Hotstar and JioCinema, two widely used video streaming apps in India, have merged into JioHotstar. JioStar, a joint venture between Reliance-owned Viacom18 and Star India, said Friday it had integrated JioCinema’s vast library of content into a revamped version of Disney’s Hotstar platform. The merged app, live as of early Friday local India time, will […]

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Coinbase is working on its re-entry to India more than a year after it officially ceased operations in the world’s most populous nation. The American crypto exchange is engaging with various Indian authorities, including the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU), an Indian government agency that scrutinizes financial transactions, according to two sources familiar with the matter […]

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Two senior partners are leaving Peak XV, one of the world’s largest venture capital firms, four sources familiar with the matter told TechCrunch.  Shailesh Lakhani, a 17-year veteran of the firm, and Abheek Anand, who co-led Southeast Asian investments, are departing, said the sources requesting anonymity. Peak XV didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment. […]

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Zeta, a provider of banking software to banks and fintech startups, has raised $50 million from a strategic investor at a $2 billion valuation. The new investment from American healthcare company Optum marks a 70% increase in the Bengaluru-based startup’s valuation from the $1.15 billion price tag (pre-money) it earned in 2021, when it raised […]

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Indian food delivery company Swiggy’s stock fell below both its IPO price and its last private valuation as mounting losses and a wavering market position in quick commerce pressured its margins in the last quarter. On Thursday, the food delivery company’s stock fell as low as ₹374.80 ($4.29) below its November IPO price of ₹390, […]

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India’s central bank is introducing an exclusive “.bank.in” domain for banks from April 2025 as part of efforts to combat rising digital payment frauds and bolster trust in online banking services. The Institute for Development and Research in Banking Technology (IDRBT) will serve as the exclusive registrar for the new domain, the Reserve Bank of […]

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Indian food delivery group Zomato plans to rename itself as Eternal in an effort to make a strategic shift as its quick-commerce unit, Blinkit, becomes a significant driver of growth. The Gurugram-based company, which joined India’s benchmark index, BSE Sensex, in December, said on Thursday the name change would better reflect its expanding business portfolio, […]

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Cashfree, an Indian payments startup that facilitates and processes more than $80 billion for its customers each year, has raised $53 million in a new round of funding as it gears up to deepen its presence in some international markets. Krafton, maker of sleeper hit titles such as PUBG and BGMI, led Cashfree’s Series C […]

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Ola founder Bhavish Aggarwal is investing $230 million into an AI startup he founded as the country pushes to establish itself in a field dominated by U.S. and Chinese firms. Aggarwal is financing the investment in Krutrim — which has been building LLMs for Indian languages — largely through his family office, a source familiar […]

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China said Tuesday it has launched an antitrust investigation into Google, part of a swift retaliation after the U.S. President Donald Trump imposed a 10% tariff on Chinese goods. The probe by China’s State Administration for Market Regulation will examine alleged monopolistic practices by the U.S. tech giant, which has had its search and internet […]

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Chinese fast-fashion platform Shein has relaunched in India through a partnership with local conglomerate Reliance’s retail chain, nearly five years after Shein was banned amid diplomatic tensions between New Delhi and Beijing. The new Shein India Fast Fashion app, developed and launched by billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Retail, marks the firm’s significant return to one […]

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India announced a new $1.15 billion Fund of Funds for startups on Saturday while unveiling sweeping regulatory reforms and an ambitious nuclear energy program, as New Delhi seeks to boost tech innovation and clean energy in the world’s fifth-largest economy. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, presenting the federal budget for 2025-26, said the fund builds on […]

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India’s IT minister on Thursday praised DeepSeek‘s progress and said the country will host the Chinese AI lab’s large language models on domestic servers, in a rare opening for Chinese technology in India. “You have seen what DeepSeek has done — $5.5 million and a very very powerful model,” IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said on […]

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SoftBank is in talks to invest up to $25 billion in OpenAI as part of a broader partnership that could see the Japanese conglomerate spend more than $40 billion on AI initiatives with the Microsoft-backed startup, according to the Financial Times. The potential investment would make SoftBank OpenAI’s largest single backer, the report said, surpassing […]

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Quick-commerce startup Zepto has moved its domicile to India from Singapore, joining a growing number of Indian startups that have moved their headquarters home ahead of an IPO in the country. The transition marks the fastest shift of registered headquarters to India by a startup in the country, according to Zepto’s chief financial officer Ramesh […]

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Chinese AI firm DeepSeek has emerged as a potential challenger to U.S. AI companies, demonstrating breakthrough models that claim to offer performance comparable to leading offerings at a fraction of the cost. The company’s mobile app, released in early January, has lately topped the App Store charts across major markets including the U.S., U.K., and […]

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Tata Electronics has acquired a 60% controlling stake in the Indian arm of Apple assembly partner Pegatron as the conglomerate expands its iPhone-manufacturing capacity in the country. Taiwan-based Pegatron operates three iPhone production plants in India, including one near Chennai in India’s southern state of Tamil Nadu. The deal comes less than a year after […]

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Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance is planning to build what could become the world’s largest data center in Jamnagar, India, with a capacity of 3 gigawatts to capitalize on surging AI demand. The facility would dwarf the current largest data center, Microsoft’s 600-megawatt site in Virginia, Bloomberg reported Friday. The project could cost between $20 billion and […]

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Private equity firm Everstone has reached a deal to acquire a majority stake in Wingify, one of India’s earliest bootstrapped software-as-a-service success stories, for about $200 million, three sources familiar with the matter told TechCrunch. The deal, finalized this week, marks a significant exit for Wingify’s founder Paras Chopra, who built the SaaS startup without […]

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An Indian tribunal on Thursday suspended restrictions that would have barred WhatsApp from sharing user data with its parent company Meta, delivering a significant victory for Mark Zuckerberg’s social media empire in its largest market by users. The ruling by the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal temporarily lifts a five-year ban imposed by India’s antitrust […]

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