Hello Reader,
It is officially the final quarter of the calendar year and it looks like funding remains muted across the Indian startup ecosystem.
The last week of September saw just $140 million raised in venture funding, reflecting the gloom and doom of global markets.
However, we did get a new unicorn as Goa-based Molbio Diagnostics raised $85 million at a valuation of $1.6 billion. That’s 23 unicorns for India in 2022 so far.
Meanwhile, companies are still trying to figure out how to bring millennials and GenZ back to the office.
Spoiler alert: It’s not collaboration.
In today’s newsletter, we will talk about
- Peter Cat’s honest approach to music
- Inside Mani Ratnam’s dream project
- Explainer: Card tokenisation
Here’s your trivia for today: Which is the only equation to feature in Stephen Hawking’s book A Brief History of Time?
Music
Breaking norms and making niche sound
Your ears perk up to the sound of a blaring trumpet. Soon, your eyes shift towards this group of men, all dressed in kurtas, taking centre stage, ready to give you the performance of a lifetime.
In an age of singles, Peter Cat Recording Company has chosen to break norms and do things the traditional way, making way for a niche sound that is better heard than explained.
Strumming outside the box:
- The decade-old band often tours across the country, with thousands of listeners flocking to every gig. Yet, every time they perform, it appears as a surprise that so many people listen to their music.
- Their last album Bismillah clocked in millions of streams on Spotify and put them on a pedestal for everyone to see.
- Being simple and straightforward is very much the Peter Cat way. You can see this in how they dress—opting for a simple kurta when most contemporary artists prefer flashy clothes.
<Top funding deals of the week>
Startup: Molbio Diagnostics
Amount: $85M
Round: Undisclosed
Startup: Signzy
Amount: $26M
Round: Series B
Startup: Elucidata
Amount: $16M
Round: Series A
Movies
Inside Mani Ratnam’s Ponniyin Selvan I
“The book is better,” says every reader, who has been subjected to a movie or a show based on something they have read, and worse, loved.
Well, for Mani Ratnam’s magnum opus Ponniyin Selvan: I, the same does ring true. Kalki Krishnamurthy’s books are better—an unputdownable masterpiece, gripping and engaging. After all, Ponniyin Selvan, published in the early 1950s, is considered to be the best novel in Tamil literature.
Our take:
- Ponniyin Selvan I has a star-studded cast that understands the weight of translating Kalki Krishnamurthy’s masterpiece on the silver screen and pulls it off successfully.
- Ravi Varman’s cinematography is gripping. Each shot is carefully thought of, beautifully placed and executed, bringing the Chola kingdom from the pages to life.
- What didn’t work? Some book lovers may notice a few of the less important but equally impactful scenes missing but that doesn’t take away from the core narrative.
Finance
Card tokenisation 101
The Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) card-on-file tokenisation rule is all set to kick in from today. It mandates that merchants, ecommerce websites and apps, and other service providers will no longer be allowed to store customers’ card data on their servers.
So, what happens now? Here is everything you need to know as a card (debit or credit) holder in India.
What’s happening:
- Instead of filling out card details at the time of payment, all you would need is an “encrypted token”, unique for each user.
- In simpler terms, a token is a replacement for all of your actual card details.
- With unique tokens, no merchant will be able to store anything during the transaction process.
- The tokens will be saved on the merchant platform. One can just check the last four digits of the saved cards to make the payment again.
News & updates
- Tastes like a win: The foil-wrapped chocolate bunny made by premium chocolate maker Lindt & Sprüngli is celebrating a legal victory, after Switzerland’s highest court ruled that it deserves protection from copycat products, including one made by Lidl.
- Meep morp zeep: Tesla CEO Elon Musk has said a robot business will be worth more than its cars, and on Friday, investors, customers and potential workers expect to see a prototype at Tesla’s “AI Day” that could prove whether the bot named “Optimus” is ready for work.
- Flying high: Air India is considering raising at least $1 billion at a valuation of around $5 billion. The carrier, controlled by India’s oldest conglomerate Tata Group, is in discussions with potential investors including private equity funds and sovereign wealth funds.
Here’s what you should watch out for
- Prime Minister Narendra Modi will launch 5G services at the inaugural day of the 6th India Mobile Congress 2022.
- ‘India Startup Festival’ to kickstart in Bengaluru.
Which is the only equation to feature in Stephen Hawking’s book A Brief History of Time?
Answer: E = mc2.
In the book’s acknowledgement, Hawking wrote he was warned that for every equation, the book’s readership would reduce by half.
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