FMCG Battle Heats Up: HUL Plans These Products to Take on Baba Ramdev’s Patanjali
Hindustan Unilever announced its fourth quarter results on Wednesday and said that it is working on natural range of products for the Indian market to take on competition from Baba Ramdev-led Patanjali. HUL is testing a new range of products formulated with Ayurvedic ingredients under ‘Lever Ayush’ in five southern states. The company, however, declined to a share a timeline and said that it is focusing on the standards of the product before hitting the markets. Read More |
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Flipkart to Include Consumables & FMCG Products from July
Flipkart is set to enter the consumables and FMCG category. The company is eyeing the monthly shopping basket of users on the platform, will roll out the services in July. Flipkart will also incentivise customers who shop frequently on the platform through multiple programmes, similar to Amazon’s Pantry initiative and the associated cashback on Amazon Pay. Currently, consumables and FMCG as a group ranks among the top three selling categories on the Amazon India platform. Flipkart has been dependent on mobile devices, apparel and large appliances for powering sales. Read More |
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Emerging Markets Take Over Half of FMCG Spend
Emerging markets now account for 51% of global spend on FMCG, rising from 48% in just three years, according to new figures from Kantar Worldpanel. Emerging markets spent $34bn more in 2016 than 2015, representing an increase of 6%. With more developed markets flat year on year, emerging markets were responsible for all of the FMCG growth in 2016. Top-performing markets included Russia, which was up 14%; Sri Lanka, up 9%; Indonesia and the Philippines, which both grew 6%. At the level of brands, Coca-Cola remained the most chosen brand globally for the fifth year in a row. Colgate, the toothpaste brand, was the second most chosen brand – and the only brand chosen by more than half of the global population (62.4%). Read More |
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ITC’s Newer FMCG Business Crosses Rs 10,000 Crore Revenue Milestone
FMCG business, which includes packaged food, personal care and education stationary products, crossed the Rs 10,000 crore revenue milestone in 2016-17 with sales growing by 8% to Rs 10,511.83 crore. The profitability of the newer FMCG businesses during the year was impacted declining by 72% at Rs 28.12 crore which ITC attributed to sharp increase in input prices during the year, gestation costs of new categories such as juices, dairy, chocolate and coffee and disruption in sales momentum due to the cash crunch. Read More |
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KPMG Acquires Matchi, a Fintech Matchmaking Platform
KPMG International acquired Matchi, a global fintech matchmaking platform that connects financial institutions, including banks and insurance companies, with financial services technology solutions & companies worldwide. The Matchi platform includes more than 700 curated fintech solutions and a database of more than 2,500 fintech companies that financial institutions can work with to apply fintech capabilities to solving their business problems and pursuing new market opportunities. Neha Punater, head of fintech, KPMG in India said, “The acquisition of Matchi adds to the capabilities of KPMG firms to bring market-validated ideas to financial services clients’ toughest challenges. These acquisitions are important from the perspective of the growth of Fintech sector, both globally and in India.” Read More |
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Tachyloans Targets India’s Fintech Segment Which is About to Touch $2.4B By 2020
Singapore based Fintech startup, FinMomenta, announced the launch of ‘Tachyloans’, the first-of-its-kind integrated digital lending platform in India for individuals as well as businesses. Tachyloans has made its entry at a strategically important time in India’s burgeoning fintech sector that is forecasted to touch $2.4bn by 2020. Tachyloans uses a proprietary credit scoring model enabled by Artificial Intelligence and Big Data to assess the creditworthiness of applicants. Read More |
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Bahrain’s New Fintech Fund to Invest in Indian Startups
Bahrain’s new fintech fund will invest in Indian startups that have an economic interest in Bahrain. In a bid to speed up its financial offerings in the fintech space, Bahrain has tied up with the Singapore Fintech Consortium to invest in fintech start-ups in the middle-east and Asia region to boost the development of financial technology in Bahrain. The new fund will earmark a certain portion of its investment assets to Indian startups that have an interest in the Bahrain region and those that are planning to scale up their operations in the middle-east. Read More |
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India to see regulations for financial technology space soon: Report
According to a study by KPMG, the government is expected to come out with regulations for fintech space as the industry is likely to witness increased payments and lending activities. These regulations will be particularly related to peer-to-peer lending, which could lead to additional activity. KPMG India Fintech Head Neha Punater said: “While payments and lending continue to drive most fintech investment in India, other areas are quickly gaining momentum”. Read More |
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Aviva eyeing AI and big data in bid to become fintech firm
Aviva is eyeing acquisitions in artificial intelligence and big data as it looks to overhaul the insurance industry and transform itself into a fintech firm. Chief executive Mark Wilson informed that the acquisitions would be done in big data, maybe in platforms. Read More |
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Facebook Files Patent Application for Payment Services via Messages
Facebook has filed a patent application with the Indian Patent Office for its invention on sending and receiving payments using a message system. Facebook offers payment services through its online chat application Messenger in some countries. The company has claimed that the invention relates to systems methods and devices that provide a transactional payment system, which allows users to send and receive electronic payments to and from other users of the messaging system. Read More |
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Razorpay Partners with Telegram for Chatbot Payments
Digital payments startup Razorpay has partnered with messaging app Telegram as the latter is rolling out digital payments through its chatbot. Telegram said that while most payments are currently being handled by payments platform Stripe, it was also tying up with other payment partners globally, including Razorpay in India. Telegram recently announced that it was starting bot payments, wherein users of Telegram 4.0 and later updated versions can pay for goods or services through bots, which will include a Pay button to their messages. Read More |
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Mswipe Acquires PayU India’s Offline Business To Expand Digital Payments
PoS (Point of Sale) solutions provider Mswipe has entered into a strategic partnership with online payment service provider PayU India. According to the deal terms, Mswipe has taken over the offline merchant acquiring business of PayU India. Mswipe will merge PayU’s existing offline PoS division team into its existing operations and workforce expanding its network to 220K terminals across 550+ cities. On the other hand, merchants associated with Mswipe will now be able to avail Internet payments services offered by PayU India. Read More |
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Amazon Pay To Partner With Indian Govt. To Facilitate Digital Payments
Amazon is planning to enter into strategic partnerships with government bodies such as electricity and insurance companies, to increase the user base of Amazon Pay beyond its online marketplace. As per an ET report, it has already launched digital payments facility via Amazon Pay for online food delivery ventures such as Faasos and Box8 and hyperlocal services startup Housejoy. Additionally, the global ecommerce player is also in talks with state electricity boards and public insurance companies to launch the payments service on these platforms. Read More |
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Apple, Facebook eye control of digital payments IP in India
Apple has submitted at least five applications with the Indian Patent office over the past one year for innovations related to digital payments as it looks at services as a way to boost sales of its iPhones in India. Apple’s patent applications range from innovations around using biometrics to authenticate payments to securely transferring payment to a device such as a point of sale device. The move points at the company preparing to bring its Apple Pay service to India, following rivals Samsung and Google which have also begun working on the same. Read More |
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India Climbs up 12 Spots in WEF’s Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Index
India has jumped 12 spots to 40th position in World Economic Forum’s travel and tourism rankings. Spain topped the 2017 edition for the second time, followed by France which emerged as the runner-up. Germany stood third, Japan moved five notches up to the 4th spot. Europe famous tourist destination, Switzerland was ranked 10th in the list. In South Asia, India is leading followed by Bhutan and Nepal. The index takes into account indicators like air transport infrastructure, ground and port infrastructure and tourist service infrastructure, prioritization of travel and tourism, price competitiveness, etc. Read More |
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India Jumps 16 Places in World Tourism Ranking
With the inclusion of non- resident Indians among international tourists, India has jumped 16 places in the revised World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) rankings to settle at 24th for 2014 and 2015. Earlier, it was ranked 41st and 40th in 2014 and 2015, respectively, as per the global ranking. The rank of India in international tourist arrivals (ITA) in both 2014 and 2015 in the latest UNWTO’s World Tourism Barometer, as of March 2017, is 24th as against the previous ranks of 41st and 40th in 2014 and 2015, respectively, as per a press release issued by the Ministry of Tourism. Read More |
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RBI Calls for Account Number Portability, Banks Wary
Reserve Bank of India (RBI) deputy governor S.S. Mundra on Tuesday pushed banks to allow customers to move seamlessly between banks without having to change their account numbers. Technological innovation and linking accounts to Aadhaar, the ID number issued by the Unique Identification Authority of India, have made it easier to move towards account number portability. Read More |
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Punjab National Bank Gets ADB’s First Tranche for Solar Rooftop Fund of $100 Mn
Punjab National Bank has received $100 million (about Rs 645 crore) as the first tranche of ADB’s multi-million-dollar funding for installation of rooftop solar systems in India. The $100 million loan agreement signed between the Asian Development Bank and PNB is backed by a guarantee from the central government. PNB will deploy this fund as loan to various developers and end users to install large solar rooftop systems on industrial and commercial buildings throughout India, ADB said in a release. Read More |
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Bharat Financial Inclusion in Talks with Three Banks for Stake Sale
According to reports, Bharat Financial Inclusion Ltd, is open for a complete takeover or a partial stake sale to a strategic investor such as a bank to create value for its stakeholders and increase market penetration. IDFC Bank, IndusInd Bank and RBL Bank are in talks with Bharat Financial to this end. Managing Director MR Rao said, “We are open to partnership with banks on the premise that both customers and kirana stores should have bank accounts to run this process. We are open if a bank wants to provide the facility without any stake sale. We are also happy if the partner bank wants a 10% equity.” Read More |
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The Big Dreams of Small Finance Banks
All the 10 small finance banks that have got the in-principle license from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) are now armed with the regulator’s final nod; eight of them are up and running. Two in the lot—Equitas Small Finance Bank Ltd and Ujjivan Small Finance Bank Ltd—are part of listed entities; their financials are in the public domain. Suryoday’s deposit mobilization is at Rs35 crore. It is focussing on retail deposits. The bank has plenty of money in its vault and wants to play safe during the transition from a microfinance institution (MFI) to its current avatar. Eight of the small finance banks were MFIs, while one was a local area bank and another a non-banking financial company. Read More |
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India’s Ed-Tech Industry to Grow Eight-Fold to $2 Bn by 2021: Google-KPMG Study
According to joint report by search giant Google and consultancy firm KPMG, India’s online education industry is expected to grow almost eight times to hit $1.96 billion by 2021, with the number of paid users rising six-fold from 1.6 million now to 9.6 million. Over the last two years, the number of online searches for education has doubled. Searches from mobile devices have risen even faster, trebling over the period, says the report titled ‘Online Education in India: 2021’. The research covered over 3,600 respondents across 27 geographies, including metros and non-metros. Read More |
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This Zuckerberg-Backed Indian Learning App is Now a Harvard Case Study
BYJU’S is changing the way children learn across grades. This education-startup was one of the first few investments done by the Chan-Zuckerberg initiative who made a strategic investment in the company last year. Titled as “BYJU’S The Learning App,” this case study will be available for teaching purposes within and outside Harvard. Authored by John Jong-Hyun Kim, a Senior Lecturer at Harvard Business School, and Rachna Tahilyani, Associate Director, Harvard Business School India Research Center, the case studies the growth of the app, its impact on students and how this K-12 app can be used by students globally. Read More |
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