Happy Wednesday!
Countries across the globe are miffed with China for its alleged role in hiding critical information that could have prevented the Covid-19 pandemic. For many Indians, the sentiment was fanned further more recently by the face-off between the Indian and Chinese armies in Ladakh, leading to calls for a boycott of products made in Asia’s largest economy.
But online and offline retailers say the growing rhetoric on social media to boycott Chinese goods is unlikely to sway consumer behaviour.
No cheaper options
Sellers told ET that the tight-fisted consumer does not have much choice when it comes to buying a product, especially smartphones. Buyers will continue to pick up Chinese-made products that offer value for money, especially when there’s a squeeze on discretionary spending.
‘Vocal for local’
While India’s e-commerce executives reported that they haven’t seen any effect on buying patterns, Flipkart and Amazon have been promoting locally made products. A Flipkart advertisement promotes brands such as Raymond, Libas and Hidesign. Amazon has a ‘Go vocal for local’ section that lists products from small businesses, artisans and startups. Read more.
Facebook’s Jaadhu Holdings
Social media giant Facebook has floated a new entity — Jaadhu Holdings LLC – incorporated in Delaware in the United States, which will acquire 9.99% stake in Jio Platforms. The two companies disclosed this in a submission to India’s competition watchdog, seeking clearance for the $5.7 billion deal that was announced in April.
Since the announcement of Facebook’s investment in Jio Platforms, the subsidiary of Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries has raised a further Rs 34,988 crore from PE firms KKR, Vista Equity Partners, General Atlantic and Silver Lake, at an equity value of Rs 4.91 lakh crore and an enterprise value of Rs 5.16 lakh crore. Read more.
Related: Facebook signs a global licensing deal with music label Saregama
Loan repayment nightmares
Hundreds of customers have taken to social media to complain of intimidation and harassment by collection agents of online loan applications. They claim that cyberbullying techniques such as naming and shaming, intimidation using fake legal notices and repeated ‘harassment’ calls are being made by some companies seeking missed dues on short-term loans availed by customers during the virus outbreak.
Why it matters
The pandemic-induced economic slowdown has triggered mass-defaults among several sections of customers in both urban and rural demographics, making operations of several digital lenders unviable. This has caused some lenders to go aggressive on their collection strategies, irking some customers while distressing others. Read more.
Leading the way
Leadership teams at India’s top startups including Flipkart, Paytm, Udaan, and Zomato, among others have chosen to come back to work first, before asking colleagues to return, in part to instil confidence in the workforce around health safety.
WFH continues
In June, most businesses have given their employees continued flexibility to work from home, for functions which may not need at-work presence, despite the government’s recommendation to resume office travel.
Fear factor
Employees that ET spoke to also highlighted several concerns around returning to work including travel restrictions, reluctance to risk the health of their family, especially in cases of aged parents, and young children. In some instances, people have also returned to their hometowns and are unable to travel. Read more.
IT spending to fall
Information technology spending in India will plunge 8.1% to $83.5 billion in 2020, according to the latest forecast by research firm Gartner. This would be the first decline in IT spending in the last five years.
By the numbers
- Spending on devices will see the steepest decline at 15.1%.
- Spending on data centre systems will drop 13.2%.
- ·Spending on enterprise software is set to record a marginal dip of 2.6%.
Read the full story here.
(Illustrations and graphics by Rahul Awasthi)
Leave a Reply