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upGrad integrates study abroad business with online courses

upGrad, a career skilling and workforce development company, has integrated its diversified study abroad portfolio with blended and online courses. 

“Ranging from market-ready skilling programmes to assuring the last-mile connectivity with global recruiters, we have built a one-stop spectrum to enable the learning and placement needs of everyone who seeks to build a career in an international geography,” said Mayank Kumar, Co-founder and MD, upGrad.

The brand has expanded its footprints across over 20 countries with over 1,000 university partners and 40,000 recruitment agents.

The study abroad segment also experienced over 100% growth during FY23 due to a strong intent towards overseas education that suffered a setback in the last two years. It is expected to cross Rs 500 crore in annual gross revenue in FY24 and will be profitable. The segment will account for about 20% of the group revenue for the year.

HARMAN expands automotive engineering footprint in India

HARMAN, an automotive electronics technology company and a subsidiary of Samsung Electronics focused on designing consumer experiences at automotive grade, announced its expansion plans in India by opening a new automotive engineering centre in Chennai, Tamil Nadu.

According to the company, the new Chennai centre, which will be fully functional by the second quarter of this year, will support HARMAN to tap into Chennai’s rich talent pool of automotive engineers and researchers and contribute to the growth of the global auto ecosystem.

The company will begin operations with a workforce of 200 employees in the first year itself. Currently, over one-third of HARMAN’s total workforce, i.e., close to 10,000 employees work in India.

The Chennai centre will cater to both global and Indian OEMs, and will work in tandem with the other key centres, including Bengaluru and Pune, to develop advanced automotive technologies.

Broadband India Forum signs MoU to expand next-generation wireless ecosystem

Broadband India Forum (BIF) and Wireless Broadband Alliance (WBA) concluded their inaugural event on “Wi-Fi and Delicensing of 6GHz – The Driving Force of Broadband for All” on Tuesday at Le Meridian Hotel, Delhi.

The event jointly focused on the importance of the globally harmonised unlicensed 6Ghz spectrum band and the benefits it brings by addressing the digital divide and making the spectrum available for the next generation. Wi-Fi products based on standardised IEEE 802.11 technologies viz, Wi-Fi6E and Wi-Fi 7, accelerate technology innovations including new applications like AR/VR as well as holographic and haptic systems.

The event brought together policymakers, industry leaders, subject matter experts, and other stakeholders to discuss and deliberate on aspects around how the latest Wi-Fi technologies viz Wi-Fi6E (and upcoming Wi-Fi 7)—that work exclusively in the delicensed 6Ghz spectrum band—can help complement 5G and thereby help bridge the connectivity gap besides spurring new innovations and research and development of new applications and services.

Blowhorn launches offline to online same-day deliveries

Blowhorn has introduced retail store pickups that will allow brands to cut down on inventory costs and deliver products on the same day. This service will be particularly beneficial for metro cities, where the average delivery time for non-grocery items is more than two days.

This new service offers a solution that enables brands to use its current inventory in its offline stores to service online customers, in turn reducing inventory replication costs and improving last-mile delivery times. This would also enable brands to offer faster and more efficient delivery options to their customers, which would improve their overall satisfaction.

This service is currently available in all the metro cities and the plan is to extend it to Tier II cities by the end of this year.

Blowhorn is India’s largest same-day delivery platform enabling customers to scale up seamlessly on a pay-per-use basis. With a self-operated network of asset-light warehouses, transportation and technology integrated, Blowhorn focuses on outstanding SLA (service-level agreement) quality.

Yubi Co.Lend records 3.5 million+ transactions in FY23; registers 4X YoY growth

Co-lending platform Yubi Co.Lend has recorded over 3.5 million transactions in FY23. Yubi Co.Lend, which is Yubi’s co-lending marketplace, saw a 250% growth year-on-year (YoY) in terms of gross transaction volume.

The total co-lending portfolio declared by PSBs for FY23-FY24 is Rs 25,414 crore, with SBI accounting for the bulk. The co-lending market in India is seeing significant growth, with 16 partnerships announced by various banks and non-banking financial companies (NBFCs) in H2 of FY23 alone.

The co-lending partnerships announced this year covered a diverse range of segments, including housing finance, SME lending, and consumer finance, indicating a growing demand for credit across different sectors of the economy.

With over 500 co-lending partners, over 50+ lenders, and 100,000 average daily transactions, Yubi Co.Lend claims to be the biggest co-lending player in the Indian market. Yubi Co.Lend has already partnered with major public sector banks including the State Bank of India.

(This article will be updated with the latest news throughout the day.)