Everyone wants in on Edtech: Larsen & Toubro, the engineering & construction major, launched its own app-based learning platform. Didn’t see that coming!
More M&As: The ride-hailing unicorn Ola acquired geo-analytics technology platform GeoSpoc, while the edtech unicorn Unacademy acquired live face to face tuition provider Swiflearn.
Another Used Car Unicorn?: Cars24 became the 3rd Startup in the used car segment after Droom and CarDekho, to enter the Unicorn club. Now, Spinny, which is also a used car selling platform, is in talks to raise a new round of funding at over $1 Billion valuation.
D2C is getting hotter: The famous US based Startup that acquires promising D2C brands to scale them up quickly, is setting up shop in India. In our previous issue we discussed how GlabalBees, an Indian Startup, replicated Thrasio’s model here in India.
Offence is the best Defense: Since 2018, PhonePe and BharatPe have been poking each other over the use of the postfix ‘Pe’ in their brand names. Now, BharatPe launched it’s BNPL product by the name of PostPe, leading PhonePe to approach Bombay High Court. Meanwhile, BharatPe filed a lawsuit in Delhi High Court, seeking cancellation of PhonePe’s trademarks.
Swiggy’s making a Bazaar: Swiggy has been making job postings for its new project – Swiggy Bazaar. The Bazaar will enable users to buy groceries as a group, taking advantage of bulk discounts. The idea is inspired from a similar concept that has recently witnessed an upsurge in China. In case you forgot, last month Zomato declared that it’s quitting its Grocery Delivery business.
Speaking of Zomato, last month, the food-tech major tweaked its algorithm to increase the pick-up radius from 10km to 40km without informing its delivery partners, leading to huge uproar from them. The tweak was since restored.
Zoho behind the loudspeaker: The SaaS Unicorn, announced the launch of it’s biggest ever update – Zoho One, an Operating System for businesses. The Software offers 40+ integrated business apps ranging from finance to marketing to analytics and more.
This article is a part of October'21 edition of our Startup Newsletter. Here's the complete publication:
