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All you Need to Know About FAANG Stocks

Shalmoli Sarkar — Sat, 23 Oct 2021 08:35:41 +0000

Initially, it was simply FANG and not FAANG. It was during 2013. when Jim Cramer coined the term FANG stocks which is a collective term for the stocks of the world’s leading technology behemoths – Facebook, Amazon, Netflix, and Google. In 2017, Apple joined the bandwagon to be renamed FAANG.

Since, the outbreak of the pandemic that confined people to their homes, the dependence on OTT platforms, social media, and digitisation of businesses soared resulting in the rallying of these stocks thereby attracting several investors to buy shares of these tech companies.

What makes FAANG stocks popular in India?

Indian investors in India want to build a portfolio that has investments in the foreign market. Investing in a different economy can be beneficial since every economy has its weaknesses and strengths and not all economies become weak at the same time. The stock market here presents a true picture of a nation’s economy. Most Indian investors spread their investments in foreign stock markets mainly in the US financial markets to diversify their portfolio and cushion the risks that might be associated with the Indian stock markets.

The FAANG stocks are the stocks of such companies that are leading in technological advancements that have changed the definition of interacting, socializing, shopping and entertainment and own an expansive consumer base globally. Moreover, in the wake of the pandemic, the companies from FAANG have further revamped their products and offerings and with artificial intelligence, cloud, and machine learning to suit the needs of the new virtual workforce thereby pushing the demand and proving the investment in these stocks to be lucrative.

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FAANG stocks is a collective term for the stocks of the world’s leading technology behemoths – Facebook, Amazon,Apple, Netflix, and Google.

How can Indians invest in FAANG stocks?

Under the Liberalised Remittance Scheme (LRS) of RBI, every Indian individual can invest overseas upto $250,000 each year. Indians wanting to invest in FAANG stocks can do so from their broking account if the broking firm offers overseas trading services.

Also, consider the following data of the recent FAANG stock prices at an exchange rate of Rs 75.32.

Facebook : Rs 24,357
Amazon : Rs 255,675
Apple: Rs 10,800
Netflix: Rs 47,100
Google: Rs 212,025

From the above stock prices of FAANG, it is quite evident that the stocks are expensive. To own a share from each company one needs to invest a massive Rs 5.49 lakh. To solve this, some broking firms or trading platforms provide a fractional trading facility where one can buy less than one share as well, which means they can be the shareholder of 0.00001 shares of FAANG.

Otherwise, the second manner to invest in FAANG stocks can be through the mutual fund route to invest overseas. Several fund houses have launched schemes to invest in the foreign markets along with India.

Word of advice for the investors

Investing in the US markets might seem an uphill task but an informed decision backed by proper research can help in doing so. Investing in FAANG stocks can be profitable since the companies are well-established and are safe to invest in. This also goes without saying that one should always assess their risk-appetite level. In addition to this, one must keep a tab on inflation and interest rates, Fed reserve policies and growth rates across geographies since these factors influence the currency movements.

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Its raining IPOs, What This Means for Google Cloud

DU Desk — Thu, 22 Jul 2021 08:35:12 +0000

Google is adamant on making it rain IPOs because of the billions of dollars in funding being pumped into the Indian start-up ecosystem. With big names like Zomato, PayTM, Mobikwik, PolicyBazaar, CarTrade and Nykaa headed for IPO at rapid speed, Google cannot afford to miss the chance at offering up their products and services to them.

Tech giants like Amazon, Facebook and Google have long been actively supporting start-ups in India, taking the cue from the Indian Government’s efforts to bolster the start-up community. Getting help from these tech giants is invaluable because your success rate shoots up. The technology stack and services from tech giants like Google are unparalleled. Start-ups shouldn’t miss the opportunity to apply for support programmes by these big tech firms.

Google Cloud’s interest for IPO bound start-ups

Google Cloud is interested in IPO bound start-ups and the Indian start-up ecosystem as a whole for two key reasons. One, the capital inflow into the ecosystem is set to touch a high of $19-$23 B by the end of 2021. Two, Google Cloud wants to further bolster the growth of these already-growing start-ups by empowering them with cutting-edge Cloud technology.

Google Cloud is providing specially designed programmes for start-ups across various growth stages as well as for unicorns and IPO-bound start-ups. Through these programmes, they are providing training, zero credits, mentoring sessions and giving them the opportunity to work with specialists. As start-ups grow and progress towards becoming unicorns, Google Cloud helps tackle their larger problems by making them shift from providing an engagement model to offering solutions.

How Google Cloud is empowering start-ups and unicorns

Google Cloud is empowering start-ups and unicorns in India by helping them grow the number of monthly active users on their platform. By leveraging Google’s Cloud technology, these start-ups and unicorns are being empowered to achieve key milestones along their growth trajectory.

Prominent start-ups using Google Cloud infrastructure

Well-known start-ups and unicorns in India using Google Cloud’s infrastructure include Glance (Artificial Intelligence (AI) – based software company), ShareChat (consumer tech unicorn), Rapido (automobile start-up) and Dailyhunt (consumer tech).

How Google Cloud works with start-ups

Google Cloud works with start-ups by first offering them with cloud solutions and then giving them access to ‘ALL of Google’. What this means is that the start-up will grow with Google. The start-up’s products will also be added to Google Maps. Google will also help with Google Ads integration.

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As start-ups grow and progress towards becoming unicorns, Google Cloud helps tackle their larger problems by making them shift from providing an engagement model to offering solutions.

What’s in it for me?

Google has a number of start-up programmes which are very easy to apply and get approval for. Products and services by the tech giants are all start-ups need to propel them forward since Google’s offerings are very powerful and robust. Migrating to the Google Cloud is very beneficial for start-ups in various growth stages because you not only enjoy tools and resources provided by Google, but you also get support to fix issues along your start-up journey.

Google is also offering their Startups Accelerator Program (GSFA) through which you can get nurtured for a period of three months with free mentorship and support. It is designed for growth and early-stage start-ups. The leadership training from Google experts that you can avail through this programme will prove to be invaluable in later stages. In this programme, you stand to gain equity-free support, training and credits which you can use to purchase premium Google cloud and other products.

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PhonePe: Making the Most of India’s Digital Adoption

Muskan Khemka — Fri, 28 May 2021 09:35:04 +0000

While payment apps in India are coming up with new offerings to corner the market, this particular start-up kicked it up a notch. Have you ever heard of a payment app that has its own ATM? This unusual but brilliant move was made by Bengaluru-based start-up PhonePe.

Before we explore this first-of-its-kind offering by the payment app, we rewind six years to when the start-up began its humble journey from a simple digital wallet to its culmination into one of the leading fintech players in the industry today.

Inception 1.0

In 2015, Sameer Nigam, Rahul Chari and Burzin Engineer started PhonePe to cause much positive destruction in the way people look at digital payments. The aim was to develop an app to give an overall new experience to users while ensuring financial inclusion and easy access.

The trio, however, was unsure whether PhonePe would be a payments company or a platform company. The market was transitioning into a phase of digital wallets boom back then. The early entrants – Paytm and Mobikwik – had already gained traction in the crowded e-wallet market at the back of sound funding, cash backs and product development.

In April 2016, National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), a government-backed consortium of banks, introduced Unified Payments Interface (UPI). Within a few days of this launch, e-commerce giant Flipkart, which was scouting for suitable acquisitions in the payments solutions space, announced its acquisition of PhonePe which saw ‘UPI’ as its golden ticket and was building a payments solution app based on the same.

In August, merely 4 months after UPI’s launch, the PhonePe app was made live. It became the first non-banking entity to launch a UPI app. It was only a year later that Google Pay and Paytm entered the UPI space, but PhonePe had gained the first mover’s advantage.

The start-up took a different approach from how the market was trying to solve the problem of online payments. They did not want to remain restricted in terms of product scalability by building a banking app, a recharge app or a utility payment app. Rather, the aim was to reach a wider audience with a scalable product and maintain inclusivity.

What does the PhonePe app do? It enables transfer of money from one bank to another (UPI allows a customer to pay directly from a bank account to different merchants, both online and offline, without details like IFSC code, net banking passwords, etc). Customers can use the app to pay bills, recharge pre-paid mobile numbers, recharge data card and DTH, send or request money from friends by entering their number, name or VPA, split bills between people, check bank account balance and scan QR codes to pay.

The app also sells products and services like groceries, insurance, food (via product promotion). What is fascinating about PhonePe is its evolution and growth over the past years. Within three months of its launch, over 10 Million users downloaded the app.

In a short span, it has surpassed its peers with over 280 Million registered users. It is processing over 100 Million transactions in a month and an annual total payment volume (TPV) of over $388 Billion, including 17.5 Million merchants across 500 cities.

Going Beyond a Digital Wallet

PhonePe has been in a continuous mode of evolution since inception. It entered the BFSI segment in 2017 by offering gold on its platform in partnership with SafeGold and MMTC-PAMP.

The start-up registered its wealth management division, PhonePe Wealth Services Pvt Ltd., marking its debut into financial services. It dispatched shared assets and protection monetary items like expense saving assets, liquid assets, worldwide travel protection and protection cover for COVID-19 in association with various financial organisations like Yes Bank, ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, Axis Bank among others.

It has now become the largest platform for buying digital gold with a 35% market share.

In the most recent development, PhonePe is planning to foray into stockbroking. The aim is to encourage its existing users to put a fraction of their unutilised funds in wallets into the stock market. This will intensify the battle in the stock market which is dominated by players like Zerodha, Upstox and others.

The fintech company has a vision of becoming a full-fledged diversified financial services player and stock broking is an addition to the same. The expansion and plunge into different categories is also a part of the company’s strategy of monetizing its customer base – offering financial service being one of them.

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PhonePe is processing over 100 Million transactions in a month and an annual total payment volume of over $388 Billion.

Making Inroads in Unorganized Market

In a bid to tap the huge opportunity in the retail market, PhonePe started focussing on Kirana stores owners and small-scale retailers and help them adapt to the new-age style of doing business.

The company has ‘PhonePe for Business’ app, which offers end-to-end control of the payment process, including instant payment confirmations, receipts, and reconciliations and grocery deliveries to Kirana store owners and small merchants.

PhonePe has recently launched its own ATM which will enable people to get cash from merchant partners through transactions with their mobile devices. The company said that the service will enable neighborhood stores to act as ATMs for PhonePe users. At the same time, it will also help merchants avoid the hassle of storing cash and making multiple trips to the bank branch to deposit their extra cash.

The brand is also advertising the SMEs and local shopping brands on its app to raise awareness and help them market their products. The app offers its merchant partners to grow their business by giving them a personalised store page on the app, allowing them to list their store timings, share their product catalogue, and promote home delivery options, thereby reaching out to a much wider customer base.

The app further offers voice notifications in 11 vernacular languages free of cost. This helps the merchants during peak business hours as the app announces the amount received from customers, saving all the time to check the customer’s phone screen or wait for a bank message.

PhonePe at present has 13 Million merchants on its platform and it is accepted as a payment option at over 17.5 offline and online merchant outlets across 500 cities.

The company has come up with a Bluetooth-enabled Point Of Sale (POS) device that is indigenously designed to help merchants of all sizes – be it local kirana stores, petrol pumps, food chains or quick service restaurants to help accelerate digital inclusion at all levels.

PhonePe was one of the first fintech companies to identify the needs and demands of the local merchants who are not equipped with technology like the big retailers, hence the POS device. This device works like a traditional calculator which is cheap, easy to use and highly durable, something a merchant would be interested in.

The App’s USP

PhonePe user interface is simple and easy to use even if one has never made a digital transaction before. This makes it a Unique Selling Proposition (USP) as different age groups of people are often challenged while making online payments and revisit its adoption unless out of compulsion.

This is an important feature in such a highly competitive and crowded payments app market. The app, since inception, was kept simple and hence scalable to incorporate more verticals, especially in the context of Kirana store owners and small retailers who might not be well-versed with digital mediums.

There is an ease of looking up terms, navigating across pages and options besides strong privacy measures on the app. In terms of users’ experience, it ranks at the top, in comparison to its peers – Paytm, Gpay, Razorpay and Instamojo.

The company also introduced a separate chat service for users and merchants in over 11 Indian languages to further smoothen the user experience.

In 2018, the start-up had launched Switch which offers more than 260 mini web applications and allowed users to switch between various apps, including travel, grocery, food and shopping, within the PhonePe app.

This innovation turned out to be unique as users do not have to download and install all these apps individually on their phones, they can easily access the services from Switch without any additional convenience fee or charge. This further added to the app’s USP of ease and comfort and created a superior product experience.

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PhonePe user interface is simple and easy to use even if one has never made a digital transaction before.

Clash of the Titans: Paytm vs PhonePe vs Google

To date, PhonePe is cashing on its first mover’s advantage. The start-up defeated Google Pay in terms of market share between November and January 2021 and became the top UPI mobile app. The company processed 968.72 Million UPI transactions involving nearly Rs 1.92 lakh crore in January 2021.

The duo dominate the UPI apps market and have over 75% market share together. Paytm Payments Bank app, on the other hand, stands third followed by Axis Bank app and Amazon Pay.

The technical glitches faced by the banking partners of Google Pay and the government-mandated cap on UPI transactions, boosted the number of UPI transactions for PhonePe and Paytm as customers moved away from the former.

However, this cannot be credited as the sole reason for PhonePe’s lead in the sector. The start-up has been aggressively investing in its offline merchant base which has increased its user base and transactions besides its massive adoption in Tier 3 and Tier 4. Both PhonePe and Paytm have been adding more use-cases, growing the overall UPI ecosystem.

The Spin-Off

In December 2020, Flipkart divested PhonePe into a separate unit and partially sold its stake to its parent company, Walmart. PhonePe came under Walmart post Flipkart’s acquisition but continues to retain majority stake in shareholding pattern. The acquisition saw a rising growth of PhonePe as a brand.

At present, Walmart is considering spinning off the start-up to give the company more flexibility and freedom to pursue its development and get access to dedicated capital for its long-term goals. The partial spin-off will bring new opportunities for the start-up as it will be able to raise more primary capital, giving autonomy to operations.

PhonePe has come a long way since its inception from starting as a digital wallet to becoming the leader in UPI transactions.

As per the founders, the start-up aims to be profitable by 2022 and go public in 2023. The company bagged $700 Million from Walmart and other existing investors and another $21 Million from Flipkart, which still holds 87% stake in PhonePe, in December 2020. The post-funding valuation stood at $5.5 Billion.

Product innovation, diversification (fintech market) and the company’s mass-market focus (reach beyond metros) will continue feeling its future growth.

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Is the Silicon Valley Model of Entrepreneurship Still the Best for Start-ups?

Aakash Sharma — Fri, 16 Apr 2021 00:35:04 +0000

The Silicon Valley business model has a long history of enthusiastic discussion worldwide. Start-ups, entrepreneurs, and innovators long to be a part of it. Governments worldwide want to make their own Silicon Valley, and scholars incessantly aim to figure its new financial tenets.

Entrepreneurship has allowed the Silicon Valley region to take advantage of the opportunity of globalization rather than being a victim of it over decades.

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Silicon Valley is a strong supporter of entrepreneurs. Many experts monitor or support in the areas of human resources, development, technology and business strategies.

What is the Silicon Valley model of entrepreneurship?

Silicon Valley’s business model is designed for high-tech companies built on fundamentally practical innovation and technological capability. As outlined in the MIT Technology Review, “Every region and industry dreams of becoming the next technology hub and the birthplace of tomorrow”.

The OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) and the World Bank have focused their policies on solid growth. And more recently, measures to improve economic performance have been deployed globally. Although the concept of entrepreneurship encompasses a wide range of organizations and practices, the Silicon Valley model of entrepreneurship focuses on performance, particularly tech-driven growth and innovation.

Essential aspects of the Silicon Valley Model of Entrepreneurship

Spare entrepreneurs for start-ups trade

There is a deep understanding in Silicon Valley that not all entrepreneurs succeed at different business stages. Thus, the pool of entrepreneurial skills in the Silicon Valley Model ranges from expanding or translating ideas into market values at multiple levels.

Positive financing to entrepreneurs

If a Silicon Valley start-up struggles to start, investors often seek out their mentors. To raise funds, they share contact information and gain specialized business start-ups leads. It is helpful to manage operational problems more effectively.

A strong network of advisors

Silicon Valley is a strong supporter of entrepreneurs. Many experts monitor or support in the areas of human resources, development, technology and business strategies. To take advantage of this, educators work with management agencies to help fast-growing entrepreneurs manage Silicon Valley business’s complex tangle.

Model Competence: Challenges in Entrepreneurship

There are some significant problems because the Silicon Valley model of entrepreneurship is the only bona fide entrepreneurship.

Selective entrepreneurship success

A singular focus of the model constitutes a phenomenon that is an outlier and exception- it reflects only a fraction of people and enterprises, even as it captures the broad public’s headlines and imaginations.

Policy issues

The exclusive and singular view of entrepreneurship may contribute to a warped policy. The focus and priority are solely on policies and instruments to spur high-tech, high-growth innovative companies at the expense of main street entrepreneurship.

Alternatives to Silicon Valley and its Model

Silicon Valley may be a favourite destination for start-ups, but as mentioned, it comes with drawbacks of its own. The rapidly changing world is developing at an unprecedented pace, and there are many emerging economic power centres where visionary entrepreneurs can create unique opportunities for themselves.

Hong Kong

Hong Kong is emerging as Asia’s financial technology capital. Hong Kong has 70 of the top 100 banks in the world. With its infrastructure, a suitable business environment due to reduced taxes and regulations, Hong Kong is set to become the world’s economic capital very soon.

Bengaluru, India

Bengaluru is known as India’s Silicon Valley and accounts for more than 30% of its computer and IT exports. The city of Bengaluru houses giant IT companies such as Infosys, Wipro, Mphasis and Mindtree, and an international technology park in Whitefield, making it the most prominent IT centre in the country.

Shenzhen, China

Shenzhen is one of the world’s largest cities and is part of the most famous traditional electronics manufacturing regions in the world. The city has grown from an outsourced manufacturing centre to a thriving centre for tech-hardware companies.

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Why Is Silicon Valley A Start-up Heaven?

Aakash Sharma — Thu, 15 Apr 2021 04:35:04 +0000

Located in the Southern San Francisco Bay Area in Northern California, USA, Silicon Valley is a global centre of high technology and innovation. As per the Brookings Institution, the San Jose metropolitan zone, the lifeline of Silicon Valley, ranks third in terms of GDP per capita globally (after Zurich, Switzerland and Oslo, Norway).

The term “silicon” actually refers to many innovators and manufacturers in the California region who specialised in silicon-based MOS (metal-oxide-silicon) transistors and integrated circuit chips initially. Today, the area is home to many large technology companies globally, including 30 Fortune 1000 companies headquartered there and thousands of start-ups.

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Silicon Valley has the necessary infrastructure, capacity resources and a growing market for manufacturers, making it an ideal place for start-ups in a technology-driven world.

Silicon Valley – A Global Centre for Start-up Entrepreneurship and Financing

Silicon Valley accounts for one-third of total US venture capital, making it a central hub for innovation and start-up ecosystems. Historically, Silicon Valley has developed a vast majority of silicon-based integrated circuits, microprocessors, and microcomputers, among other things. In 2013, the industry employed about a quarter-million of the United States’ IT workforce.

The term Silicon Valley is often used as a synonym for the American high-tech economy. The name is synonymous with research and high-tech work. In this way, similar sites, research parks and technology centres worldwide with a similar structure have also been modelled after this peculiar region. Most notably, the Indian city of Bengaluru is called the ‘Silicon Valley of India‘.

Silicon Valley is a haven to some of the world’s biggest companies, including the following:

Google
Apple, Inc.
Hewlett-Packard
Facebook, Inc.
Netflix
Adobe Systems
eBay
Cisco Systems

Why is Silicon Valley Suitable for Start-ups?

Silicon Valley has the necessary infrastructure, capacity resources and a growing market for manufacturers, making it an ideal place for start-ups in a technology-driven world. In the region’s hi-tech environment, start-ups can easily host local systems because they have all the necessary connections. They can easily find skilled workers to form an effective and highly empowered team, as there is no dearth of software developers, programmers and operators in Silicon Valley.

More so, Silicon Valley is known for its tenants and products as it has become an ideal market for goods tech-transactions in the world. The passion for innovation, collaboration, and entrepreneurial adventure run throughout the everyday life of the world’s tech capital.

Top 5 Silicon Valley Startups in 2021

Given the region’s success boom, at least one Silicon Valley start-up joins the significant leagues every year. In 2020 and early 2021, many start-ups are en route to this oath, some of which are listed below.

Nuvia, Inc.

Nuvia, Inc. is a silicon design company dedicated to developing robust, low-energy consuming computer processors. It is located in Santa Clara and was founded by a former Apple designer. Its recent $ 1.4 billion acquisition by Qualcomm bears testimony to the success of Silicon Valley merchants.

Netdata

Located in Redwood, Netdata provides an open-source tool that tracks the performance metrics required for systems, applications, and other digital infrastructure components. It helps monitor disk activity, CPU usage, website usage and bandwidth usage and visualises it in a graph to run the diagnosis.

Wing

Located in Palo Alto, Wing is a delivery service platform. With operations in Australia, Finland and the United States, its application provides delivery services for essential goods like medicine, groceries and food.

Productiv

Productiv is also based in Palo Alto and provides insights into daily business and application analytics. It assists IT managers to reduce costs and increase business efficiency.

Step

This start-up focuses on teenagers as its target maker and allows them to use mobile banking services. It enables them to send and accept money directly from their Step card, accessible track services and expenses management.

The above mentioned are some of the deductions why Silicon Valley has a booming start-up business sector. It is safe to say that the spirit of innovation and collaboration keeps growing in Silicon Valley to meet the needs of entrepreneurs with high-tech solutions quickly.

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Upskilling: The New Mantra for Small businesses

Shalmoli Sarkar — Wed, 31 Mar 2021 06:35:10 +0000

Series of lockdowns in the pandemic that stretched over three to four months brought tremendous losses to the MSME ( Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises ) sector. Though market restrictions have been lifted, the losses incurred during that period persist and are a huge blow for the MSMEs. With fresh new cases arising in 2021, the state government is looking forward to imposing lockdown again. Small and traditional businesses, to cope with the current pandemic, need to pivot their business operations to digital platforms or have a digital presence. Here, upskilling will play a major role.

As per the MSME Annual Report 2020-21, there are 63.4 million units of MSME businesses nationwide that contribute 30.27 percent to India’s GDP also employing 120 million people, hence making this sector the bedrock of India’s growth. The MSMEs lack the digital know-how to operate a business online, accept payments online, marketing businesses online which stood as a hindrance for continuity of business for the MSME sector. To keep businesses afloat in such harsh times entrepreneurs and small business merchants are stepping forward to upskill themselves with the new skillsets and unlearning outdated business practices to survive in this fast-evolving digital world.

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As per the MSME Annual Report 2020-21, there are 63.4 million units of MSME businesses nationwide that contribute 30.27 percent to India's GDP also employing 120 million people

How will upskilling be beneficial for the MSMEs?

The apprehensions of stepping out in the pandemic yet lingers at the back of people’s minds, due to which customers will continue online buying of groceries, non-essentials, appliances, etc. Here, small businesses should not fail to digitise their business operations.

India’s biggest conglomerate Reliance has launched JioBusiness that offers enterprise grade-level fibre connectivity, digital solutions and devices to empower the micro small, and medium businesses. It aims to bring together 50 million medium and small-scale businesses online.

Apart from conglomerates, B2B retail trade platform Udaan connects retailers and businesses to source merchandise from manufacturers, brands, white labels, importers, etc. on a single platform. It currently houses 30 lakh small and medium-scale businesses and retailers. Thus, small businesses need to upskill themselves to be able to run businesses online.

What Upskilling initiatives Companies are providing for MSMEs?

MojoVersity

Instamojo, India’s largest on-demand payments and e-commerce platform for startups and MSMEs has launched MojoVersity an online skilling platform for small business owners to provide them with the digital knowledge to start a business online. The MojoVersity platform has a total of 9 courses that consists of essential topics such as GST, email marketing, sales funnels, hosting webinars, business accounting, public speaking, MS Excel, etc. According to a recent Instamojo report titled ‘Indian e-commerce Outlook 2021’ its online skill learning programme received 40,000 new unique visitors, out of which 30% were female learners. The platform also witnessed learners from merchants belonging to Tier-II and III cities. 42% of the learners chose to learn skilling programs on their mobile devices.

Google for Small Business

Similarly, tech giant Google, under the ‘Make small strong’ initiative, has launched Google for Small Business to upskill the small business owners with knowledge of digital skills and tools for free. The skills training is in the form of quick help videos that will aid the MSMEs to do business online. The skill courses are divided into three segments namely :

Digital unlocked: Contains 90 self-paced video tutorials which offer quality training on a comprehensive set of topics right from building a web presence and driving online growth to reach customers over mobile to email marketing to social media marketing.
Primer App: It is a free educational mobile app that offers quick, bite-sized, jargon-free video lessons to help business owners and individuals learn new skills in digital marketing and business. The five-minute lessons cover topics like business planning, management, sales, customer satisfaction, online advertising, analytics, etc.
Skill shop: To develop digital marketing skills, Skillshop has e-learning video courses ranging from Google ads to analytics to ad manager, where the learner gets certifications of the course completed.

Areas of Upskilling in which MSMEs are focussing on

Instamojo’s report titled ‘Indian e-commerce Outlook 2021’ revealed MSMEs took interest in the below areas to upskill themselves

Financial stability was disrupted in 2020 for most small businesses. To insulate themselves from the cash crunch, MSMEs took interest in learning the aspects of financial discipline and fundraising.
Simplifying business processes and systems has attracted MSMEs, as they have realised that improvement of work processes and systems will gain a competitive advantage in cost and delivery.
Digitisation in businesses such as digital marketing, e-commerce adoption, automation in business processes are garnering attention from MSMEs. They are realising that if your business does not have a digital presence, then it cannot survive in the long run.
MSMEs are taking a keen interest in export and import business since the political tensions with China have strained.

For the MSMEs

Looking at the massive response of MSMEs willing to upskill themselves, these enterprises have showcased their willingness to learn new skillsets and ramp their business operations online. With a deluge of smartphones and cheaper internet plans penetrating deeper into rural India, there will be an increase in online shoppers. Thus, more and more MSMEs shall be interested in upskilling themselves with new skillsets to establish businesses online.

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New Regulations for Social Media: How will it Change the Way Google, Facebook and Twitter Operate in the country

Aakash Sharma — Sat, 06 Mar 2021 10:35:05 +0000

On February 26, 2021, the Indian government passed a bill to introduce new regulations for social media, digital media (including news outlets) and OTT platforms operating in India. These recent changes come at a time when technological developments in the country are pushing innovation and entire sectors amidst a pandemic exacerbated by the economic crisis.

What transpired in the lead up to the new regulations for social media platforms?

On February 10, 2021, Indian officials held a virtual meeting with the top leaders of Twitter. Government officials outlined that the social media giant is “welcome to do business in India,” but it had to follow the country’s laws “irrespective of Twitter’s own rules and guidelines”.

The meeting was the outcome of tensions between the Bharatiya Janata Party government and Twitter. The Modi government’s passage of new farm laws has ignited protests that are going on for nearly five months now. The government had asked Twitter to remove provocative hashtags and tweets from accounts used by alleged Sikh and Pakistani separatist groups.

Twitter outright pleaded that it would not block the accounts of media companies, journalists, activists and politicians because that would amount to the violation of the fundamental right to free expression under Indian law.

New rules and regulations- bringing everything under the government’s ambit

According to the new government regulations of February 26, 2021, intermediaries such as WhatsApp must identify the first “author” of the content and messages deemed a threat by the government. All such platforms will have to remove illegal content within 36 hours of receiving notification. The government issued these new rules in addition to the Information Technology Act 2000. The government clarified that it is not asking the intermediary to break any encryption by seeking to know the originator of the message.

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The government's motives behind these new rules seem to be that of a monitoring agency rather than an inhibitor of business.

New rules for social media sites- how will they function in the future?

New government regulations governing internet businesses such as Facebook, WhatsApp and Twitter pose new challenges for the US social media giants in a large Indian market critical to their global reach.

Social media companies must revoke and takedown explicit porn-related content within 24 hours of reporting under the new rules. The companies are also expected to appoint agents and work with people living in India to coordinate law enforcement and handle complaints. They also need to help identify the “first real sender” of specific messages that pose some form of threat.

Representatives for Facebook and WhatsApp said Facebook has “always been clear as a company that we welcome regulations that set guidelines for addressing today’s toughest challenges on the Internet.”

How can the new changes impact SMEs running and advertising on social media platforms?

The new regulations majorly bring content assets and targeted content that can potentially harm the civil discourse and violate the Indian law under the purview. There does not seem to be an adversarial impact on the small businesses running via social media. Numerous small businesses have benefited from the campaigns and advertisement services offered by initiatives like Facebook for Business, Google Shops, Instagram Shop, Twitter ad campaigns.

The government’s motives behind these new rules seem to be that of a monitoring agency rather than an inhibitor of business. These mega-corporations bring vast opportunities for Indian people and continue to do so as long as no laws are violated. Nevertheless, what the future holds for businesses and content creators on these platforms cannot be ascertained. What can be said is that there is no immediate threat to any SME running through these platforms.

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Google to Invest $15 million in India’s SME: How Will It Benefit Small Businesses?

Smruthi Krishnan — Wed, 24 Feb 2021 12:35:05 +0000

Google has planned to invest $15 million (nearly Rs 109 crore) as funding for small and micro enterprises in India to bring back their businesses in the post-COVID-19 market. The company is already in talks with several local partners in India to diversify funding and reach out to as many SMEs as possible.

American multinational technology company specializes in Internet-related services and products especially online advertising technologies, a search engine and cloud computing. It announced its partnership with the European Investment Fund (EIF) along with two other organisations in Latin America and Asia to facilitate $75 million as funding provisions to small and medium-sized companies that were hit by the coronavirus pandemic.

These funds are part of the original $800 million initiative which was announced by Google in March 2020 when the pandemic shut down companies and offices leading to losses in businesses. The initiative to focus on SMEs is to provide them with essential funds that can help them revive their business and survive in case of such unprecedented times in the future.

The crux of Google’s Initiative

Google had announced an investment fund plan of more than $800 million to support small businesses when the pandemic struck the world last year. It has always tried to work towards the upliftment and development of small businesses across the world. The funding by Google will help small and medium scale enterprises in India to revive post-pandemic as many of them have been suffering losses and lack of demand.

With these funds, they can undergo a digital transformation for their company which will help them scale online, innovate and develop better technology and expand their customer base thus inducing demand. This will also help them access the required capital to recover and also build resiliency for the future. Last year, Google planned to invest nearly $10 billion under the Google for India digitisation fund over the next seven years to help India go digital in businesses. This new funding scheme will focus on bringing about digitalisation within the SMEs as well.

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Google is already in talks with several local partners in India to diversify funding and reach out to as many SMEs as possible.

How does Google plan to go ahead with the funding?

Google has planned to invest their funds in three different ways which include an amalgamation of equity investment, partnerships and an operational infrastructure ecosystem in India. They can invest and partner up with several Fintech platforms that are already working towards the same cause.

For instance, Mastercard and Razorpay have recently teamed up to help MSMEs to go digital in India. They can also tap on various banking systems, both digital and traditional ones to transform the operational infrastructure in the business market.

SMEs need funds and guidance to scale their business now more than ever. Google’s initiative will prove to be a blessing for these companies especially post the colossal damage caused by the COVID pandemic.

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How Google For Businesses is helping them Go Digital

Shalmoli Sarkar — Sat, 19 Dec 2020 07:34:53 +0000

Google Helps Businesses To Go The Digital Way

Owning a beauty salon was a dream come true for Priya, as she believed in making women feel better about themselves. Be it Kylie Jenner’s hairstyle or Deepika’s bridal look, she could do it effortlessly. However, things took a different turn with the lockdown announcement as it demanded the closure of all shops and malls. As the pandemic compelled staying at home and social distancing, Priya realized that her salon would remain closed for a long time and no customers would be coming in.

That is when she decided to give her business a digital presence with the help of Google My Business. To start with, she got her salon listed on Google My Business for free and added all necessary information such as contact details, services offered, business hours and pricing. She also posted some pictures of her salon and the equipment used there to highlight how she follows stringent hygiene measures. Priya knew people would like to keep cash payments to a minimum due to pandemic protocols. So, she downloaded Google Pay for Business to ensure digital payment. She further leveraged the ‘Nearby Stores’ feature on Google Pay to make her business easily discoverable for searchers staying in the vicinity. Now that she is future-ready, her customers are booking appointments and making payments online before availing her services at home or at her salon.

Priya’s narrative should not be unique, though. According to a report by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), India is home to approximately 6.33 crore medium and small businesses which account for 29.7 percent of GDP, and hence, is the backbone of the Indian economy. The impact of the pandemic outbreak has hurt small businesses as they are staring at financial losses due to low demand during multiple lockdowns. This necessitates a digital transformation so that businesses can still operate and stay afloat.

Why Small Businesses Need a Digital Interface

According to RedShift research, 63 percent of Indian small businesses do not have a website; 40 per cent believe that their business is too small to have a website; 19 per cent perceive website creation to be complex and 17 per cent believe website creation to be expensive. However, with the Internet adoption growing at a fast clip – in 2020, India had nearly 700 million Internet users, according to Statista – digitalization can catapult efficiency and innovation across business operations. Here is a quick look at how Web technologies can help small businesses.

Brand building for customer growth

A potential customer’s journey comprises multiple touchpoints before she actually decides to buy. The first touchpoint in that journey is the online discovery of your business. But what happens when your business does not have an impressive web presence? According to Google, if a company does not have a proper website, 45 percent of customers will turn away and look for an alternative. Therefore, a basic business listing online is a must. Adding more information about your products and services as well as contact details can convert casual surfers and searchers into customers.

Ease of transaction

The pandemic crisis has driven customers to remote buying and digital payments. It means one’s brick-and-mortar shop must be able to accept online payments to ensure customer convenience. On the plus side, all transactions get tracked and recorded without any manual intervention so that there is zero error in payments history. One can also save on time and efforts.

Enhanced efficiency

Unlike Priya and her staff, a remote workforce has become the new workplace normal, but most small businesses are still struggling to cope with the absence of a physical establishment. Consider a sales lead or a person in charge of finance who requires constant access to crucial data and documents for decision-making. Then there is the admin staff who needs to carry out back-office tasks. Finally, one cannot do away with those ubiquitous meetings without which no business could possibly survive. However, a virtual network of office employees with secure access to crucial data would solve most of these problems. Whether it is budget planning, client presentation or holding a town hall meeting, tracking inventory or procuring it, a virtual office can do everything and more.

How Google Helps Businesses

Small businesses which want to stand tall, need to have a profound presence online. Right from managing its payments, workforce management, advertising to operations, Google has tools that can cater to all your business needs. Here is the list of Google tools which will help your business go digital.

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According to Google, if a company does not have a proper website, 45 percent of customers will turn away and look for an alternative.

Google My Business (GMB) listing

Businesses without a digital presence can sign up with Google My Business for a free Google listing. Just like Priya, one can add all relevant business information such as product/service descriptions and contact details besides photos, videos, and posts so that the business becomes discoverable on Google Maps and via search engines. Signing in with Google My Business will also create a free website domain name. Or you can purchase a custom domain. To understand how customers are engaging with their business listings, owners can access Google Insights that gives a detailed report. Let us understand this with an example, suppose we have a bakery shop and we have added all information to get it listed on Google, Google Insights gives a report having details that if a customer has searched your bakery shop through a direct search or a discovery search that is customer searching for a particular cupcake where your shop appeared or branded search where customer searched for a particular brand of cake and your store name came up. Besides these it can give a detailed report on customers actions such as how many of them clicked on your shop website, requested for store directions or have directly called you. Hence, giving a complete understanding how your bakery shop is performing online.

Additionally, Google Pay for Business has recently added a feature called Nearby Stores. As the name suggests, it helps users find neighbourhood stores which are providing essential goods or services. Business owners using Google Pay can provide necessary information such as business hours, availability of essential goods, home delivery options and hygiene measures followed in their stores. Google gathers this information from businesses and displays it in the list of Nearby Stores that helps both users and businesses.

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Today it’s important to be present, be relevant and add value.

- Nick Besbeas, former CMO of LinkedIn

Google Pay for Business

The pandemic has compelled minimum physical contact and triggered the use of online or contactless payments. In such times where contactless payments are deemed safe, Google helps businesses to go for contactless payments by encouraging them to download ‘Google Pay’. The facility of cashless payments gives the customers a convenient way of making purchases in a swift, simple and safe manner hence driving customer satisfaction.

There are five major benefits of using Google Pay for Business:

Payments made by customers reach directly to the owner’s bank accounts with no fees.
Customers can make payments using phone numbers and QR codes.
A detailed transaction report showing how much the owners have earned on Google Pay.
Earn cashback rewards that is directly deposited in the bank account.
It gives the businesses to receive and accept payments with ease through multiple payment options such as credit or debit cards and multiple bank accounts on a single platform.

Apart from transactions, Google is in talks with financial institutions to offer loans through Google Pay for Business app to support small businesses in India.

Google Workspace

Businesses working with a remote workforce will be new normal now. Hence, streamlining of work processes digitally is essential for the overall productivity of the company. Google Workspace is an integration of multiple applications such as email, video conferencing, chats, docs sheets, slides, to-do lists etc for effective communication among team members. Use of Google workspace will help in making fast decisions. One can easily schedule meetings with automatic email invites. With the cloud storage feature, one can store all important documents such as sales agreements, contracts or financial reports. The documents stored in cloud storage can be accessed by remote team members for downloading anytime thus making it easier to collaborate. Company data in the cloud is protected from cyberattacks as it provides protection through multifactor authentication and security keys.

Google Small Business Hub

The government of India’s initiative of going ‘Vocal for Local’ has led Google to come up with a Make Small Strong initiative. In this initiative, Google helps businesses that are small and medium in size by creating short quick help videos that help the business owners to make the most of the digital tools. This initiative is providing free digital skills training to the business owners to equip themselves with the required skill set to bring business online. The skill courses are branched into three:

Digital unlocked: The course contains 90 self-paced video tutorials which offer quality training on a comprehensive set of topics right from building a web presence and driving online growth to reach customers over mobile to email marketing to social media marketing. It also has an extensive toolkit that will help in getting the business online.

Primer App: It is a free educational mobile app that offers quick, bite-sized, jargon free video lessons to help business owners and individuals learn new skills in digital marketing and business. The five-minute lessons cover topics like business planning, management, sales, customer satisfaction, online advertising, analytics, social media that come with actionable next steps where people can start reaching their goals.

Skill shop: To develop digital marketing skills it provides e-learning video courses ranging from Google ads to analytics to ad manager, and while learning gets certifications of the course completed.

Google has partnered with Zoho, a provider of Web-based tools for businesses, and Instamojo, a full-stack digital services platform for MSMEs, to help businesses build websites, create online stores, and manage inventory and shipments all from a single platform. SMBs can create websites by signing up with Zoho inventory and Zoho commerce for free till March 31, 2021, and with Instamojo which is offering a six-month free subscription to its online store solution. It has also partnered with Swiggy, the online food ordering and delivery platform and Dunzo that provides online delivery for food, medicines and groceries to enable businesses to accept online orders and enable delivery. Small businesses with a zero-sign-up fee with Dunzo can avail its 24×7 merchant support for instant registration and can use Swiggy’s ‘Fast Track Onboarding’ to make its business online.

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