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Hello,

In life, two things are certain: taxes, and shopping in the festive season.

India’s ecommerce sector is poised for nearly 20% growth as the country gears up for the upcoming festive season, according to a report by logistics service provider Delhivery. 

While metros like Bengaluru, Hyderabad, and Mumbai predictably lead in online orders, the report highlighted that non-metro regions such as Raipur, Nagpur, and Indore, are catching up. 

Speaking of ecommerce, Amazon and Flipkart have come under the spotlight for allegedly breaching India’s anti-trust laws. Deep discounting, high margins, and vendor bias didn’t sit well with small retailers.

In other news, shares of Samsung Electronics fell as much as 3% on Friday, as workers at its Sriperumbudur plant continued to strike, disrupting production at the consumer electronics unit for a fifth day.

Samsung’s management, worker union representatives, and the local labour officials failed to reach an agreement on Thursday. Pay and working conditions top the list of workers’ demands.

ICYMI: TechSparks Bengaluru 2024 is right around the corner and prices will go up in TWO days. Hurry and secure your spot!

Moving on, a real-time drama at a billion-dollar company. 

OpenWeb, a New York startup backed by Samsung, welcomed a new CEO earlier this week. The problem? The current CEO, a founding member, didn’t take the news too well and refused to leave.

A tech exec stalemate!

In today’s newsletter, we will talk about 

• Kazam’s playbook for India’s EV game
• Nazara’s gaming acquisition spree
• Decoding the silent reading movement

Here’s your trivia for today: Which petroleum company merged with Exxon in 1999?

Startup

Kazam’s playbook for India’s EV game

Founded in 2020, Bengaluru-based Kazam operates charging stations in public spaces for the general public and quick commerce players. 

As an OEM supplier, it sells white-label chargers—which EV companies can sell under their brand—and software that helps consumers and operators keep track of their vehicle’s charge.

Building it up:

• Kazam CMS helps operators understand and monitor fleet charging, while FMS helps OEMs integrate help centres, finance, and fleet operations. Kazam BSMS monitors and controls battery health.
• Kazam also focuses on original equipment manufacturers. In fact, Bajaj Motors, Ather Energy, and Mahindra & Mahindra are leveraging Kazam’s chargers. 
• The startup has partnered with an India-listed company with global operations to help build its hardware. It has also joined hands with another manufacturer to help mitigate the risk of depending on a single manufacturer for the company.

Top Funding Deals of the Week

Startup: Moonshine Technology

Amount: Rs 982 Cr

Round: Equity

Startup: InMobi

Amount: $100M

Round: Debt

Startup: Centricity

Amount: $20M

Round: Seed

Gaming

Nazara’s acquisition spree

Gaming company Nazara Technologies has made an investment of Rs 832 crore for a 47.7% stake in Moonshine Technology, the parent company of PokerBaazi, through a secondary transaction. Nazara will also inject Rs 150 crore in primary capital into Moonshine via compulsory convertible preference shares.

Expansion strategy:

• Earlier in July, the gaming company had acquired a 48.42% stake in Paper Boat Apps for Rs 300 crore. It is now considering merging Paper Boat Apps into the company, which will allow it to benefit from healthy cash flows.
• The shares of Nazara Technologies surged on Thursday after the company announced acquiring a 15.86% stake in gaming creator platform GetStan Technologies for Rs 18.4 crore in an all-cash secondary transaction.
• In August, it acquired UK-based Fusebox Games in a Rs 228-crore all-cash deal. The acquisition is part of Nazara’s aggressive expansion strategy.

Community

Decoding the silent reading movement

Many cities and towns in India are witnessing the growth of a silent reading movement. The concept is simple—pick a private spot in a designated public place during a particular time on the weekend and read.

Cubbon Reads in Bengaluru is an informal reading group that gathers every Saturday to read on the green lawns of Cubbon Park.

Flipping through:

• “We wanted to build a community of readers that read their own books together, not discuss or dissect one book together,” says Shruti Sah who started Cubbon Reads with Harsh Snehanshu.
• Shruti says they are often approached by people in other cities about wanting to start a silent reading chapter. So, they share their playbook openly on social media to help them through the process with initial content and guidelines.
• Joggers’ Park, a seashore park with walking and jogging tracks in Bandra West, Mumbai, sees avid readers between 8 am and 10 am on Sundays. 

News & updates

• Audit lapse: PwC’s Chinese arm has been suspended from the country for six months over its work on the collapsed Chinese property giant Evergrande. The Big Four accountancy firm is also being fined more than $62 million after Chinese authorities said it had helped cover up fraud at Evergrande.
• Hiring plans: BYD has significantly ramped up hiring, increasing its workforce to more than 900,000 people as of Friday, a senior manager reportedly told Reuters, making the Chinese electric vehicle giant one of the largest employers in the country.
• Logistics giant: Denmark’s DSV has agreed to buy Schenker, the logistics arm of German state rail operator Deutsche Bahn, for $15.85 billion in a deal that would make it the world’s biggest logistics company.

Which petroleum company merged with Exxon in 1999?

Answer: Mobil Corporation

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