Capital Float (Capfloat Financial Services Private Limited), the largest digital lender in India, has acquired Pune-based Walnut (Thumbworks Technologies Pvt Ltd), makers of the country’s leading personal financial management (PFM) app, in a deal amounting to $30 million. The acquisition follows shortly after Capital Float announced its foray into the Consumer Finance vertical, emphasising a strong strategic focus on leveraging this lucrative borrower segment.
Walnut is a personal finance management mobile app that helps users to automatically track spends, bank and card balances, bill payments, and split expenses within a group, in just a few clicks. With a simple and user-friendly mobile experience, Walnut enables individuals to effortlessly manage their finances. Walnut has over 7 million downloads on the Play Store, an average rating of 4.4/5 and is featured in Google Editor’s Choice list of Top 5 Financial applications.
In July 2017, Walnut launched “Walnut Prime”, an instant credit line that users can access on the app anywhere, anytime. This small ticket app-based credit line is centred on Walnut’s “Prime Credit Score”. While a traditional bureau score is derived basis existing loan and credit card repayment behaviour, the Prime Credit Score takes into consideration an alternate data range that includes one’s income, purchase behaviour, earning capacity and security savings. The data range also incorporates newer forms of consumption such as e-commerce, wallet, shopping, food, bills etc. giving an in-depth insight into the consumer’s behaviour, thereby enabling risk evaluation at granular levels. This unique proposition offers consumers with no credit exposure and no behaviour data, an easy access to credit, besides supporting the financial inclusion through digitalization. Walnut recently crossed INR 100 crores in loans to users on its mobile app.
“We’re excited to collaborate with Walnut, an accomplished member of the Fintech ecosystem. Our sensibilities and objectives aligned with theirs, which largely paved the way for our decision to join hands with the company. We were extremely impressed with the team and the product Patan and Amit have built. Their approach towards leveraging technology to solve financial concerns of the common individual was particularly impressive, and we eagerly look forward to working closely with them. Walnut Prime is a product of deep interest to us, and it will essentially become a new addition to our stable of exceptional, customized credit products,” said Sashank Rishyasringa and Gaurav Hinduja, co-founders of Capital Float.
“Since we launched Walnut, we have been focused on simplifying personal finance for our users. We’re excited to partner with Capital Float as we aim to exponentially grow and bring Walnut and its intuitive features to millions of more Indians. We believe having Capital Float on our side opens up an immense set of opportunities by leveraging their strength in online lending and financial products with our innovative approach to consumer experiences.”, said Patanjali Somayaji and Amit Bhor, co-founders of Walnut.
Maruti Suzuki India Limited has launched its premium sedan Ciaz, with the new 1.5 litre K15 petrol engine. The company’s next generation smart hybrid with Lithium-ion battery makes its maiden appearance in the New Ciaz. Since 2014, Ciaz became the most popular mid-size premium sedan under A3 segment, having sold over 2,20,000 units since launch.
The longer-lasting lithium-ion batteries in due course is expected to replace the traditional lead-based ones in cars sold by Maruti Suzuki India Ltd. Suzuki, in a joint venture with Toshiba Corp. and Denso Corp., is in the process of setting up the battery manufacturing plant in Gujarat at an estimated investment of Rs 1,152 crore (Rs 11.52 billion). The company plans to launch an electric vehicle in India by 2020.
“Ciaz is the first car in India to be powered by next generation Smart Hybrid technology with Lithium-ion battery,” said Kenichi Ayukawa, Managing Director & CEO, Maruti Suzuki.
“The new Ciaz cost us Rs 160 crores for new tools and dies. It is currently being manufactured at Manesar with components sourced from the same set of suppliers and on the equipment,” said CV Raman, Senior Executive Director (Engineering), Maruti Suzuki.
Maruti Suzuki currently has a combined capacity of 1.55 million cars at its Gurugram and Manesar plants and its capacity in Gujarat is in the process of being ramped up from 250 thousand cars to 500 thousand cars. In a recent development, Toyota being involved with Suzuki at a global level, Toyota’s plant in Bidadi (running at 30 percent capacity of 300 thousand cars annually) is expected to be used by Maruti Suzuki to augment its production capacity in the country.
New Ciaz comes with aggressive road presence with new impactful exterior features:
•Sharp Front Fascia with new Grille & Bumper
•Sleek & Contemporary LED Projector Auto headlamps with DRLs (Segment first)
•LED Fog Lamps and chrome Garnish
•Rear LED Combination Lamps
•Elegant Chrome Bezels on front & rear fascia
•16-inch precision cut alloy wheels in dual tone Metallic Pebble Grey Finish
Sophisticated Interior
With core focus on convenience and luxury, the interiors accentuate premium position of New Ciaz with upmarket features:
• New Birch blonde wood grain accents with sophisticated low gloss finish
• Satin chrome highlights on dashboard & door trims
• New 4.2” Multi information colored TFT display
• Eco illumination in speedometer which dynamically changes color based on the driving pattern.
“The Ciaz commands a market share of 34 percent in the A3+ segment. With over a third of the market share, the Ciaz has been a leader in the A3+ segment for the past two years. It disrupted the entire segment,” said R.S Kalsi, Senior Executive Director (Marketing & Sales), Maruti Suzuki.
The Ciaz is retailed through the NEXA network since April 1, 2017. The top end (Alpha) variant of Ciaz contributes 41% of its total sales.
HDFC ERGO General Insurance Company, India's leading non-life insurer, today announced the launch of my:health, a unique service one-stop platform which will allow individuals to manage their health and well-being. Customers can access this new service on the HDFC ERGO Insurance Portfolio Organizer (IPO) application on their mobile phones.
With the hectic modern day lifestyle, people are turning to technology for a solution to help them manage their health and overall well-being. A healthy lifestyle helps an individual attain better physical and mental health and also decrease the risk of many diseases.
Commenting on the launch, Anurag Rastogi, Member of Executive Management, HDFC ERGO General Insurance Company said, “At HDFC ERGO, our focus is to tell customer to take it easy. With the busy modern day lifestyle, people are dependent on technology for all their health related concerns. Keeping this in mind, HDFC ERGO’s my:health service, offered on our Insurance Portfolio Organiser (IPO) App, will promote well-being and assist them at every step in living a healthy lifestyle.”
The ‘my:health’ service within HDFC ERGO’s IPO app offers an array of benefits such as:
1) Book a doctor’s appointment and get medical assistance from over 1 lac licensed doctors
2) Diet and Physical exercise plans which can be selected as per individual goals
3) Set Alerts and Reminders for routine health check-ups, next vaccination date, time to consume medications on time. One can also set alerts for their parents to do the same
4) Maintain Personal Health Records to freely access them from anywhere. This also comes as an added advantage for Corporate customers as this will help in faster claims processing
5) Health Risk Assessment to identify the risk factors associated with their health and accordingly get a remedial plan
6) Take up Health Challenges & win Rewards which taken up among families and friends, thereby promoting a healthy lifestyle
7) Search Provider to the nearest pharmacy, blood banks, hospitals, ambulance providers and much more
8) Health Tips & Information for a healthy lifestyle
Trend Micro Incorporated, a global leader in cyber security solutions, through its Virtual Patching will help its customers shield vulnerabilities in critical systems until a patch is available and deployed in place of a future patch, and to protect systems that are unpatchable. Trend Micro’s answer to the unwinnable challenge of patching unpatchable systems is Deep Security Virtual Patching, a ‘vulnerability shield’ that protects systems during the risk window and beyond. This addresses the dual challenge of vulnerability risks and patch management which are not sufficiently being met by traditional solutions.
Trend Micro Deep Security is designed to deliver comprehensive protection for all servers—physical, virtual, and cloud—as well as endpoints. It provides a smart blend of cross-generational threat defense techniques for protecting servers from unknown threats, including anti-malware and Intrusion Prevention System (IPS), to detect and stop sophisticated attacks. VMware and Trend Micro have partnered to deliver agentless security that enables virtual patching on virtualized desktops and data centers. Trend Micro Deep Security uses a dedicated, security-hardened virtual appliance that integrates with the VMware vShield APIs to provide agentless security. Together, this approach allows vulnerabilities to be shielded without deploying in-guest security agents.
Nilesh Jain, Vice President – South East Asia and India, Trend Micro said, “Advanced cyberattacks including ransomware such as SamSam, WannaCry, Petya, Locky etc., have made customers aware of the importance of security more than ever. Patching is critical for defending against attacks that exploit security flaws and when organizations can’t patch directly, using a virtual patch can help mitigate the risk. Virtual Patching, the unique feature of Trend Micro Deep Security, is advanced in shielding from vulnerabilities without leading to do emergency patching and safeguarding of networks and endpoints from threats.”
“The ease of use, proactive protection and scanning the vulnerabilities are biggest USPs and hence BFSI, pharmaceutical companies and other organizations from various sectors are deploying Deep Security Virtual Patching solutions from Trend Micro,” he further added.
In addition to this, Trend Micro Vulnerability Protection also provides earlier, stronger endpoint protection by supplementing desktop anti-malware and threat security with proactive virtual patching. A high-performance engine monitors traffic for new specific vulnerabilities using host-based IPS filters, as well as zero-day attack monitoring, which helps detect network protocol deviations, suspicious content that signals an attack, or security policy violations. Trend Micro Vulnerability Protection is very scalable with options for multiple servers to ensure endpoint deployment for even the largest of organizations.
LIC Mutual Fund, one of India’s prominent asset management and financial product advisors, have deployed Trend Micro’s solutions to secure their endpoints, network, and data centers. Speaking on the implementation, Prashant Thakkar, Chief Technology Officer and Head of Strategy, LIC Mutual Fund Asset Management Limited said, “With ever-growing security risks and a complex IT environment, it was very important to find a flexible, customizable, easy-to-manage solution suitable for our business. Partnering with Trend Micro led to a harmonious collaboration that helped us combat the challenges of securing and protecting our data and network from potential security risks and cyber threats.”
Lupin Pharma, CIBIL are some of the other companies who have deployed the Virtual Patching solution from Trend Micro.
ITC Ltd, the cigarettes to shampoo company, is working on an eight-point strategy to reinvent itself and accelerate growth in its non-cigarette businesses, especially branded consumer packaged foods, a segment that it entered 15 years ago, chief executive Sanjiv Puri said.
The “create the new ITC” strategy is part of the Kolkata-based company’s plan to reach Rs 1 lakh crore in revenue from its non-cigarette packaged goods business by 2030. The growth in the branded packaged food business will be fueled by the company’s entry into fruit, vegetables and sea food segments, adding one new product every quarter.
Patanjali Ayurved Ltd will launch products in the dairy and apparel business this calendar year, said its founder Ramdev. “With this we will be in 11 categories,” Ramdev said on the sidelines of Globoil India 2017, an edible oil conclave. “The total market size (of these two categories) will be Rs 20 lakh crore. We will enter both within this year.”
Ramdev also took aim at Hindustan Unilever Ltd(HUL), India’s largest consumer packaged goods firm. “We are number one in trust and we will be No. 1 in the turnover in a year,” he said. “We have done shirshasan (laid down) of many large companies. Only Unilever is left.”
US chipmaker Intel has trained as many as 99,000 developers, students and professors in artificial intelligence (AI) in India since April 2017, against a target of 15,000 for the first year of its programme, according to the tech major.
It has also tied up with premier educational institutes like the IITs in Delhi, Mumbai, Kharagpur, Kanpur, Chennai, and IIITs in Bengaluru, Hyderabad, BITS Pilani, ISI Kolkata, IISc Bangalore, CDAC and companies like Shell and TCS among others for training under its AI developer education.
The programme was launched in April 2017 and the initial target was for a year ending April 2018, he said, adding the programme is aimed to democratising AI through collaborations with partners and customers.
