Digital payments growth in India in the past five years has registered a CAGR of 128%. But on a larger base and with increased penetration, the drive toward a digital economy is showing signs of plateauing. Last year, growth was 35% across all channels. The number of debit cards has stagnated at 900 million, while […]

L&T Infotech, Vodafone Idea, Tata Consultancy Services and several other companies have cut back on their business with SoftBank-backed Oyo Hotels & Homes for employee accommodation, people familiar with the matter at the hospitality firm, some of its former employees and hotel partners said. These sources cited multiple issues ranging from safety and security of […]

The battle between Zo Rooms and Oyo has intensified with a fresh plea in the Delhi high court against the restructuring move by the SoftBank-backed accommodation major. Zo Rooms on January 21 filed a petition in the Delhi HC against Oyo’s decision to restructure its businesses and house them in new entities without informing the […]

Amid layoffs and restructuring, Oyo Hotels and Rooms has suspended further campus hiring for now, but the hospitality chain said the exercise will not impact job offers already rolled out at institutes. The SoftBank-backed hospitality chain, which is under pressure to rein in costs and streamline operations, has/will be giving most Bschools, including IIM Bangalore, […]

By Brad Stone The last two weeks have been remarkably eventful for Jeff Bezos. First, the Amazon co-founder’s visit to India was met with street-side protests, a new antitrust investigation into “predatory pricing and unfair trade practices” and hostile comments from the government led by India Prime Minster Narendra Modi. Then last week, Bezos’s yearlong […]

A committee formed to look into the issue of child sexual abuse material on social media platforms has recommended that companies follow a uniform benchmark practice in regulating and taking-down such content. The Rajya Sabha panel headed by Congress leader Jairam Ramesh said social media platforms must target encrypted content to identify child sexual abuse […]

Chinese online retailer Club Factory, which was embroiled in a controversy, for allegedly sending goods to Indian consumers directly from China under the guise of gifts, has now been accused of selling Schedule H drugs on its platform without medical prescription. The office of the joint commisioner of Food & Drug Adminstration in Greater Mumbai […]

Consumers who order food online are paying more for it. Food delivery apps Zomato and Swiggy – which control the market – have raised delivery fees over the last six months, introduced dynamic discounting, tightened order cancellation rules and hiked prices of their loyalty programmes. Along with reduced discounts overall, this has hit order numbers, […]

Sachin Bansal, who acquired microfinance firm Chaitanya India last September after his momentous Flipkart exit, travelled to Jagalur, a small town in Karnataka, recently for a branch visit and decided to check out the competition, a government-owned regional bank. Jagalur, about 250km from Bengaluru, has a population of 25,000. The regional bank’s offices here were […]

To fight the rising menace of online fraud by cyber crooks resulting in consumers losing money, Paytm Payments Bank — which houses the Paytm e-wallet — has handed over 3,500 numbers to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai), the ministry of home affairs (MHA) and CERT-In, the cybersecurity agency. It has also filed a […]