To The Point
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Chandrayaan-3 gets off to a roaring start with flawless LVM3-M4 spaceflight; here's what's next
India's flagship LVM3 rocket made another flawless flight today, taking off at 2:35 p.m. local time from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota to see off Chandrayaan-3 on the first leg of its journey to the Moon—an incrementally widening elliptical orbit from where the satellite will move towards its final destination. BR Guruprasad, a space scientist turned science writer and broadcaster, joins us today on ToThePoint to give us a sense of what happens next. He says success will rank India as the fourth nation to 'gently' land a spacecraft on the Moon
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Flipkart Big Saving Days versus Amazon Prime Day — what's different this time?
Amazon and Flipkart are both kicking off their annual discount sales starting the 15th — the one for two days and the other for four days. Ankur Bisen, Senior Partner and Head - Consumer, Food and Retail at Technopak Advisors, a consultancy, who's been tracking the ecommerce scene for close to 15 years now, joins us on ToThePoint today to give us a sense of what might be different this time. Ankur walks us through changes in consumer preferences for various categories and the evolution of India's ecommerce rules over the years
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India more attractive than China, says Invesco — here's some perspective
India has emerged ahead of China as a more attractive investment destination, according to the latest edition of an annual study by Invesco, a $1.48 trillion money manager. Sanjay Anandaram, co-founder of JumpStartUp one of India's earliest US-India cross border VC funds, and a widely respected investor and mentor in India's growing entrepreneurial landscape, joins us on ToThePoint today to offer some perspective on this development. Anandaram also talks about how, while India has changed a lot, there is much more red tape to be cut in this game that is ours to lose
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After Foxconn's breakup with Vedanta, what next for India's semiconductor plans?
Hon Hai Technology Group, better known internationally as Foxconn, is parting ways with Vedanta Group, ending a partnership that was working to establish India's first large-scale semiconductor foundry — to make chips that could go into a wide variety of electronic devices. The statement yesterday suggested that it was pulling out because the project was progressing too slowly for its taste. Forbes India's Manu Balachandran, who's been tracking India's semiconductor plans, joins us on ToThePoint today to talk about what might be the next steps for Vedanta
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Can the Indian EV industry sustain itself without subsidies?
Electric two-wheeler sales data from the government's Vahan portal showed that June has been the worst month this year. Does this reflect the cut back in subsidies that the government announced recently, and what does it say about the sector's prospects? Amitabh Saran, co-founder and CEO of Altigreen Propulsion Labs in Bengaluru, joins us on ToThePoint today to explain what's happening in the industry. While the timing can be debated, the industry will have to prepare itself for the day when there will be no subsidies, he says
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Maruti Suzuki's Invicto versus Toyata's Innova Hycross — which one would you pick?
Maruti Suzuki's Invicto, which many are saying is a rebadged Toyota Innova, is out. So, is it? Forbes India's Manu Balachandran joins us on ToThePoint today to talk about this latest offering from Maruti, its first in this segment, which is priced a tad lower than the Innova Hycross, its Toyota twin. After the success of the Grand Vitara, will the Invicto help Maruti chalk up another win or is the Innova too well entrenched in Indian psyche as the top people carrier? Manu points out that both vehicles have already garnered thousands of bookings
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IT services outlook: How TCS, Infosys and others are evolving differently from each other
Tata Consultancy Services will kick off earnings results for India's top IT companies next week for their fiscal first quarter that ended on June 30. We asked Yugal Joshi, a partner at Everest Group, to join us today to talk about the outlook for the sector. "Deceleration does not equate with decline," says Yugal. Companies like TCS and Infosys are so core to the operations of the world's biggest corporations that, barring black swans, the future can only hold growth. In the near term, an important phenomenon to pay more attention to is the number of senior exits, he says
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India's SAFF victory: What it means for the future of Indian football
India won its 9th SAFF Championship final yesterday and Sunil Chhetri took home his third Golden Boot award. But how bright is the future of Indian football? In this extended edition of ToThePoint, Kathakali Chanda is in conversation with the well-known sports presenter Joe Morrison. They speak about how far the game has come in India from its darkest day of recent memory when Chhetri had to appeal to fans to come watch the match to the current growing interest in the game. And, did the latest championship reveal glimpses of who might inherit Chhetri's mantle?
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Meta's Threads vs Twitter: Is this the real Mark vs Musk cage fight?
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg may have had to contend with less than spectacular success with the metaverse, but will Instagram's Threads become an instant hit, as a "Twitter rival" or something better? Hitesh Rajwani, CEO of Social Samosa, joins us on ToThePoint today to talk about how Meta's ecosystem might finally have us in its full embrace. Hitesh also offers his views on why Threads might be the first real threat to Twitter, at a time when the microblogging platform continues to reel under the impact of Elon Musk's experiments
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HDFC Bank becomes a global giant — what should we expect from it now?
The merger of HDFC Bank with the company widely seen as its parent, HDFC Limited, in India's biggest corporate deal, a $40 billion all-shares transaction, created the fourth-largest bank in the world by market capital. Forbes India's banking expert Salil Panchal joins us on ToThePoint today to discuss the significance of this development, which has been more than a year in the making, since it was first announced. And an important chapter concludes in the bank's history, Deepak Parekh, one of India's most respected corporate leaders, retires from the organisation
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India's National Research Foundation gets green light and Rs 50,000 crore — big step?
The union cabinet yesterday approved the introduction of the National Research Foundation (NRF) Bill, 2023 in parliament, the ministry of science and technology said in a statement. The NRF is to provide high-level strategic direction to scientific research in the country as recommended in the national education policy. The first outlay for it is Rs. 50,000 crore over the next five years. We asked Kamlesh Vyas, a partner at Deloitte and a specialist in education and skill development, to join us on ToThePoint today to explain the significance of this historic move