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Grocery delivery startup Zepto has raised $60 million in its first institutional financing round. The startup has a unique proposition in the rather crowded hyperlocal delivery space — a 10minute guarantee on grocery delivery. The funding round was led by Glade Brook Capital, the US-based growth equity firm, and included participation from Nexus Venture Partners and Y Combinator, as well as angel investors Lachy Groom, Neeraj Arora, and Manik Gupta. After the round, the young startup is valued at $225 million. According to the startup, the proceeds from the funding round will be utilized towards expanding its operations and userbase across the country to expand and hire more employees. It currently has 300 employees and plans to quadruple the amount over the next few months. Being in beta mode for the last six months in Bengaluru, Mumbai, and Delhi-NCR, it plans to expand to Hyderabad, Chennai, Pune, and Kolkata in the next 30 days, expanding to 100 dark stores and servicing around 100...

Neo-banking in India, just like other fintech sectors, has picked up surging pace, specially in post-pandemic times. From the numbers that startups claim, it seems people have started to opt for neobanks at a much faster pace, as compared to traditional banks. As time has passed, the neobank segment is slowly moving out from its fledgling state and becoming more mainstream. The same has held true in the case of Bengaluru-based neobank Fi, which raised $50 million in its latest funding round led by Eduardo Saverin’s B Capital and Falcon Edge. With this, the two-year-old Fi is now valued at $315 million, an increase from its previous valuation of $45 million in 2020. According to the startup, the proceeds from the funding round will be used in order to hire people for its tech team and bring more customized products to its users. “The feedback from users has been encouraging and the app has been well received. We have been focused on delivering a banking experience for digital natives th...

The name UPI has become almost commonplace – not only has it revolutionized the rapidly growing fintech sector, but it has enabled people to make easy and fast transactions. The government has been working hard to make it more accessible, and the results have been shown in the data provided by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI). According to the data, United Payments Interface (UPI) clocked over a record 4 billion transactions in the month of October (4.21 billion to be exact), while the value of transactions made through UPI crossed $100 billion in a month for the first time. Transactions worth ₹7.71 lakh crore were conducted during October, fueled by the shopping frenzy that accompanies the festive season. This is a massive increase from how it fared in September – UPI had registered 3.6 billion transactions worth ₹6.5 lakh crores in that time period – a rise of 15%in the number of transactions and 18.5% in the value of transactions. The number of transactions has more...

SpaceX has its eyes set on the skies, whether it be sending rockets or launching satellites for its Starlink constellation. This time, it is the latter – SpaceX now has its wholly-owned subsidiary in India as it aims to start launching broadband and other satellite-based communication services in the country. Currently, SpaceX is preparing to apply for licenses from the local government. The subsidiary, registered under the name Starlink Satellite Communications Private Limited, was announced by Sanjay Bhargava, Starlink Country Director India, in a post on LinkedIn. “Pleased to share that SpaceX now has a 100% owned subsidiary in India. The name is SSCPL – Starlink Satellite Communications Private Limited and the incorporation date is Nov 1, 2021. Happy Birthday, SSCPL. We can now start applying for licenses, open bank accounts, etc,” the post read. Companies are required to set up subsidiaries in India to provide internet in the country. Once the local unit has been set up and the co...

Delhivery has been gearing up for its IPO for quite some time, and now, it has filed its draft red herring prospectus (DRHP) with the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) for an initial public offering (IPO) worth ₹7,460 crores. The IPO of the homegrown logistics and supply chain startup consists of fresh issuance of equity shares worth ₹5,000 crores and an offer for sale (OFS) of shares worth up to ₹2,460 crores by existing promoters and shareholders. In the OFS, Deli CMF will sell ₹400 crores worth of shares, while CA Swift Investments will sell shares worth ₹920 crores. SVF Doorbell Ltd will sell up to ₹750 crores, while Times Interest will sell shares worth ₹330 crores. If the IPO goes smoothly, Delhivery is likely to be valued at over $6 billion. It was last valued at over $3 billion. ₹2500 crore from the proceeds from the IPO will be used for funding organic growth initiatives, while another ₹1250 crore will be utilized to make acquisitions, other strategic initiatives, ...

In a news that may not be a massive surprise to industry watchers, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, announced a new corporate identity for the social networking giant he founded. Facebook Inc, which was the parent for all of social networking giant’s products ecosystem,  will now be called ‘Meta’. Announcing the new identity at the company’s augmented and virtual reality conference, Zuckerberg said “Right now our brand is so tightly linked to one product that it can’t possibly represent everything we’re doing today, let alone in the future. Over time, I hope we are seen as a metaverse company, and I want to anchor our work and our identity on what we’re building towards.” The name change comes at a critical juncture. While the company is projecting itself as a spearhead of the ‘metaverse’ (more on this later), it is also embroiled in lawsuits globally, around its anti-competitive practices. Facebook has since been trying to shed this image, of being a monopolistic big tech company,...

With October coming to an end, it’s time to see how companies fared in the third quarter of the year earnings. The industry wide result has been mixed this time around. While Truecaller, Microsoft, and Alphabet did well in Q3 2021, Facebook missed its revenue forecast. Now, it looks like Amazon falls into the same bucket as the newly formed Meta , after its Q3 2021 earnings showed results that fell below the estimates. In Q3 2021, Amazon reported $110.8 billion in revenues, an increase of 15% compared to the year-ago period, but below the estimate of $111.6 billion. The company also reported a net income of $3.2 billion in the period, or $6.12 per share, below the estimate of $8.92 per share, and the largest year-over-year decline since the second quarter of 2017. Its operating income decreased to $4.9 billion in the third quarter, compared with $6.2 billion in the third quarter of 2020. As for the fourth and final quarter of the year, Amazon expects that sales will generate amounts be...