Bullets

To avoid a repetition of the Vistara pilot strike, 30 Tata-owned Air India Express cabin crew members were fired for calling in sick.

The airline took this step after major disruptions on 8 April, believing it a coordinated effort for a mass strike.

The airline says they're open to discussing the situation but terminated these employees for violating company rules. Air India Express will cut back on flights for the next few days to manage the situation. 

Paytm's lending business is facing trouble. Several partner NBFCs like Aditya Birla Finance have stopped offering loans through Paytm.

This is due to concerns about Paytm's compliance rules and potential loan defaults. Paytm might have to pay guarantees offered to NBFCs, further impacting their finances.

This particular roadblock is a blow to Paytm as a significant portion of their revenue comes from financial services. 

Tata Electronics is making strides in Indian semiconductors! They've begun exporting small batches of packaged chips made at their Bengaluru facility.

These chips are being sent to partners in Japan, US, and Europe. This is a pilot project while Tata builds a bigger chip packaging unit in Assam and a massive chip factory in Gujarat.

This could in turn benefit Tesla’s entry in India as it has signed an agreement with Tata Electronics for chips distribution.

Also read: Can tesla disrupt India's auto industry?

Vodafone Idea is fast-tracking talks with Nokia and Ericsson to upgrade its 4G network. Purchase orders will likely be issued in June-July and might even include initial 5G deals.

This follows their successful follow-on public offer (FPO) that raised ₹18,000 crore, with over half allocated for network capex, primarily focused on 4G expansion.

With the gained funds, will Vi finally be able to compete strongly with major players like Jio and Airtel?

Also read: Could Vi finally join Jio & Airtel as a 5G Service Provider?

Azim Premji's family office, Premji Invest, is close to buying a controlling stake (around 51%) in Nainital Bank. Discussions are advanced, with a potential valuation of ₹800 crore for the bank.

Bank of Baroda, the current large shareholder with 98% stakes, is looking to sell its entire stake.

This follows earlier reports of several parties interested in acquiring the bank, including Zerodha, MobiKwik, and Premji Invest.

The ban on Indian spice companies like Everest & MDH overseas has led the central government to order all states to test their spices.

While the Spices Board and FSSAI were already sampling, no official statements confirming quality have been issued. Uttarakhand, with over 50 spice manufacturers, is actively testing its spices.

Food safety officers are collecting samples across the state to ensure quality control. After recent controversies, this move aims to regain trust in India's spice industry.

This is one of many instances. Many times, India's food industry has faced serious allegations. Read about a few of them from the article: Is the Indian Food Industry in Danger?

RBI is concerned about how banks partner with fintech companies for gold loans. This follows their action against IIFL Finance for issues in its gold loan portfolio.

Apparently, the central bank isn't happy with how gold is valued and loans are approved by some fintech platforms.

While there's no official communication yet, RBI has expressed its dissatisfaction. This could slow down the growth of gold loans offered through fintechs by major banks like HDFC, Kotak Mahindra, and Federal Bank.

RBI's strict rules regarding asset quality norms result in only one out of 11 small banks applying to become full-fledged banks. This would allow these banks to receive the ultimate universal bank license. 

AU Small Finance Bank is the only one that qualifies now due to strong financials and a diversified loan portfolio. With ₹12,500 crore net worth & minimal NNPA margins helped in achieving the mark. 

AU SFB’s recent merger with Fincare further strengthens its position. 

Also read about AU SFB’s competitor Capital Small Finance Bank.

Swiggy is planning an IPO to raise $1.25 billion (over ₹10,414 crore). They filed confidential draft documents with the stock market regulator, SEBI.

This means the details aren't publicly available yet. The IPO will include both new shares and existing shareholders selling their shares (offer for sale).

Swiggy’s upcoming initial public offering has been an awaited occasion for investors. Then why is the food delivery startup being all discreet about it? What are they hiding?

Swiggy is inching closer to going public as its shareholders approved raising funds up to ₹10,414 crore ($1.25 billion) via IPO.

This includes raising ₹3,750 crore ($450 million) in new capital and ₹6,664 crore ($800 million) from existing investors selling shares.

Swiggy is among several Indian startups planning IPOs in 2024, including Firstcry, Ola Electric, and Awfis.

Interested in investing in the upcoming IPO? Read an article on Swiggy to learn whether to bet or not.

Reliance Jio, India's leading telecom operator, has become the world's largest mobile operator for data traffic, beating China Mobile.

Jio's network handled 40.9 Exabytes of data in Q1 2024, surpassing China Mobile's 38 Exabytes. 

The company's net profit of ₹5,337 crore for the March 2024 quarter showed a healthy 13% increase Y-o-Y. However, compared to the previous quarter, the net profit growth was modest at 2.47%.

Read about Reliance’s future plans to dominate the market from here.

Ather Energy is looking to raise $75-90 million through a primary funding round. This comes alongside news that Flipkart’s co-founder Sachin Bansal sold a part of his stake to Zerodha’s co-founder Nikhil Kamath.

Bansal, holding a 10.7% stake in Ather as of December 2023, might even sell his remaining shares. He was also Ather's first angel investor.

Could this be the boost Ather Energy was looking for to finally join the band of unicorns? 

Vedanta Group is looking to demerge Hindustan Zinc, but the government holds 29% shares and is thinking of selling 3.5% stake first. 

CEO Arun Misra says they can do both at the same time. However, the government is hesitant thinking it might hurt sales prices. 

Interestingly, Hindustan Zinc is now the world's 3rd largest silver producer.

The Godrej family, known for their diverse conglomerate, is splitting. Brothers Adi & Nadir Godrej left the boards of companies run by cousins Jamshyd & Smita Godrej Crishna. 

Godrej Industries & Associates is run by Adi & Nadir Godrej whereas Godrej & Boyce (G&B) falls under the command of Jamshyd & Smita Godrej.

This signals a formal division of the family business after over 100 years. Both sides will soon sell their ownership stakes in each other's companies. 

Swiggy is merging its grocery delivery brand Instamart with its online mall “Swiggy Mall”. This mall is operational in some parts of Bengaluru and is planning to expand to other cities.

This will let customers order non-grocery items alongside groceries for super fast delivery. Over 35 categories would be introduced apart from grocery and home essentials.

Read about how Swiggy plans to get its affairs in order with an incoming IPO from here.

India might partner with Nvidia to provide subsidised GPUs (Graphic Processing Units) for AI research and startups. This is part of a larger ₹10,000 crore AI mission.

The final decision awaits elections, but Nvidia's market dominance makes them a likely choice.

There are two options: the government can make a deal with Nvidia, or companies can rent and sublet from the supplier themselves.

Apple is in talks with conglomerate Murugappa Group & Tata Sons’ Titan for iPhone camera parts. The discussion would include assembling & producing the components for the iPhone's camera.

This step would reduce China’s standing in the global market and will align with Apple’s vision of shifting half of its supply chain to India.

The final decision has not been announced by the parties involved, but if confirmed, this news would be another shock for China.

Samsung grabs the top spot for phone manufacturing and selling as iPhone shipments drop 10% in the first quarter of 2024.

Samsung has a 20.8% market share and finally reached the top as Apple dropped back to a 17.3% share.

With the news that Apple devices face the threat of mercenary spyware and competitors like Huawei gaining traction, iPhone shipments dropped.

Tata's super app, Tata Neu, is now piloting food & beverage ordering on ONDC in parts of Delhi-NCR & Bengaluru. This is the first time Tata has entered ONDC as a buyer.

Other Tata enterprises, such as BigBasket and StarQuik, are also participating in the pilot and have been available on ONDC as sellers.

Out of the 7.68 million monthly orders in ONDC, 9.55% are from the food and beverage sector. It appears that Tata Neu has great potential on ONDC.

2024 is going to witness many major Mergers & Acquisitions on the horizon. As per a report, business M&A saw a jump in 2024’s first quarter, reaching a near two-year high. 

This was driven by the massive Reliance-Disney deal, even though the overall number of deals only increased slightly to 427 from 422.

The values of these deals surged by 4% to $20.416 billion (around ₹1.69 lakh crore).