Startups across the board had cut employee salaries as the Covid crisis had hit and business outlook had looked uncertain, but some of those salary cuts are now being reversed. Zomato and Ixigo have said that they have reinstated the salaries of employees to pre-Covid levels. “In order to quickly reduce our costs during the initial days of the COVID-19 crisis, we had requested our staff to volunteer for salary cuts. 75% of our employees…

An Indian unicorn with a significant Chinese investment has just set the bar for the Boycott China movement, which is quickly spreading across sectors and industries. PolicyBazaar CEO Yashish Dahiya has said that if Tencent were willing, his company would be happy to buy back their 10% stake in his company. “They have been a good shareholder,” he said. “If they were willing, we would be happy to buy their shares. The company has the cash…

After Amazon had bought a stake in Shoppers Stop in 2018, Flipkart has gone ahead and acquired a minority stake in a fashion company. Flipkart has invested Rs 260 crore to buy a “significant” minority stake in Arvind Fashions’ recently formed subsidiary Arvind Youth Brands. The subsidiary will own the Flying Machine brand, which has been retailing on the Flipkart Group platforms for over six years, according to Arvind Fashions’ stock exchange filing. Flying Machine calls itself India’s first homegrown…

Large brands are scrambling to fill in the void created by the ban of Chinese short video application TikTok. Just today, both Facebook and India’s Gaana.com are launching their TikTok alternatives for the India market. Gaana has launched something called Gaana Hotshots, which will allow users to create and share short videos and stories. Facebook, for its part, is launching something called Instagram Reels, which “offers a new way to create and share short videos on Instagram.” Both…

Even as Chinese apps have been shunted off app stores, Indian apps are quickly coming in to try to take their place. The Art of Living Foundation, run by Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, has thrown its hat into the social networking space with the launch of Elyments, which it calls “India’s first social media super app”. The app was launched by Vice President Venkaiah Naidu and Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, and has been made by…

After the news of the layoffs, the news of offices being shut has started streaming in too. Uber has decided to permanently shut down its Mumbai office, Mint reported. Uber’s Mumbai employees will continue to work from home until December, and it is not clear if the employees will be moved to another office in Mumbai next year. A spokesperson for Uber declined to comment on the development but added that it will continue to provide “a…

When Reliance had announced last month that it was going to launch a video conferencing app, it was believed that it would be an Indian alternative to Zoom. When Reliance has officially launched JioMeet, people are marveling at how much of a Zoom competitor it really is. Jio today formally launched JioMeet, its video conferencing app. Like Zoom, JioMeet offers unlimited number of free calls in high definition (720p) to users and supports as many as…

Entrepreneurship isn’t easy. It brings with it pain, tears, and moments of self-doubt. But every once in a while there’s a story that comes out that makes entrepreneurs believe that it can be all worth it. Founded just 17 years ago, Tesla is now the most valuable car company in the world. Tesla reached the milestone after its stock hit a record high of $1,080, taking its market capitalization to $200 billion. This allowed it to…

The Indian government banned 59 Chinese apps on Monday amidst the Ladakh standoff citing security concerns and data privacy issues. While this caused some cheer around the country — a ban on Chinese apps would undoubtedly hit China hard — there was even more enthusiasm among India’s startup community. With 59 popular apps having disappeared from app stores overnight, there’s an opportunity for Indians to build alternatives, which could quickly garner users. The biggest app…