Several Indian startups have taken baby steps towards starting operations abroad — Zomato acquired US-based Urban Spoon a few years ago, Ola is now present in the UK and Australia, Redbus has operations in some south-east Asian markets, and Practo had once started its services in Brazil. But no startup appears to have so comprehensively embraced its international plans as has Oyo Rooms. Oyo Rooms has said that it now has more rooms in China than in its home…

Much has been written about the dramatic jump in India’s Ease of Doing Business rankings from 100 to 77 this year, but Indian executives and entrepreneurs claim that they also see a marked difference on the ground. “(The jump in rankings by 23 places) is incredible news,” said Paytm CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma following an event with PM Modi. “This is exactly how governments should function, helping improve the ease of doing business,” he added. “I have been…

Until a few years ago, Xiaomi was known for being an urban-centric phone brand. It was also known to be a company that had no on-ground presence, and sold phones only over the internet. But things can quickly change in the world of tech, because Xiaomi’s now looking to be just the opposite. Xiaomi says it has opened 500 stores at once in rural India in a big offline push. “We simultaneously opened 500+ Mi…

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey is under attack…on Twitter. India’s Twitter community is slamming Dorsey after he was photographed holding up a sign that said “Smash Brahminical Patriarchy.” Dorsey is on an India visit, and during a visit with journalists and activists, posed for the picture that has since gone viral. The picture was condemned by several high-profile entrepreneurs, including former Infosys CFO Mohandas Pai and India Quotient’s Anand Lunia. Twitter has since responded to the…

2018 is nearly done, but the unicorn glut in the Indian startup ecosystem refuses to abate. Payments company BillDesk has become the latest Indian startup to acquire the unicorn status in 2018. BillDesk reached the milestone following a near $300 million investment into the company by Visa. BillDesk now has a valuation of $1.8 billion, and becomes the 16th unicorn startup in India. But calling BillDesk a unicorn startup might just be stretching it —…

Walmart has insisted that Binny Bansal’s resignation was because of a personal misconduct charge, but it’s very quickly brought about some big business changes at Flipkart as well. Walmart will fire 200 Jabong employees today and merge the company with fellow Flipkart-owned fashion arm Myntra, multiple reports have said. ET has also reported that Myntra CEO Ananth Narayanan, who’s now reporting to Kalyan Krishnamurthy after Binny Bansal’s exit, will also leave the company. The Myntra-Jabong CFO Dipanjan…

In India, there have been several ways to measure exactly when a startup comes of age. At first, it used to be when a startup got itself a swanky office. Later, it was about attracting big-name investors, and later still about attracting billion-dollar cheques. But perhaps the truest measure of a startup’s success is the kind of talent it attracts, and it that regard, Oyo has stolen a march over its peers. Oyo Rooms has…

There have been no developments in the Paytm extortion case that had rocked India’s startup ecosystem last month, and that has meant that the accused are still languishing in jail. Sonia Dhawan and her husband continue to be under judicial custody, nearly three weeks after the Rs. 20 crore Paytm extortion case had come to light. The district court today rejected the bail plea of Dhawan’s husband Rupak Jain, while Dhawan’s own bail application is…