Nykaa employees saw their median pay remain stagnant

• The outliers here were Paytm which saw a 7% rise in median pay and Mamaearth at 20% increase

Go deeper

Azim Premji, the czar of India's tech giant Wipro, is not content with his company's AI ambitions. 

• His investment fund, Premji Invest, is on a mission to back promising AI startups, and the latest is Galileo

Premji Invest is set to invest around $15 million in Galileo, a California-based AI startup. 

• The investment will be part of the AI startup's Series B round of funding
  
  
• It raised $18 million in a Series A round from a clutch of investors in November 2022

The California-based startup helps data scientists and engineers make their machine-learning models more accurate.

Premji Invest has been actively investing in AI and generative AI startups. 

• Galileo marks the fifth such investment in the past year alone

Other notable investments include Hippocratic AI, Hugging Face, Canva, and Poolside.

Dig deeper

For over a decade, one-time passwords (OTPs) have been the go-to security measure for online transactions.

• But the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is pushing for a change

The RBI wants banks to ditch OTPs in favour of more secure alternatives like biometrics. But banks are not on the same page!

• Why? The "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" mentality prevails

Banks are hesitant to make these changes, especially when OTPs have worked well for so long.

Switching to secure alternatives like biometrics isn't a simple matter of flipping a switch. 

• It requires significant investments in technology and infrastructure

Interestingly, India's most popular payment method, UPI, doesn't rely on OTPs for second-factor authentication (2FA).

• Instead, it uses a static UPI PIN. Even so, the RBI has deemed PINs less secure than biometric authentication

The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), which operates UPI, is exploring biometric authentication as a potential replacement for PINs. 

• Some banks have also started experimenting with alternative solutions

Dig deeper

Fintech NBFCs are rapidly becoming the most popular investment trend," asserts Vikram Vaidyanathan, Managing Director at Z47, "demonstrating resilience and scalability in a tightening market.

As traditional NBFCs undergo digital transformation, innovative fintech startups are actively pursuing NBFC licenses to directly provide loans and establish asset bases. 

• The VC has his stakes placed on wealthtech, which he believes has "only scratched the surface”

Read the full interview

• Indian property developer Rustomjee plans to build data centres on 5 million sq. ft of land in Thane, Mumbai, to capitalise on the AI boom.
  
  
• Salesforce is acquiring Tenyx, an AI-powered voice agent developer, to bolster its AI solutions.

Remember FAU-G? The game franchise is making a comeback with a sequel called "FAU-G: Domination."

• But aside from the name, everything else is different this time around

The game has been rebuilt from the ground up with a new engine, game tech, and story—and it's also developed by a different studio.

• Gaming veteran Vishal Gondal spoke to us about why the original FAU-G failed and what are their plans with the new title. Find out more

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