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Hello,

TRAI is on the offensive against pesky telemarketers.

On Tuesday, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India told telecom companies to get serious about reducing spam messages and protecting consumers from scams.

Starting September 1, all access service providers will be prohibited from transmitting messages containing URLs, OTT links, or callback numbers, which are not ‘whitelisted’ (authorised) by the senders, the regulatory body said.

Meanwhile, global technology giants, including Amazon, Google, and Netflix, are pushing back against attempts by India’s telcos to bring internet services under stricter regulation. 

Up ahead: A stand against AI.

iPad design application Procreate has vowed it will never use Gen AI in any of its products. 

By not giving in to AI as its competitor Adobe Photoshop, Procreate CEO James Cuda believes the company is “on the right path supporting human creativity”.

Also, a growing number of Fortune 500 companies are flagging AI risks.

Lastly, meet Chubby, the AI-generated cat that finds itself in sad situations.

In today’s newsletter, we will talk about 

• Upskilling is the way for edtech
• The key to success in India VC market
• Erekrut changing the hiring game

Here’s your trivia for today: The Atlas Mountains stretch across which three countries?

Interview

Upskilling is the way for edtech

UpGrad Co-founder Ronnie Screwvala, in an exclusive interview with YourStory, pointed to the recent Union Budget as a clear signal of the vast opportunities ahead for India’s edtech sector. 

“If you look at it, the Union Budget, for example, is screaming across the rooftops about this sector because they’re saying skilling is the most important, internship is the most important,” said Screwvala, whose Swades Foundation successfully listed a project on the NSE’s Social Stock Exchange.

Necessary steps:

• He said the ambitious goals of the Union Budget cannot be met without online help.
• “We cannot actually learn, educate and skill people who are in jobs by asking them to go back into a training centre or learning centre in that sense,” said Screwvala.
• While the Indian edtech segment has been struggling with funding drying up—only $710 million was raised in 2023—upGrad recently raised Rs 287.5 crore in debt from EvolutionX Debt Capital.

Investor

The key to success in India VC market

Success in India’s VC market hinges on mastering exit strategies, exercising patience, and strategically timing investments to seize the most opportune exit moments, Blume Ventures’ General Partners told its investors or Limited Partners in the latest newsletter sent to them.

Blume’s take on the exit environment in India comes when the exit debate is hotting up in the country, with many domestic venture capital firms coming to the end of the cycle for their first fund.

Strategies:

• In an interview, Karthik Reddy, Co-founder and Managing Partner of Blume, said that the VC managed to generate returns in the ‘high teens’ from the first fund, slightly lower compared to the average return of over 25% typically expected from a seed-stage fund.
• Blume’s General Partners said that large dollar exits, typical in the range of $50-500 million, usually occur between years 3 to 8 of a company’s lifecycle as a majority buyout by a financial or strategic investor. 
• Super-large M&A outcomes, on the other hand, worth over $500 million are rare in India, and only acquirers with large cap tables or massive cashflow can afford these acquisitions, Blume said.

Startup

Erekrut changing the hiring game

In 2019, while volunteering for Amity University’s campus-to-corporate programme, fashion student Ajay Goyal recognised the inefficiencies in traditional hiring, including lengthy cycles, delayed responses, and an impersonal approach that failed to attract top talent.

To solve this, Goyal—along with his father, Dr Ravinder Goyal, who had nearly three decades of experience in vocational training and placement—founded Erekrut in 2020, a platform that automates and streamlines the hiring process to enhance efficiency and reduce delays.

Finding jobs:

• In response to the lengthy hiring processes typical in India, where it takes an average of 32 days to hire an employee, Erekrut introduced its “One Day Hire” feature in June. 
• Powered by AI-driven system Erika, this feature aims to complete the entire recruitment process—from job posting to offer acceptance—within a single day. 
• Erekrut also runs an internship programme that provides substantial learning and practical experience. The programme, which has trained over 800 individuals, offers interns access to research and development resources, enabling them to work on real projects.

News & updates

• Black myth: A new video game titled, Black Myth: Wukong, launched on Tuesday by a Tencent-backed startup has quickly become the most-played game on a major online platform, highlighting growing interest in Chinese-developed titles. 
• Chip war: Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. broke ground in eastern Germany on its first European plant as the continent seeks to safeguard its chip supplies amid growing US-China tensions.
• Electric vehicles: The European Union on Tuesday said planned tariffs on Tesla vehicles imported from China would be cut to 9% from 20.8%, while also reducing a number of planned import duties on other Chinese electric vehicle firms.

The Atlas Mountains stretch across which three countries?

Answer: Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia. 

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