India’s food delivery space might’ve just lost one of its biggest players. Ola-owned Foodpanda has severely curtailed its operations. As of writing, all restaurants, apart from Dominos and Pizza Hut, are listed as “unavailable” on its app. Mint is reporting that the company has terminated its food delivery business, and laid off 40 mid to entry level employees. It has also reportedly terminated the contracts of 1500 delivery executives. “They (Ola) have realized they can’t…

India’s already-crowded air ticket booking space has a new — and massive — addition. Amazon has launched its flight booking service in India as it looks to become a super app. Amazon’s app and website now has a flights icon on the Amazon Pay page, and customers can book flights much as they’d book one on a dedicated travel portal . Amazon has partnered with Cleartrip to launch the service. “We are excited to partner with Cleartrip and…

Indian unicorns, no matter which sector they operate in, are making a beeline for fintech. Paytm and Ola have both launched their own credit cards this week, marking their formal entry into the lending and credit space. Paytm’s card, called Paytm First, has been launched in partnership with Citi, while Ola has launched a card in partnership with Visa and SBI. Last October, Amazon had launched a co-branded card in association with ICICI. Flipkart too…

Over the years, Paytm has been fighting to prevent cashback fraud perpetrated by its customers. Now it seems to have had to fight cashback fraud perpetrated by its own employees. Paytm Mall is investigating a cashback fraud involving some of its employees and merchants, Mint reports. Some Paytm Mall employees allegedly worked with third-party vendors and created fake orders to siphon off cashback offers. Paytm has engaged consulting major EY to audit the fraud. The…

Arnab Goswami had first made his name through TV news, but he seems to be doing just as well in the entrepreneurial arena as he did in journalism. Goswami has bought back shares of Republic TV from Asianet, which will allow him to regain control of the channel he’d founded in 2017. The repurchase of shares will allow Goswami to put Republic TV on track to becoming an Editor-run news channel. More significantly, the two year…

Startup investments aren’t for the faint of heart — a large percentage of startups never really take off, which means that early investors often lose their shirts. But when startups do take off, startup investments can generate some very lucrative returns.  And when you’ve invested in the most valuable startup in the world, the returns can be something to behold. Uber is going public next week, exactly a decade after it was founded. And with…

Flipkart might soon take the biggest step in its much-publicized online-to-offline strategy. Flipkart is in talks to acquire Bangalore-based grocery chain Namdhari’s Fresh, CNBC TV 18 has reported. Namdhari’s Fresh was founded in 2000, and operates 30 stores in Bangalore. Apart from its retail business, the company also exports agricultural produce to Europe, Asia and the Middle East, and handles more than a thousand tons of fruits and vegetables per year. The acquisition of Namdhari’s…

As India’s food delivery market is growing bigger, it’s also branching out into newer ways of performing deliveries. Swiggy has said that it now delivers as many as 15 lakh orders a month through mechanical cycles. Out of Swiggy’s overall delivery fleet of 1.7 lakh, 10,000 deliver orders while riding cycles. Twenty percent of these riders are in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities like Surat, Belgaum, Guwahati and Lucknow. “A couple of years back we initiated…

One of India’s oldest travel portals now has a Chinese giant as its biggest investor. China’s Ctrip now owns 49% of MakeMyTrip after the exit of long-term investor Naspers. Naspers has sold its entire stake in MakeMyTrip in exchange for 5.6% of shares in Ctrip, effectively exiting the Indian travel portal and becoming an investor in Ctrip instead. After the deal, Ctrip owns 49% of MakeMyTrip that’s worth $1.3 billion (Rs. 10,000 crore), and has…