MUMBAI, NEw DELHI, BENGALuRu, kOLkATA, CHENNAI, AHMEDABAD, HyDERABAD, CHANDIGARH*, puNE*
88
Friday, April 14, 2023
mint primer
What’s fuelling
the record petro
demand in India?
BY RITURAJ BARUAH
Demand for refined petroleum products hit a record in FY23, led by
transportation fuel. The Petroleum Planning & Analysis Cell (PPAC)
said consumption reached 222.30 million tonnes in the last fiscal.
Mint explains this spike:
Big burn
India consumed 222.30 million tonnes of petroleum products in FY23 which was 10.2%
higher than the year before. The consumption is projected to rise even further.
86.82
35.09 37.8
Petrol
*Estimates
What’s the trend in
1 petro products?
The 222.30 million tonnes of
petroleum products consumed in
FY23 was 10.2% higher than the
year before. The previous record
for consumption came in FY20 at
214.13 million tonnes. Demand was
impacted in FY21 due to the covid-
19 pandemic. In FY23, demand for
most products crossed pre-covid
levels as various sectors of the
economy made a recovery from
the pandemic slowdown. Demand
for diesel—the most-consumed
fuel in India—stood at 86.82
million tonnes. Demand for petrol
came in at 35.09 million tonnes
while India’s LPG consumption
also hit a new record of 28.62
million tonnes.
4 Will the demand stay
strong this year?
The global economy is expected to
slow down. Yet, the demand for
petroleum products in India is
expected to stay robust. According
to PPAC projections, the demand
is likely to set a new record in
FY24, nearly 5% higher compared
to FY23. That’s because The
demand for petrol and diesel will
remain strong for the same
reasons we saw last fiscal. Sourav
Mitra of Crisil said that increase in
domestic consumption, fuelled by
accumulated household savings
during and after the pandemic,
will also boost demand.
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90.56 Consumption of key petroleum
products (in million tonnes)
FY23 FY24*
29.11
28.62
8.6
7.39
Diesel ATF LPG
Source: Petroleum Planning & Analysis Cell
SARVESH KUMAR SHARMA/MINT
Why is India seeing
2 such a surge?
The increase in consumption of
petrol, diesel and jet fuel during
FY23 came on the back of growth
in industrial activity and travel.
These activities recovered after
slowing down in the previous two
fiscals because of the pandemic.
Sourav Mitra, director of
consulting at Crisil, noted that
enhanced refining of crude
imports and improved utilization
of petrol and diesel across India
have contributed heavily to the
rise in demand. The rise in
refining is in tandem with
increased crude imports. This
reflects a global trend—oil demand
is rising globally due to a rebound
in Chinese consumption.
3 Does the Ukraine war have
anything to do with this?
The Russian invasion sparked an energy
crisis. India had to diversify its oil import
sources and raise imports for energy
security. Cheap oil from Russia also added
to import bill. According to provisional
trade data released by the commerce
ministry on Wednesday, India’s import of
crude oil and petroleum products rose
29.5% to $209.57 billion in FY23.
5 What does this mean
for OMCs?
Increase in petroleum product
demand boosted refining margins
of oil marketing companies
(OMCs). According to PPAC, in
April-December, major state-run
refiners at least doubled their
gross refining margins (GRM).
Indian Oil Corp.’s GRM rose from
$8.52 to $21.08 per barrel;
Hindustan Petroleum Corp. from
$4.50 to $11.40; Bharat Petroleum
from $6.78 to $20.08; Mangalore
Refinery and Petrochemicals from
$5.80 to $11.70. Refining margins
are likely to improve further.
rituraj.baruah@livemint.com
THE WORKING LIFE
Here is what you need to know about
employer-employee relationship,
and the latest com-
pensation and
retention trends
adopted by India
Inc. This podcast
also tells you why
the right HR poli-
cies are as crucial as aiming for
aggressive business strategies and
strong balance sheets for corporates.
VOL. 6 NO.
QUICK EDIT
Export
march
India’s latest exports figures are
a relief, given the state of world
demand. Goods exports in
2022-23 rose 6% to set a new
record of almost $447.5 billion,
while services exports grew 27%
to $323 billion. Although mer-
chandise shipments lagged, that
we recorded a rise at all amid
global headwinds can be con-
sidered an accomplishment.
Taken together, our exports
reached roughly $770 billion, as
declared by the government, up
from $676 billion in 2021-22.
The numbers follow the recent
release of a new foreign trade
policy, which has no end date so
that it can be adapted to shifting
realities and features multiple
measures to ease and promote
exports without falling foul of
World Trade Organization
rules. It aims for $2 trillion in
total exports by 2030, split
equally between services and
goods. A big question that’s left
unanswered is how shifting cur-
rents of world trade, with storm
clouds of de-globalization in the
air, could get in the way of our
ambitions. Another is whether
India’s Atmanirbhar thrust will
keep tariffs too high to foster
wide enough competitiveness.
Our trade alliances have been
slow and defensive, but let’s
hope we make up for lost time as
we look west instead of east.
MINT METRIC
by Bibek Debroy
In a toilet, how does one reconcile
Finding a seven foot crocodile?
Discovered in a Firozabad village
It was Ganga canal’s spillage.
But forest department rescued it in style.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
I am among those who know
what are the consequences of a
Cold War: it is loss of talent and
contribution to the world. I
don’t want to see that repeating.
KRISTALINA
GEORGIEVA
IMF MANAGING
DIRECTOR
THE SKETCH
In this podcast, Mint’s editor-in-chief
Sruthijith K.K. speaks with business
leaders, not only
about the perform-
ance of their busi-
nesses but also
about their convic-
tions, their meth-
ods, their influen-
ces, and their journey. Through the
conversations, the podcast aims to
paint in the listeners’ mind, a sketch.
 PLAIN FACTS

Data recap: Inflation

eases, auto sales drag
CURATED BY PAYAL BHATTACHARYA
very Friday, Plain Facts publishes a compilation of data-based insights, complete with easy-to-read charts, to help you

E delve deeper into the stories reported by Mint in the week gone by. Retail inflation eased to a 15-month low in March,
while auto sales, despite high growth, were still lower than the pre-pandemic levels. Meanwhile, the India Meteorologi-
cal Department has predicted normal monsoon this year.

Inflation Dips Auto Struggles

CPI inflation in Year-on-year change (%) in vehicle retail sales
March 2023 (in %) FY21 FY22 FY23 CAGR (FY20-FY23)*
Two-wheelers
Three-wheelers
National Average Four-wheelers
5.7% Goods and public vehicles
Tractors
Chhattisgarh
Others
1.88%
Note: Data not available for Overall
states marked in grey. Inflation Telangana -80 -60 -40 -20 0 20 40 60 80 100
for Jammu & Kashmir and 7.63% Other categories include trailers, special category vehicles, and ambulances.
Ladakh is reported as a *Average annual change in the three-year period, based on compound
combined figure. Source: MoSPI annual growth rate. Source: Vahan dashboard, Mint analysis

INDIA’S RETAIL inflation eased to a 15-month low of
5.66% in March, data released on Wednesday showed.
This is the first time in three months that inflation has
come in below the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) upper
tolerance limit of 6%. The decline in retail inflation was
mainly on account of food, inflation for which eased to
4.79%. While all-India inflation fell below 6%, eight states
recorded higher inflation than the upper limit.
Telangana posted the highest inflation in March at 7.63%.
THE AUTOMOBILE industry recovered the majority of
its lost ground in 2022-23, with sales of retail vehicles
jumping by 21%. However, most segments witnessed
double-digit growth due to base effect and were still
below the pre-covid levels seen in 2019-20, a Mint
analysis showed. While retail sales of passenger vehicles
hit record high, two-wheeler sales fell 16% from its pre-
covid level. The two-wheeler segment was a big drag as it
accounts for nearly three-fourths of all vehicles sold.

Project Tiger
THIS IS the number of tigers in India as of 2022. The latest

3,167 census showed the number of tigers in the country rose by

200 over the past four years. India is now home to more
than 70% of the global tiger population. The efforts to
conserve tiger population in the country has resulted in
significant progress, with the number rising from 1,411 in
2006 to 2,967 in 2018. The tiger census is done every four
years.

Monsoon Prediction Retail Rush

IMD's April forecast Actual rainfall Share of retail investors (%) Dec 2022 Mar 2023
125 Adani Green
ACC
100 96
Adani Power
75 Ambuja
Adani Wilmar
50
Adani Enterprises
48,19,823 71,08,007 47%
Adani Ports
25
Adani Transmission
0 Adani Total Gas Total Public shareholders
2011 2023
0 5 10 15 20 25
Note: All figures are % of long period average (LPA) Source: CMIE Source: Exchanges

INDIA WILL likely receive normal rains during the
crucial southwest monsoon season this year, the India
Meteorological Department (IMD) said on Tuesday.
The rains usually hit the southern state of Kerala around
1 June, and retreat by September. The IMD has
predicted a total rainfall of 96% of the long-term
average (LPA) this year amid the concerns over
agricultural output. Last year, India had received 106%
of the average LPA rainfall.
DESPITE THE recent controversy and the erosion of
wealth, the Adani group has seen renewed interest from
retail investors, who have bought shares worth at least
$3.1 bn in the March quarter, Mint reported. Following
the release of the Hindenburg report the embattled
group lost about $145 bn since 24 January. However, new
retail investors, totalling at least 1.1 mn, have invested in
shares worth at least $1.8 bn across the group’s nine core
companies in the March quarter.

EV Drives

1.15 million
THAT IS the number of electric vehicles sold in India in
FY23, which recorded a rise of 153% from the previous year.
E-scooters, which accounts for the bulk of the industry’s
volumes, saw their sales rising 30% in March from February.
While sales of passenger vehicles (PVs), three-wheelers and
two-wheelers doubled, e-bus saw a rise of 60% from the
previous year. E-PVs contributed 4%, electric two-wheelers
62% and three-wheelers comprised 34% of the total sales.

AI Investments Chart of the Week: Exports Gap

Top countries with the highest investments in AI (in 2013-2022, $ bn) Share of India's goods exports in 2022-23 (%)
US 248.9 Gujarat 33.3
Maharashtra 16
China 95.11
Tamil Nadu 9
UK 18.24 Karnataka 6.2
Israel 10.83 Uttar Pradesh 4.9
Canada 8.83 Andhra Pradesh 4.5
Haryana 3.5
India 7.73 West Bengal 2.9
Germany 6.99 Telangana 2.5
France 6.59 Odisha 2.4
Data for the 10-month period from April 2022 to January 2023.
South Korea 5.57 Source: Stanford Artificial Intelligence Index Report 2023 Source: Ministry of Commerce

INDIA HAS ranked sixth in terms of investments AMID THE push to promote district-wise exports, a
secured for artificial intelligence (AI)-based products and Mint analysis showed that only three states account for a
services between 2013 and 2022, beating Germany, majority of India’s exports, with Gujarat alone
France and South Korea, as per Stanford University’s accounting for a massive one-third.
annual AI Index report. However, the country was way Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu were the
behind the US, which received investments worth $249 other top exporting states with 16% and
bn. In 2022, India got investments worth $3.24 bn and a 9% share, respectively.
large proportion of GitHub AI projects were contributed Follow us on #MintCharts on our
by the country’s software developers, the report said. social media handles.
PARAS JAIN/MINT

TOP TRENDING TAMIL MOVIES TOP TRENDING SPANISH SHOWS

1 AYOTHI 3 DADA 3 ELITE
Platform: ZEE5 Platform: Amazon Prime Video Platform: Netflix
Cast: Preethi Asrani, M. Sasikumar Cast: Kavin, Aparna Das Cast: Ester Exposito, Itzan
Escamilla
4 BURQA
Platform: aha Tamil
4 NOT MY FAULT: MEXICO
Cast: Kalaiyarasan, Mirnaa 1 THE SNOW GIRL Platform: Disney+ Hotstar
Menon Platform: Netflix Cast: Giovanna Utrilla, Gonzalo
Cast: Milena Smit, José Coronado Vega Jr
5 AGILAN
2 VAATHI Platform: ZEE5
2 THE SIGNING 5 SANTA EVITA
Platform: Netflix Cast: Jayam Ravi, Priya Platform: Netflix Platform: Disney+ Hotstar
Cast: Dhanush, Samyuktha Menon Bhavani Shankar Cast: Lex Borrero, Rauw Alejandro Cast: Natalia Oreiro, Ernesto Alterio
 MUMBaI, NEw DELHI, BENGALURU, kOLkATA, CHENNAI, AHMEDABAD, HYDERABAD, CHANDIGARH*, PUNE* VOL. 6 NO. 88 Rs. 10.00 16 PAGES

Friday, April 14, 2023

Cooked in wood, tempered PSUs to get exclusive rights to

livemint.com with taxes uP10 offshore mineral blocks uP3

SENSEX 60,431.00 38.23 NIFTY 17,828.00 15.60 DOLLAR ₹81.86 ₹0.23 EURO ₹90.23 ₹0.53 OIL $86.98 $0.35 GOLD ₹60,616 ₹282

Comcast makes big Rising gap

Exports rose 6% to a record $447 billion in FY23. At the same
time, goods imports surged 16% to touch $714 billion.
Trade gap (in $ bn)
266.78
Infy projects
weak sales
DON’T MISS

outlook,
India bet via Bodhi 133.95 137.47
118.22
108.54
162.06
184.14
160.99

102.01
191.32
shares dive
Shouvik Das & Nishant Maher
Bodhi Tree will, in turn, use funds to invest in Viacom18 Media shouvik.das@livemint.com
NEw DELHI
ED probes BBC for alleged
Gaurav Laghate

I
nfosys Ltd, India’s second- foreign exchange violations
gatEwaY to InDIa
2013-14 2015-16 2017-18 2019-20 2021-22
2014-15 2016-17 2018-19 2020-21 2022-23
gaurav.laghate@livemint.com
Source: CMIE
largest software services The Enforcement Directorate, responsible
MUMBAI company, projected slower- for investigating financial irregularities, has
The move will pave the way for the American multinational to own a SATISH KUMAR/MINT
than-expected sales for the launched an inquiry into alleged foreign

C
small indirect stake in Viacom18 Media
omcast Corp, the
world’s second-largest
broadcasting and cable
Equity share

0.01
Compulsorily
convertible
preference shares
Fully diluted basis
Paramount
Global RIL group
entities
India FY23 exports year to 31 March, as clients
became cautious about spend-
ing due to fears of a looming
exchange rule violations by the British
Broadcasting Corp. (BBC), according to a
Reuters report. >P9
Bodhi Tree
television company, has
entered the Indian
media and entertainment industry
TV18 Bodhi Tree

17.80
Bodhi
Tree
13.01 defy global turmoil recession and the banking cri-
sis in the West.
The company forecast Funding winter for startups
with an initial investment of ₹1,600 annual revenue growth to shows signs of thawing
crore ($200 million) in Bodhi Tree
Systems, an investment vehicle led
by Uday Shankar and James Mur-
48.99 (in %) 50.99 (in %)
82.20
13.08

doch.
Comcast-run NBC Universal
received approval from the Compe-
tition Commission of India (CCI) late
Paramount Global
Post investment Viacom18 structure
13.5
(in %)
60.37
to hit record high range between 4% and 7%, fall-
ing short of the average analyst
estimate of nearly 11%. Infosys
A severe funding winter that squeezed
capital for cash-starved Indian startups
appears to be easing with the total number
Ravi Dutta Mishra during the year, as exports that projected operating margin at of transactions in March staying at almost
RIL group entities TV18 ravi.dutt@livemint.com grew 13.84% to a record $770 20-22%. The company’s the same level compared to the previous
Source: Viacom18 statement NEw DELHI billion were outmatched by US-listed shares plunged more month. >P3
imports that grew at a faster than 9% in early trading.

Wednesday to invest in Bodhi Tree,
a move that will pave the way for the
American multinational, which also
owns a majority stake in European
satellite broadcaster Sky, a small
indirect stake in Viacom18 Media.
“The CCI approves the acquisition
of the certain shareholding of BTS
Investment and Bodhi Tree Systems
VCC (BTS VCC) by NBC Universal
Media LLC, a wholly owned subsidi-
ary of Comcast Corp. under Section
31(1) of the Competition Act, 2002,”
the competition watchdog said in a
release.
The funds from NBC Universal’s
investment in Bodhi Tree will be
utilized to invest in Viacom18.
Separately, Bodhi Tree will invest
₹4,306 crore in Reliance Industries
BIG BET
CoMCaSt will make BoDhI Tree plans to
an initial investment invest up to ₹13,500 cr
of ₹1,600 cr in Bodhi in Viacom18
Ltd-controlled Viacom18 as the first
tranche of an overall commitment of
₹13,500 crore. Reliance Industries
group entities, meanwhile, will put
in an additional ₹10,839 crore.
Out of Bodhi Tree’s ₹4,306 crore,
around ₹2,000 crore will come from
Qatar Investment Authority, Qatar’s
sovereign wealth fund, while the
remaining will be invested by Bodhi
Tree. An additional ₹1,600 crore will
come from Comcast later, one of the
people said, requesting anonymity.
“Comcast has done the due dili-
I
CoMCaSt’S funds
are expected to come
in by June
SARVESH KUMAR SHARMA/MINT
gence of multiple media assets in
India and has been looking to enter
the Indian market for some time, but
none of the deals fructified. This
time, they are coming in with Uday
Shankar-James Murdoch’s venture,
but the amount they are investing as
of now is under $200 million,” the
person said.
Bodhi Tree had initially commit-
ted to invest up to ₹13,500 crore in
Viacom18, the second person said on
TURN TO PAGE 6
n a year of uncertainties
worldwide, India exported a
record $447 billion worth of
goods in FY23, up about 6%
from the previous year, com-
merce ministry data showed.
However, goods exports in
March 2023 slipped to $38.38
billion compared to $44.57 bil-
lion during the previous year,
registering a 13% fall. At the
same time, goods imports rose
over 16% to touch $714 billion,
widening the goods trade defi-
cit to highest ever mark of
$267 billion against the previ-
ous year’s $191 billion.
Overall trade deficit—
including goods and services
—touched a record $122 billion
pace of 17.38% to a record $892
billion. Imports from Russia
jumped 370% during the year,
as India shopped around for
cheaper crude oil. The rise in
deficit also weakened the
rupee and eroded forex
reserves. India’s foreign
exchange reserves declined by
around $70 billion in 2022,
amid rising inflation and inter-
est rates. From $632.74 billion
in January, the reserves fell to
$562.851 billion by the end of
2022.
Ajay Srivastava, co-founder,
Global Trade Research Initia-
tive, said that energy-related
TURN TO PAGE 6
In a post-earnings call with
reporters, chief executive Salil
Parekh said the company wit-
nessed unplanned project
ramp-downs and decision-
making delays across sectors,
including financial services,
retail and telecom.
Chief financial officer Nil-
anjan Roy said the slowdown
was driven by deal volume
contraction, as well as some
cancellations, especially in the
North American market.
Indian software services
companies are grappling with
subdued demand as clients
become wary of spending amid
TURN TO PAGE 8
SUVs lead the way as passenger
vehicle sales climb in FY23
Automobile sales across segments in FY23
grew from the year earlier, data released by
the Society of Indian Automobile
Manufacturers showed. However, the
passenger vehicles segment, driven by SUVs,
saw sales above pre-pandemic levels. >P7
Equity mutual fund flows hit
one-year high in March
Equity mutual funds recorded net inflows of
₹20,534.21 cr in March, the highest monthly
inflows in a year, driven by record investor
contributions through the popular
systematic investment (SIP) plan. SIPs hit a
record high of ₹14,276.06 cr in March. >P4

Sitharaman voices concern New covid cases cross 10k;

over global economic outlook may keep rising for 12 days
Gireesh Chandra Prasad recent bankruptcy reforms. Priyanka Sharma comes with peaks twice in a
gireesh.p@livemint.com However, external factors and priyanka.sharma@livemint.com year, monsoon and winter.
NEw DELHI the potential impact of El Niño NEw DELHI Similarly, there is another res-
on rainfall present downside piratory virus (covid) that will

F C
inance minister Nirmala risks. Sitharaman also high- oronavirus infections be there. Now, covid is like a
Sitharaman expressed lighted the importance of the continue to rise across normal cough and cold, and
concern about the global World Bank’s mission to end India, with 10,158 new fortunately, it is not causing
economic outlook in light of extreme poverty and promote cases detected in the prece- any severity and increased
People take pictures outside a soon-to-be-launched Apple retail the International Monetary shared prosperity. She urged ding 24 hours, the highest hospitalization,” Gupta said.
store at a mall in New Delhi REUTERS Fund’s (IMF) recent warning the institution to continue since July 2022. The day also ICMR is also conducting a
about the heightened risk of a working toward this vision in saw 19 deaths due to the viral study to determine the cause

Apple’s India hard landing for the world

economy.Sitharaman voiced
her concerns during the World
Nirmala Sitharaman, Union
finance minister PTI
an inclusive, resilient, and sus-
tainable manner.IMF manag-
ing director Kristalina Georgi-
disease, taking the pandemic’s
overall toll to 5,31,035.
Three out of four infections The surge in infections was the
of heart attacks in some young
people who have contracted
covid. The report is expected

push gets $7 bn
Bank-IMF Development Com-
mittee meeting held in Wash-
ington DC, the finance ministry
said in a social media post.
eva called on the international in the latest surge are due to highest since July 2022 PTI in two to three months.
estimate of 6.1%.India’s con- community to help close a XBB.1.16, a sub-variant of Omi- As cases rose, the govern-
cerns stem from the precarious funding gap for the “poverty cron. However, cases continue Gupta, senior scientist and ment ordered nationwide
global financial environment reduction and growth trust,” to be mild, requiring few hos- head of the epidemiological mock drills at hospitals to

output boost “Despite this year’s projec-

ted growth rate of over 6% for
the Indian economy, we
amid a synchronized monetary
tightening to curb inflation. In
an unexpected move earlier
the Fund’s primary instrument
for providing interest-free
loans to low-income countries.
pitalizations.
The Indian SARS-CoV-2
Genomics Consortium (INSA-
department at the Indian
Council of Medical Research
(ICMR). “We must keep fol-
review the state of health pre-
paredness. The government
has stocked over 8.6 million
Bloomberg mates. remain concerned about the this month, the Reserve Bank Georgieva warned that these COG) has noted an increase in lowing covid-19 appropriate personal protective equip-
feedback@livemint.com At the same time, Indian global economic outlook and of India (RBI) maintained its countries risk further diver- infections, especially in west- behaviour besides vaccination ment (PPE) kits, 28 million
Prime Minister Narendra geopolitical environment,” benchmark interest rate at gence unless action is taken. ern, southern and northern and isolation of the infected N-95 masks, 668 million para-

A
pple Inc. assembled
more than $7 billion of
iPhones in India last
fiscal year, tripling production
in the world’s fastest-growing
smartphone arena after accel-
erating a move beyond China.
The US company now
makes almost 7% of its iPhones
in India through expanding
partners from Foxconn Tech-
nology Group to Pegatron
Corp., people familiar with the
matter said. That’s a signifi-
cant leap for India, which
accounted for an estimated 1%
of the world’s iPhones in 2021.
Modi has dished out a spate of
incentives to boost local man-
ufacturing.
Of the total production,
Apple exported $5 billion of
iPhones in the year ended
March 2023, nearly four times
as much as the previous
period, the people said.
Apple will likely try to man-
ufacture the next iPhones in
India at the same time as in
China, sometime in the fall of
2023. If so, that will be the first
time that iPhone assembly
begins concurrently in the two
countries. And if the aggres-
according to Sitharaman.
On Tuesday, the IMF cut its
global growth estimate for
2023 to 2.8% from its previous
2.9% projection and lowered
India’s growth projection for
FY24 to 5.9% from an initial
In this worker vs. bot battle, humans are winning by a mile
Callum Borchers
feedback@livemint.com
6.5% after six consecutive
increases since May of the pre-
vious year, committing to fur-
ther hikes if necessary. India
expects growth to accelerate
due to improved company and
lender balance sheets after
sales representative Brooke-
lyn Castro, who takes one-on-
one video calls with customers
Georgieva said that low-in- parts of India. Scientists said individual. Covid cases are cetamol doses, and nearly 10
come countries had been cases may keep rising for the increasing because of an million doses of azithromycin
impacted severely by multiple next 10-12 days before they increased pace of testing and and other essential medicines.
economic shocks in recent settle down. the presence of cases in the Also, 77,923 ventilators,
years, and their per-capita “Covid is an endemic infec- community. The fact is that 261,534 oxygen concentrators,
income is expected to rise at the tion now, and it will continue covid is more or less like influ- and 685,567 oxygen cylinders
slowest pace since 1990. to come and go,” said Nivedita enza now -- the way influenza are currently functional.
“Then it’ll be stupid to con- Tesla Inc. CEO Elon Musk and
tinue having humans and pay- AI pioneer Yoshua Bengio,
ing for them,” says Oren Har- and they are calling for a six-

Apple is exploring ways to
reduce its reliance on China as
tensions between Washington
and Beijing continue to esca-
late. Its longtime partners,
who make most of the world’s
iPhones from sprawling facto-
ries in China, have added
assembly lines at a rapid pace
over the past year, the people
said, declining to be named as
the information isn’t public.
The world’s most valuable
company struggled last year
with chaos at Foxconn’s main
“iPhone City” complex in
Zhengzhou, which drove
home vulnerabilities in
Apple’s supply chain and
forced it to cut output esti-
T
sive expansion of its suppliers
continues, Apple could assem-
ble a quarter of all its iPhones
in India by 2025. Representa-
tives for the US company
declined to comment.
Even before last year’s
iPhone city flareup, Apple had
recognized the need to diver-
sify its supply chain. It success-
fully lobbied for incentives in
India and pushed suppliers
Foxconn, Wistron Corp. and
Pegatron to ramp up locally.
The trio, which together
employ some 60,000 workers
in India, make models ranging
from the aging iPhone 11 to the
TURN TO PAGE 6
he Nanit baby monitor
uses a high-tech camera
and software to track an
infant’s sleep habits.
It is like a $249 AI parent
who stays up all night logging
rollovers and breathing pat-
terns, and
doesn’t
need coffee
the next
morning.
So imagine shoppers’ sur-
prise when they type a ques-
tion into the Nanit website and
get a response from a real per-
son instead of a chatbot.
“I have to reiterate: ‘Hey, I
am a human. My name’s
Brookelyn, and I’m real,’ ” says
from her home in Florida.
Ms. Castro works on com-
mission through a third-party
company called Feel, a ven-
ture-backed startup with an
off-trend pitch to retail clients:
At a time when algorithms and
artificial
intelli-
gence can
offer prod-
uct (and parenting) recom-
mendations, human touch is
still the best way to close a sale.
Apple last month introduced a
similar service that allows
online shoppers to speak one-
on-one with people who are
product specialists via video.
Nanit Chief Executive Sarah
nevo, Feel’s co-founder and
chief executive.
The stakes for people in
sales, as in many fields, are
clear: Keep doing your job bet-
ter than a bot could do it—
preferably a lot better—or risk
replacement.
AI proponents often claim
that technology will make
people more efficient and free
them from drudge work to do
At a time when algorithms and AI can offer product suggestions, higher-level tasks.
some think human touch is still the best way to close a sale. AFP Lately, however, several
tech executives and top artifi-
Dorsett says 1% to 3% of people Castro, that conversion rate is cial-intelligence researchers
who browse her company’s far higher at 10% to 25%. have begun to talk openly
website make purchases. But even Feel is training about the prospect of job
When visitors speak with a bots to match the sales success losses.
sales representative, like Ms. of people—if they can. The leading voices include
month pause in development
to set safety standards for the
industry.
“Should we automate away
all the jobs, including the ful-
filling ones?” the group of
researchers, which also fea-
tures Apple Inc. co-founder
Steve Wozniak, wrote in an
open letter last month.
“Should we develop nonhu-
man minds that might eventu-
ally outnumber, outsmart,
obsolete and replace us?”
Sam Altman, CEO of
OpenAI, maker of the strik-
ingly humanlike text genera-
tor ChatGPT, says a morato-
TURN TO PAGE 6
02 FridAy, 14 April 2023
MuMbAi ECONOMY & POLICY LIVEMINT.COM

m MINT SHORTS
Panel on digital competition law
PSUs to get exclusive rights Direct tax
buoyancy
likely to finalize report by May-end
New Delhi: The government-constituted panel on digital compe-
tition law has completed stakeholder consultations and is likely to
finalize its report by the end of May, according to senior officials.
to offshore mineral blocks highest in
15 years
The panel, chaired by corporate affairs secretary Manoj Govil is
examining various regulatory aspects in dealing with challenges Saurav Anand
emerging from the digital economy. It is also looking at the need saurav.anand@livemint.com
for an ex-ante regulatory mechanism for digital markets through Govt plans to table an amendment to Offshore Areas Act 2002 during the monsoon session NEW DELHI
separate legislation. PTI

T
he Central Board of
Subhash Narayan The Geological Survey of India (GSI) Direct Taxes (CBDT) on
HSBC plans to hire 30 bankers to subhash.narayan@livemint.com estimates 79 million tonnes of heavy Thursday said direct tax
minerals. As India aims to become a buoyancy was at 2.52 in FY22,
serve the ultra-rich in India NEW DELHI
high-growth economy, it needs to har- the highest in the last 15 years.

S
trategically important large ness its maritime resources to its optimal Tax buoyancy refers is the
offshore mineral blocks will be capacity. Through reconnaissance sur- responsiveness of tax revenue
set aside for public sector units vey, GSI has been able to delineate pre- receipts to changes in national
in response to Chinese deep liminary resources for heavy minerals in income. A tax buoyancy greater
sea mining, two persons privy the inner-shelf and mid-shelf regions off than one signifies tax revenues
to the plans said. Offshore riches Odisha, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, Tamil growing at a faster rate than
These strategic blocks would be India and China have offshore deposits of several minerals. Nadu and Maharashtra. growth in national income.
offered only to nominated PSUs, and India has a unique maritime location. The tax authority said net
INDIA CHINA
without any auction. The move comes in Its 7,517-km coastline is home to nine direct tax collections have risen
Heavy mineral placers Methane hydrate
the backdrop of China’s global ambi- coastal states, four union territories and by an impressive 121% from
Lime mud Rare earth elements
tions in deep-sea mining. 1,382 islands. India’s exclusive economic ₹6.38 trillion in FY14 to ₹14 tril-
Construction sand Polymetalic nodules
Stringent regulations for offshore zone of over two million square kilome- lion in the 2021-22 fiscal year.
Phosphorite Sulphides
mining form part of amendments to the tres holds significant recoverable The growth is 160% if the
Polymetallic Fe-Mn modules & crusts Manganese
New Delhi: HSBC Holdings Plc plans to recruit about 30 OffShore Areas Mineral (Development resources of crude oil and natural gas, period from FY14 to FY23 is
Source: Ministry of mines & Mint Research
bankers to service India’s ultra-rich through its private bank and Regulation) Act 2002 (OAMDR) construction sand, heavy minerals, lime taken into account, CBDT said
that the lender will launch in the country in the next few which the government plans to intro- mud, poly-metallic nodules and crust. referring to a provisional figure
months, according to people with knowledge of the matter. duce and pass in the coming monsoon bidding to state corporations in mineral- in each area earmarked for mining, To ensure the availability of funds for of ₹16 trillion for FY23.
The bank is seeking to fill the roles internally from staff in the session of Parliament, one of the two rich areas reserved by the central gov- there would be at least one government exploration, mitigation of adverse Direct tax collections also
country, as well as to hire wealth managers from rivals and persons said. ernment. The bill also provides for grant company. impact of offshore mining, disaster showed an impressive growth
independent firms, the people said, asking not be identified The amendment bill aims to improve of exploration licence or production Queries sent to the ministry of mines, management and research, a provision of over 126.73% in FY 2021-22,
discussing private information. BLOOMBERG transparency in the allocation of min- lease only to a government company in which will finalise the changes to the has been made for setting up a non-laps- reaching ₹16 trillion compared
eral resources, with a provision for case the quality minerals in that particu- OAMDR Act and prepare able Offshore Areas Mineral Trust with ₹7 trillion in FY 2013-14.
granting production lease a note for cabinet which will maintain a fund under the Gross direct tax collections
SII, Oxford university tie up for only through auction. MINING RIGHTS approval, remained unan- Public Account of India. This will be increased by over 172.83%
Nonetheless, govern- swered till the time of made up of an additional levy. between FY14 and FY23,
‘high efficacy’ malaria vaccine ment entities will likely STRINGENT THE amendment bill THIS is the first time going to press. The exact rate of additional levy will reaching ₹19 trillion (provi-
London: A “high efficacy” malaria vaccine, developed by the Uni- maintain a significant regulations for aims to improve
offshore mining form transparency in the
the govt is opening
up the country’s vast
This is the first time the be prescribed by the government post sional).
versity of Oxford developed and manufactured by Serum Institute presence in offshore part of amendments allocation of mineral mineral-bearing government is opening up parliamentary approval of the amend- In addition, the direct tax to
of India (SII) has been licensed for use in Ghana by Africa’s Food areas, while private com- to the OAMDR Act resources offshore areas the country’s vast miner- ment. GDP ratio rose from 5.62% in
and Drugs Authority, the university announced. The R21/ panies will be encouraged al-bearing offshore areas. The Parliament enacted the OAMDR FY 2013-14 to 5.97% in FY
Matrix-M vaccine, leveraging Novavax’s adjuvant technology, has to contribute cutting- Extraction of minerals Act, 2002 to provide for development 2021-22.
been approved for use in children aged 5 to 36 months —the age edge technologies for the execution of lar area is equal to or above the threshold from these areas will also serve India’s and regulation of mineral resources in Further,, the cost of collec-
group at the highest risk of death from malaria. PTI complex mining operations. value. The threshold value will be strategic interests and give it a stronger offshore areas which include the territo- tion has decreased from 0.57%
As per the proposals in the draft decided by the Centre when rules gov- hold in its territorial waters that other- rial waters, continental shelf, exclusive of total collection in FY 2013-14
amendment bill, mineral concessions erning the changes in the Act are final- wise also sees constant threat of ingres- economic zone and other maritime to 0.53% of total collection in
Guj court to rule on Rahul Gandhi will be granted without any competitive ized, the person said. It is expected that sion by neighbouring countries. zones of India. FY 2021-22.
defamation petition on 20 April

‘Heal by India’ scheme to send Centre to revamp soil health

medicos abroad nears launch card initiative to aid farmers
Priyanka Sharma Queries sent to the health Puja Das tares of rain-fed land— decided
priyanka.sharma@livemint.com ministry remained unan- puja.das@livemint.com by the district administrations
NEW DELHI swered. NEW DELHI of the agriculture department.
Dr Aashish Chaudhry, man- However, there are challenges

I T
ndian doctors, nurses and
Surat: A court finished hearing arguments in Congress paramedical personnel are to
leader Rahul Gandhi’s appeal to suspend his defamation con- be despatched abroad to
viction and will pass an order on 20 April, his lawyer said. help out with medical treat-
Gandhi wanted to secure a stay of his conviction from the ments, two officials aware of
court to be reinstated as a member of parliament. His defa- the matter said, outlining a
mation conviction carries a two-year prison term and if not scheme that is to be launched
lifted could see him barred from next year’s Lok Sabha elec- shortly.
tions. BLOOMBERG The National Health Author-
ity (NHA) will provide technical
support for the scheme, called
‘Innovation needed for insolvency Heal by India, while the Ayush-
man Bharat Digital Mission’s
resolution, not over-regulation’ (ABDM) registry will provide
New Delhi: Amid instances of long delays in the insolvency reso- data on healthcare personnel.
lution process of various companies, IBBI chief Ravi Mital said res- The ABDM registry has the
olution requires innovation and “over regulation is not a solution”. names of 165,726 healthcare
Around 650 resolutions of debt-ridden corporates have happened professionals, out of which
since the implementation of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code 76,173 are doctors.
(IBC) in late 2016. PTI “Heal by India will be a single
source of database having
details of ministry of external
P-notes investment declines affairs-registered and PGE-li-
censed recruiting agencies and
for third month in a row employers and verified health-
New Delhi: Investment in the Indian capital markets through par- care professionals like doctors,
ticipatory notes dropped to ₹88,398 crore month-on-month in nurses, dentists, AYUSH pro-
February amid higher valuation of domestic markets.This was the fessionals, allied health profes-
third consecutive monthly decline in the investment level. Before sionals, pharmacists, etc. Such
this, investment through the route had been on an increasing trend an initiative will provide acces-
since July 2022 because of a slump in the oil and other commodi- sibility, transparency and trust
ties prices . PTI to all stakeholders. The plat-
The ABDM registry has the
names of 165,726 healthcare
professionals.
form has been developed by
the NHA and will have support
from the registry of verified
healthcare professionals,” one
of the two officials cited above
said on condition of anonymity.
India, which has positioned
itself as the ‘pharmacy of the
world’, aims to showcase its
healthcare capacity as part of
soft power projections.
“The portal is ready, and
right now, we are working for
the formal launch of the Heal in
India platform in coordination
with the health ministry,” the
second official added.
aging director, Aakash Health-
care, said, “Heal By India is a
welcome move to showcase tal-
ent and expertise of Indian doc-
tors internationally. Right now,
I am here at Tashkent and have
just operated on three cases of
knees at the apex military com-
mand hospital. Heal by India
initiative is a great opportunity
for our doctors and other medi-
cal professionals to travel other
countries to perform surgeries,
HT a way to a healthy global soci-
ety.”
The health ministry is also
working on a related initiative
to encourage foreigners to
travel to India for medical treat-
ment.
The government has devel-
oped a ‘Medical Value Travel’
digital portal for foreign
patients. In 2021, over
300,000 foreign patients
visited India for medical treat-
ment.
India has been ranked 10th
in the Medical Tourism Index
for 2020-2021 out of 46 desti-
nations by the Medical Tour-
ism Association.
he government is rede-
signing the soil health
card initiative, targeting
small and marginal farmers
with an investment of ₹596.51
crore to analyze 50 million soil
specimens in the coming three
years.
The revamped programme
is set for a launch by the month-
end.
Intense cultivation and
excessive use of chemical fertil-
izers and pesticides have been
affecting India’s soil fertility.
The revamped soil health card
is an add-on to ongoing efforts
to promote organic farming.
Through the scheme, farm-
ers will be notified about which
fertilizers to pick for cultivating
a particular crop, two officials
aware of the plans said.
“As part of the revamped
scheme, the government is also
focusing on creating a network
of around 7,500 soil health
entrepreneurs at the gram pan-
chayat and block level,” one of
the officials said.
“Once the network is cre-
ated, entrepreneurs will be
The revamped soil health card
is an add-on for promoting
organic farming. REUTERS
given a small, automated soil
testing machine, and farmers
can get a service from them at a
cost decided by the govern-
ment. The cost will be minimal
as farmers have to get their soil
tested before every crop cycle,”
the officer added.
Given the economic and
political sensitivities surround-
ing the farm sector, the
revamped scheme will address
the issues concerning small and
marginal farmers.
Currently, one soil sample is
collected for every 2.5 hectares
of irrigated land and 10 hec-
in verifying the authenticity of
the data.
Although the average land
holding of small and marginal
farmers is less than 2.5 hec-
tares, the reports they receive
are for large land holdings. This
is because multiple farmers
who could be farming the same
piece of land are counted sepa-
rately.
The soil sample reports are
crucial because farmers plant
crops and use fertilizers based
on the soil testing results, an
industry official familiar with
the scheme said.
Aiming to give farmers an
easy decision-tool rather than a
complex report, the govern-
ment is also redesigning the
soil health card portal, with
emoticons indicating soil
health. The revamped portal
will make soil health informa-
tion easily accessible and avail-
able.
Farmers will no longer have
to visit laboratories; instead,
soil samples will be collected
from their doorsteps and the
report will be sent by SMS.

India, Latin America in talks to expand preferential trade agreement CORRECTIONS AND
CLARIFICATIONS
The headline of the second
Shashank Mattoo & GDP of the four MERCOSUR nomic relationships with key cated. The foreign ministers of pharmaceutical companies to chart in the 13 April, Plain Facts
Ravi Dutta Mishra countries was $1.9 trillion with countries like Mexico, Brazil Mexico, Brazil and Argentina the region, which could act as story should have stated that
a total market of 295 million and Argentina. India’s auto- were in New Delhi in March a gateway to larger markets in ‘Nearly 70% of Shark Tank India
pitches come from tier 1 cities’.
NEW DELHI people. motive sector, which now for the G20 Foreign Ministers North and South America.
The error is regretted.
Under the deal India and counts Latin America as its Meeting. Investments in energy are also

I
ndia and the MERCOSUR
group of Latin American
countries are in discussions
to expand their preferential
trade agreement, according to
persons aware of the matter.
The MERCOSUR trading bloc
comprises Brazil, Argentina,
Paraguay and Uruguay.
India and MERCOSUR
signed the PTA in 2004, which
allowed New Delhi to forge
closer economic ties with one
of the world’s largest trade
blocs. In 2020, the combined
MERCOSUR have agreed to
give tariff concessions ranging
from 10% to 100% on 450 and
452 tariff lines respectively,
according to the ministry of
commerce and industry.
Both sides are currently dis-
cussing expanding the num-
ber of goods included in the
agreement, according to per-
sons aware of the negotiations,
which are in their early stages.
Queries sent to the foreign
ministries of India and Brazil
remained unanswered till
largest export market, has
been a particularly big benefi-
ciary.
External affairs minister S
Jaishankar has visited Mexico,
Argentina, Brazil and Para-
guay since 2021 and is
Both sides are currently discussing expanding the number of expected to go on another visit
goods included in the agreement. BLOOMBERG to the region later this month.
New Delhi has also expanded
press time. trade with Latin America has its diplomatic footprint in the
This development comes as shot up from $2 billion in region, having set up new mis-
India makes a major diplo- 2000 to over $50 billion in sions in Paraguay and the
matic and economic push 2023. This increase has largely Dominican Republic.
toward Latin America. India’s been driven by closer eco- Latin America has recipro-
Closer economic ties with
India have topped their
agenda. The region was badly
hit by the covid-19 pandemic
and its recovery may benefit
from increased investment
from and collaboration with
India. The region’s economies
are keen to attract Indian
investments in a key sectors
like pharmaceuticals. In an
interview with Mint in Janu-
ary, Panama’s foreign minister
Janaina Tewaney Mencomo
spoke of attracting Indian
of interest to both countries.
Renewable technologies
like green hydrogen are of
interest to Panama while Guy-
ana seeks Indian expertise in
developing its newly discov-
ered oil reserves.
An expanded PTA with
MERCOSUR will signal New
Delhi’s interest in pursuing an
energetic economic diplo-
macy agenda with the region,
analysts said.
shashank.mattoo@live-
mint.com
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suggestions or complaints
about errors. Readers can alert
the newsroom to any errors in
the paper by emailing us, with
your full name and address to
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LIVEMINT.COM DEALS, TECH & STARTUPS FRidAy, 14 ApRil 2023
MuMbAi 03

m MINT SHORTS
Microsoft’s AI-powered Bing
Startup funding winter What hobbles the
growth of litigation
comes to SwiftKey keyboard
New Delhi: Microsoft’s AI-powered Bing is now available to
smartphone users through the SwiftKey keyboard app. SwiftKey
users can leverage Bing AI’s chat capabilities to get detailed
shows signs of easing financing in India?
answers to queries, fine-tune text and chat messages, and search K Amoghavarsha
the web directly from the keyboard. AI-powered Bing is based on k.amoghavarsha@livemint.com
OpenAI’s latest generative AI model GPT-4 and has been cus- BENGALURU
tomized for search. It is also available on Bing, Edge, Skype, and The total number of deals in March were almost the same as in February
W
Microsoft Start apps on mobile devices. STAFF WRITER hen BlackRock Inc.,
the world’s largest
Anuj Suvarna asset manager,
CreditAccess Grameen raises Anuj.s@livemint.com Green shoots emerging signed a $254-million deal
A total of 72 deals were inked in March. On an average, 2.3 deals were with Hindustan Construction
$20 million ESG loan BENGALURU
inked each day during the month. Co. in March 2019, it fuelled
Startup funding volume

A
ISTOCK
severe funding winter that Value ($ mn) Volume of deals (right-hand scale) hope of propelling growth in
squeezed capital for cash- 6,000 250
in March (2015-2023) India’s nascent market for liti-
starved Indian startups Value ($ mn) Volume of deals gation financing. Four years
appears to be easing with the Mar 2015 959.5 158 on, that hope has had a reality
5,000
total number of transactions 200 check and the market hasn’t India currently doesn’t have
in March staying at almost the same level Mar 2016 334.4 147 grown as expected. But now, any law regulating litigation
compared to the previous month. 4,000
there is another ray of hope. financing. ISTOCK
Angel investments and venture capital Mar 2017 622.9 153 BlackRock had agreed to
150
funding had been declining for the past buy rights to a portfolio of Litigation finance usually
Mar 2018 440.3 138
several months, hitting a nine-year low in 3,000 arbitration awards and claims covers the legal costs of any
February, as rising borrowing costs, frag- Mar 2019 839.6 121 on projects tied up in litigation kind of dispute resolution
100
ile economic conditions, stock market from HCC. That deal came a mechanism, be it traditional
2,000
volatility and a re-rating in technology Mar 2020 579.8 100 year after Patel Engineering litigation in courts, insolvency
shares turned investors cautious. The new Ltd sold litigation claims to proceedings, arbitration and/
New Delhi: CreditAccess Grameen Ltd, a microfinance year started on a worrying note, too, with 50 Mar 2021 3,150.0 135 distressed assets investor or mediation.
1,000
institution, has raised $20 million in external commercial major layoffs by big tech companies such Eight Capital for ₹2,169 crore. Third-party funding agree-
Mar 2022 2,673.4 184
borrowing from The Development Bank of Austria, Oester- as Amazon, Google, and Microsoft drag- The two large transactions and ments are recognized for civil
reichische Entwicklungsbank AG (OeEB). The capital infu- ging the morale of 0 0
Mar 2023 1,100.0 the enactment of the Insol- suits in some states such as
Jan 2021 Mar 2023 72
sion comes less than six months after the Bengaluru-based startups lower. vency and Bankruptcy Code, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Madhya
Source: VCCEdge
microfinance institution took a $35 million ESG (environ- However, startup 2016 (IBC) initially appeared to Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh.
mental, social and governance)-linked loan from US Inter- funding activity in fuel interest of investors in The Supreme Court has also
national Development Finance Corp. MALVIKA MALOO India held steady in March compared with worth $1.1 billion. ventures in India as investors became cau- third-party financing in India. recognized such agreements
February, offering a flicker of hope. This is more than double February’s tious about taking fresh bets in startups. At one time, global litigation as valid when the third parties
A total of 72 deals were inked in March, revised figure of $482 million but less than Consequently, many startups faced severe funds such as Australia’s IMF are not lawyers. But India cur-
Mumbai Angels, Speed Fund, according to data collated by VCCEdge, half the aggregate value of deals recorded financial difficulties, leading to cost-cut- Bentham Ltd, Augusta Ven- rently doesn’t have any law
the research platform of VCCircle. This in March 2022. ting measures such as layoffs. tures Ltd and Vannin regulating litigation
others back beer brand Proost means that on an average, 2.3 deals were Startup funding boomed in 2021 as ven- Some startups even had to shut down or Capital from the UK, financing. This has
New Delhi: Delhi-based beer brand Proost Beer said it has inked each day during the month. ture capital and private equity investors merge with other companies. and US-based Bur- made it difficult for
secured ₹8.5 crore ($1.1 million) in debt and equity funding. The The deal volume in March was the same poured billions of dollars into local com- This month too, funding value rose sig- ford Capital were litigation finance to
funding round saw participation from Mumbai Angels, Hydera- as February’s revised figure nificantly due to several said to be interested in the gain wide acceptance, say law-
bad Angels, Speed Fund, GetVantage and Finvolve, with a clutch but far below the 184 transac- STARTUP SHOCKS small- and mid-sized deals Indian market. However, no yers and industry executives.
of angel investors. Proost Beer was among startups to feature on tions struck in the same amid fresh investments by global firm has entered India. According to Mukesh
Shark Tank India, a reality show where entrepreneurs pitch their month last year. RISInG borrowing THE new year STARTUP funding private equity and venture Instead, a couple of local legal- Chand, senior counsel at law
business ideas. SHUBHOBROTA DEV ROY Also, March’s deal volume costs, fragile
economy, stock
started on a
worrying note, with
had boomed in 2021
as VC and PE
capital firms. tech startups have ventured firm Economic Law Practice,
was the lowest for the month market volatility major layoffs by big investors poured Last week, a total of $540 into the market. These start- the main reasons for the slow
since 2015. impacted cos tech companies funds into local cos million was invested across 21 ups highlight the potential in pace of development of third-
Menswear brand Barcelona raises Last month’s steady deal deals, a 50% jump from the the litigation finance market party financing is the lack of
volume comes at a time when first week of the month, but admit there is a long way to awareness among litigants and
₹5 crore debt from GetVantage benchmark stock market indices in the panies. showed VCCircle analysis.In an indication go before that potential is real- the confusion around its per-
New Delhi: Menswear brand Barcelona, which is planning an country have also managed to hold their India reached the milestone of having that the startup ecosystem may finally be ized. missibility under the law.
initial public offering, has raised ₹5 crore (around $610,000) as ground, while the Reserve Bank of India 100 unicorns, or startups with a valuation coming out of the liquidity crunch, last Litigation financing, or He said third-party funding
a part of its debt funding round from GetVantage. The startup paused its rate hike cycle after lifting its of $1 billion or more, in 2021. But as stock week marked non-bank lender DMI third-party funding, involves is preferred in arbitration situ-
will deploy the funds to launch nearly 50 outlets across the coun- key lending rate by 250 basis points since markets corrected and central banks Finance Pvt. Ltd securing $400 million in the funding of legal costs of ations instead of civil litigation
try and to expand its marketing efforts. Founded in 2015 by May 2022. began hardening interest rates, concerns a funding round led by Japan-based Mit- businesses in exchange for a since arbitration proceedings
Jaimin Gupta, Barcelona claims to be one of India’s fastest-grow- In terms of total deal value, March arose about excessively high valuations. subishi UFJ Financial Group, Inc. through share of the claim amount if are time-bound and more exe-
ing branded apparel brands for men. SHUBHOBROTA DEV ROY recorded startup funding transactions This resulted in a domino effect on tech its consolidated subsidiary MUFG Bank. successful. cutable.

E-SPORTS NEEDS KEY GROWTH MediaTek

DRIVERS TO FLOURISH IN INDIA open to
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AAShnA Sheth
& V i P u l PAt e l
Respond to this column at
feedback@livemint.com
I
n 2022, the Indian government officially
recognized Esports as a sport, placing it on an
equal footing with mainstream sports like
cricket and football. In the same year, Esports
debuted as an official medal sport at the Asian
Games and as a pilot event at the Commonwealth
Games. The Indian DOTA 2 (a multiplayer battle
arena video game) team created history by win-
ning bronze at the first Commonwealth Esports
Championship held in Birmingham last year.
The Indian digital gaming industry is expected
to grow exponentially, fuelled by increased digi-
tization due to affordable data and smartphones,
as well as the pandemic. A subset of digital gam-
ing, Esports is at the forefront of this growth and
is estimated to become a ₹1,100 crore industry by
2025 at a CAGR of 46%.
While they are often confused with each other,
Esports are categorically different from casual
digital gaming and real money gaming (RMG).
Casual digital gaming entails interaction with
video games at an informal level. RMGs, which
include fantasy games, are online games where
a user makes a deposit in cash or kind with the
expectation of earning winnings.
Esports, on the other hand, involve skilled ath-
letes competing individually or in teams for prize
money and global recognition. While all Esports
are video games, not all video games are Esports.
Some popular Esports today include Counter
Strike, Fortnite and Valorant.
Competitive gaming can be seen as the germi-
nation point for Esports. Alongside competition,
other characteristic elements of Esports include
a large player base and audience, score tracking
features as well as backing from tournament
organizers and video game publishers. A signifi-
cant audience is particularly important. Like
mainstream sports, Esports stakeholders such as
teams and tournament organizers rely on audi-
ence monetization as a major revenue source.
Due to the viewership-heavy nature of
Esports, the industry has found a place next to
major entertainment avenues such as OTT and
mainstream sports. For instance, an event orga-
nized by NODWIN Gaming, an Esports company
in India, was televised on Star Sports 2 garnering
12.3 million views in the first eight days.
There are, however, some foundational
requirements for Esports to reach its potential.
First, the birth of local Esports tournaments is a
critical starting point and growth driver for the
using India-
KIIT Deemed to be University
industry. These tournaments act as avenues for
athletes to train, compete and be discovered for
larger competitions. A similar trend has been made chips
seen with mainstream sports where regional
Abhijit Ahaskar
Bhubaneswar
competitions like the Ranji Trophy for cricket
Y20 CONSULTATION 2023
and Subroto Cup for football have become train- abhijit.ahaskar@livemint.com
ing and scouting grounds. NEW DELHI
The emergence of grassroots Esports tourna-
Under the aegis of Ministry of Youth Affairs & Sports, Govt. of India
F
ments in India has begun. This traction must be abless chipmaker Medi-
given a boost. For instance, startups like Gamerji aTek, which supplies
and Tournafest offer platforms for Esports tour- chips to some of the
April 14 – 15, 2023
nament discovery and engagement. As popular world’s top electronics firms,
Esports athletes emerge in nascent tournaments, said it is open to considering
a strong fan following is expected to develop, using chips made in India once
paving the way for Esports to become entertain- the country’s ecosystem devel-
ment much like mainstream sports. ops. In an interview, Anku Jain,
India’s G20 agenda will be
Second, countries with a robust history in sports managing director, MediaTek
and entertainment have been able to integrate
underpinning networks of broadcasting, journalism
India, said fabrication units
planned for India will likely
inclusive, ambitious, action-
oriented and decisive. Let us work
Shri Giriraj Singh
and content distribution into Esports. As Esports focus on mature nodes at first. together to shape a new paradigm Hon'ble Minister of Rural Development and
begin to gain interest from a massive audience, a The technology node is vital
of human-centric globalisation. Panchayati Raj, Govt. of India
strong commercial structure becomes essential for in chip manufacturing. Smaller
smooth operations of large-scale tournaments and nodes lead to more efficient
leagues. These structures include digital platforms chips, which are used in the most Shri Narendra Modi in the august presence of
for viewer monetization, physical and virtual event advanced devices. More mature
Hon’ble Prime Minister of India
management solutions, tech enabled ticket and
merchandise sales and more. India is well positioned
nodes like 28nm and above,
however, are still used in many
Shri Ashwini Kumar Choubey
with a rich history in sports and entertainment and devices, including appliances, Hon’ble Minister of State for Consumer Affairs, Food &
must capitalize on and smart home products. Public Distribution, and Environment, Forest &
Esports is existing infrastructure
for Esports. Third, rec-
Jain’
s com- Climate Change, Govt. of India
estimated to
ognition and support ments
become a
Shri Tusharkanti Behera
from educational insti- follow
₹1,100 cr tutions provide a boost MediaTek chief executive Rick
industry to the industry. In Tsai saying last November that Future of Work: Hon'ble Minister of State for Home,
by 2025 2022, a school in Uttar chipmakers like MediaTek will Industry 4.0, Innovation
Pradesh became the need multiple sources in
and 21st Century Skills Sports & Youth Services, and E&IT, Govt. of Odisha
first in India to offer future. Tsai, who was speaking
Esports as part of extracurricular activities. to Reuters at the time, how-
The recruitment of Esports athletes by mar- ever, mentioned Taiwan, US, Special Guest:
quee teams along with lucrative sponsorships Germany and Europe as the
have demonstrated the potential of Esports to pro-
vide legitimate full-time career opportunities. The
key producing markets.
MediaTek is one of the larg-
Mr. Ricky Kej
average age range of Esports athletes across game est chip suppliers to smart- Multiple Grammy Winner, India
titles is 20-27 years, indicating that fresh gradu- phone makers. Counterpoint
ates could be a potential talent acquisition source Research said the firm supplied
for teams. Leading Esports teams in India include 28% of all mobile chips in the Hon’ble Members of Parliament from 20 countries (USA, UK, Switzerland,
Germany, Ukraine, Poland, Armenia, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Democratic Republic
Revenant Esports and Orangutan Esports, which December quarter, behind
carry rosters across Esports like Call of Duty, Free Apple, and ahead of US rival
Fire and Valorant, which are different video games
under the first-person shooter genre.
Qualcomm. Smartphone chips,
especially the ones supplied by
of Congo, Ivory Coast, Liechtenstein, Sierra Leone, etc.)
Finally, government intervention for setting up firms like MediaTek and Qual-
Hon’ble Members of Academicians from
5 Hon’ble Diplomats
a formal governing body and recognition will give comm, however, are usually Over
a massive fillip to the growth of the Esports industry.
With the right foundational elements in place
made using 5nm and below
nodes right now, which aren’t 25 Parliament from India 200 different countries from five countries
and growth drivers on track, Esports have the expected to be produced in
potential to create more than 11,000 direct and India at the moment.
indirect jobs by 2025 and become a major con- Jain said, however, Medi-
tributor to the Indian digital gaming industry. aTek sees a “very high chance”
(Aashna Sheth is analyst-seed investing and of India emerging as a chip
Vipul Patel is partner-seed investing at CIIE.CO, a manufacturing hub. He added
startup incubator established by IIM Ahmedabad. that chip availability has
Views are personal.) improved at the macro level.
04 FridAy, 14 April 2023
MuMbAi MARK TO MARKET LIVEMINT.COM

S&P BSE Sensex Nifty 50 Nifty 500 Nifty Next 50 Nifty 100 S&P BSE Mid-cap S&P BSE Small Cap
ClosE PERCENt CHaNgE ClosE PERCENt CHaNgE ClosE PERCENt CHaNgE ClosE PERCENt CHaNgE ClosE PERCENt CHaNgE ClosE PERCENt CHaNgE ClosE PERCENt CHaNgE

60,431.00 0.06 17,828.00 0.09 14,954.25 0.08 38,496.75 -0.17 17,635.15 0.05 24,720.57 0.16 28,149.58 0.33
PREvIous ClosE oPEN PREvIous ClosE oPEN PREvIous ClosE oPEN PREvIous ClosE oPEN PREvIous ClosE oPEN PREvIous ClosE oPEN PREvIous ClosE oPEN

60,392.77 60,364.41 17,812.40 17,807.30 14,941.55 14,946.45 38,560.90 38,592.00 17,626.90 17,624.45 24,680.16 24,716.52 28,056.09 28,048.68
HIgH loW HIgH loW HIgH loW HIgH loW HIgH loW HIgH loW HIgH loW

60,486.91 60,081.43 17,842.15 17,729.65 14,965.70 14,885.25 38,623.30 38,411.55 17,647.70 17,546.55 24,801.15 24,651.06 28,187.94 28,047.77

m MINT SHORTS Telecom tariff hikes: As cloud over CEO lifts,

China’s contradictory data AU Small Finance Bank
fuels debate over stimulus
China’s recent economic indicators are providing con-
tradictory signals about the recovery, raising doubts
about the growth outlook and fuelling debate over
Difficult, but urgent may be set for re-rating
whether Beijing needs to step up its stimulus. March data Bavadharini KS Bavadharini KS & Harsha Jethmalani
Need to dial up Levelling up
so far showed a surge in the services sector as consumers bavadharini.ks@livemint.com bavadharini.ks@livemint.com
spend more on travel and restaurants now that covid Lack of tariff hikes has weighed on the average revenue per user of telecom AU Small Finance Bank stock

T
companies in the past few quarters. jumped sharply on Thursday, but it

U
waves have eased. Yet, at the same time, inflation weak- elecom operators are likely to ntil Wednesday, shares of AU still lags the Nifty Bank index in the
ened in the month, pointing to subdued domestic report dull financial results Bharti Airtel Vodafone Idea Reliance Jio Average revenue per user (in ₹) Small Finance Bank (AU SFB) past one year.
demand. On Thursday, official data showed a surprise for the quarter ended March 200 were nearly 21% lower than
AU Small Finance Bank Nifty Bank
jump in Chinese exports—after five months of declines— (Q4FY23) in the absence of their 52-week highs seen in April last
120
largely due to stronger demand from Asian markets and price hikes and fewer number year. One of the factors hurting inves-
as factories returned to normal. That was in contrast to of days sequentially. Revenue and aver- tor sentiments had been the lack of 112.46
signals from purchasing managers’ surveys last week, age revenue per user (Arpu) growth is 150 clarity on the continuity of the current 110
which suggested a slowdown in manufacturing in the expected to moderate. For instance, managing director and chief execu-
month. Credit figures were also strong this week, BNP Paribas Securities India expects tive officer (MD and CEO). That over-
although economists said that was probably more to do domestic telecom industry revenue hang is out of the way now. 100
with a surge in liquidity. BLOOMBERG growth to moderate to about 10% year- 100
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has 96.83
on-year in Q4 from 17.5% in Q3 as the approved the reappointment of San-
benefit of previous tariff hikes gets jay Agarwal as MD and CEO for three 90
absorbed in the base. The broking firm 50
years from 19 April. This has come as
expects sequential revenue growth to a relief for AU SFB’s investors. Recall
moderate to 1.5%. that last month, RBI had approved the 80
Subscriber additions are likely to be a extension of IndusInd Bank’s MD and
mixed bag. Vodafone Idea Ltd is 0 CEO Sumant Kathpalia’s tenure for
expected to continue to lose subscribers Q1FY22 Q2FY22 Q3FY22 Q4FY22 Q1FY23 Q2FY23 Q3FY23 Q4FY23 two years versus investor expecta- 70
estimated 13 Apr 2022 13 Apr 2023
in Q4. This could drive gains for Bharti tions of three years. Thus, the three- Values rebased to 100 Source: Capitaline
Source: Company data, Motilal Oswal Financial Services
Airtel and Reliance Jio in subscriber year extension in the case of AU SFB is
additions. For telecom companies, Arpu SATISH KUMAR/MINT
positive. The excitement is evident SATISH KUMAR/MINT

is a key metric to track, but growth boosted industry revenue growth in liamentary elections in India lined up in from the stock’s reaction, which marginal increase in disbursement
momentum is unlikely to be exciting for FY23, and we expect industry revenue H12024, IIFL now assumes tariff hikes zoomed 17% on Thursday. The central yields is likely to have some impact on
Q4 given the absence of tariff hikes. growth to be strong at 17-18% in FY23 only in Q2FY25. bank has also approved extension of spreads.
“Overall, Arpu improvements should despite moderation in Q4FY23 growth.” Additionally, investor sentiments AU SFB’s whole-time director Uttam Near-term earnings trajectory
moderate with lower gains from 4G-led Going ahead, tariff hikes are para- could stay muted as return ratios may Tibrewal’s tenure for three years. aside, how the bank’s growth strate-
mix benefits,” said analysts from Motilal mount for telecom companies for reve- remain under pressure. According to This clarity is welcome. “We expect gies pan out is also crucial. “Outside of
The dollar weakened further on Thursday, helping the Oswal Financial Services in their earn- nue growth and a key trigger for telecom Vora, “Capital expenditure on account of this extension to ensure top manage- near-term performance, in our view,
euro rise 0.27% to a two-month high of $1.102. ISTOCK ings preview report. They added, “Over stocks. Unsurprisingly, investor hopes 5G deployment is set to continue in ment continuity. Besides, it improves it would be important to see how the
the last few quarters, we saw sharp mar- are pinned on tariff hikes in the new FY24. Large investment in 5G spectrum visibility on continuation of its growth bank is able to differentiate itself from
ket share gains by Bharti and Reliance financial year (FY24). But the outlook for and network is set to weigh on the near- journey like in the past--scale with peers on both growth and return
Dollar drops to two-month low Jio from Vodafone Idea, which too may tariff increase is dull. As analysts from term return ratio. An increase in Arpu is robust asset quality and ratios in an environment
on cooling US inflation moderate given Vodafone required to see an improve- profitability,” said ana- The March where most lenders have
The dollar fell to a two-month low on Thursday after data Idea is now seeing decent CALL DROP ment in return ratios.” lysts at ICICI Securities quarter turned aggressive on
showed US inflation slowed sharply in March, bolstering network experience.” Against this backdrop, Ltd. operational growth,” Kotak Institu-
hopes that the Federal Reserve’s rate-hiking campaign Further, the benefit of GROWTH in THE benefit of FOR improvement in when telecom companies Investors now need to update released tional Equities said in a
is either already finished or will be by May. Figures reduced spectrum usage revenue and average reduced spectrum return ratios and announce their Q4FY23 shift focus towards AU
revenue per user is usage charges on the overall earnings, an earlier this month 13 April report.
released on Wednesday showed that consumer price charges on the Ebitda mar- expected to Ebitda margin front uptick in Arpus results, management com- SFB’s financial perform- For now, with this lat-
index (CPI) inflation came in at 5% year-on-year in gin front would be rela- moderate would be lower in Q4 remains crucial mentary for Airtel and Reli- ance. Here, the March shows results est development, the
March, down from 6% in February. Yet core inflation— tively lower in Q4 given ance Jio on capex and tariff quarter (Q4FY23) opera- would be decent bank’s re-rating pros-
which strips out volatile food and energy prices—picked that companies have hikes remains crucial. With tional update released pects have improved
up to 5.6%, from 5.5% the previous month. The dollar already realized a larger share of the IIFL Securities Ltd said in a 12 April Vodafone Idea’s survival depending on earlier this month sug- further. “If the manage-
dropped after the data was released and weakened fur- benefit in the previous two quarters. report, “Persisting consumption spend- fresh fundraising, any news flow on that gests financial results would be ment commentary on strategic
ther on Thursday, helping the euro rise 0.27% to a two- Margins are expected to be flattish ing weakness, elevated competitive would be crucial. The fundraise is also decent. Loans and deposits have growth in FY24 is encouraging, then
month high of $1.102. The dollar index, which measures sequentially. intensity in light of Jio’s recent pricing essential to ensure that it doesn’t fall grown by 26% and 32%, respectively, that can drive re-rating given the
the greenback against six major peers, was last down To be sure, while expectations from interventions in the mobile post-paid behind in the 5G race, with peers having year-on-year. But given the increas- steep stock correction,” said Dnya-
0.2% at 101.28, its lowest since the start of February. It was Q4 results are subdued, telecom compa- and FTTH markets, and potential mar- already taken the lead, point out analysts ing competition and rising cost of nada Vaidya, research analyst at Axis
on track for its fifth straight weekly drop. John Hardy, nies are likely to close FY23 on a good ket-share gain opportunities for Jio and from Emkay Global Financial Services. funds for lenders, net interest margin Securities. Another trigger could
head of FX strategy at Saxo Bank, said the inflation data note. Kunal Vora, head of India equity Bharti on Vodafone Idea’s delay in fund- From their 52-week highs, shares of Air- (NIM) needs closer tracking. The come from reducing operating
“left the market with not much to go on”. He said he research at BNP Paribas said, “Tariff hike raising—have reduced the probability of tel and Vodafone Idea have declined by bank’s Q4 operational update said the expenses, which is a key lever for
expects the dollar to grind lower from here. REUTERS that was taken in November 2021 has a tariff hike in the near term.” With par- 11% and 45%, respectively. uptick in funding cost coupled with return on asset growth, she added.

Mark to Market writers do not have positions in the companies they have discussed here

SARVESH KUMAR SHARMA/MINT

Equity MF flows hit one-year high in March Why did retail inflation fall in March?
By Pragya Srivastava
pragya.s@livemint.com CHANGING DRIVERS
Ram Sahgal Association of Mutual Funds in investors ploughing around Year-on-year inflation (%)
Systematic growth India's retail infation fell to a 15-month low of 5.66% in
ram.sahgal@livemint.com India (Amfi). ₹31000 crore into corporate March, thanks to a decline in food inflation and the
8
Headline Headline, excluding vegetables
MUMBAI
Monthly SIP flows have stayed Monthly SIP flows have bond fund, banking and PSU
consistently above the ₹13,000 statistical effect of a favourable base. On a Core*

crore mark since October.

stayed consistently above the fund, long duration fund, month-on-month basis, the Consumer Price Index 7

E
quity mutual funds
recorded net inflows of
₹20,534.21 crore in
March, the highest monthly
inflows in a year, driven by
record investor contributions
through the popular systematic
investment (SIP) plan.
Last month’s figure was the
highest since March 2022 that
saw net inflows of ₹28463.49
crore. This enabled the bell-
wether Nifty to recover from a
crucial support of 16,828 points
on 20 March to close 2.2%
higher at 17,205 by the month-
end. SIP contributions hit a
record high of ₹14,276.06 crore
in March.
“SIP inflows continue to
soar, breaking the record on a
₹13,000 crore mark since medium to long duration funds (CPI) rose 0.2%. Vegetables, once again, pulled the 6.6
Mar 2018 SIP Monthly
October. and gilt funds, among others in headline inflation down, excluding which the figure
7,119 Contribution would have been 6.6%. Overall, the contribution of the 6 6.0
Investor money flowed into the last week of March. food and beverage group in overall inflation declined 5.7
Mar 2019 thematic funds, dividend yield Venkatesh said investors to 41% from 45% in February. Core infation also eased
8,055 5
funds and ELSS in equity-ori- opted for certain debt schemes slightly but was still at the critical 6% mark. Going
Mar 2020 ented schemes of MFs. Debt with the aim of deploying their ahead, rising prices of pulses and milk, among others,
8,641 funds witnessed outflows of money at a time they expect the could exert pressure on inflation. 4
Jan 2021 Mar 2023
Mar 2021 ₹56,884.13 crore, a six-month interest rate cycle to have *Excludes food, and fuel and light groups.
9,182 high, with corporates with- peaked. When rates peak, bond
Mar 2022 drawing money to meet prices tend to rise. FOOD RELIEF Telangana recorded the highest retail inflation in
12,328 advance tax payments and For FY23, mutual funds’ net Contribution of food and beverage in overall inflation (in %) March, Chhattisgarh lowest
Mar 2023
banks seeking to deploy capital assets under management CPI inflation in March 2023 (in %)
more effectively. The outflows grew by ₹1.85 trn to ₹39.42 trn 48
14,276 44 45
from debt funds would have with 4 million new investors 40 41 1 5.7 10
Source: Amfi 37 Punjab
been higher had it not been for hopping on to the mutual fund Himachal
SATISH KUMAR/MINT
the amended Finance Bill bandwagon. To be sure, AUM 6.8 Pradesh National average
month-on-month basis—it removing long-term capital growth was sharply slower than 4.0
Haryana
would not be an overkill to say gains and indexation benefits ₹6.14 trn seen by the end of Delhi
6.9 3.4
that the retail investor is the from debt mutual funds effec- FY22. In FY22, the number of
hero of the markets,” said N. S. tive 1 April. The bill was passed new investors added was also
Oct 2022 Nov 2022 Dec 2022 Jan 2023 Feb 2023 Mar 2023
Venkatesh, chief executive at on 24 March and resulted in higher at 10.9 million.
Items with biggest year-on-year inflation in each group (in %)
Item (Group) Inflation
Jeera Chhattisgarh
40

Kotak cites weak market to defer FoF 1.9

(Food)
Kerosene
(Fuel & light) 35 Telangana
Porter charges
33 7.6
(Miscellaneous)
Headwear, belts, ties
Satya Sontanam & (Clothing & footwear) 19
view, we have taken the call to Kotak India Alternate Alloca- year the fund starts investing in Data not available for states
marked in grey. Inflation for
Pan leaf (Pan, tobacco
Sneha Shah postpone the PE/VC FOF,” tion Fund was set up as an alter- companies.The fund was and intoxicants) 9 Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh is
reported as a combined figure.
said a spokesperson for KIAL. native investment fund under launched amid strong interest Cost of repairs for residential
8
building, land (Housing)
NEW DELHI/MUMBAI The company didn’t Sebi regulations last year. The from high net worth individuals Source: MoSPI, CMIE
respond to que- fund aimed to raise (HNIs) in the last few years to

K
‘
otak Investment Advis- ries emailed sepa- Kotak India ₹1,500 crore, invest in the PE space. For a fund WHAT'S IN STORE? Month-on-month % change in average retail prices
ors Ltd (KIAL) said it has rately on whether Alternate including a green- that has a fixed life cycle, there is February March April* We note the risks of a potential El Niño in
deferred its Fund of the fund will start Allocation Fund shoe option of a defined deployment period. If Rice 1.4 0.5 0.1 the second half of the year and possible
Fund (FoF) that was launched returning money was set up ₹750 crore. The due to market conditions, the Wheat 1.3 -3.0 -2.9 heatwaves in the summer, which may
last year to invest primarily in it has raised so far fund’s objective general partner (GP) isn’t able to Wheat flour 0.8 -1.9 -1.6
raise concerns about food production
as an AIF under
private equity (PE) and ven- back to investors. was to diversify deploy capital, they can return it Pulses -0.2 0.6 0.9
ture capital (VC) funds. However, a Sebi regulations across PE/VC along with fee earned so far. Edible oil -1.6 -1.3 -1.0 and prices.
last year BARCLAYS
“In PE/VC investment, vin- person with funds in sectors A second person said in case Potato -10.1 -8.3 -2.6

‘
tage of the fund i.e. the time to knowledge of the such as consumer, of Kotak, though it has been a Onion -5.8 -8.4 -2.8
start deploying capital is very development said technology, year since the fund was Tomato -5.1 -0.6 0.1 We expect headline CPI inflation to
Sugar -0.3 -0.3 0.3 remain below 6% for the rest of the year,
important. Presently, valua- that KIAL has “begun conver- healthcare, and financials, as launched, the firm decided to
Milk 0.4 0.6 0.5
tions are correcting; hence it is sations with investors (limited well as across multiple stages, return capital from the FoF and expect the RBI to remain on hold till
Tea (Loose) -0.7 0.2 0.3
prudent for FoF to defer partners) and will soon be from early stage to growth stage following poor market condi- end of 2023.
Salt 0.9 0.3 0.8
investing and catch a better returning money it has drawn and late stage across different tions and inability to deploy it. *Data for April so far. Source: Department of Consumer Affairs GOLDMAN SACHS
vintage of funds. With this down,” the person said. vintages. ‘Vintage’ refers to first satya.sontanam@livemint.com
LIVEMINT.COM CORPORATE FridAy, 14 April 2023
MuMbAi 05

Capital goods stocks ride on Vivo’s new ₹1,100 cr, 170-acre

facility to come up in G Noida
big orders, smart execution Gulveen Aulakh
gulveen.aulakh@livemint.com

C
hinese smartphone
maker Vivo will invest
Improving private capex likely to sustain order flows; international queries hold out hope ₹1,100 crore to set up a
169-acre manufacturing plant
in Greater Noida. The facility
Ujjval Jauhari tively, according to analysts. is likely to be operational by
ujjval.J@livemint.com Strong sentiments Bharat Electronics has been a key 2024, Yogendra Sriramula,
nEw dELhI The trend has driven the BSE Capital Goods Index beneficiary of defence orders, securing brand strategy head for India,
to a 52-week high of 35,948.78. projects worth ₹1,670 crore. Vivo, said in an interview.

I
ncreasing private capital expendi- 70,000 40,000 Going forward, domestic tendering The investment is part of its
ture by India Inc. and easing supply- BSE Sensex 35,459.6 activity is expected to remain healthy for plan to double annual manu-
side constraints have boosted order defence, transmission and distribution, facturing capacity to 120 mil- According to Yogendra Sriramula, brand strategy head for
books of capital goods players such 35,000 water, railways and metro, among oth- lion units, from the existing 60 India, Vivo has dominated offline sales for over three years.
as Larsen and Toubro Ltd, KEC 60,000 ers. Healthy ordering inquiries will also million. It has set aside ₹7,500
International Ltd, Siemens Ltd, and continue in key export markets, said crore for its expansion plans. are made in India, the com- manufacturing. So that’s how
ABB Ltd. 60,431 30,000 Prabhudas Lilladher analysts. “In phase I, we said that we pany intends to increase local focused we are.” Retailers who
The trend is now being reflected in the Capital Goods index ABB and Siemens too are well placed will invest ₹3,500 crore. We sourcing of components and are part of its network make a
robust share performance of these com- 50,000 (right-hand scale) to benefit from automation solutions, have already infused ₹2,400 sub-components that go into fifth of their revenue from sell-
panies, which in turn, has driven the BSE 25,000 digitization, diversified businesses and crore and the rest ₹1,100 crore assembling the smartphones. ing Vivo phones, he claimed.
Capital Goods Index to a 52-week high of exports. Defence suppliers such as Hin- will be invested over the rest of Vivo assembles motherboards According to industry insid-
35,948.78, which also happens to be its all dustan Aeronautics (HAL), BEL, Bharat this year. By the beginning of for all smartphones using sur- ers, brick-and-mortar outlets
40,000 20,000
time high. Strong order flows and healthy 13 Apr 2022 13 Apr 2023 Dynamics, Cochin Shipyard, Mazagon next year, we should be able to face-mounted technology. will gain prominence in com-
execution have also improved revenue Source: Capital Market Dock and Garden Reach Shipbuilders start phase I of our new manu- About 95% of battery com- ing months, with Apple open-
and earnings prospects of the companies are also benefitting from the Make in facturing facility.” ponents it uses, ing its flagship stores in India
in Q4 FY23 and for the full year. India initiative, and bagging massive Sriramula said Vivo will and 70% chargers next week. In-store customer
KEC International has announced an chief executive said orders for the rail- Bharat Electronics Ltd and many other defence orders. Improving private capex Vivo is on track to continue to and earphones experience and iconic design
all-time high order inflow of ₹22,378 way and water business have enhanced firms from various segments such as is likely to sustain order flows, while export more than expand offline are also sourced of Apple stores is likely to drive
crore for FY23, up 30% from a year ago, the order book and improved its market transmission and distribution, water, international queries have been encour- one million hand- sales via 70,000 locally. “We are other premium brands to beef
led by international order inflows for its share. Besides, its building and factories hydrocarbon, railways, defence, data aging. Softening commodity prices sets in 2023, after looking at more up their strategies, even as the
touchpoints, and
transmission and distribution vertical. vertical continued to grow and diversi- centres, digitization and energy effi- remains another positive driver for earn- facing initial hur- components. We Indian smartphone market
Vimal Kejriwal, managing director ings growth. dles from Indian 650 exclusive want to focus on experiences stagnation.
and chief executive, KEC Interna- WAVE OF OPTIMISM Capital goods companies had wit- customs authori- outlets displays next. We Sriramula said Vivo was the
tional, said the civil business has nessed robust margin growth in Q3, ties last year when have signed some largest player in offline market
strengthened its presence with an KEC International DECLARATIONS of DOMESTIC DEFENCE suppliers Parikshit Kandpal, institutional it began exports agreements,” Sri- for the past 13 quarters, and it
order in the urban infrastructure has announced an
all-time high order
large order flows
were also made by
tendering activity is
expected to remain
are also benefitting
from Make in India
research analyst, HDFC Securities, to Saudi Arabia and Thailand. ramula said but did not elabo- had gained market share in the
segment. “These new orders along inflow of ₹22,378 Bharat Electronics, healthy for defence, initiative, and said.Declining logistic costs, easing “Our manufacturing facili- rate further. premium segment (₹30,000-
with the orders announced earlier crore for FY23 L&T, and others water and railways bagging huge orders of supply issues, and improved chip ties in India meet global stan- Vivo will continue to expand plus) to 13% in 2023 from just
this year, reaffirm our confidence in supplies have been beneficial, and dards and we have the capabil- offline sales via 70,000 touch- 0.3% in 2019. Vivo intends to
achieving the targeted growth going further easing of commodity prices ity to meet demands from any points, and 650 exclusive out- cement its position in this seg-
forward,” he added. fied into new areas like data centres, edu- ciency. In the quarter, L&T announced could drive better margin performance part of the world. We are in lets,even though a significant ment, while focusing on sub-
Kalpataru Power Transmission Ltd cation complexes and institutional order inflows of ₹20,000-31,500 crore, in the coming quarters, he added. 60-plus countries and regions part of its retail volumes come ₹15,000 affordable 5G smart-
too announced new orders of ₹ 3,079 buildings. while T&D EPC firms like KEC and Kal- Despite China easing its zero covid and will be able to export devi- from online sales, he added. phone range, including T2X,
crore in March-April. Manish Mohnot, Announcements of large order flows pataru announced robust order inflows policy, benefits will continue accruing ces wherever there’s demand.” “Our investments in retail which was launched for a price
the company’s managing director and were also made by Larsen and Toubro, worth ₹6,800 and ₹8,120 crore, respec- for Indian suppliers, said analysts. While all Vivo smartphones matches our investments in tag of ₹12,000 this week.

Zee’s Goenka settles insider trading case ANAND RATHI WEALTH LIMITED
Registered Office - Express Zone, A Wing, 10th Floor, Western Express Highway, Goregaon (E), Mumbai - 400 063, Maharashtra
Priyanka Gawande PLEX, in September 2020. financials, dividends, mergers announced during covid and CIN : L67120MH1995PLC086696, Website www.anandrathiwealth.in
priyanka.gawande@livemint.com In its investigation, Sebi had and demergers, business plan, was price sensitive informa-

31% 33% 140% `7 Per

found some “unpublished and acquisitions or change in capi- tion under the Prohibition of
YoY Total
P
unit Goenka, the manag- price-sensitive information” tal structure, and if accessed, Insider Trading Regulations.
ing director and chief which were not can influence the According to the regulation, Revenue Share
Final Dividend of
executive of Zee Enter- declared by the Sebi had price of a com- the chief executive, managing
tainment Enterprises Ltd, has media company. found some pany’s securities. director or other senior execu-
settled an insider trading case Subsequently, ‘unpublished and Sebi said as MD tives of listed firms or interme- EXTRACT OF STATEMENT OF AUDITED CONSOLIDATED FINANCIAL
with Securities and Exchange
Board of India by paying ₹50.7
on 22 December
2022, Sebi issued
price-sensitive and CEO Goenka
failed to ensure
diaries must put in place ade-
quate and effective systems of RESULTS FOR QUARTER AND YEAR ENDED MARCH 31, 2023
information’
lakh, the media entertainment a show cause adequate internal controls to ensure compliance
company said on Thursday. notice to Goenka which were not controls to iden- with the requirements to pre- Quarter Ended Year Ended
In August 2021, the capital as he was at the declared tify unpublished vent insider trading. Sr. No. Par culars 31.03.2023 31.12.2022 31.03.2022 31.03.2023 31.03.2022
market regulator had issued an helm of affairs in price-sensitive After receiving a show cause (Audited) (Unaudited) (Audited) (Audited) (Audited)
order against entities for car- the company. information. Sebi notice from the markets regu- Revenue From Opera ons 14,295.96 13,800.15 11,251.47 54,863.16 41,748.51
rying out insider trading activ- Essentially, price-sensitive said information related to the lator, Goenka filed an applica- Profit Before Tax 5,930.60 5,829.42 4,399.09 22,789.15 16,735.04
ities in the shares of Zee Enter- information refers to informa- launch of ZEEPLEX was a pos- tion for settlement, without Profit A er Tax 4,270.98 4,322.56 3,460.07 16,860.11 12,679.86
tainment following the launch tion that should not be availa- itive development about the admitting or denying the find- Total Comprehensive Income for the period/year
of rent-a-movie service, ZEE- ble in public domain, such as company’s expansion plans, ings and conclusions of law. (comprising profit for the period/year a er tax and 4,267.49 4,309.34 3,479.67 16,775.61 12,687.99
other comprehensive income a er tax
Paid - up capital (per value of Rs. 5/- each fully paid ) 2,084.41 2,084.41 2,080.81 2,084.41 2,080.81

Private Wealth. uncomplicated Excellent Returns of Other Equity

Earning per share (par value of Rs. 5/- each)*
44,738.79 32,285.87
CIN: L67120MH1995PLC086696
ANAND RATHI WEALTH LIMITED
“AMFI-Registered Mutual Fund Distributor”
42% on the investment 1. Basic (Rs.) 10.25 10.38 8.32 40.46 30.50

CORRIGENDUM of 55 lakhs. 2 .Diluted (Rs.) 10.20 10.35 8.29 40.28 30.38

W.r.t. public announcement of Results In Two Years on the Flat Notes

* EPS is not annualised for the quarter ended periods.
1. The above results were reviewed by the audit commi ee and approved by the Board of Directors at their respec ve mee ngs held on April 12, 2023 and have
for Quarter & Year Ended March 31,
2023, of ANAND RATHI WEALTH in Mumbai with buy back been audited by the statutory auditors of the company.
2. The above is extract of the detailed format of Audited Financial Results ( Consolidated ) for the Quarter and Year ended March 31, 2023 filed with the Stock
LIMITED on April 12, 2023, published
on April 13, 2023. It is clarified there
scheme Guaranteed Exchanges under Regula on 33 of the SEBI (Lis ng and Other Disclosure Requirements) Regula ons, 2015. The full format of the Audited Financial Results (

Returns by the end of

Consolidated and Standalone ) for the Quarter and Year ended March 31, 2023 are available on the websites of the Bombay Stock Exchange i.e bseindia.com,
was a certain inadvertent Na onal Stock Exchange i.e. nseindia.com and the Company i.e. www.anandrathiwealth.in.
typographical error. Please read the
audited year-ended date as
31.03.2023 instead of 31.03.2022 in
second year 23.10 lakh. 3. The Board of Directors have proposed a final dividend of ₹ 7/- per equity share for the year ended March 31, 2023, subject to the approval of the shareholders at
the ensuing Annual General Mee ng.
the 1st column of ‘Year Ended’ section Total 78.10 lakh with 4. Extract of Key numbers of Audited Standalone Finaicial Results

for both consolidated & standalone

results. Other than this correction, Security & PDC. Cheque. Sr. No. Par culars 31.03.2023
Quarter Ended
31.12.2022 31.03.2022
Year Ended
31.03.2023 31.03.2022
there is no change in the results. (Audited) (Unaudited) (Audited) (Audited) (Audited)
For Anand Rathi Wealth Limited Call:8369683842 Revenue From Opera ons 13,715.77 13,298.71 10,888.54 52,997.04 40,365.50
Sd/- Profit Before Tax
Date: 14 April 2023 5,874.86 5,790.24 4,341.31 22,626.32 16,595.45
Anand Rathi
Place: Mumbai Chairman Profit A er Tax 4,318.64 4,289.54 3,403.38 16,818.36 12,544.83
Date: April 12, 2023 Sd
Place: Mumbai Anand Rathi
Chairman & Non Execu ve Director

NOTICE INVITING E-TENDER

The Deputy General Manager (Material Management), TSECL, Agartala invites the
tender on behalf of TSECL for procurement of following items :
i. XLPE cable of different sizes ii. Reel Insulators iii. Danger plate.
Details of tender will be available in website https://tripuratenders.gov.in/nicgep/app
Deputy General Manager (MM)
M. M. Division, TSECL
Bidyut Bhawan, Agartala

BRIHANMUMBAI MUNICIPAL CORPORATION

TREE AUTHORITY
PUBLIC NOTICE
In accordance with the provision under section 8(3) (C) of the BRIHANMUMBAI MUNICIPAL CORPORATION
Maharashtra (Urban Areas) Protection & Preservation of Trees Act 1975 The Pest Control Office H/West Ward Office, Ground Floor,
(As modified upto January 2018) 06 proposal from ‘L’ Ward , 01 proposal Room No. 04, 2nd Hasanabad Lane, Khar (W),
from ‘M/West’ Ward in Zone - V and 03 proposals from ‘T’ Ward in Zone Mumbai - 400 050.
- VI i.e. Total 10 proposals are received for getting approval of Tree Tel. No. 022-26422311 Ext. 619,620,621
Authority / Municipal Commissioner, Chairman, Tree Authority for No. : AC/HW/38/PCO/E Date : 13.04.2023
removal of dead & dangerous trees.
The information of the trees for Cutting / Transplanting in above NOTICE
mentioned dead & dangerous trees proposal is available on BMC Applications are invited from registered Sahakari / Berojgar Seva

website - https://portal.mcgm.gov.in/ - About us Ward / Department
Manuals /Gardens & Tree Authority 461 - Adv -7 days - Z-V, VI
On account of pandemic Covid -19, citizens are requested to send
the objections / suggestions on Email- sg.gardens@mcgm.gov.in on
or before dt. 24/04/2023 only instead of attending hearing personally.
Objections / suggestions received after this date will not be entertained
which may please may noted.
Supdt. of Gardens & Tree Officer of the Tree Authority
Penguin Building, 2nd Floor,
Veermata Jijabai Bhosale Botanical Garden
Dr. Ambedkar Road, Byculla (E), Mumbai - 400 027
Tel . No. 23742162 Email- sg.gardens@mcgm.gov.in
Sd/-
PRO/95/ADV/2023-24 Supdt. of Gardens & Tree Officer
Fever? Act now, see your doctor for correct & complete treatment.
Thank You!
Sahakari Sansthas, which are registered under the Maharashtra Co-Op.
Society Act. 1960 (whose motto is to provide jobs to unemployed Today, we take this opportunity to
persons) for providing 33 Volunteers for Insecticidal treatment at Building
Construction sites for the period of 07 Months in H/West ward.
Thank all our Clients, Investors and our
Interested Sansthas should download applications on M.C.G.M. Employees for being a part of our success journey.
portal http://portal.mcgm.gov.in or contact at the office of the Pest
Control Officer, Office address: The Pest Control Office H/West Ward
Office, Ground Floor, Room No. 04, 2nd Hasanabad Lane, Khar (W),
Mumbai - 400 052. Tel. No. 022-26008737 Ext. 619,620,621.
The last date for submission of applications at the office of Pest
Control Officer is Dt. 24.04.2023 before 02:00 p.m. on working days.
www.anandrathiwealth.in
PRO/101/ADV/2023-24
Sd/-
Asst. Commissioner - H/West Ward
Private Wealth. uncomplicated
Let’s together and make Mumbai Malaria free.
06 FridAy, 14 April 2023
MuMbAi CORPORATE LIVEMINT.COM

Apple’s
India push Tur prices up 22% in Q4, may m
MOVES
gets $7 bn
output boost
rise further on tight supply A weekly list of C-Suiters who have moved up
the corporate ladder either within or outside
their companies.

Ajay Appointed as chief financial officer

FROM PAGE 1 Goel at Byju's

latest iPhone 14 in the country.
That’s helped place Apple at
the heart of India’s ambitions
to become a major manufac-
turing hub and alternative
location to China. Apple is
among the world’s most exact-
Tur production is likely to fall by 20-30% due to factors such as unseasonal rain in October Akshay Appointed as vice-president and
Kapoor chief marketing officer at DLF
Puja Das in April is expected to moderate to 3.9% Archana Designated as chief human
puja.das@livemint.com On the wane on year from 5.1% in March, said Gaura Shiroor resources officer at Yes Bank
NEw DElhI The production of tur dal has been Sengupta, an economist at IDFC First
falling over the years Ashwani Appointed as chief commercial
Bank. officer-logistics at DP World India
Nath

ing when it comes to manufac-
turing: its production chain
encompasses hundreds of
companies across the world
and employs millions, much of
that now in China.
The migration of iPhone
production represents an eco-
nomic triumph for India that
could have implications for
how other US brands plan
their futures.
For Apple, the country itself
represents a fount of future
growth, at a time the Chinese
economy is sputtering after
years of punishing Covid Zero
restrictions.
Apple will open its first two
retail stores in India next week,
one in the financial hub of
Mumbai and another in the
capital New Delhi. Chief Exec-
utive Tim Cook is scheduled to
fly in to personally inaugurate
the two stores, underscoring
the domestic market’s rising
importance.
Cupertino, California-head-
P
rices of mill-quality tur (arhar Production (in million tonnes) Monsoon performance will be a key
or pigeon peas) have experi- factor in determining the food inflation Appointed as partner people and
enced a sharp increase in the 4.3 4.2 trajectory in FY24. Though the first Chaitali organization performance
March quarter and are 3.9 forecast on monsoon by IMD indicates Mukherjee practice at McKinsey
expected to rise further, 3.7 a normal monsoon, the risk persists with
driven by an anticipated decrease in 3.3 the likelihood of El Nino developing Kamini Appointed as chief financial officer
domestic supply. during the monsoon season. Shah at Birlasoft
Tur production is expected to fall by “The impact on food inflation will
20-30% due to factors such as unsea- depend on a confluence of factors such Appointed as vice president and
Kamolika
sonal rainfall in October and farmers as monsoon distribution (temporal and managing director for Indian
shifting to cultivating crops such as soy- spatial), rural wage growth and global Gupta Peres sub-continent at ServiceNow
bean and cotton. This has raised con- food inflation. There have been periods
Appointed as executive director
cerns over insufficient stocks in the cen- in the past when monsoon was weak, but Kapil and chief financial officer
tral pool and driven up tur prices by 22% 2018-19 2019-20 2020-21 2021-22 2022-23*
food inflation moderated as rural wage Maheshwari at Welspun New Energy
in the past three months and 32% over Crop year (July-June) growth slowed and global food inflation
the past year, industry officials said. was softer. For now, we expect normal
Key wholesale markets in Maharash-
*As per second advance estimate
Source: Union ministry of agriculture monsoon and headline CPI inflation to Kapila Appointed as marketing director
Sethi at William Grant & Sons
tra, the largest tur grower, reported mill- average at 5.5% in FY24,” Sengupta said.
quality tur trading at ₹8,400-8,500 per Rising prices of certain agriculture Lokesh Appointed as head human
quintal, against the minimum support markets of Karnataka, Maharashtra and 8 - 1 0 % a n d h o v e r a t a r o u n d commodities such as milk, sugar and resources at Reliance Retail
price of ₹6,600 a quintal, according to Gujarat are pegging at 21,000-25,000 ₹9,300-9,500 a quintal by July-August pulses, coupled with deficient rainfall
Sikka
spot market sources. This marks a sig- quintals, which is seen falling to when there is clarity about monsoon during the monsoon season because of
nificant increase from last year’s corre- 10,000-12,000 quintals by June,” said rainfall. The spike will depend on how El a possible El Nino weather pattern,
sponding period, during which fair Indrajit Paul, assistant general manager Nino impacts monsoon and next year’s could stoke inflation further in India,
average quality (FAQ) tur variety was at DeHaat, an agri-tech company. “Sup- kharif sowing,” said Tarun Satsangi, potentially forcing the Reserve Bank of
sold at ₹6,000-6,231 per quintal, as per ply this season remains 25-30% lower agriculture research head at Origo India to keep interest rates higher for
data from the government’s agriculture than last year.”
marketing portal Agmarknet.
“Rainfall in October damaged
Commodities India Pvt. Ltd, an agri- longer. Further, surging food prices may

ON ThE bOIl
jeopardize the central bank’s efforts
to keep the economy growing.
Manika
Awasthi

Mrinall
Kanti Dey

Murali
m Appointed as head human
resources at Compass Group India

Appointed as vice-president
public relations & corporate
communications at MobiKwik
Appointed as human resources
head-mines at ArcelorMittal

quartered Apple has also
sought changes in India’s labor
laws as part of its effort to
expand local production and
create mega factories.
Its largest contract manu-
facturer, Foxconn, plans to
invest about $700 million on a
plant in a southern state to
make phone components and
possibly iPhones.
Foxconn, Wistron and
Pegatron representatives
didn’t immediately respond to
requests for comment.
MOVES
standing tur crop in Maharashtra, Tur, a crucial kharif variety, Sahoo Nippon Steel India
which is likely to reduce yield by TuR production in RAINfAll in Oct INflATION in the PRICES of certain accounts for 13% of India’s pulses
20%, weighing on India’s total pro- 2022-23 (July-June) is
estimated to decline
damaged standing
tur crop in
pulses category has
been steadily
farm commodities
are likely to rise
basket. India heavily depends on Preeti Appointed as human resources
duction this year,” said Naresh to 3.7 mt from 4.2 mt Maharashtra, which increasing over the because of El Nino Myanmar, Tanzania, Mozambique, Ahuja leader India at Atlas Copco
Biyani, Akola-based Radha Udyog, in the previous year may cut yield by 20% past few month weather pattern Malawi and other East African coun-
a processor of pulses. tries to meet its domestic consump- Appointed as managing director
Tur production in 2022-23 (July- tion of about 4.2-4.5 mt of tur. India, Rajan and chief executive officer at
June) is estimated to decline to 3.7 mil- Inflation in the pulses category has tech company. in April-January of FY23, imported Gupta Orient Electric
lion tonnes (mt) from 4.2 mt in the previ- been steadily increasing over the past Daily food prices in the first half of 731,349 tonnes of tur, according to the
ous year, according to the second few months, with a 4.3% rise in March April indicate a drop in vegetable and latest data by the commerce ministry. Rajan Appointed as chief executive
advance estimate by the agriculture from a year earlier. Pulses inflation edible oil prices compared to March. Tur has a share of 45% of India’s total Kohli officer at CitiusTech
ministry. However, the industry expects made up 4% of food and beverages infla- Meanwhile, a pickup is witnessed in the pulses import basket.
output to be even lower at 2.7-2.8 mt for tion for the month, compared to an aver- prices of pulses in the first two weeks of Queries sent to the food ministry and Appointed as director corporate
Rajeev strategy and business
the year. age contribution of less than 2% in 2022. April. consumer affairs ministry remained Sonthalia
“Currently, daily supply of tur in key “Tur prices may firm up further by Overall, food and beverages inflation unanswered till press time. development at Aditya Birla Group

Appointed as chief operating

Ravi
officer and business head Smart
Kuppuraj
Comcast makes big India bet
Wearables at Titan
India’s exports hit record high Sabaleel
Nandy
Appointed as chief executive
officer chemicals business at DCM

via Murdoch-Shankar’s Bodhi
FROM PAGE 1
condition of anonymity. “Bodhi
Tree will continue to raise
funds and will invest as and
when they close more fund-
ing.”
Post investment, in equity
terms, TV18 will continue to
hold 50.994% in Viacom18,
while Paramount Global (erst-
while ViacomCBS) will own
48.994%; and Bodhi Tree will
get a 0.011% in the company.
Most of the funding will go
into Reliance and Bodhi Tree
getting Compulsorily Convert-
ible Preference Shares or CCPS
in the ratio of 82.2% and 17.8%,
respectively. If and when Bodhi
Tree manages to raise more
funds, it will increase its share
in CCPS.
On a fully diluted basis, RIL
group entities will own 60.37%,
while Reliance-controlled
TV18 will own another 13.54%
in Viacom18. Both Bodhi Tree
Uday Shankar and James
Murdoch run Bodhi Tree, an
investment vehicle
Reliance and Viacom18 first
announced a partnership with
Bodhi Tree Systems on 27 April
2022 to form one of the largest
TV and digital streaming com-
panies in India. As part of the
deal, while Bodhi Tree com-
mitted to investing ₹13,500
crore with a consortium of
investors, Reliance was to
invest ₹1,645 crore. In addition,
provide Viacom18 cash worth
₹15,415 crore to “innovate and
disrupt” the media and enter-
tainment sector, the company
said. The company has also
appointed Uday Shankar to the
Board of Viacom18.
One of the persons said that
Comcast’s funds are expected
to come in by June, which will
allow Bodhi Tree to take its
shareholding to 16% in Via-
com18. Apart from being US’s
largest cable and home internet
service provider, Comcast also
owns Universal Studios, video
streaming service Peacock,
Universal theme parks, as well
as broadcast and cable chan-
nels like CNBC, Telemundo,
and MSNBC. In 2018, it
acquired a majority stake in Sky
after buying Rupert Murdoch’s
39% stake in the European
broadcaster.
Bodhi Tree Systems is a plat-
form run by Murdoch’s Lupa
Systems and former Walt Dis-
FROM PAGE 1
imports, at $259.3 billion for
FY23, use up foreign exchange
the most. “They contributed
36.3% of India’s merchandise
import bill. But more worri-
some is the high rate of growth
in imports. Energy imports
grew 34% in FY23 over the
previous year. In contrast,
imports of remaining mer-
chandise goods grew at just
8.4%,” Srivastava added.
Experts said goods exports
may come under pressure in
the current financial year as
economic activity slows and
demand cools across the globe.
“Although India’s merchan-
dise exports rose by 6% to
touch a record $447.5 billion
in FY2023, non-oil exports
declined marginally by 0.5%,
following the slackening
external demand owing to the
global slowdown in the second
half of FY23 as well as the
moderation in global com-
modity prices. These concerns
are set to exacerbate in
Goods imports rose over 16%
to touch $714 billion MINT
during the fiscal. This will
weigh on the performance of
the manufacturing sector and
act as a drag on GDP growth,”
Aditi Nayar, chief economist
and head, research and out-
reach, ICRA Ltd.
Even as imports from China
rose 4% to $98 billion during
FY23 from $94.57 billion a
year earlier, its share in overall
imports fell to 13.8% from
15.4%. Meanwhile, China
remained the largest exporter
Barthwal said India has man-
aged to cross last year’s export
Satish
Mohapatra
Appointed as head of central human
resources at Maruti Suzuki India
numbers despite global head-
winds.“The decline in Chinese
Suresh Appointed as chief delivery officer
imports is because we have at Sonata Software
been focusing on the sector H.P.
from where there has been a Appointed as chief human
large number of imports, par- Vijayalakshmi R. resources officer at Trianz
ticularly from the electronic
sector. There was a large num- Vinay Appointed as chief marketing
ber of imports coming from Subramanyam officer at Kellogg IndiaO
China. We are building our
competitive advantage. We Source: Accord India, executive search worldwide
are also working on reducing
dependence on China and
diversification of our value
chain so that import depend-
ence on particular countries
can decline. Similarly, we are
trying to diversify our
WhatsApp revises
exports,” an official stated.
The US continued to be
India’s largest merchandise
verification to use
export destination, with
exports worth $78.31 billion,
up over 2% from the previous
last financial year. The US was
app on new device
followed by the UAE, the PTI the same way a virus infects a
Netherlands, China, Singa- feedback@livemint.com computer.
pore and Bangladesh. The NEw DElhI “Malware is used to advance
Netherlands saw the sharpest account takeover (ATO) attacks

and Paramount Global will
have 13.08% and 13.01%,
respectively.
the JioCinema OTT app was
transferred to Viacom18.
The new development will
ney Co. Asia Pacific president
and Star and Disney India
chairman Uday Shankar.
FY2024 and are expected to
lead to a deeper contraction in
India’s merchandise exports
to India, followed by the UAE,
US, Russia and Saudi Arabia.
Commerce secretary Sunil
I
jump of 66% last financial year, nstant messaging platform that send messages without the
driven by exports of petroleum WhatsApp users may need to user’s knowledge or permis-
products. switch on their old phone to sion. In our ongoing effort to
verify themselves for using the safeguard peoples’ accounts
app on a new device, the com- and information on WhatsApp,
pany said on Thursday. we’re introducing a new secu-

In this worker vs. bot battle, humans are winning by a mile
FROM PAGE 1
rium is unnecessary. But he
acknowledges his technol-
ogy’s potential to harm peo-
ple’s careers.
Part of the solution, he
recently told The Wall Street
Journal, could be a govern-
ment-funded, universal basic
income that pays people
regardless of whether they
work.
Melissa Werneck, global
chief people officer of Kraft
Heinz Co., tells me the possible
effects of AI tools on her com-
pany’s 37,000 employees
unnerve her.
“It’s a growth opportunity,
but that’s what’s keeping me
awake at night—how to use
them as a co-pilot, not an auto-
pilot,” she says.
Benign uses could include
speeding translations in multi-
lingual factories and scanning
drafts of the company’s job lis-
tings for phrases that might
inadvertently discourage
minority applicants, she adds.
Both scenarios feature AI in
subordinate roles, but some
companies view bots as future
decision makers that need
human helpers for now. Resi-
dent Home LLC, which sells
mattresses under the Nectar,
DreamCloud and other brand
names, leans on artificial intel-
ligence to manage a roughly
$200 million marketing bud-
get.
Why pay the likes of Don
Draper to divine what custom-
ers want when a computer can
analyze their shopping habits
and set an advertising strat-
egy?
“You do need a person to
watch over and make sure the
machine is reading the data
correctly,” says Chief Execu-
tive Ran Reske, but he expects
AI proponents often claim that technology will make people
more efficient and free them from drudge work to do higher-
level tasks.
full automation is coming.
“We’ll probably be able to
get there. I love AI. Let’s be
extremely clear about this. But
it’s not 100% there yet.”
BLOOMBERG
Resident Home is a client of
Feel, the supplier of live sales
reps who chat with online
shoppers.
This is largely because its
In addition to this, the com- rity measure—called Device
pany will be rolling out two new Verification—to help prevent
features, including device veri- ATO attacks,” the company
fication to help prevent mal- said. Device Verification blocks
experiments with automated death of her service dog one ware from taking over the the attacker’s connection while
responses to customers’ ques- day.” WhatsApp account and send- allowing the victim to use their
tions have been unsuccessful That kind of personal ing out messages without the WhatsApp account uninter-
so far. Mr. Reske says AI touch—and its ability to drive user’s knowledge rupted, it said.
answers are usually on point at sales—is part of what attracts or permission. Meta-owned Meta-owned
first but seem increasingly venture capitalists like Scott “If you need to firms will roll out firms will roll out
canned as chats progress, ulti- Cohen. switch your automatic Automatic Secu-
mately turning off customers. The partner at Aviv Growth W h a t s A p p security codes to rity Codes to help
Some human Partners adds account to a new
ensure that users ensure that users
sales associates Some insist that that intuition also device – we want are chatting with
insist they don’t they don’t sense influences his to double-check are chatting with the intended
sense constant constant pressure investment deci- that it’s really you. the right recipient recipient.
pressure to out- to outperform AI. sions, even as he From now on, we “You can check
perform AI. They
They feel qualities predicts artificial may ask you on this manually by
maintain that cer- intelligence will your old device to verify that going to the Encryption tab
tain qualities are like human touch impact his own you want to take this step as an under a contact’s info. To make
simply irreplace- are irreplaceable. job at some point. extra security check. This fea- this process more accessible to
able. “I guarantee an ture can help alert you to an everyone, we’re rolling out a
“Humans crave artificial-intelli- unauthorised attempt to move security feature based on a pro-
other humans, and I think that gence program somewhere is your account to another cess called ‘Key Transparency’
interaction is always going to making investment decisions device,” WhatsApp said in a that allows you to automatically
be something that AI will in startups,” he says. “I statement. The move provides verify that you have a secure
never come close to,” says Brit- wouldn’t quite say we’re all on an extra layer of security to connection. When you click on
tany Arnold, who sells fashion notice, but all of us need to be WhatsApp users. the encryption tab, you’ll be
and home goods for some of paying attention.” WhatsApp said that it is con- able to verify right away that
Feel’s retail clients. ©2023 DOW JONES & COM- cerned about malware that your personal conversation is
“I helped a lady mourn the PANY, INC infects a mobile phone in much secured,” the firm said.
LIVEMINT.COM CORPORATE FRidAy, 14 ApRil 2023
MuMbAi 07

SUVs top draw in PVs as THE MYSTERY OF THE TASMANIAN TIGER

hiker, or you or me? They looked for “spikes” in the reporting

auto sales climb in FY23 A M AT T E R

OF NUMBERS
numbers; one they found, in 1970, probably happened because
of “media attention linked to a well-publicized expedition” to
search for the thylacine. Brooks referred to this as “recency
bias”.
Put simply, all the sighting reports in the database are not
DILIP D’SOUZA equally reliable. As Brooks and his team commented, trying to
decide the reliability of the sightings is “the most vexing diffi-
Respond to this column at culty with a scientific mystery like this”.
However, sales of entry-level cars almost halved during the period: SIAM feedback@livemint.com For example, clearly an actual sighting of the animal—like
Hans Naarding reported—should carry more weight than a

A
bout the only reason the Tasmanian Tiger is—or was?— mere footprint. And in fact, Brook’s team gave the Sleeping
Alisha Sachdev called a “tiger” is that it has stripes on its body. Other Beauty sighting a low rating, meaning it was unlikely to be true.
Ebb and Flow
alisha.sachdev@livemint.com than that, nothing. It is not a tiger, nor is it even related Then possible “copycat” sightings, or recency bias, should be
new delhi
While commercial vehicles may post record performance in FY24, two- and three-wheelers to tigers or any cats. Also known as the Tasmanian Wolf, it cer- rated lower than others. But again, there are some clusters of
will have to drive up volumes to recover the losses of the covid years.
tainly looks more like a wolf than a tiger. Yet, it isn’t a wolf sightings that are close in both space and time, with similar

A
utomobile sales across seg- Financial Year (April- March) CAGR (in %) either. Instead, it is a marsupial: like the kangaroo or koala, the descriptions of the animal, but that may not be copycats. If these
ments in FY23 grew from the Passenger Vehicles Commercial Vehicles Tasmanian Tiger carries its young in a pouch. That explains the were multiple sightings of the same thylacine by different peo-
4,000 1,200
year earlier, data released by -1.13 animal’s other name, thylacine—from the Greek word for a ple, that must warrant a higher rating.
3.60
the Society of Indian Auto- 3,000 900 pouch, thylakos. With detailed and careful analysis, Brook and his co-re-
mobile Manufacturers (SIAM) Or again, should those words be “was” and “carried” and so searchers were able to give each report in the database a rating.
2,000 600
on Thursday showed. However, the pas- on—that is, should that paragraph have been written in the past To more fully comprehend what they were attempting, think
senger vehicles segment, driven by sport 1,000 300 tense? Because the last Tasmanian Tiger died many decades about what we mean when we say a particular species went
utility vehicles (SUVs), saw sales above ago. Seen as pests and a threat to livestock on the island of Tas- extinct at a specific time. Such a conclusion follows an essen-
0 0
pre-pandemic levels. FY18-19 FY19-20 FY20-21 FY21-22 FY22-23 FY18-19 FY19-20 FY20-21 FY21-22 FY22-23 mania, they were widely hunted. The last of the species died at tially statistical process. The sightings grow rarer, and after a
However, SIAM expects non-passenger the zoo in Hobart, Tasmania, in 1936. Pest or not, the thylacine point stop altogether. But if a
vehicle category to do far better in FY24.
800
Three Wheelers
24,000
Two Wheelers is such a cultural icon in Australia that the country observes Uncertainty reported sighting doesn’t involve the
The apex industry body counts factory -8.62 -6.97 National Threatened Species Day every 7 September, the day modelling actual capture of the animal, then
dispatches to dealers as sales. in 1936 when the thylacine went into extinction. there is a question about how much
Passenger vehicle sales grew nearly 27%
600 18,000
Or did it? Reminiscent of the Loch Ness Monster, there have suggests the weight it should carry. In effect, what
in FY23 from a year earlier, while com- 400 12,000 been plenty of reports of sightings of thylacine since 1936. thylacine may is the probability that that sighting
mercial vehicles grew 34%, two-wheelers 200 6,000 For example, one night in 1982, a wildlife ranger called Hans have died out in was authentic? These probabilities
14.4% and three-wheelers at 18%, data
0 0
Naarding was sleeping in his car in a forest in a remote part of the 21st century feed into certain mathematical tech-
showed. FY18-19 FY19-20 FY20-21 FY21-22 FY22-23 FY18-19 FY19-20 FY20-21 FY21-22 FY22-23
Tasmania. Heavy rain woke him at 2 am. He turned on his torch niques, known as “extinction date
While passenger vehicle sales were just Source: SIAM
and swept the beam around him. To his astonishment, the beam estimators” (EDE).
1.5% above the pre-pandemic peak in caught a thylacine, about six or seven metres away. It was an Brook and his team used their ratings with two different
SATISH KUMAR/MINT
FY19, two-wheeler sales (at 3.89 million adult male, he reported later, “with 12 black stripes on a sandy EDEs. Both are able to work with “cases where sighting fre-
units versus 3.37 million units in FY19), “We are starting to get indications that the 3.89 million total PV sales in FY23, coat”. quency declines over time and (there are) sparse sighting
were still at their lowest levels since FY15, the monsoon this year will be normal as passenger cars still accounted for 2.52 Then in July 2019, a hiker was climbing up to Sleeping Beauty records”.
while for three-wheelers, FY23 volumes well, which will be a positive for the auto million units. The decline in passenger car Mountain, west of Hobart. He saw a footprint that he later Goo- First, though, they fed the EDEs of only those sightings that
were lowest in over a decade. sector”, Aggarwal added. volumes was made up by a 34% jump in gled. He was convinced it was made by a thylacine. reported a physical specimen of the Tasmanian Tiger. No sur-
For commercial vehicles, however, vol- While commercial vehicles could see SUV volumes. These were just two of over 1,200 reported sightings of Tas- prise, the dates that popped up were pre-1940, matching the
umes in the last financial year were close the best-ever year in FY24, for two-and Sales of motorcycles below the 110cc manian Tigers all over Tasmania between 1910 and 2019. Barry 1936 death of the last-known thylacine.
to the FY19 peaks on an overall basis, even three-wheeler segments it will still be category declined 38% compared to their Brook, a mammal ecologist at the University of Tasmania, has But then they opened up the EDEs to “unverified expert
surpassing peak volumes in certain sub- bridging the gap to cover up the volumes peak pre-pandemic levels, while 1255 cc compiled all these reports into what is known as the Tasmanian reports and other opportunistic sightings by the public”. While
segments. and below categories fell 27%. Thylacine Sighting Records Database. of course these were not as reliable as physical specimen sight-
“We see good room for riding oUt the Storm Sales of mopeds fell 50% dur- Why am I telling you about this possibly extinct animal, and ings, they represented a range of ratings. What the EDEs then
growth in FY24, with some ing the same period. this database, in a column that’s ostensibly about mathematics? reported was a great surprise: “The extinction window spans a
segments witnessing moder- PaSSenger For commercial total exports fell Global uncertainties have Because Brooks and his colleagues used that database to esti- later period, from the 1980s to the present.”
ate growth, while others will vehicle sales
grew nearly 27%
vehicles, volumes
in the last financial
26% due to a drop in
the motorcycle and
also impacted export demand, mate the thylacine’s date of extinction. The date they suggest That is, this “uncertainty modelling” suggests that the thyla-
grow faster,” Vinod Aggarwal, in FY23 from a year were close to three-wheeler with volumes declining in is a serious surprise. More about that in a bit. But intriguingly, cine died out much later than 1936, possibly as recently as the
president, SIAM, said in an year earlier the FY19 peaks segments FY23 across segments barring they came to their conclusion after a statistical analysis of the early years of the 21st century. But if that came as a great shock
interview. PVs. Total exports fell 26% due database (Extinction of the Thylacine, Barry Brook et al., bioRxiv, to wildlife conservationists, there was something still more
“The overall picture in FY23 to a significant drop observed 19 January 2021, https://bit.ly/3zTeHMz). astonishing this analysis threw up.
was very positive and the industry is now they have lost in the wake of the covid-19 in the motorcycle and three-wheeler seg- As they write in their paper, they “collate and characterize the Brooks thinks his model offers a chance —if a small one—that
headed in the direction of further growth pandemic and rising prices, he said. ments. In comparison to March 2022, type, quality and uncertainty” of all those reported sightings in in some remote wilderness area of south-western Tasmania, the
on the back of a positive economic fore- According to SIAM, challenges in motorcycles and three-wheelers have the database. They dated each one and located it on a map. They thylacine lives on even today.
cast, high level of infrastructure invest- entry-level segments continued across experienced a decline of 39% and 50%, broke them down into categories, like those that were actual Mathematics that tells us things about extinction: It’s enough
ments and the expectations that income categories in FY23. Passenger car volumes respectively. specimens of the animal, or just signs of its presence (like the to make me want to go searching for the Tasmanian Tiger in its
levels of customers will be stable and (including hatchbacks, mini and compact SIAM data showed sales for entry-level Sleeping Beauty footprint). They classified the sightings island homeland. One of these days.
good. It also seems inflation is coming cars) fell further in FY23, and are now 57% categories across segments have almost according to the person reporting it: was she an expert in the Once a computer scientist, Dilip D’Souza now lives in Mumbai
under control now.” below their FY17 peaks. However, out of halved in FY23. field —a trapper, a scientist?—or just a casual observer like a and writes for his dinners. His Twitter handle is @DeathEndsFun.

DELHI JAL BOARD (Govt. of NCT of Delhi)

OFFICE OF THE ACE (DR.) PROJECT-III
THROUGH EXECUTIVE ENGINEER (C) DR.VIII
Yamuna Vihar Sewage Treatment Plant (Adjoining Dr. Ambedkar College), Delhi - 110094
PHONE : 011-22813593, e-mail:- eecdr8@gmail.com
PRESS NIT NO. 01 (2023-24)
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No. Contract Value Money processing Fee Tender/ Tender Id time of
(ECV)/ Amount put (EMD) Non Refundable receipt of
to tender (Rs.) (Rs.) (Rs.) tender
1. Providing/Laying/Jointing of 150 mm 6,47,22,822/- 12,95,000/- 1500/- 2023_DJB_ 28.04.2023
dia. Sludge line from 7 MGD STP Sonia 239632_1 up to
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ISSUED BY P.R.O. (WATER) Stop Corona: Wash Your Hand, Wear Mask,
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M.P. MADHYA KSHETRA VIDYUT VITARAN CO. LTD.

DALIT WRITING’S
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NEW VOICES Marking Dalit History Month, Lounge spotlights
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08 FridAy, 14 April 2023
MuMbAi NEWS WRAP LIVEMINT.COM

TWEETS & QUOTES

Faris H Hadad-Zervos Sangita Reddy Vinod Aggarwal
Atishi Country director for Maldives, Joint MD, President, SIAM
Education minister, Delhi Nepal & Sri Lanka, World Bank Apollo Hospitals Group If you look at the overall demand
There are 12 colleges that Economic crisis in Sri Lanka is I welcome the revision in (of automobile), it is growing and
are fully funded by Delhi estimated to have pushed an CGHS rates after almost it is moving in the right direction.
govt. We allocated ₹400 cr additional 2.5mn people into a decade. This will go a So, therefore, we should remain
for these colleges & the poverty. Better-targeted social long way in addressing very positive about the further
first quarter of the fund of assistance is a must to protect better access to health- growth in the demand in the
₹100 cr has been released poor & vulnerable communities care current year...We are very positive

India Inc’s Q4 topline DANCE DELIGHT IOC top bidder for

growth to halve: Crisil RIL’s KG-D6 gas
ndia Inc is likely to report a halving of tate-owned Indian Oil Corporation (IOC),

I revenue growth in the fourth quarter of

FY23, a credit rating agency said on
Thursday, as companies start reporting their
financials.
The revenue growth will come down to 10-
12% as against 22.8% for the January-March
period in the year-ago, Crisil’s Market
Intelligence and Analytics arm said.
For the full fiscal FY23, revenue is estimated
to have grown 19-21%, which is slower than
over 27% growth registered in FY22, it said,
adding that operating margin is likely to have
moderated by 3 percentage points.
The continuing headwinds to exports which
have had an impact on volume growth, and the
high-base were cited as the main reasons
which will cause the sharp slowdown in topline
growth for Q4FY23, Crisil, which analysed 300
companies across 47 sectors to arrive at the
expectations, said.
S Adani-Total Gas Ltd and Shell were
among the 29 companies that bid and
bought natural gas to be produced from the
deepest field in the KG-D6 block of Reliance
Industries Ltd and bp, sources said.
IOC walked away with almost half of the 6
million standard cubic metres per day of gas
sold in an e-auction while state-owned gas
utility GAIL bought 0.7 mmscmd, Adani-Total
Gas Ltd 0.4 mmscmd, Shell 0.5 mmscmd,
GSPC 0.25 mmscmd and IGS another 0.5
mmscmd, two sources with knowledge of the
matter said.
Reliance-bp on Wednesday held an e-
auction for sale of gas from the MJ field in their
eastern offshore KG-D6 block after
incorporating the government’s new
marketing rules to give CNG-selling city gas
companies first priority over supplies. PTI
PTI

Bihu dancers accomplish a remarkable feat by setting the Guinness World Record for the ‘largest Bihu performance in a single venue’ in Guwahati on
Thursday. Over 11,000 performers participated in the event at Sarusajai Stadium in Guwahati, a day ahead of Rongali Bihu festival. PTI

Coking coal production has risen to 54.6 million

After I-T, ED investigates BBC JSPL, the only private rail maker in India, will add a
new rail mill at its Odisha plant BLOOMBERG
tonnes in 2022-23.

Production of
REUTERS

over suspected forex breaches Jindal to expand

rail mfg capacity
coking coal up 17.2%
indal Steel and Power Ltd (JSPL), the third

C
oal India Ltd, the world’s largest coal
miner, reported a 17.2%rise in production
of coking coal, helping cut on imports of
the fuel that is an essential input for production
of iron and steel.
In a statement, Coal India said coking coal
Investigation under Foreign Exchange Management Act, notice to BBC in March: Report J largest private steelmaker in India,
announced on Thursday its plans to expand
its rail manufacturing capacity to 2.2 million
tonnes by commissioning a new rail mill in
Gireesh Chandra Prasad & Lata Jha unanswered at the time of publishing. like ‘discrepancies’ and failure to withhold tax but Odisha’s Angul. The company, which is the only
On 17 February, the I-T department issued a did not use the word ‘tax evasion,’ which usually private rail manufacturer in the country, stated

production has risen to 54.6 million tonnes in
2022-23, up 17.2%year-on-year growth
compared to 46.6 million tonnes in FY22 (April
2021 to March 2022).
“The quantum leap in the year was a
whopping 8 million tonnes,” it said, adding the
output was 107.3% of the target.
This assumes significance at a time when the
ministry of coal has asked the company to raise
the output of this category of coal to 105 million
tonnes by 2030 in a bid to reduce its imports and
forex outgo. BCCL and CCL, the two Jharkhand-
based subsidiaries of CIL, are major producers of
coking coal and together accounted for almost
the entire output of 54.3 million tonnes in 2022-
23.
Mineable reserves of coking coal, which is an
important feedstock in steel making, in India are
scarce. PTI
NTPC plans IPO for green energy arm, scraps stake sale plan
tate-run NTPC plans to come up with an initial public offering (IPO) for its
T
he Enforcement Directorate (ED),
responsible for investigating financial
irregularities, has launched an inquiry
into alleged foreign exchange rule viola-
tions by the British Broadcasting Corpo-
ration (BBC), according to a Reuters report. This
development follows the income-tax authorities’
survey on BBC’s Mumbai and Delhi offices in Feb-
ruary.
In the latest investigation being conducted
under India’s Foreign Exchange Management Act,
the probe agency issued a notice to the BBC in
March and questioned some employees earlier this
month, the report said quoting the people aware of
the matter.
There was no independent confirmation from
the finance ministry, the ED, the Prime Minister’s
Office or the BBC on the development. Emails sent
to them seeking comments for the story remained
statement without explicitly mentioning the BBC, figures in statements after search and survey oper- that the Odisha plant will have the capacity to
stating that a three-day survey conducted earlier at ations. produce 1.2 million tonnes of rails per year.
the business premises of a notable international PTI reported on Thursday ED has called for doc- Bimlendra Jha, managing director of JSPL,
media company revealed that the group’s entities’ uments and the recording of statements of some stated that the company is proactively adding
profits were not pro- company executives and increasing its rail manufacturing capacity to
portional to their under provisions of support the modernization of the Indian
scale of operations in Some reports said ED has called for FEMA. Railways network. He also expressed JSPL’s
India. The depart- documents and the recording of Earlier, several commitment to supporting the government’s
ment claimed that opposition politi- “Gati Shakti Yojna” initiative by providing
the survey—a statements of certain company cians had linked the domestically produced import substitution
method of gathering executives under provisions of FEMA tax survey to a docu- products at competitive prices.
information mentary aired by However, JSPL did not disclose the amount it
through official vis- BBC in the UK on the will invest for this project. MAYUR BHALERAO
its, albeit less stringent than searches—uncovered 2002 Gujarat riots, which was critical of Prime
evidence indicating unpaid taxes on specific remit- Minister Narendra Modi, the then chief minister of
tances that were not reported as income in India by the state. India’s information and broadcasting
the group’s foreign entities. In response, the BBC ministry had disallowed sharing of links of the doc-
stated it would continue to cooperate with the umentary on YouTube and Twitter.
AI’s new tow gear to
authorities. The tax department then used terms gireesh.p@livemint.com
cut A320s’ fuel use
ir India will use TaxiBot for its A320
Tata discoms
arm ranked top
A aircraft fleet at Delhi and Bengaluru
airports. The move has the potential to
save up to 15,000 tonnes of jet fuel in over three
years.

S subsidiary NTPC Green Energy Ltd (NGEL) as part of its targeted ₹6,000
crore asset monetization plan for FY24. he government ranked Tata Group-owned
The airline has entered into an agreement
with KSU Aviation to launch the TaxiBot
The development comes after talks with Malaysia-headquartered Petronas
for a stake sale failed to take off. The initial plan of the public sector thermal
power major was to sell up to 20% in its wholly-owned subsidiary through
T Tata Power’s distribution companies
(discoms) as the country’s top utilities firm
in the 11th Annual Integrated Ratings of Power
operations, according to a statement.
A semi-robotic equipment, the TaxiBot acts as
an extension of an aircraft’s nose landing gear.
private placement and later list the company. Distribution Utilities. It is used to tow aircraft from the airport
The official said that now NTPC has scrapped the plan for private placement, Tata discoms, which caters to at least 12 terminal gate to the taxi-out point and to tow
instead would look at listing the shares of NGEL in anticipation of better value. million consumers in the country, was rated on aircraft from the terminal gate after landing
“We will not go for a stake sale now as the scope of NGEL also has widened. It the basis of parameters including operational (taxi-in phase) without utilizing the aircraft’s
may be listed within this financial year,” the official said. and financial performance; regulatory engines. This will cut down jet fuel
NTPC Green Energy Ltd (NGEL), a wholly-owned subsidiary of NTPC Ltd, compliance; customer service; and energy consumption.
was incorporated in April last year. efficiency, among others. Air India CEO & MD Campbell Wilson said
Around 13 companies had shown initial interest in NTPC’s offer to sell stake Shares of Tata Power ended -0.41% lower at the airline is constantly looking for ways to
in NGEL including Brookfield Asset Management, Canada Pension Plan The plan was to sell 20% of the NTPC’s subsidiary through private 196.30 apiece on NSE in a weak Thursday improve sustainability and manage its carbon
Investment Board. RITURAJ BARUAH & SUBHASH NARAYAN placement and subsequently list the company. market. MAYUR BHALERAO footprint. PTI

Infosys projects weak sales outlook as clients take a cautious turn

FROM PAGE 1
fears of an economic slow-
down, the impact of higher
interest rates, and bank fail-
ures in the US and Europe.
Infosys’s larger rival, Tata Con-
sultancy Services, on Wednes-
day, reported weaker-than-an-
ticipated quarterly earnings
because of a spending slow-
down in North America.
In the March quarter, Infosys
reported a 1.6% contraction in
North American revenue from
the preceding three months.
Additionally, revenue from the
banking, financial services, and
insurance (BFSI) sector, which
accounted for almost 29% of
the company’s revenue,
declined by 1.7% sequentially.
Overall, March quarter net
profit rose 7.8% to ₹6,128 crore
from a year earlier but
declined 7% from the prece-
ding three months. Revenue
rose 16% to ₹37,441 crore from
a year earlier but fell 2.3% on a
sequential basis.
Omkar Tanksale, an analyst
at Axis Securities, said the
company missed Street expec-
tations on every metric. “The
Infosys figures are really disap-
pointing. The figures add fur-
ther to scepticism behind reve-
nue growth in IT services in
FY24. Infosys is known for
offering conservative gui-
dance. But, even with that, a
higher guidance range of 7%
shows clear weakness,” he said.
Ruchi Burde Mukhija, an
analyst at Elara Capital, said
that the quarterly numbers are
shocking.“Infosys itself missed
its own revised guidance that
was given three months ago.
Even the FY24 guidance is
very weak, and looking at the
compound quarterly growth
rate projection — which is 1.7%
to 2.8% — this comes against a
rate of 2.1%. So, the lower band
of growth does not give much
comfort. The growth guidance
implies risks for Infosys right
now,” she said.
Tanksale added that Info-
sys’s figures were significantly
more impacted by the BFSI
slowdown in North America
than that of TCS.
“Infosys could be the weak-
est IT result of the overall
bunch. TCS has retained a good
deal of value and revenue base,
and even the BFSI vertical was
Missing the mark
The company forecast annual revenue growth to range between 4%
and 7%, falling short of the average analyst estimate of nearly 11%.
Net profit (in ₹ crore)
6,586
6,128
5,686
Q4FY23 Q3FY23 Q4FY22
not hit as badly as Infosys. FY24
will definitely be a decline in
revenue growth momentum
for Infosys,” he said.
In Mumbai, shares of Infosys
fell 2.8% to ₹1,388.60, under-
gence) as a major initiative. Despite this, financial services
“We are building an in-house remained the largest revenue
generative AI platform to contributor, accounting for
streamline our internal opera- 28.9% of total revenue, followed
Order book tions for the software develop- by retail (14.8%), communication
(in $ billion)
ment applications and client- (11.8%), energy & utilities (12.9%),
3.3 specific use cases. manufacturing
Q3FY23 The AI projects Infosys’s (13.5%) and life sci-
2.1
Q4FY23 are based on both headcount ences (7.2%).
third-party dropped by 3,611 North America,
licensed tools employees in the however, saw a
2.3 and in-house use decline in revenue
March quarter,
Q4FY22 cases,” he said. contribution of
I n f o s y s although attrition 100 basis points,
Source: Exchange filings by Infosys
Salil Parekh, chief executive of reported a 3.2% reduced to 20.9%. while the Euro-
Infosys PTI sequential decline pean market grew
SARVESH KUMAR SHARMA/MINT
in constant cur- by 120 bps during
performing the 0.06% gain on gin guidance fell below expec- rency growth, with the total con- the quarter.
the BSE IT index. tations, implying a weak FY24. tract value of new deals drop- Infosys’s headcount dropped
Mitul Shah, head of Meanwhile, Parekh said that ping from an eight-quarter high by 3,611 employees in the
research, institutional equity Infosys is actively pursuing of $3.3 billion in the December March quarter, although attri-
at Reliance Securities, added new opportunities, including quarter to $2.1 billion in the tion reduced by 3.4 percentage
that revenue growth and mar- generative AI (artificial intelli- three months ended 31 March. points to 20.9%.
LIVEMINT.COM GLOBAL FridAy, 14 April 2023
MuMbAi 09

m MINT SHORTS
Apple to use 100% recycled cobalt
China softens stand on debt
in batteries by ’25 in net-zero move
Apple Inc said on Thursday it would use only recycled cobalt in
batteries by 2025 as a part of its efforts to make all its products China may drop demand that multilateral development banks take losses alongside other creditors in debt rejig
carbon neutral by the end of the decade. Magnets in Apple devi-
ces will use recycled rare earth elements, and in-house designed
printed circuit boards will use recycled tin soldering and gold Bloomberg Officials from a number of countries development banks in any debt
plating, the company said. Apple is pushing to become carbon feedback@livemint.com cautioned, however, that a major restructuring, arguing that any “hair-
neutral through its entire supply chain and the life cycle of every breakthrough is unlikely this week, cut” would undermine those bodies’

C
product by 2030. REUTERS hina is softening its stance
over how to restructure
billions of dollars of debt
Didi unveils autonomous car in held by poor nations,
offering a glimmer of
first big post-crackdown move progress in long-stalled talks over
unlocking desperately needed aid.
Discussions on Wednesday in
Washington during the World Bank
and International Monetary Fund’s
Spring Meetings were aimed at ending
a deadlock among the biggest creditor
nations on how to renegotiate poorer
nations’ debt, which had become
unsustainable amid surging inflation
and a stronger dollar.
Leaders including People’s Bank of
China Governor Yi Gang, World Bank
President David Malpass, IMF Manag-
Didi Global Inc. rolled out an autonomous car and self-driv- ing Director Kristalina Georgieva, US
ing taxi services Thursday, outlining its first big business Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen as
foray since becoming a central target of Beijing’s sweeping well as officials from G-20 host India
campaign to rein in powerful tech players.The company and Zambia—which is seeking debt
showcased a self-driving concept car called the Didi Neu- relief—attended Wednesday’s meet-
ron during a sleek press event, without saying when it will ing.
be available. “Didi’s self-driving taxi services are already A proposal under discussion would
available in specific areas of Shanghai and Guangzhou,” see the World Bank provide fresh low-
Chief Technology Officer Zhang Bo said. BLOOMBERG interest concessional loans and grants
to countries that have defaulted, in
World Bank President David Malpass has said that the bank intends to increase
its emergency assistance to countries in debt distress.
exchange for China dropping a key
demand that multilateral develop-
ment banks take losses alongside
other creditors in debt restructurings.
The talks were described by people
familiar with the matter, who asked
not to be identified because the dis-
cussions are private and the outcome
is still uncertain.
After hearing complaints from
developing nations about Beijing’s
stance on the sharing of losses on
AFP
loans, China—the biggest bilateral
creditor to poor countries—decided to
soften “relevant positions” given
broader diplomatic considerations,
according to a person familiar with the
matter.
Key to the compromise is the World
Bank increasing its emergency assist-
ance to countries in debt distress,
something that Malpass, its outgoing
president, said Tuesday that the len-
der was already intending to do.
that China’s position remains unclear ability to respond to crises and make
and the discussions are focused largely concessional loans.
on the overall process. A US Treasury official on Tuesday
Even if Chinese officials withdraw reiterated Washington’s opposition to
their demand, “it’s still not clear they MDB debt-restructuring participa-
will provide relief and financing assur- tion, saying that these lenders provide
ances in a manner that is both timely financing at low rates and that the con-
and consistent with cessionality often
other official bilateral The US opposes increases as a country
creditors,” said David the inclusion of moves into debt distress.
Loevinger, a sovereign loans by The standoff over debt
analyst at TCW Group multilateral restructuring and the
Inc. and former US Trea- role of development
development
sury Department senior institutions has played
coordinator for China banks in any debt into the larger dispute
affairs. restructuring between China and the
To truly solve the debt US, particularly when
problem, all parties need engaging with develop-
to implement the principle of joint ing economies where they’re both
action and fair burden, a spokesperson seeking influence.
from the Chinese foreign ministry Wednesday’s Global Sovereign
said. Multilateral creditors, together Debt Roundtable meeting involved a
with bilateral official and commercial “very good discussion,” Georgieva told
ones, should propose plans for partici- reporters as she left the hall where it
pating in resolving debt, the person took place.
said. US Treasury chief Yellen and Trea-
The US—which is the biggest share- sury Undersecretary for International
holder in the World Bank— opposes Affairs Jay Shambaugh declined to
the inclusion of loans by multilateral comment when they left.

FTX is considering using creditor

money to restart crypto exchange
FTX may use money marked to repay customers to restart its
failed crypto exchange because the project would require a sig-
Murdoch may land US govt
nificant amount of cash, a lawyer for the company said in court
Wednesday. The company is still in the early stages of deciding in court in Fox case rejects Fed
whether to bring back the exchange, which allowed customers
to trade digital assets before FTX collapsed, Andrew G. Dietder-
ich, an FTX attorney with law firm Sullivan & Cromwell told US Bloomberg
outlook on
Bankruptcy Judge John T. Dorsey. BLOOMBERG feedback@livemint.com
recession
R
upert Murdoch’s Fox
SoftBank to sell almost all its News empire is going on Bloomberg
trial for airing false 2020 feedback@livemint.com
Alibaba stake, says report election fraud claims, even as it
BLOOMBERG

T
continues to struggle over its he White House said
relationship with the man who Thursday that data does
most stoked those conspiracy not indicate a US reces-
theories: Donald Trump. sion is on the horizon, rebuffing
Fox Corp. and the Fox News Federal Reserve staff econo-
network are now facing a possi- mists who forecast a minor
ble $1.6 billion damages award contraction starting later this
in a defamation suit brought by year.
Dominion Voting Systems Inc., Fox News owner White House Press Secretary
which was accused by hosts Rupert Murdoch. AP Karine Jean-Pierre said job
and guests on the conservative numbers and consumer spend-
network of rigging the election Fox Corp.’s chief executive offi- ing are strong and chalked it up
for Joe Biden. The 92-year-old cer, as well as Fox News CEO to President Joe Biden’s eco-
Beijing: Japanese tech investment titan SoftBank has Murdoch could be called to the Suzanne Scott and superstar nomic plans, waving off a reces-
decided to sell nearly all of its stake in Alibaba to limit expo- witness stand as early as Mon- hosts like Tucker Carlson and sion risk.
sure to China, the Financial Times reported Thursday.Soft- day, to be grilled about his fail- Sean Hannity, take the stand— “We’re seeing the success of
Bank was an early investor in the Chinese internet giant ure to rein in the network away from their carefully con- his plans, and recent economic
founded by Jack Ma but began to offload its shares last year. despite his own belief that trolled studio environments indicators are not consistent
According to the report, SoftBank, which once owned 34% Trump’s claims were baseless. and sworn to tell the truth. with a recession or even a pre-
of Alibaba, has sold more than $7 billion of its shares since Jury selection in the Dela- Yet, to judge by recent pro- recession,” Jean-Pierre said
the start of the year through prepaid forward contracts. AFP ware state court starts Thurs- gramming, none of that has Thursday when asked about
day, and a verdict could be forced a rethink of Fox News’s the Fed forecast.
costly. Bloomberg approach to poli- Federal Reserve minutes
NPR quits Elon Musk’s Twitter over Intelligence esti- A verdict could be tics, or to Trump. published Wednesday indi-
mates that if the costly for Fox as The network and cated that “the staff’s projection
‘government-funded’ label jury finds Fox lia- other Murdoch- at the time of the March meet-
the jury could
National Public Radio is quitting Twitter after the social media ble, it could award award Dominion owned media out- ing included a mild recession
platform owned by Elon Musk labelled NPR’s main account last Dominion dama-
damages of about lets like the Wall starting later this year, with a
week as “state-affiliated media”. Elon Musk hit back at National ges of about $375 Street Journal recovery over the subsequent
Public Radio after the broadcaster announced it will no longer million. Even that $375 million if it is sought earlier this two years.”
publish fresh content to its 52 official accounts. “Defund NPR,” fraction of the $1.6 found liable year to promote Still, Fed officials appear on
Musk reacted in a tweet. BLOOMBERG billion the voting Florida Governor track to extend their run of
machine maker is Ron DeSantis as interest-rate hikes, shrugging
seeking would be one of the their preferred 2024 Republi- off the warning.
Airbus regains €100 billion market biggest defamation awards of can candidate. But Fox has Jean-Pierre pointed to job
all time and would amount to begun hosting the former pres- gains, the unemployment rate
value last seen before covid roughly two-thirds of Fox’s ident in its programming again and consumer spending as
Airbus SE has clawed back a €100 billion ($110 billion) market adjusted profit in its most as polls show him soaring indicators. She also said that
value last reached before the coronavirus pandemic in early 2020 recent quarter. among GOP primary voters, inflation has been falling,
knocked the stock, as a rapid rebound in air travel swells the There’s also the potential for and especially since he was though it remains well above
planemaker’s order book.The Toulouse, France-based plane- courtroom humiliation. indicted by a grand jury con- target. Still, the spokeswoman
maker last had a market capitalization in excess of €100 billion Besides Murdoch, the trial is vened by Manhattan District contradicted the warning of the
in the early weeks of 2020. BLOOMBERG expected to see his son Lachlan, Attorney Alvin Bragg. Fed staff.

US-Saudi oil pact falls apart as Russia calls the shots

Bloomberg been—because consumers as inadvisable given ongoing For the global economy writ
feedback@livemint.com spending more on energy will market volatility, but will wait large, lower oil supply and
have less cash left for other to see what actions Opec+ ulti- higher prices is bad news. The

J
ust three years ago, when
Opec+ oil giants fell out,
the US found itself playing
the role of peacemaker.
Now it looks more like their
target.
The Saudi-Russia oil alli-
ance has the potential to cause
all kinds of trouble for the US
economy—and even for Presi-
dent Joe Biden’s re-election
campaign. This month’s
Opec+ decision to cut crude
output, for the second time
since Biden flew to Saudi Ara-
bia last summer seeking an
increase, may be just the start.
That 2 April announcement
has lifted oil prices by about $5
a barrel. Opec’s own projec-
tions show that the cuts will
widen the supply shortfall
later this year. That means
inflation will be higher, and
recession risks are bigger than
they otherwise would have
stuff. Russian President Vlad-
imir Putin, meanwhile, gets a
bigger war-chest to fund his
attack on Ukraine.
But more significant is what
the Opec+ move says about the
likely path of oil prices over
the coming years.
In a world of shifting geopo-
litical alliances, Saudi Arabia is
breaking away from Washing-
ton’s orbit. The Saudis set oil
production levels in coordina-
tion with Russia. When they
wanted to ease tensions with
regional rival Iran, they turned
to China to broker a deal—
with the US left out of the loop.
Western influence over the oil
cartel, in other words, is at its
lowest point in decades.
And the Opec+ members all
have priorities of their own,
from Saudi crown prince
Mohammed Bin Salman’s
ambitious plans to reinvent his
The Saudi-Russia oil alliance
can cause trouble to the US
economy. AP
economy, to Putin’s war. Any
extra revenue they get from
charging more for oil is a help.
Asked about US concerns
that Opec+ has twice elected to
cut production since President
Biden’s visit to Saudi Arabia, a
state department spokesperson
said the administration is
focused on holding down
domestic energy prices and
ensuring US energy security.
The US views production cuts
mately takes, said the spokes-
person.
Meanwhile, the threat of
competition from US shale
fields, a deterrent to price
hikes in the past, has receded.
And while there’s a global
effort to reduce fossil-fuel use
— and higher prices will accel-
erate that effort—the dash to
drill in the last year shows that
the zero-carbon economy
remains more long-term aspi-
ration than short-term driver.
Add all of this up, and while
some analysts say demand
hurdles mean the recent bump
in prices could prove fleeting,
most anticipate prices above
$80 a barrel over the coming
years—well above the $58-a-
barrel average price between
2015 and 2021.
It’s been a volatile 18 months
or so on crude markets, with
three main phases.
major exporters are the big
winners, of course. For import-
ers, like most European coun-
tries, more expensive energy is
a double blow— dragging on
growth even as inflation rises.
The US falls somewhere in
between. As a major producer,
it benefits when prices rise.
But those gains—unlike the
pain of higher pump prices —
aren’t widely shared.
Bloomberg Economics’
SHOK model predicts that for
every $5 increase in oil prices,
US inflation will rise by 0.2 per-
centage point—not a dramatic
change, but at a time when the
Federal Reserve is struggling to
bring prices under control, not
a welcome one either.There
are three key reasons why more
such shocks may be in store:
The geopolitical shift, the
maturing of shale, and the
Saudi spending splurge.
10 FridAy, 14 April 2023
MuMbAi LONG STORY LIVEMINT.COM

COOKED IN WOOD,
TemPereD wITh TAxes
Indians have taken a liking to made-in-India single malts. But brands are struggling with supply and taxation troubles

Piccadily Distilleries’ warehouse in Indri, Haryana. Distilled malts are stored in wooden casks for maturing. PRADEEP GAUR/MINT

Sayantan Bera Bengaluru launched a single malt in Glas-
sayantan.bera@livemint.com gow, Scotland, marking the beginning of
kArNAl/NeW DelHi a new category of premium world whis-
kies—the Indian single malt. Ever since,
the flavour profile will be different due to
differences in temperature and humidity.
“You cannot make an Amrut in Haryana
or an Indri in Bengaluru,” Kumar added.
immigration officer’s face when I said I The domestic industry is fine with lower
mint
SHORT am here to launch an Indian single malt. duties—say, a duty cut of 100% spread over
STORY Initially, there was a lot of apprehension 10 years—if the agreement secures a level
since India was known to make whiskey playing field and does not encourage mis-

A
massive warehouse where the segment has grown rapidly with at Sure, domestic consumers are loving from molasses, and doubts, if we were fol- use of trade concessions, said Vinod Giri
40,000 barrels are neatly least nine brands on offer by 2022. Among these different flavour profiles. About a WHAT lowing proper (manufacturing) prac- from CIABC, the industry lobby.
stacked on metal racks is them are Paul John from Goa, Rampur by fourth of the 475,000 cases (of nine litres tices,” Paul P. John, chairman of John “But non-tariff barriers like maturation
where the angels come to Radico Khaitan and Solan Gold by Mohan each) of single malt consumed within India now makes some of the Distilleries told Mint. requirements must go. We are against the
take their share. It is a dimly Meakin—makers of the popular Old Monk India now comprise home-grown brands, best single malts. There are at “But over the years, the accolades began practice of under-invoicing. Presently, an
lit space with a slight nip in the air, heady rum. Even Diageo, among the top spirit according to estimates from the Confed- least nine brands and many of to flow; now you have fans of Indian single international brand can import premium
with the lingering aroma of fine malts sellers globally and makers of Johnnie eration of Indian Alcoholic Beverage them have bagged international malt across the world. In fact, some the whiskey for its domestic subsidiary at very
maturing in wooden casks. As the stored Walker blended scotch whiskies, Companies (CIABC). Indian single malt awards. This, in turn, helped best single malts are now coming from low prices. How will premium domestic
spirits age over time, a part of it is lost to launched an Indian single malt named makers are currently producing around shore up domestic sales. Asian countries like Taiwan, India and brands compete?” Giri asked.
evaporation. Distillers call it angel’s share. Godawan last year. 225,000 cases. A part of this is exported. Japan,” John added. But this is not the only pain point for
The warehouse in Haryana’s Karnal, off Within India, the premiumization is Of the estimated whiskey consumption The Indian market, too, has evolved over Indian brands. In India, liquor taxes are
the busy highway connecting Delhi to driven by the growing affluence of a sec- (in 2022) of 240 million cases in India, BUT the years. For brands like Paul John, Amrut decided by state governments which often
Chandigarh, is in a village named Indri. The tion of the population. The rich were about 80% are cheap variants, priced at and Indri, India is now the single largest impose higher taxes and license fees on
village now lends its name to a new single already consuming large volumes of less than ₹500 for a 750 ml bottle (taking A fourth of the 4,75,000 cases market accounting for 60-70% of sales. domestic brands. For instance, it costs an
malt brand launched in mid-2021. Branded imported scotch, which were blended Delhi as the reference market). These of single malt consumed in India As a strategy, Piccadily, which is the international brand just ₹50,000 to register
Indri-Trini, the premium three-wood with Indian grain spirits. Recently, India make little money for manufacturers. So, now comprise of home-grown largest independent malt distiller in India, a label in Delhi, while domestic brands pay
whiskey crafted by Piccadily Distilleries is replaced France as the world’s largest many distilleries are targeting the pre- brands. Distillers did not plan is getting rid of cheaper, low-margin a staggering ₹25 lakh license fees per label.
made from six-row Indian barley grown in importer of scotch whisky by volume. mium segment—priced at over ₹1,000 a for this surge in demand; some brands. “We are currently available in 11 In November 2021, Maharashtra reduced
Rajasthan and matured in three different The early makers of Indian single malt— bottle—which account for 8 million cases. have run out of spirits. states in India and 16 countries interna- excise taxes on imported liquor from 300%
casks. The imported barrels which once like Amrut in 2004 and Paul John in “Within the premium segment, single tionally. The plan is to expand to 22 states to 150%, while domestic brands are taxed at
stored bourbon, wine and sherry add an 2012—went for an international launch for malts have seen massive growth in con- in India. I am often told that Indri is priced 300%. Together, Delhi and Mumbai account
array of flavours and aroma as the malt a reason. They wanted to prove that Indian sumption in recent years. Since Indian sin- AND at a discount (₹2,800-3,000 for a 750 ml for over 70% of premium liquor sales.
interacts with the wood while ageing. distillers can make premium whiskey and gle malt distillers did not plan for this surge bottle in Gurgaon) for the quality it offers. This sort of taxation is structured to
To qualify as a single compete with renowned in demand, some have run out of spirits,” Liquor taxation is another pain But I want people to encourage import of low-
malt, the whiskey must brands in their home turf. said Vinod Giri, director general of CIABC. point. In some states, domestic drink the liquid,” said volume premium liquor;
be a product of a single Of the estimated whiskey Also, the global market This explains why retail outlets in major brands pay higher taxes and Siddhartha Sharma, The Indian market is taxes and fees for domes-
distillery, though the consumption of 240 million held a promise beyond cities often run out of Indian single malts. license fees. Companies, founder of Piccadily. evolving fast. For brands like tic brands were kept high
malt can be matured in the over-regulated, com- “In comparison, imported brands have therefore, hesitate in releasing But going ahead, adds as they were seen as mass
different casks. cases, about 80% are plex and heavily taxed the advantage of past inventory. Besides, premium limited-edition liquor. Sharma, India will need Paul John, Amrut and Indri, market players with large
Indri earned itself cheap variants, priced domestic market in India. since they supply all over the world, they to introduce regulations India is now the single largest volumes. The reality is
some bragging rights The international acco- are better placed to cater to the surge in and standards around different now, with
within a short span. In at less than ₹500 for a lades, in turn, helped demand in one market,” Giri added. uct from India. That gave us a lot of confi- single malts to prevent market accounting for domestic premium
the year to March 2023, shore up domestic sales. Few years back, Japan too, witnessed a dence,” Jagdale said. fly-by-night operators brands entering the mar-
Piccadily sold 15,000 750 ml bottle. “India has broken massive surge in demand for aged varieties It took Amrut another two years to from spoiling the party; 60-70% of sales. ket. Higher taxes on
cases (of nine litres each) through this barrier of single malt which led to shortage on the launch the first single malt at the Café there is still a trust deficit domestic brands also
of Indri, an impressive count going by now… (of) people’s perception of the best shelves. Since malt matures faster in India, India restaurant in Glasgow in 2004. But in international markets. means they hesitate from releasing pre-
industry standards. Since its launch, it has whisky coming only from Scotland. Yes, distillers are better equipped to handle the three years into the project, the going got mium limited-edition liquor as that entails
won a handful of international awards, some of the best whisky comes from Scot- demand spike. Yet, ageing the malt for at harder. In 2007, a meeting with a distribu- UnfaiR tReatment higher overhead cost per bottle.
including a gold tasting award at the Inter- land, but so does some of the worst. People
national Spirits Challenge, London, and have preconceived notions and percep-
another gold from Dominic Roskrow who tions that are carved in granite, when in
least three years (single malts have to be
aged for at least three years), means a tem-
porary setback to local supplies.
tor in London did not go off well. They
rejected Amrut. The Jagdales were told
that an Indian single malt held little poten-
I ndia imposes a 150% duty on imported According to Giri, this anomaly is hurt-
alcohol, including on Scotch whiskey. ing low volume premium brands from
Currently free-trade negotiations are on India. “It may sound odd but if an Indian
ran a ‘New Wizards Awards’, both in 2022. fact there are quite a few top-notch whis- tial. But Amrut chairman, Neelakanta Rao with the UK, which can potentially result single malt distiller decides to manufac-
Dominic Roskrow, a maverick whiskey kies coming out of India,” whiskey critic ROcky beginning Jagdale, took a call to persist even “at the in a reduction of duties. ture in Sri Lanka and then import it to
critic and writer, died late last year. He was Jim Murray said in an interview to First-
an authority on ‘new world whiskies’—or post in 2019.
whiskey crafted beyond traditional hubs
T he journey of the Indian single malt
began in July 2002. Rakshit Jagdale,
the current managing director at Amurt
risk of losing some more millions.”
Then in 2010, Jim Murray’s Whiskey
Bible rated Amrut Fusion as the third fin-
But Indian brands are confident. “If we Maharashtra, its products will be cheaper
can compete in the global market and still by 20-30%.”
sell whatever volumes we produce, why fear Despite the adverse tax regime, distill-
like Scotland and USA. OUt Of stOck Distilleries, was then pursuing a manage- est in the world. “This has to be one of the a duty reduction? Besides, it will be benefi- ers remain hopeful. “The Indian market
The rise of single malts from India, the
world’s largest whiskey market, follows a W hat made Indian single malts stand
apart in the international market?
long journey which began more than two In a tropical climate like India whiskies
ment degree at Newcastle, UK. For the
course dissertation, Jagdale took his
father’s suggestion and did a project on the
great whiskies found anywhere in the
world; from distillation to maturation, this
is genius whisky from whichever conti-
cial for Indian distillers who import scotch has come of age... domestic sales now
for blending. Blended whiskies will become account for two-third of our annual sales
cheaper and their quality will improve,” said of 60,000 cases. Of course, the interna-
decades ago. Even 10 years back, Indian mature faster. “Our whiskies are almost potential market for an Indian single malt, nent,” Murray wrote. The tide had turned. Sanjeev Banga, president of international tional accolades helped us increase our
whiskies were frowned upon internation- cooked in wood,” explains Surrinder sold via Indian restaurants in UK. Jagdale Around the time when Amrut launched business at Radico Khaitan, which launched domestic footprint,” said Rakshit Jagdale
ally as most distillers used molasses, a Kumar, former master distiller at Amrut imported samples of malt maturing at in Glasgow, Goa-based John Distilleries was its Rampur single malt in 2016. from Amrut, adding that surging demand
by-product of sugar production, which was who also developed Indri. The angel’s Amrut’s facility and did a tasting survey, mulling a similar entry, away from whiskies “On the flip, side non-tariff barriers prompted it to increase distillation capac-
in abundance. Within India, it was sold as share is high. The exchange between the which received a favourable response. catering to the lower end of the market, into imposed by UK will need to go; Indian ity by 25% over current levels.
whiskey but the world liked to call it rum. malt and the wood as it contracts and One afternoon, during a blind tasting at premium single malts. Following eight manufacturers cannot sell regular whiskey India is witnessing a generational shift
Faced with a crippling shortage of food post- expands lends it a unique flavour profile. If the popular Pot Still bar in Glasgow, whis- years of research, travels and groundwork, in UK because they insist on at least three- in drinking culture, said Piccadily’s
independence, for years, distillers shunned one compares four different whiskies key connoisseurs mistook the Amrut sam- it launched a single malt internationally in year maturation. That is suited to the Sharma. “Drinking is also an experience—
making whiskey from grain spirits. matured in four different regions of India— ple for a 12-year-old highland scotch. 2012, and in India three years later. weather in Scotland but not in India where something to unwind with. Alcohol is not
Then, in 2004, Amrut Distilleries from even when they follow the same process— “They were shocked when told it is a prod- “I still remember the smirk on the UK the malt matures faster,” Banga added. just about getting drunk anymore.”
LIVEMINT.COM
Should you buy a new car or
just use ride-hailing apps?
Both have their distinct advantages but owning a car is costlier if you are to employ a driver
Akshat Rohatgi & Neil Borate
neil.b@livemint.com
A
car. A house. And a fat
bank balance. That is what
aspirations are all about, at
least for most people. And
in these days when the
preference is for personal mobility,
owning a car definitely makes sense.
But, with inflation eating into your sav-
ings and fuel prices continuing to soar
almost daily, one question remains.
Should you buy a car or get around
using ride-hailing apps such as Uber
and Ola? That answer largely depends
on these factors: How much do you
commute daily and how much are you
willing to spend on the new vehicle?
And, is owning a car cheaper than a cab
ride?
Buying a car has a huge upfront
cost. If you take a loan, you will also
have to factor in the amount you need
to pay to the lender in equated
monthly instalments (EMIs). Then,
you have to account for the mainte-
nance costs of the car, its insurance,
and fuel costs. More importantly, you
will need to shell out more if you
employ a driver.
You do have another choice, though:
Continue with your ride-sharing apps
instead of buying a car. There are issues
with that as well. The per-km fare is
usually high and this can go up sharply
during peak times (also known as surge
pricing). You also might not get a cab in
time—that depends on the availability
of drivers in the area. And, on many
occasions, they are simply not available
at night.
It’s now time for you to choose one
of the options. Still unsure? If so, let’s
break down the cost of owning a car
for a period of seven years with a
round-trip of, say, 40km per day and
fuel efficiency of 12 km per litre in city
traffic. Although many people retain
their cars for longer periods, seven
years is a good average, especially for
millennials and GenZ who periodi-
cally upgrade their cars. So, what
exactly are the costs of owning a car?
Here goes.
Downpayment and EMIs: A typi-
cal high-end hatchback or midsize sub-
compact SUV costs around ₹10 lakh.
Assuming a down payment of 30%, or
₹3 lakh, and interest on the remaining
loan in the range of 7-9% with a 1% pro-
cessing fee, and a duration of five years,
the total EMI comes out to ₹14,000 per
month and the total financing of own-
ership at ₹11.5 lakh.
Fuel: Assuming yearly fuel infla-
tion to be 8%, fuel alone would burn a
hole in your pockets by nearly ₹11 lakh
over seven years. (Base price = ₹100
per litre)
Insurance and maintenance:
Own-damage plus third-party insur-
ance cover would set you back by
around ₹15,000 per year. You will
need to set aside an additional ₹5,000
per year for repairs and services. As the
car ages, insurance premiums fall in
line with the decline in Insured
Declared Value (IDV) even as mainte-
nance costs tend to accelerate.
Parking charges: Since this varies
significantly, depending on the user
and the location, we have not included
these in our calculations. However, if
you do not have free parking at your
home or office, you can make a rough
addition. For instance, if you are a
Delhi resident, assume a typical
WILL DEBT FUNDS START LOSING THEIR SHEEN FROM THIS FISCAL YEAR? MAYBE NOT
POWER
POINT
NITIN RAO
We welcome your views and comments at
mintmoney@livemint.com
T
he change in capital gains tax treatment on gains arising
from debt mutual funds (MFs), invested on or after 1 April,
will push some investors to explore alternative investment
solutions. A relevant option is Alternative Investment Funds
(AIFs) which are managed by marquee fund managers and offer
the ability to invest in a wider range of opportunities, including
high yielding debt and other avenues.
The rise of debt AIFs
In the last year, interest in the high-yielding debt AIF space has
grown, as most debt MFs yielded anywhere between 3-5% gross
returns due to the sharp increase in interest rates. In the same
period, Consumer Price Inflation (CPI) rose higher than 6%, and
left investors with a negative real return. Even for investors who
were willing to allocate towards credit risk MFs, the returns were
much lower than debt AIFs. MFs sharply cut down their alloca-
tions to the mid-corporate segment since 2018-19, following the
MINT MONEY FridAy, 14 April 2023
MuMbAi 11
WHAT'S THE FOREX RATE?
Whether you are planning
overseas travel or want to
send money abroad, it is
always a good idea to shop
around for the best forex
exchange rate. From banks,
travel aggregators to money
changers, various small and
big players sell foreign
exchange. To simplify your
work, here is a list of INR to
USD forex rates offered by
some of the major banks
and travel aggregators. We
recommend that you also
check the commission being
charged by these players to
Driving a hard bargain ensure that you are getting
Whether you want to own a car or use Ola and Uber should be decided based on factors such as the best deal.
the upfront car cost, car loan rates and your own desire to drive. FOREX RATES (/$)
RIDE-HAILING APPS OWN CAR Wire transfer* Buy forex
Bank/travel
Base fare Average cost of a aggregator inward Outward Forex/travel card Cash
₹50 mid-range car
₹10 lakh SBI 81.30 82.80 NA 83.40
Peak & off peak
average fare/km Down payment
₹12 ₹3 lakh Bank of Baroda 81.65 82.47 82.90 83.30
Ride time Loan amount Canara Bank 81.71 82.46 82.66 NA
fare/min ₹7 lakh
₹1 Fuel efficiency Rate of interest IndusInd Bank 80.54 83.54 84.33 84.63
City: New Delhi
GST ₹12 km/litre 8%
5% Monthly cost if you travel 40 km per day Processing fees Kotak Bank 79.56 83.44 83.84 84.41
Resale value
Ride-hailing apps Own car (Figures in ) ₹3 lakh 1%
Cost for 40 km HDFC 80.81 83.40 83.64 84.21
Year 22,835 Monthly EMI on loan
₹751 Opportunity
1 ₹14,099
53,652* cost (interest ICICI 80.23 83.84 83.63 85.19
foregone) Insurance+
maintenance/year
24,662 ₹181,734 Axis Bank 79.71 84.50 85.20 84.95
2 ₹20,000
28,880 Fuel inflation Fuel cost per litre Yes Bank 80.62 83.47 84.37 84.37
ADVANTAGES 26,635
8% ₹100
3 Ride-hailing
Ride-hailing apps
29,756 apps are more Thomas Cook 80.54 83.42 83.28 83.64
 No hassle over upkeep
28,766
cost effective if Note: Data collected from website of respective entities as on 12 April 2023; Rate denotes INR/USD;
 No need for driving skills 4 Rates are as mentioned on the website of the bank/FI and it may vary according to different amount slabs;
your daily travel *Telegraphic Transfer (TT) buying and selling rates used.
 Less stressful in traffic 30,702
is less than Compiled by BankBazaar.com
Own car 31,067 20 km Total cost over 7 years (in ₹ lakh)
5
 No waiting time/ 31,723 Ride-hailing Better
surge pricing
apps Own Car option?
 Control over driving 6 33,553
Ride-
 Aspirational value
7
18,728
36,237
20 km per day
40 km per day
16.75
24.45
20.96
22.60
hailing apps
Own car
I have ₹16 lakh in savings. Is it
-5,081**
Total
60 km per day 32.14 31.82 Own car
Numbers are illustrative and pertain to Delhi NCR
possible to buy a ₹2 cr house?
₹24.45 ₹22.60 *Due to down payment
lifetime
cost lakh lakh **Due to resale of car Source: Mint research
Vishal Dhawan
PARAS JAIN/MINT
8-hour workday, the Delhi Municipal At the end of seven years, for our Some smart cost-saving tips I am 38 years old and have
Corporation (MCD) charges around base case, the costs of using Ola and Buy a Used Car: A new car can lose savings of nearly ₹16 lakh. I
₹10 per hour. Over a period of seven Uber will come to about ₹24 lakh. That up to 20% of its value in the first six want to purchase a 2BHK
years, this will set you back by another is at least ₹1.4 lakh more than what you months itself. Depreciation is one of flat in Mumbai for ₹2 crore.
₹1.3 lakh. spend in owning a car. the biggest costs that the public ignores How can I achieve this
Opportunity cost: If the downpay- However, if you were to hire a driver when deciding to buy a car. Suppose goal? I want to finance this
ment was invested in a long-term bond for your car, the figures become you buy a used car of ₹5 lakh with a house with a bank loan and
fund, returns after indexation and taxa- skewed in favour of ride-hailing com- down payment of ₹3 lakh and a loan of I am planning to use 60% of
tion (interest foregone) at 7% would panies. Assuming a salary of ₹15,000 ₹2 lakh, then using the same assump- my savings.
have fetched ₹1.8 lakh approximately. per month (conservative estimate), tions as our earlier calculation, your -Siddhesh Jamsandekar
At the end of seven years, if the vehi- with annual increases in salary of 10%, total car ownership cost over seven
cle is sold at 30% of its original cost, the the cost of owning a car goes up by years falls to ₹19 lakh, lower than the It is rather challenging for
total cost of ownership comes to about another ₹17 lakh over seven years. ₹24.5 lakh cost of using Uber/Ola. you to buy a ₹2 crore home,
₹22.6 lakh. To own or not to own Negotiate a better deal on loans: with the relatively smaller
Some people, however, prefer Using Ola or Uber, as opposed to Negotiate with your lender for a lower asset pool of ₹16 lakh that you
using a Uber or Ola over buying a car. owning a car, would be slightly cheaper rate of interest and try to increase the currently have. Most loan pro-
“With Ola or Uber, I don’t have to over a period of seven years if your principal amount repaid as a percent- viders are likely to insist on at
worry about finding a parking spot. average daily travel is below 20 km. age of your EMI. (This lowers the inter- least a 10% down payment,
Also, it is more convenient than driv- However, if we were to travel more est payment on the lifetime of the which itself comes to close to
ing during peak hours, and I easily use distance per day, the benefits of using loan.) ₹20 lakh, and this is higher ASK MINT will need to inform your cur-
the commute time to complete my the services of ride hailing apps start to “Buying a car will entail an outright than the assets that you cur- m FINANCIAL PLANNING rent employer or the EPFO:
daily tasks”, said Hardik More, an shrink. With a round trip totalling 40 purchase cost, but there will be flexibil- rently have. you will have to email the cur-
associate product man- km or more a day, owning a ity in terms of personal transport. If you were to take a loan of rent and previous UAN to
ager based in Mumbai. Buying a car has a car becomes more eco- While using ride hailing services like ₹1.8 crore, ie the balance dent Fund Organisation uanepf@epfindia.gov.in.
Let’s now break down huge upfront cost nomical. There are also Ola/Uber, the car purchase amount can amount for 20 years, your (EPFO), at that time. Post a verification process,
the costs of using these and other issues of convenience. be invested to earn a return, apart from equated monthly instalment I took a break from your previous UAN will be
cabs for a period of seven expenses, while “Cab drivers always avoiding depreciation, insurance and (EMI) would come to approxi- employment and recently blocked and the new one will
years, with a round trip of
ride-hailing apps demand cash, often cancel other maintenance costs associated mately ₹1.56 lakh at current joined a new IT firm where be kept alive. You will then
40 km per day and for 20 rides without any explana- with car ownership. In most cases, ride interest rates. If this EMI, along they issued me with a new have to submit a claim to trans-
days a month. come with their tion and frequently deviate sharing works out better than owner- with any other EMIs that you PF account and a new UAN. fer the EPF account (linked
Base fare: This is a share of problems from the recommended ship, and it’s the same in this case as currently have, is not more However, when I asked my with the blocked UAN) to the
fixed amount that has to route displayed on the well. But we need to consider non-fi- than 50% of your net salary, current employers to new active account. This may
be paid irrespective of the map. This not only nancial aspects as well, like the flexibil- you can evaluate going with it, transfer funds from my take some time though, so you
distance travelled (usually in the range increases travel time but also results in ity of having your own transport”, said provided your income sources existing PF account to the would need to be patient with
of ₹50–60). higher fares. On numerous occasions, I Ravi Saraogi, a Sebi Registered Invest- are stable. Alternatively, you new one, they said this has the process.
Distance fare: The ballpark figure have arrived late to my office as a result. ment Adviser and co-founder of Sam- may need to consider buying a to be done by the previous Vishal Dhawan is a certified
in metros is ₹9 per km during non-peak Consequently, I have been avoiding asthiti Advisors. house of a significantly lower employer. The latter is also financial planner and founder
hours. these services lately”, said Govind The choice is ultimately yours. If you value than ₹2 crore. not helping. of Plan Ahead Wealth Advisors,
Ride time fare: This is the fare Goyal, a curation specialist based in are buying a car for its convenience and I then approached EPFO a Sebi registered investment
charged per minute (doesn’t vary dur- Gurgaon. aspirational value, a slightly higher cost I have worked in two IT officials, who said this advisory firm.
ing peak hours) Car ownership still has aspirational might not move the needle. Similarly, companies before and have needs to be done by the
Peak hour charges: Fares increase value and hence, for many people, it if you travel a lot (more than 20 km a a provident fund (PF) employers concerned. Is Do you have a personal
in multiples of non-peak charges (1.5x may be more than just a financial cal- day), owning a car is cheaper. On the account. However, my there a way to transfer or finance query? Send in your
assumed on one trip or day in our cal- culation. It can also be economical other hand, an Uber/Ola spares you the Aadhar was not linked to withdraw money from the queries at
culations). compared to Uber/Ola if you share the hassle of driving in traffic and main- the UAN, or universal existing PF account? mintmoney@livemint.com
and get them answered by
GST: 5% of the sum total of all of the car and its costs with multiple family taining a car. You can use our calcula- account number provided —Srikanth
industry experts.
above. members. tion to guide your decision. by the Employees’ Provi- In order to correct this, you
IL&FS default and the Franklin Templeton debt fund crisis. As For conservative investors, a high credit quality accrual-ori-
a result, the mid-market enterprises have faced a lack of access ented fund portfolio may be suitable where one might take inter-
to debt, which has presented an opportunity to structured and
private debt AIFs.
est rate risk but would be safeguarded against credit risk.
Balanced investors may consider a combination of duration-
Debt AIFs offer an investment opportunity across multiple oriented strategies along with some allocation towards accruals.
strategies such as structured credit, venture debt, mezzanine Aggressive investors may consider a combination of 70% fixed
debt, etc., that may offer investors a gross return of 15-18%. This income investments in MFs, with the balance 30% towards high
has driven interest towards debt AIFs in addition to their profes- yielding debt AIFs, that has the potential to create an optimal fixed
sional management, diversification offered. etc. income portfolio for the next 4–6 years.
Investing in debt AIFs is not for the average investor though Debt AIFs offer While it is still early days, Sebi categori-
and comes with its own risks and limitations including the regu- an investment zation allows AMCs to come up with
latory minimum investment of R 1 crore, catering predominantly funds in the “balanced hybrid” category
to high net worth individuals and family offices. So, while debt opportunity (defined by allocation to equities varying
AIFs may find a place in a few portfolios, what we recommend is net asset values, or NAVs, (that might arise due to any future rate across multiple in a band of 40-60%). These could con-
to follow basic tenets of asset allocation while creating a fixed hikes) thus helping investors lock-in entry yields at the near peak. strategies but tinue to benefit from the current tax
income portfolio. This helps to get an attractive carry as long as the rates remain high. there are risks regime (LTCG at 20% with indexation for
Actively managed debt MFs are important Secondly, when rates start coming off in the system (by way of a holding period over 3 years). However,
While taxation changes have resulted in rendering any tax policy rate cuts), managers could potentially increase modified this category could prove to be volatile
arbitrage (across debt instruments) meaningless, but the grandfa- duration of their funds, thus helping participate in marked to compared to conservative hybrid funds or pure play debt funds. An
thering of long-term capital gains for all investments done up to market gains for investments made. alternative could be Balanced Advantage Funds where the risk is lim-
31 March is a significant measure to help carry on these gains for A combination of both these factors could offer near double ited to the equity exposure with 35% allocation towards fixed income.
the next many years. MFs also offer portfolio liquidity and mini- digit or higher holding period returns which are relatively cost- Moving into the next fiscal year, a combination of these strate-
mal to nil exit load, which is attractive compared to other debt effective and provide liquidity at all points in time. gies would help optimize allocations across fixed income portfo-
products. Also, given that most of the rate hikes are behind us, we On a post-tax basis, the returns would continue to be attractive lios. To sum up, it’s not an ‘either or’ approach but an ‘and’
believe it’s a great opportunity to start allocating towards actively (as we believe the mark to market, or MTM, movement would approach that could help investors navigate the structural shift
managed debt MFs. We see a two-fold benefit in doing so: partially offset negative tax impact). There are opportunities to in debt space more effectively over the coming months.
Firstly, as rates plateau, there is a limited negative impact on fund invest across fund categories that align with investor risk appetite: Nitin Rao is CEO, InCred Wealth
12 FridAy, 14 April 2023
MuMbAi VIEWS LIVEMINT.COM

OUR VIEW MY VIEW | TECH WHISPERS

REUTERS

The innovator’s dilemma facing

Google may well have a solution
OpenAI and Microsoft are sharpening their threat but it may be a cloud war rather than for search

partnered very effectively with OpenAI.
Satya Nadella, its CEO, has gone hammer
and tongs at Google, moving with the
speed of light to integrate ChatGPT into
Bing Search, Teams, Azure cloud and all
its iconic 365 productivity software.
Nadella has publicly declared that it
wants Google “to dance, and the world to
know that we made them dance.”
JASPREET BINDRA Rather than dancing, Google seems to
is a technology expert, author of ‘The Tech be more like a deer caught in the genera-
Whisperer’, and is currently pursuing his tive AI headlights, sluggish and frozen. It
Masters in AI and Ethics from Cambridge has countered ChatGPT by its own Bard,
University but both the product and its reception
greater than “electricity or fire”. Google
is now caught in the classical innovator’s
dilemma, as its cash-spewing ten-blue-
links business model of search built on
the world’s best information database
and infrastructure is threatened by a less
monetizable chat interface resting on a
completely different architecture.
However, it would be foolish to under-
estimate Google, which not only domi-
nates search, but also the internet. There
is plenty it can do to counter the momen-
tum. Bard, for one, will get much better,
as it is upgraded to its more powerful

Policy had a heroic role

have been underwhelming. The day of PaLM LLM. Google owns arguably the
its flawed launch saw Google’s value two best AI teams in the world—Deep-

T
he book Innovator’s Dilemma: plummet by a whopping $100 billion. Mind and Google Brain. Expect them to
When New Technologies Cause Pichai has admitted: “I feel like we took a come up with even better Generative AI
Great Firms to Fail authored by souped-up Civic and kind of put it in a models, and newer business models to

in the Apple Store story Clayton Christensen was chosen by The

Economist as one of the six greatest busi-
ness books ever. It expanded on the con-
cept of disruptive technologies, a term
race with more powerful cars.” Google
has also integrated Bard half-heartedly
into its dominant search engine, and,
like Microsoft, in many web properties.
monetize them. It owns large content
properties with YouTube and Gmail, so
has a free content advantage. Google
pays 21% of its search revenue to content
Christensen himself had coined, and It has declared a ‘Code Red,’ and the sites like NYT or Quora across the web to
how they could unseat great established founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin are feed content to its engine, and it could
Celebrations are in the air as Apple plans its retail debut in India. Its China-plus game is a companies, not because management back with sleeves rolled up. very easily increase this Traffic Acquisi-
was doing the wrong things, but because The irony is that it is Google that tion Cost (TAC) to lock them out of its
grand win for us as we vie for global value chains. Yet, its story is too special to help much it was doing almost everything right! ‘invented’ Large Language Models competitors. Most search is on mobile
“The reason [why great companies (LLMs)—before GPT, there was its own devices, and Google owns the dominant
failed] is that good management itself BERT, and before ChatGPT, there was mobile operating system, Android,
was the root cause,” wrote Christensen. LaMDA (now repurposed as Bard). Right where no Bing can venture. It pays Apple

A
pple Watch data could prove it,
but it’s safe to assume pulses
were set racing among fans by
news of its own stores ready for
their debut in India next week.
An ‘unveiling’ would be more
apt a description for the event planned, given
Apple’s love of arty elegance, visible in its logo
as much as the stuff it adorns. Of the two local
renditions of its famous bitten apple (think
‘byte of knowledge’), the one designed for
Mumbai looks a bit kitschy, if colourful, while
the other for Delhi offers vivid tribute to a city
of jharokas and archways. To celebrate, its
website has a portal with a music playlist. The
capital’s, for example, is led by the soundtrack
of Delhi-6, a 2009 Hindi film, with Rabbi Sher-
gill’s classic Bulla ki Jaana cued up next. It’s
all part of what Americans call laying on the
charm. Apple Inc’s CEO Tim Cook, due for a
visit that might include a meeting with Prime
Minister Narendra Modi, recently called India
a “major focus” as a “hugely exciting market.”
Its iPhone sales here are looking up and so are
US-based company was so keen to open outlets “Managers played the game the way it’s after he became CEO in 2016, Pichai a colossal $15 billion to make it default on
of its own that it adapted its entire Indian game supposed to be played. The very deci- declared Google to be an “AI first” iOS too. Its brand is the default pick for
sion-making and resource allocation company, and that its impact would be search, and that will be very difficult for
to our maze of retail rules. This is why policy- processes that are key to the success anyone to replicate. Nadella knows this,
makers may get tempted to join the festivities. of established companies are the very but his game is not to do the impossible
Estimates peg Apple’s outward shipments of processes that reject disruptive technol- and dethrone Google in search. Rather,
iPhones at nearly $5 billion in 2022-23. If so, ogies: listening to customers; tracking QUICK READ to reduce Google’s margin in search
this would be a hearty chunk of the $10 billion- competitors’ actions carefully… These through increasing TAC, paying Apple
are the reasons why great firms stum- The poor reception of Bard has more, etc, so that it has less free cash flow
plus worth of such handsets exported overall bled or failed when confronted with put Google in a spot even as for its other businesses, notably cloud.
(as reported) and a feather in the Centre’s cap disruptive technology change.” OpenAI and Microsoft raise the This is not a search war; it is a cloud war.
as a policy outcome. Back in 2017, the com- If I were Sundar Pichai, I would be game in a generative AI field Pichai is sanguine about the whole
pany had reportedly sought tariff relief for re-reading this book. The Generative AI where ironically Google had deal, telling WSJ, “Throughout our
local assembly plus relaxation of an FDI rule tsunami led by OpenAI’s ChatGPT has made early advances. history, there are many areas where we
rocked the boats of almost every Big haven’t been the first to market some-
for a fully-owned retail chain that required it Tech company. However, it is Google Google is now caught in the thing. We didn’t develop the first search
to source 30% of the value of its saleable wares that looks most vulnerable for two classic innovator’s dilemma as engine. We didn’t develop the first
locally. After talks and tweaks, its Indian retail reasons. One, its core search business is its search business is at threat, browser or the first email... There are
business can include what’s sourced for export squarely in the cross-hairs. Two, the though the real Big Tech battle times when being first matters a lot.
in its tally to comply with that rule (as per a company holding the gun is not only ahead could be for broad There are some times it doesn’t matter.”
OpenAI, but also Microsoft, which has dominance of cloud services. Let’s see if it matters this time.
2020 circular), it has a trio of vendors busy
churning out iPhones here, and ‘Made in India’
volumes are rising robustly in response to
public incentives for production under a self-
reliance scheme. Thousands of local jobs have
been created, with many more to come as
Apple diversifies its supply chain away from www.livemint.com
New Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Kolkata, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Chandigarh*, Pune* Monday, April 15, 2013 Vol.7 No.89 `3.00 in Delhi­NCR/`4.00 outside Delhi­NCR 24 PAGES

its exports. It’s a win-win story, the kind we China to make India another export hub. Will the real
CAPITAL CALCULUS:
Rahul please stand up >4
BANKER’S TRUST: Wilful defaulter—
who’ll bell the cat? >6

want global investors to notice, given that its For other investors to follow suit, though, CONTENT PARTNER
CAPITAL ACCOUNT: A tale of two downturns >15
POLITICS: NDA’s PM candidate needs to have
secular credentials, says JD(U) >5

This is one of the innovator’s

success is the highlight of our China-plus-one India must diversify its policy hardsell. Apple’s SENSEX 18,242.56 ® NIFTY 5,528.55 ® DOLLAR `54.52 ® EURO `71.40 ® GOLD `27,880 ® OIL $103.06 ®

dilemmas: Blindly following

LEADERSHIP CHALLENGES BUSINESS ADVENTURER QUICK EDIT

Will Infosys’s R.P. Goenka, an industrialist with Another

pitch for value chains that girdle the globe. success does not reflect how cost competitive next CEO be
an appetite for risk, dies at 83
INDRANIL BHOUMIK/MINT

OBITUARY
self goal
I f there is a prize to be
handed for self-inflicted
wounds, the United

the maxim that good

R.P. Goenka Progressive Alliance
government will surely win

Apple’s numbers for the country are suitably its new game is. As a premium brand, globally, an outsider?
1930­2013 it hands down. Barely a
week before the start of the
B Y A NIEK P AUL Parliament session, the
aniek.p@livemint.com government has done it
························· again.
KOLKATA
The controversy over the

With hunt for successor
to Shibulal beginning,
confidential details and no- I t is widely known that Rama
Prasad Goenka, who died on
alleged “vetting” of a
Central Bureau of
body is authorized to com- Sunday at the age of 83, was a Investigation (CBI) status

bright. By IDC data, it sold 6.7 million iPhone its gadgets make up a smaller fraction of its
some board members
want search to include
external candidates
B Y P ANKAJ M ISHRA
A NIRBAN S EN
·························
managers should keep
ment. strong supporter of the late In- report on the coal
Founded in 1981 by Naraya- dira Gandhi, India’s former allocation issue—meant
na Murthy and six others, in- prime minister. Some say he only for a bench of
cluding Nandan Nilekani, S. even idolized her. judges—by the Prime
Gopalakrishnan and Shibulal, Following the withdrawal of Minister’s office is another
Infosys was considered the the Emergency in 1977, he was example of this
& bellwether of India’s $108 bil- arrested and held in police government’s inability to
lion information technology custody for a few days on sus- steer clear of trouble.
(IT) sector until three years picion that he hid money for It is interesting that this

units here in 2022, up from 4.8 million in 2021 gestalt value than in the case of rivals. As a
BANGALORE ago. her. is not the first instance of

I nfosys Ltd, India’s second In the past two years, the But as a fiercely ambitious allegations of government

close to their customers

biggest software firm, has
started the hunt for a chief
executive officer (CEO) when
the last of its founders, S.D.
Shibulal, retires in two years.
Some directors on its board
company has missed its reve- industrialist, he ought to have interference in the working
nue and profit growth fore- hated her for the state control of CBI. Yet its ministers
casts several times and has she imposed over India’s refuse to learn the simple
been overtaken by Cognizant economy. lesson: to keep an arm’s
Technology Solutions Corp. in By the time the so-called li- distance from investigation
annual revenue. It also pur- cence raj ended in 1990 and agencies being supervised

and 2.7 million in 2020. It’s a premium buy, business, it had bet its future on setting itself
want the search to include ex-
ternal candidates because the
company’s current manage-
ment is struggling to regain its
past glory.
sued the new 3.0 strategy dog- the time had arrived for Goen- by courts in particular
gedly in an environment when ka’s ambitions to take flight in cases.
outsourcing customers are a free market, he had pretty This issue has provided
only looking to save costs. much hung up his boots. more ammunition to the
Last year, Infosys missed the He retired as executive opposition. At the very

Jeffrey Sean Lehman, the
New York University Shanghai
vice-chancellor and chairman
of the nominations committee
lower end of its revenue fore-
cast at least twice and stopped
giving quarterly forecasts. The
sluggish growth rates and in-
can sometimes be
chairman that year to give his minimum, we are staring at
Deep roots: Goenka belonged to a fast­fading generation of businessmen sons Harsh Vardhan and San- a disruption in the
from Kolkata who saw the city slide from being one of India’s most functioning of Parliament.
endowed commercial centres to one nearly bankrupt of industries. TURN TO PAGE 3®

so it must content itself with one in every 20 apart, not sharpening a price edge. Typical
at Infosys’s board, is leading creasingly impatient investors
the process, said two people prompted Infosys to re-exam-

directly familiar with the de-
velopment. Lehman led the
hunt for Infosys’s chairman
when the company’s iconic
founder N.R. Narayana Murthy
Hero retains
ine its strategy and it started
cutting prices for select clients.
The company also entered into
revenue-sharing agreements
with companies such as IPsoft ambition in

retired in August 2011.
Infosys’s 15-member board
smartphones bought (144 million last year). trends in world trade, however, are dictated by
has nine independent direc-
tors, two co-founders and four
leaders from the management.
Of these, some are of the opin-
ion that Infosys needs to make
bolder decisions, especially
a fatal mistake.
Inc. to drive up business vol-
umes, even at the cost of mar-
solo ride
gins.
On his part, Shibulal admit-
ted that the new strategy that B Y A MRIT R AJ
aims to generate one-third of amrit.r@livemint.com
total revenue from Big Data so- ·························
lutions, products and plat- NEW DELHI

while selecting the next CEO as

part of the company’s biggest
management transition.
forms may have been ill-timed.
“There’s no doubt that the
volatility impacted our reve-
P awan Munjal and his sen-
ior management team
boarded a late evening char-

But as rich markets saturate, it can count on dull prices distorted by national policies. The
“The board is duty-bound to
look for the best possible can-
didates, both internally and
from outside. Given recent
performance, a more thorough
hunt that includes candidates
from outside too is something
high on the agenda,” said one
of the people. Both requested
nue, which did not allow us to
benefit from 3.0. The strategy
is all about creating two other
new growth engines. That
should be done at any point of
time—there’s no good time or
bad time for that. We cannot
wait for the world to be stable
before we say we’re going to
tered flight for Delhi on 10 Jan-
uary 2010 after attending an
awards function in Mumbai.
On board, Munjal, managing
director of the company then
known as Hero Honda Motors
Ltd, told his team about his in-
tention to part ways with the
firm’s Japanese partner.

upgrades here for years on end. The dazzle of world is in geopolitical flux, so the distortion
anonymity because these are create a new growth engine,” “I am planning to go solo,”
Shibulal said in an interview Munjal said, according to a

after the company announced
its earnings for year ended 31
March, which fell short of the
5% revenue growth prediction.
When asked about his views
as a board member on Info-
sys’s next CEO and the ongo-
C l ay ton M. C hr i ste n se n
person who was on that flight.
“Are you guys ready?”
His audience cheered and a
small celebration followed, re-
called the person, who spoke
on condition that he wouldn’t
be named. “We raised a toast

snazzy stores, it must have reckoned, will outlook is hazy. But our best bet for a China-
ing succession planning, Shib-
ulal said that was being done
by the nominations commit-
tee.
Experts such as Partha Iyen-
gar, who heads research at
Gartner Inc.’s India office, said
Infosys’s pessimistic stance at
the beginning of the year is a
as years of waiting were going
to get over,” he said, a refer-
ence to the geographical limits
the joint venture had enforced
on Hero’s ambitions.
Still, Munjal’s proposition
was momentous for a company
TURN TO PAGE 8®

engage buyers better than the dreary sales plus economic boost would be to acquire a
cause for concern and it’s time
the board gets aggressive. ALSO SEE
“If you’re in a position of
Mint is also available for R7 with >It is customers who make a Splendor,
Hindustan Times in Delhi-NCR only says Pawan Munjal >P10
TURN TO PAGE 2®

channels we have had so far. Indeed, the broad cost advantage that’s loud and clear.

GUEST VIEW

Five ways founders can build enduring organizations

They build a structure designed for growth:
AlOK KShIrSAGAr The principle is that the operational model
needs to be both flexible enough to allow for
future growth and stable enough to manage
it. This requires a change of mindset—from
‘growth for funding’ to ‘growth for sustained
urgent issues. They use data transparently companies found that organizations which company are pretty much the same thing.
to drive actions, and do not allow historical reallocated talent frequently were twice as But growth requires more layers, diverse
friendships and personal equations to get in likely to outperform their peers. talents and more structured development
the way. They foster a distinctive culture: Startups paths. An online food-delivery platform, for
They get talent right: Startups can often create culture on the fly; with maturity, instance, created a career development
cram everyone in a room, and the founder- however, this needs to become far more programme targeted at its 140 people, with

is a senior partner at McKinsey
& Company, and co-leads
McKinsey’s global practice
focused on founder-led
companies
B
rilliant ideas, energetic founders and
supportive investors can help start-
ups get off the ground. But keeping
the company flying is a different challenge,
particularly in these tough and uncertain
markets. In a McKinsey analysis of almost
1,800 startups, 78% that had launched a
successful product failed to scale it up.
Why? It is not just about ideas or capital, but
is driven much more by whether or not
founders can build a robust organization
and culture. In fact, investors have attrib-
uted 65% of any less-than-expected per-
formance in their portfolio companies to
issues related to people and organizational
set-ups. Hyper-scalers are geared to out-
perform the industry, remain resilient dur-
ing downturns, maintain strong cash posi-
tions, set a high bar for corporate perform-
ance, and make calculated bold moves.
Five factors stand out from McKinsey’s
experience with founders in India and
around the world who have scaled up to
build organizations that endure:
scale’. That means building an organiza-
tional structure that encourages innovation
and risk-taking, but with clear accountabili-
ties and decision rights. Too many founders
say they want to delegate and do so on paper,
but those who succeed actually empower
their teams and enable them to make their
own decisions. In addition, startups whose
operating models allow for multidirectional
growth, beyond their core business or geog-
raphy, are 97% more likely to outperform
those that don’t, our study shows.
They create new ways to collaborate: Start-
ups are keen to bring in customers and rev-
enue by all means. As they grow, however,
they face the complexity of coping with
multiple channels, platforms and partner-
ships. Communication becomes frag-
mented and siloed. Founders who scale up
are much more deliberate about creating
joint teams (across products, operations,
compliance, tech) with specific operating
metrics that they are responsible to drive,
with focused daily meetings to resolve
chief executive officer interviews all new intentional. It is important to acknowledge customized leadership journeys for each.
prospects. ‘Scaled innovators’ accept there that the culture that enables a startup’s suc- By doing this, the platform’s founders got a
comes a time when this is no longer tenable, cess may need to evolve to drive its next highly motivated and skilled team of tal-
and that they may need different kinds of phases of growth. They communicate their ented individuals who were now able to
candidates than the time when their startup growth mission and reward those who live drive massive growth together.
was ‘the next new thing’. At this point, sys- out their core cultural values, and let go of Founders who believe in the myth that
tems come into play to clarify the talent those who do not, even if they happen to be aggressive, dictatorial behaviour drives
management strategy current high performers. performance can have some initial success,
and define a differenti- Digital entrepreneur particularly if they also got funds raised on
ated employee value QUICK READ James Bilefield, who the basis of their ‘idea’. But those that scale
proposition. One digital helped scale up Skype’s successfully have understood how to create
commerce company Great ideas and their originators global business, put it 100-200 leaders who operate like owners
used advanced analytics backed by supportive investors this way: “Failing to themselves, have high levels of mutual trust
to identify which skills it can get startups off the block maintain a clear focus on and bear accountability towards one
would need over the but lasting success depends on core values and princi- another to achieve the company’s goals.
next three years. Then it whether founders create a strong ples during the scaling Look at the journeys of unicorns in India
revised its hiring and organization and culture. process can result in just in the past decade. Those founders that
training programmes unacceptable behav- have scaled and created value have not just
and redefined key roles Scaling up requires a model iours and other harmful talked about these five factors, but executed
on the basis of this sce- designed for growth that affords effects.” them with due focus and determination as
nario. It is difficult to wider talent and new modes They adapt their lead- well. They will keep flying in good times
overstate how much this of collaboration in a business ership model: In the and tough times both.
matters: A McKinsey culture that must evolve in startup phase, the lead- Claudy Jules and Kate Lloyd George con-
survey of more than 600 line with strategic objectives. ership team and the tributed to this article.
LIVEMINT.COM VIEWS FridAy, 14 April 2023
MUMbAi 13

MY VIEW | VOX HETERODOX M I N T C U R AT O R

For our world in flux: Some hard Exasperated US recruiters do

have themselves to blame too
lessons in history from the 1930s They should check if their own practices suit a tight labour market

We need enlightened leadership and a new architecture for international cooperation to curb the risk of repeating past errors

GETTYIMAGES

SARAH GREEN CARMICHAEL

is a Bloomberg Opinion editor.

DEEPAK NAYYAR
is emeritus professor of economics, Jawaharlal
Nehru University

E
xecutives in the US looking forward to
a softening labour market with some

T
he world is in a state of flux. Economies
are going through difficult times, if not
crises. Politics within countries is con-
tentious, if not polarized. The geo-
political divides are visible, and
sharper than they have been for
decades. International relations are strained, and
there are several potential flashpoints. It would
seem that our world in the third decade of the 21st
century presents a picture which has striking simi-
larities with the world one hundred years ago. The
potential implications are indeed worrisome.
There are several symptoms of the difficult times
we live in. The coronavirus pandemic prompted
repeated lockdowns across the world, leading to
sharp contraction in output and employment
everywhere. The economic recovery has been
slow. In many countries, national income in 2022
just about returned to its 2019 levels. The recovery
has been K-shaped, so economic inequalities have
continued to rise. The pandemic also disrupted
integrated global production networks, while
stifling international trade and investment flows.
The situation might have improved in early
2022. But that was thwarted by the Russia-Ukraine
war, which disrupted global supply-chains in food,
fuels and fertilizers. The sharp rise in food and fuel
prices, pushed inflation to double-digit levels in
most countries. The response of central banks,
driven by orthodoxy, has raised interest rates,
which will stifle investment and dampen con-
sumption, instead of curbing inflation that is
caused by supply-constraints rather than excess
liquidity. In fact, the prospect of recession in the
world economy looms large. The continuing war
in Ukraine has enhanced uncertainty and risk in
the economic and political spheres, making
markets nervous, inducing large international
firms into relocation and re-shoring of production.
Globalization is at risk.
There is also a political backlash in the form of
resurgent nationalisms riding on the back of popu-
list or chauvinist sentiments. In rich countries,
nationalist-populist political parties, or far-right
xenophobic populist leaders, exploit fears about
openness in immigration and trade as a threat to
jobs, making racism explicit. In poor countries,
nationalist-populist political parties or leaders
exploit religious beliefs or ethnic divides to create
an identity politics seeking to exclude the per-
ceived ‘other’. Such populist-authoritarian
regimes, often elected by people themselves, now
straddle the world across countries and continents.
There are many strong parallels with the world
that existed a century earlier. The preceding era of
globalization, 1870-1914, which seemed unstoppa-
ble at the time, was brought to an abrupt end by
World War I. In 1918, when the war ended, soldiers
returning home from Europe transformed the
Spanish Flu into a worldwide pandemic that cost
relief—at last, it will be easier to hire
people—might be in for an unwelcome sur- Complex recruitment processes can be a
prise. In a survey by the Conference Board, put-off for many candidates ISTOCKPHOTO
57% of CEOs said they’re having problems
attracting qualified workers. While that hiring process is for a single candidate, it’s
number has declined from the final quarter even more onerous for the managers evalu-
of 2022, it still means that more than half of ating multiple applicants.
companies find it hard to hire. Companies also want new staffers to
For years, business leaders have com- come ready-made with the skills they need
plained about their struggle to fill jobs. Usu- to do the job without any training. But those
ally, they blame the economy or workers, or unicorn candidates often do not exist, espe-
even the US education system. And sure, cially not at the salaries that most employers
there are some jobs that are truly tough to are willing to pay, says recruiter Laura Maz-
fill, whether because there are few who can zullo, founder of East Side Staffing. That’s a
do it, few ready to accept low pay for it, or message that many senior executives are
few who want to do it. reluctant to hear from their Human
But there is a more obvious reason hiring Resource departments.
is hard: Many recruiters just don’t do it well. Companies need to bring more discipline
Too often, they alienate prospective hires to the hiring process—from start to finish.
by subjecting them to a tortuous vetting Sure, the first draft of a job description can
process. They reject promising candidates include a wish-list of 42 different skills and
50 million lives. Even as the United States entered from Pax Britannica to Pax Americana. In this who don’t meet their impossibly long list of attributes candidates should have. But the
the roaring 1920s, Europe struggled with problems quest, during the late 1930s, Germany pushed requirements. And they overlook qualified final version should focus on what’s actually
of reconstruction, slow growth and hyperinflation. Europe closer to World War II, which was declared internal candidates for outside talent. needed to do the job.
Economic inequalities between and within coun- in September 1939. Japan did so in December 1941, The prevailing attitude toward applicants Interview processes should unfold over
tries rose. This was conducive to the rise of nation- when it attacked the US and the British Empire in seems to be, ‘You’ll be lucky to work for us weeks, not months. A handful of structured
alism and militarism. Benito Mussolini captured Asia. It is an irony of history that Japan had joined at Heaven Sent Corp.’ But executives having interviews is more revealing than a dozen
power in Italy, subverting democracy, and trans- the Allies in World War I, invoking its 1902 alliance difficulty filling jobs—and the US has 3 mil- freewheeling conversations.
forming dictatorship into fascism. Unequal terms with Britain, to capture Germany’s colonial posses- lion more open roles now than in 2019— And although judging candidates by
in the Treaty of Versailles, which required Ger- sions in Asia and the Pacific. should consider how the application pro- sample tasks can bring some fairness to a
many to pay financial reparations, disarm, lose There are striking similarities between this cess looks from a candidate’s point of view. process often warped by personal biases,
territory and give up all its colonies, did have past and our present. The financial crisis of 2008 That’s exactly what Uber CEO Dara Khos- the tasks need to be short enough that can-
economic and political consequences. spread worldwide through contagion. The Great rowshahi did when he posed as an Uber didates can complete them in an hour—
In October 1929, the Great Recession followed in its after- driver. When the ride-hailing company had something that will also help hiring man-
Crash in stock markets of the US math, disrupting the smooth sail trouble attracting new drivers, Khosrow- agers evaluating dozens of them.
led into the Great Depression. It QUICK READ of globalization. shahi and other executives got behind the One way to combat poor hiring practices
was not long before this spread The covid pandemic was wheel—and quickly realized they needed to is with data. Companies should keep track
worldwide and persisted The geopolitical and economic perhaps the proverbial last straw revamp things to compete for workers. of how long they have had a role open, says
through the 1930s. Economic shake-up being seen globally for globalization. Inequalities in At full-time desk jobs that come with sala- Mazzullo, as well as how many candidates
troubles led to political instabil- has striking similarities with an income and wealth between ries and benefits, applicants can expect to they have considered and how many offers
ity in many parts of the world. upheaval in the early part of and within countries are confront a marathon of interviews, assess- they have made. Following up with people
The political churn spurred the last century that we could unprecedented. Slow growth, ments and screenings. Between 2009 and who have withdrawn from consideration
nationalism and militarism in take important lessons from. persistent inflation and a possi- 2019, employers nearly doubled the time can diagnose issues with the process.
some countries. By 1930, the ble recession might exacerbate they spent interviewing candidates, accord- Cappelli also recommends keeping an
Nazis were the second largest As the global order crumbles, discontent among people. ing to data from Glassdoor. eye on how new hires are performing so that
political party in Germany, and collective action is the only way The Ukraine war could have In recent weeks, I’ve seen screenshots of managers can answer the most important
in 1933, Adolf Hitler was to tackle our many challenges global implications, as Russia, multipage questionnaires that applicants question: Did that Herculean recruiting
appointed chancellor. By 1934, and this calls for enlightened not quite a Union of Soviet have been asked to complete. I’ve heard of effort actually pay off?
he was chancellor, president and leadership so that cooperation Socialist Republics, strives to hiring processes that stretch over months An advocate of long hiring processes
fascist dictator. The Great determines crucial outcomes. regain its seat at the world high- and include meetings with more than two could argue that they not only weed out less
Depression also led to the rise of table. There is a pronounced dozen interviewers. It isn’t unusual for can- serious candidates, but also give potential
militarism in Japan during the 1930s. Economic shift in the balance of economic power, from the didates to be asked to take personality employees a chance to kick the tires on the
nationalisms surged almost everywhere as coun- West to Asia, and from the US to China, which assessments or complete sample assign- organization. But more often, the succes-
tries adopted ‘beggar-thy-neighbour’ policies, now seeks superpower status. Collective action is ments. Some could take hours. sion of interviews is a red flag, a signal of
restricting imports to protect domestic output and the only way to address the many challenges. But And compounding all of this, says Peter corporate flab.
employment. history suggests that established dominant powers Cappelli, a professor of management at the When an employer spends six months or
Both Germany and Japan, rising powers that are reluctant to cede economic or political space Wharton School: Companies today fill even a year trying to fill an open role, one
were latecomers to industrialization and empire, to latecomers. about 80% of open roles with outside hires, has to ask: Is it really the labour market?
aspired to a larger role in a world dominated by the Enlightened leadership and a new architecture compared with perhaps 5% or 10% a few Unless it involves data science or diapers,
US and Great Britain, even if it was in transition for international cooperation are essential. decades ago. That means as painful as the probably not. ©BLOOMBERG

MY VIEW | PEN DRIVE

Taiwan matters more than we’d like to tell ourselves

Commentators in China said Macron was
RAhUl JACob “brilliant”. Pity Taiwan. With a population of
just 24 million and an army a fraction the size
of China’s, it needs the world’s support.
Instead, multilateral agencies and global
leaders have pandered to China’s claim that
West, as evidenced with him strengthening prison, allegedly for violating a lease contract centrating on anti-missile defences, for
his alliance with Russia in a summit with for the headquarters of the tabloid he used to instance. That report suggests some of its
President Vladimir Putin. In 2009, on a visit run. Several so-called pro democracy Hong army officers also appear to lack the resolve
to Mexico before he was even president, Xi Kong activists and legislators are in jail or that such an unequal fight would demand.
Jinping memorably voiced it thus: “There have sought asylum overseas. Ukraine-styled heroism that goes on for
are some well fed foreigners who have noth- Optimists about Hong Kong’s future after more than a year in the event of an invasion

F
is a Mint columnist and a
former Financial Times
foreign correspondent.
or most businesses, risk diversification
is a good thing. Yet, late last year, Morris
Chang, who heads Taiwan Semicon-
ductor Manufacturing Corp, the world’s
largest semiconductor company, sounded
downbeat as plans to break ground on a new
plant in the US proceeded apace. Globaliza-
tion and free trade, he insisted, were almost
dead. He grumbled that the US government’s
plans to bring semiconductor manufacturing
home were “doomed to fail.” Yet Chang
knows better than most that, controversial as
industrial policy is because it usually comes
with higher costs, his new plant in Arizona
reduces the risk that Beijing will enjoy domi-
nant control of chip production if it were to
attack and overpower its tiny neighbour.
This week, it was the turn of French Presi-
dent Emmanuel Macron to underplay that
worryingly likely possibility. Macron went
further in a reference to Taiwan when he said
Europe should not fall into a “trap” and
become involved in “crises that are not ours.”
it is a renegade province by not recognizing
Taiwan as an independent country with a
vibrant democracy. Macron’s blunder and
Chang’s grumble about the costs of moving
production overseas are just the latest exam-
ples of such short-sightedness.
As Beijing has stepped up its military exer-
cises near Taiwan over the past several days
and increased its disregard of Taiwanese air-
space by sending fighter jets repeatedly into
it, Taiwan’s president Tsai Ing-wen, a brave
woman in an impossibly difficult job,
sounded all the right notes on a recent visit to
the US, but this was undermined by a simul-
taneous visit to China by the leader of oppo-
sition Kuomintang party (KMT). Ma Ying-
jeou, who was president of Taiwan between
2008 and 2016 when the KMT was in power,
played to China’s script by recalling its past
humiliation by foreign powers.
This is a theme that China has milked from
Mao to its present modernity. But President
Xi Jinping has a particular dislike for the
ing better to do than point fingers at our it was returned to China in 1997 said that Bei- looks unlikely for all these reasons. In addi-
affairs,” he said. “China does not, first, export jing had an incentive to keep its promise to tion, the KMT might win the general election
revolution; second, export poverty and hun- allow Hong Kong’s free-market economy next year and pave the way for a de facto
ger; third, cause troubles for you.” and free press because this would help the Hong Kong-style change in sovereignty for
And yet, since Xi became head of the Chi- project of an eventual peaceful unification the island republic. When I visited Hong
nese Communist Party more than a decade with Taiwan. Over the past few years, as with Kong last month, its capitalism seemed
ago, Beijing’s credit poli- all its neighbours includ- almost as vibrant as before, even if its media
cies to boost infrastruc- ing India, China has has been self-censoring. There were fewer
ture projects for its state- QUICK READ decided intimidation expatriate business people and a movie dis-
owned giants has created works better. Its conven- tributor had to cancel showings of Winnie the
debt traps for many After the prolonged fighting in tional arms lead over Tai- Pooh in March because memes have likened
developing countries. Ukraine, the threat Taiwan faces wan is enormous and President Xi to the cartoon character. After
Beijing promised to gov- from China may feel like an growing; to pick just one the horrors of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine
ern Hong Kong as a semi- overload, but what happens example, China has 400 have played out on our news feeds, few have
autonomous, liberal there matters to all of us more naval ships, Taiwan just the stomach for a prolonged battle in Tai-
financial centre when than we would like to think. 26. A recent in-depth wan—as Macron’s comments suggest. The
the city was handed back report in The Economist disturbing human rights implications of this
to it by Britain in 1997. De-globalization is already says this asymmetry has are troubling enough, but Taiwan is also the
But, in December, hurting trade and an invasion been worsened by the epicentre of global semiconductor produc-
Jimmy Lai, the city’s of Taiwan could put the world’s Taiwanese military buy- tion, with a 90% share of very advanced
leading newspaper pub- high-end chip supplies at risk and ing the wrong kinds of semiconductors. For many reasons, we
lisher, was sentenced to also confront us with yet another weapons such as expen- should all be worried as this geopolitical
almost six years in human rights catastrophe. sive F-16s instead of con- tragedy plays out.
14 FridAy, 14 April 2023
MuMbAi BUSINESS OF LIFE INDULGE LIVEMINT.COM

Time travelling in London

via its historical pubs
Michael Jordan’s Air Jordan 13 ‘Breds’ AFP

A story of the
most valuable
trainers ever sold
And more from the world of luxury,
fashion and changing buying patterns
(Clockwise, from above:) The St
Bride’s Church; Ye Olde Cheshire Agencies
Cheese; and The Sherlock Holmes.

themed and country, rustic and posh. The bor-
ough of Westminster is richest, with more than
430 pubs.
I step out and walk along the Thames to reach
Anchor Bankside, resplendent in red and gold.
Said to be Bankside’s oldest surviving tavern, it
has been rebuilt many times like other historic
pubs in London, though records show there has
been a pub at this location for more than 800
years. The Anchor was a haunt of actors from
neighbouring playhouses such as the Globe, the
The British bars aren’t for social and intellectual exchange in villages, Swan and the Rose.
towns and cities. British pubs aren’t entirely I continue walking. Around me abound pubs
just venues selling homegrown. According to Historic UK, centu- with celebrated pasts. The Cockpit, where cock-
ries ago, an invading Roman army brought fighting drew crowds till 1835 when the practice
different kinds of ales. along road networks and pubs, then known as was banned, was once owned by Shakespeare.
tabernae. These tabernae, now taverns, served The Blackfriar Pub, built in 1875 on the site of a
They are heritage spaces, wine to the troops and passers-by, but quickly 13th century Dominican priory, is one of the
offering glimpses adapted to local tastes by serving ale. All ale-
houses, inns and taverns became known as pub-
comeliest pubs in London, with stained glass
windows depicting jolly monks.
of a bygone era lic houses, and then pubs during the reign of Walking by the river has worked up an appe-
King Henry VII. In 1552, an Act necessitating a tite and I step into the Old Bell, thinking of a pale
licence to run a pub was passed. The drinking ale, beer-battered onion rings, and the fat chip-
Teja Lele establishment continued to grow and evolve pies that seem to cock a snook at the regular
with social and political movements. skinny French fries.
ust think about it, I tell the little Initially, the working class thronged pubs, The Old Bell stands on the site of an earlier
A
pair of sneakers, worn by Michael Jordan during the 1998
NBA Finals, has fetched a record $2.2 million at an auc-
tion, making them the most valuable sneakers ever sold.
According to a Reuters report, the Air Jordan 13 “Breds”, short
for “black and red”, were worn by Jordan in the second game of
the Finals during his final season with the Chicago Bulls, referred
to as the “Last Dance”.
Jordan scored 37 points in the game and led the Bulls to a
93-88 win over the Utah Jazz. He went on to win his sixth and
final NBA Championship and was named the Finals MVP, adds
the Reuters report.
Jordan then gave the shoes as a gift to a Jazz ball boy after the
game as thanks for finding his lost jacket. They were the final pair
of Breds that Jordan wore in a game, said Sotheby’s.
The online sale cements Jordan’s position as the most valuable
athlete at auctions for sportswear memorabilia. It broke his own
record of $1.5 million for sneakers, set in September 2021, states
an AFP report.
Such high price for a pair of sneakers shows the boom in the
market for rare sports shoes. The record price for sneakers has
been broken several times recently as what was seen as a niche
market a decade ago now attracts interest from the general public
as well as leading collectors.
Kanye West’s Nike Air Yeezy 1 prototype model, which fetched
$1.8 million in 2021, were earlier the most expensive sneakers to
be sold at an auction.

J voice in my head, this might be the

table Charles Dickens chose to
relax at after a hard day’s work. The
George, set back from the main
road between London Bridge and Borough
Market, is one of London’s oldest pubs. But
Dickens, who mentioned The George when it
was a coffee house in Little Dorrit, isn’t the pub-
lic house’s only claim to fame.
Harking back to the 17th century, The George
is said to have hosted Shakespeare when it dou-
bled as a theatrical venue. Audiences would
stand in the galleries, watching the performan-
ces in the cobbled courtyard below.
There are no audiences now but I can hear
the pleasant thrum of a happy crowd. The
George sits in the middle of Southwark,
between the contemporary Shard and Millen-
nium Bridge and the ancient St Paul’s Cathedral
and London Bridge, drawing both tourists and
locals. The battered halloumi bites, topped with
a red chilli and pickled red onion garnish, and
baked British Camembert with sourdough
strips, grapes and red peppers consume my
attention. I take a swig of cold beer and look
around the historic public house I am in.
The British pub isn’t just a place where peo-
ple come together to sip ale. Like the Parisian
cafés and Chinese tea houses, pubs are commu-
nity spaces that have long functioned as centres
which had bare-bench seats and wooden stools
standing on unfurnished floorboards, often
covered with sawdust to absorb “spit and saw-
dust”, and women were barred. By the end of
the 18th century, most pubs created a new
space: the saloon, which charged an admission
fee and offered drinks alongside entertainment
tavern, The Swan, which gave way to Fleet
Street’s first printer in 1500. It was later rebuilt
by Sir Christopher Wren to house the masons
who were renovating St Bride’s Church—said to
be the inspiration for the tiered wedding cake—
after the Great Fire. The Old Bell is considered
the second oldest pub in London, and was the
The record
price for
sneakers has
been broken
several times
DEMAND FOR LUXURY GOODS IS
SURGING AGAIN
Sales of LVMH, Europe’s most valua-
ble company, have soared as Chinese
shoppers bounced back from the
world’s strictest lockdowns and
splashed out on luxury items, accord-
like singing, dancing, drama or comedy. My pub of choice for printers and journalists work- recently ing to a Bloomberg report.
friend, a London local and a seasoned pub ing on Fleet Street. Nearby is Ye Olde Cheshire Organic sales at the group’s biggest
crawler, says that males and accompanied Cheese, in a building dating back to 1667, where unit, which sells fashion and leather
women visited these bars, which had carpeted the seat “to the right of the fire, under the por- goods, rose 18% in the first quarter, LVMH said in a statement.
floors, upholstered seating, and better drinks. originally made without hops. Ale brewed with trait of the head waiter” is said to have been That’s almost twice the gain that analysts were expecting from
The “snug” also sprung up around this time. hops made an appearance in the 14th and 15th Dickens’ favourite. the brand. Demand is increasing again in every region, adds the
A small private area with access to the bar and a centuries, and was known as beer. By 1550, all To walk through London’s taverns is to take Bloomberg report. Japan saw the strongest quarterly growth in
frosted glass window for privacy, the snug brewing used hops, and the terms alehouse and a trip through its living heritage. I’ve managed the first quarter, rising 34% on an organic basis, followed by a 24%
charged more but was popular with people who beerhouse were used interchangeably. Today, to cover only a handful along the Embankment. uplift in Europe and a 14% jump in Asia outside Japan.
did not want to be ales, stouts and lagers There is The Mayflower, tracing its roots back
seen drinking in pub- are just different to the 1600s and was named after the ship that LACOSTE, NETFLIX JOIN HANDS
lic. This is where the London is home to kinds of beers. took the Pilgrims to the New World. Then Netflix Inc. and Lacoste SA have launched a clothing collabora-
local priest got his more than 3,500 pubs, By the 16th century, there’s the Viaduct Tavern, said to be one of tion, wherein the fashion brand’s iconic garments, from Polos to
evening drink, the the heart of London London’s most haunted pubs and built on the tracksuits, have been reimagined to celebrate fan-favourite
constable grabbed a old and new, themed and city was home to site of Newgate Prison, which jailed many pris- shows. This creative collaboration will cover eight of Netflix’s
pint, or the brave soli- country, rustic and posh about 3,000 pubs and oners, including Oscar Wilde, and two female most popular shows, including Stranger Things, Bridgerton,
tary woman ordered a bars. But the Great serial killers. The Seven Stars, located in one of Money Heist, The Witcher, Sex Education, Shadow And Bone, and
fixer-upper. That puts Fire of London, which the few buildings that survived the Great Fire; Elite. The collection is aimed at a younger audience, signalling
me in the mood for a fixer-upper, and I settle on blazed for nearly five days in September 1666, Ye Olde Mitre Tavern, where Queen Elizabeth Lacoste’s attempt to expand its appeal. Previously, Netflix had
an English brown ale with a predominantly razed nearly one-third of the city and countless I once danced around the cherry tree at the partnered with French fashion house Balmain for a Western-
malty palate. Gordon, the bartender, is well drinking establishments. The British love for entrance… they all have to wait for next time. themed collection inspired by The Harder They Fall.
versed in the history of what he’s dispensing. He pubs prevailed, however, and today, London is
tells me that ale, the native British brew, was home to more than 3,500 pubs, old and new, Write to us at businessoflife@livemint.com Write to us at businessoflife@livemint.com

A beast of a machine that’s perfect for work and play

The 2023 M2 Pro-based ous iteration, so there was little to refine in As good as the screen gets, the target slow progress on filing this review, with
the design, except may be add a colour or audience for this laptop may well never 35-40% left in the tank. A lighter day and
MacBook Pro is an two to the silver/space grey options. see the screen, as MacBook Pros often are I’d probably be able to go two days without
expensive workhorse Ditto for the excellent touchpad and connected to an Apple Studio Display or charging.
keyboard. From the get-go though, you similar colour accurate monitors for built- There are a couple of caveats to keep in
that handles fun and realise this is not a laptop to be trifled with, for-large screen creative applications. mind, starting with the evergreen ques-
both in terms of performance and longev- You’re really paying the big bucks for the tion: “Can you play games on this?”.
work with ease ity claims as well as the sheer heft of the performance boost from the M2 Pro and You can certainly game on these
16-inch model. M2 Max chips, which pack in even more machines, with a good assortment made
Tushar Kanwar If you haven’t seen the previous genera- transistors than the previous M1 equiva- for Apple Silicon-games, now available on
tion models, these are pudgy pieces of kit, lent chips for a 30% bump up in graphics Apple Arcade (or older ones on compati-

A
fter years of dithering on what
makes for a great pro-grade laptop,
Apple turned a corner in 2021 with
the redesigned MacBook Pro in 14- and
16-inch avatars. These laptops finally
added the power and ports that profes-
sionals had been hankering after for years.
Building on the same product ethos, the
2023 M2 Pro-based MacBook Pro is a
beast of a mobile workstation aimed
squarely at pros with a pro-sized budget.
Plus, there’s an M2 Max variant with up to
96GB of memory and 8TB of storage if you
have the need to go all out.
This time, we’ve taken the 16-inch mid-
range M2 Pro model (₹2,69,900) for an
extensive spin to see how far we could
push Apple’s latest workhorse.
Expectedly, build quality is exceptional,
the weight is evenly distributed, and
there’s simply no flex or give anywhere,
either on the chassis or the lid. Design
wise, Apple got it mostly right in the previ-
with the 16-inch model coming in at
2.15kg. Slip this into a bag and it makes its
significant presence felt. The upside of
this portliness is ports: two USB-C ports, a
3.5mm headphone jack and a magneti-
cally attaching MagSafe 3 charging port
on the left, and a SDXC card slot, one
USB-C and HDMI port on the right.
Not messing around with basic formula
also means that it ships with the same
vibrant 16.2-inch mini-LED Liquid Retina
XDR display, which still manages excel-
lent black levels and deeper contrast levels
than regular LCD panels.
More importantly, the MacBook Pro’s
screen can go up to a peak brightness of
1600 nits on HDR media/games.
As with the previous model, the 120 Hz
variable refresh rate dynamically balances
fluidity with battery consumption. You
get pre-calibrated colour profiles for pre-
cise colour accuracy while colour grading
your videos or editing photographs, but
The 16-inch model, worth over ₹2.6 lakh, comes with a six-speaker sound system.
you’ll want to switch to the XDR Display
profile when you’re done for the day and
just want to relax with a movie or a televi-
sion show.
The six-speaker sound system lands just
as impressively. This is an all-rounder of a
laptop that’s equally at home in a creative
workplace as it is in the den.
The display also houses the controver-
sial iPhone-style notch cutout, which con-
tains the much-improved 1080p webcam,
but no Face ID hardware for hands-free
authentication à la the iPhone, a change
that could have made a real quality of life
improvement over the first-generation
MacBook Pro.
performance while still retaining their
famed energy efficiency.
The unit I tested was the highest non-
configured SKU (1TB storage) with the M2
Pro unit, which has a 12-core CPU and a
19-core GPU. While I can’t comment on
the M2 Max’s boost in performance over
the M2 Pro, I can say the M2 Pro alone is a
beast of a machine.
Forget obliterating premium priced
Windows laptops for creative applications
(which it does handily), this laptop chews
through everything, from video editing
and rendering six simultaneous 4K
streams in Final Cut Pro (FCP) to applying
complex colour correction in DaVinci
Resolve. The laptop kept on going at peak
performance, even on battery.
What impressed me more was that I
could go through a 10-12 hour workday,
streaming music, juggling more browser
tabs than should be considered legal, noo-
dling around with video edits and making
bility mode via Rosetta 2), or AAA titles via
the Epic Games Store. But these laptops
aren’t specifically designed for gaming.
The other thing to note is that as with all
base configuration Macs these days, there
is a drop in read/write speeds in the base
512GB model as compared to the 1TB
model I tested. Also, only the 16-inch
models support 140W fast charging.
THE VERDICT
If you’re a MacBook Pro user who hasn’t
made the move to Apple silicon yet, this is
a great time to do it. The chips are vastly
more capable for “pro” applications than
the Wintel peers, and the battery
improvements will alter your usage pat-
terns for the better. It’s heavy on the wallet
(and your lap), so it’s best viewed as an
investment in your workflow. This is not
a purchase I expect anyone to regret.
Write to us at businessoflife@livemint.com
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