Medinfi Raises $200K in Angel Funding from Reputed Professionals

Medinfi Healthcare Private Limited announced that it has raised approx. $2,00,000 (sR 1.5 Crores) of fresh angel funding from reputed professionals like Mudit Saxena (Senior Vice President, Genpact) and Evan Lim (Singapore). Existing Directors like Mr. Hemant Kaul (ex-CEO, Bajaj Allianz General Insurance) and Dr. Ram Kumar Kakani (Professor, XLRI) have re-invested in this round of angel funding. With this funding, the company has so far raised more than USD 0.5 million (approx. INR 4 Crores) in angel funding.

This round of funding comes soon after company’s selection for Red Herring Award 2016 finals in Manila, Philippines for Top 100 start-ups in Asia. The company was also chosen by Aditya Birla Group recently in its Bizlabs Core Program 2016 for top healthcare technology start-ups.

Medinfi intends to use the funds to grow its user base to 5,00,000 from 50,000 currently by March, 2017. The company wants to extend its services for the users in 50 Indian cities, up from 12 cities at present, and may explore South East Asian countries including Singapore. It also plans to serve the users of iPhone by launching iOS mobile application by this time..

According to Mr. Ravi Shankar Mishra, Founder & CEO, Medinfi, “Medinfi is overwhelmed by the response from global angel investors in this round. We shall remain committed to offer verified information to our users for taking healthcare decisions online and expand our services to many more users across India and South East Asia.”

In past, Medinfi was selected in top 100 digital health start-ups globally by Interface Health Excellence (IHX), Canada and was selected for Facebook’s FBStart and Social Good Programs.

Medinfi is Indian pure-play healthcare content platform which offers verified and genuine information on nearby doctors and clinics to its users. The startup has an easy-to-use Android mobile application and website which helps users locate the nearest doctors and hospitals for their every-day check-ups. The applications automatically detect the current user location and displays the nearest doctors, hospitals, and clinics.

While the users can call the doctors and hospitals from the mobile application, Medinfi does not have any revenue tie-ups with either doctors or hospitals and thereby does not book appointments. The company wants to remain a pure-play content platform and would like to continue serving its users with genuine and verified content at all times.

Currently, the application is available for users in 12 Indian cities, namely Bangalore, Delhi, Mumbai, Pune, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Gurgaon, Ghaziabad, NOIDA, and Navi Mumbai with information on 12000+ verified doctors, clinics and hospitals. The mobile application has more than 50,000 users which has grown 600% since January, 2016.

Medinfi has worked closely with Insurance Information Bureau of India, promoted by Insurance Regulatory Development of India (IRDAI), for Registry of Hospitals in Network of Insurance (ROHINI) project which has given Unique Identification to 32000+ hospitals located across India.

Meet Spero, India’s First Crowdfunded Eco-Friendly Electric Bike

The environment problem is real, and its high time that the citizens of the Earth start taking a stock of their actions and really do something to fish the world out of this crisis. It is for sure a problem that will take a long time to get solved but in order to reach there, the mankind needs to start with small-small steps everyday. Spero, India's first crowdfunded eco-friendly electric bike is a step in that very direction.

Manufactured by Milltex Engineers, a Coimbatore based company, the Spero electric bike offers a smart alternative for the current urban commutation problems. Though light in weight, the e-bike isn't particularly light on pocket. The base Spero model starts at an expensive Rs. 29,900.

The central idea behind Spero is quite simple. The makers wanted to manufacture a powered bicycle which is small and lightweight, hence very portable to use. For people who use their motorcycles/cars to get to the metro/train stations, this can serve to be a suitable alternative option.

Massive adoption of the Spero can have a real, significant effect on the current traffic congestion, pollution problems faced almost daily by the urban population and might even improve general public health by propagating a healthier and active lifestyle.



The company recently concluded the first crowdfunding campaign for the high-powered electric bike and raised INR 38,65,000 from 147 funders, way more than its goal of INR 30 Lakhs. The second campaign is currently LIVE and one can book themselves a Spero e-bike through this second campaign. With 56 days remaining, the second round of crowdfunding campaign has currently raised INR 97,200 of its goal of INR 15,00,000.

Running on a 48KV lithium-ion battery with a two-year warranty, the 5-Speed electric Gear shift bike can reach its top speed of 25kmph in mere 10 seconds, when the motor is running. Further, the biggest relief is that the battery is detachable and hence can be charged by anyone, anywhere. According to claims of Milltex Engineers, the battery charges from 20 to 80 percent in just six hours.

The e-bike comes in 3 models:

• E-30 – Has a range of 30 kms on a single charge (available only in MEN'S model)


• E-60 – Has a range of 60 kms on a single charge (available in both MEN'S & UNISEX models)


• E-100 – Has a range of 100 kms on a single charge (available only in MEN'S model)

Price:

The price of the eBike ranges from Rs.55,000 for its base model to Rs.84,900 however one may get the Spero at 45% leeser price in its second crowdfunding campaign here. Prices indicated include cost of delivery.

The idea for the e-bike was conceived and developed by 36-year old, Manikandan, an MBA having ample experience in the manufacturing realm.

The bicycle, which is a result of three years of intense research and development, can be considered as another brilliantly executed ‘Made in India’ story, well almost. According to the company, the e-bike has been made with with a judicious mix of materials that were locally sourced and some key imported components –such as the motor and the tyres come from partners in Korea and the battery comes from Samsung.

So, would you consider booking a Spero for yourself? Do tell us in the comments below.

How Non-Funded Startups Can Expand Themselves In Current Scenario of Start-up Ecosystem

A Startup is an entrepreneurial endeavor which necessarily implies recently rising and quickly developing business. It is an organization that is intended to develop quickly. New ventures can come in all structures and sizes. The plan of action of an organization, the thought process and the viability of that idea makes it unique and renders supports of individuals put resources into it. Venture funding is an important aspect of entrepreneurship. Smaller endeavors require small scale funding, which mainly originates from family, companions and personal bank loans. For greater endeavors, private financial specialists utilize their cash-flow to back a start-up. Ventures which are not financed or supported, by any investor are known as non-funded ventures, non-funded companies or bootstrapped companies. The business visionary here needs to do a self-financing for his venture.

Self-financing for a bootstrapped organization is extremely difficult as it needs lots of struggle, time and money. In the early years, the entrepreneur needs to make seed investments. Seed investment demands good investment funds from part of the entrepreneur. Positively striving towards the development of the venture is an essential part of development in a non-funded company. It can take months and years to get desired results. The organization needs to fundamentally spare cash for subsidizing of costs. Spending less for oneself and curbing other expenses are regular practices identified with such new businesses. Non-funded companies go into debt after borrowing from family, friends, and partners to arrange for seed investments. For the individuals who fail once or lose focus on their ideas suffer socially too. The effects can also prove devastating to one because it causes mental pressure and depression too. A non-funded entrepreneur has to find resources that will make his life easier and that are cheaper too, so that he doesn’t have to compromise his venture capital.

There are a few issues for a business person to start-up in a developing country. In a country where innovation is less appreciated and less compensated because of existing business models, starting up is a major risk. There are exceedingly inefficient lawful procedures required, which are lengthy, and corruption adds miseries to it. To expand the entrepreneur in a non-funded company needs to apply his knowledge to his project. Spending less cash or no cash ought to be the main priority. He has to initially find ways to build things internally that are small according to his skill. One never knows what product he can create out of it. That is how things are invented, and project costs are cut.

Being regular to work is another intelligent thought to keep up the spirit in a start-up venture. It helps in concentrating on its effectiveness. Knowing the business sector for the start-up endeavor is critical. The market does not involve one buyer. Expanding one's group of contacts facilitates better opportunities.Better connection and good communication skills can easily attract customers for the business. Having a check on the competitors is also needed.Trusted individuals should be inducted in the start-up group for the best outcome.The product one is selling or the services one is giving to the customer must not be questionable and unsatisfactory because if the product is sub-standard, good customer response and demand should not be expected from seller's part. So knowing the value of what you are offering to market and thinking from a customer's perspective is crucial.

Keeping a decent office culture for colleagues is also a must. The better the working environment, the more result they provide to the company. So the entrepreneur should be nice with his start-up team. The enthusiasm for one's thought assumes a unique part in the development of its business. Risk joins a start-up. Most of the failing entrepreneurs give up in the beginning as they start suffering losses and no profits in the early stages of the venture.The passionate ones do not give up.They stick to their plans and work on them with their heart, body, and soul. The new generation wants to accomplish everything early, so they consider start-up to be their best alternative rather than having a great job in a decent organization.

In a nation like India, where the population is high, demand is also high. So, on the off chance that one makes something good, he can get a decent market. Building trust for an entrepreneur is valuable as it aids in maintaining the business sector, he has obtained for his business. The current situation demonstrates that India is genuinely a start-up nation. In the Indian market, new businesses are developing with a gigantic rat. The e-commerce, advertising, and online portal start-ups are also growing and creating an excellent opportunity for entrepreneurs. The growth of start-up ecosystem in India is inspired by the Prime minister's speech and the "Start-up India, Stand Up India campaign”.

Finding a perfect spot, making the ability to scale and income are the significant challenges for an innovator. India positions third in the worldwide start-up ecosystem which implies development rate of new companies is at a quick pace. For the development of start-up environment, a non-budgetary backing is also required. Start-ups require administration advice, improvement in business plans, networking, capacity building and legal advice. It reduces the risk of financial support.Incubation plays a significant role in a non-funded startup. It helps to develop entrepreneurial skills such as building a venture around an idea, creating and testing a prototype and understanding the market.

Accelerators help to grow a business model by providing shorter and intense programs. To build good entrepreneurial, education plays a noteworthy role. Universities and colleges offer entrepreneurship courses and provide incubation services and start-up labs for young entrepreneurs.
To make a quickly developing start-up ecosystem, more start-up centered arrangements should be established. Support from public, private and non-profit areas is a must. Government related services, approvals for accelerating start-ups, direct, support, providing skilling and preparing for the enterprise can empower new companies in India to make an enhanced business environment.

The above is an authored article by Chiranjiv Patel, Regional Director - Entrepreneurs Organisation (EO), South Asia. EO is the only global network exclusively for entrepreneurs. It helps leading entrepreneurs learn and grow through peer-to-peer learning, once-in-a-lifetime experiences, and connections to experts.

[Top Image - Shutterstock]

Flipkart Shows The Door To 700-1000 Underperforming Employees

It's said in the world of startups, it is always the survival of the fittest. Whether you're a company or an employee, you work, you perform, show results, only then you get to stay; otherwise it's ta-ta, bye-bye, sayonara and you're quickly shown the door. Flipkart, one of India's most successful e-commerce startup employees are currently facing this very scenario.

According to reports doing round in the media, the Indian e-commerce giant is letting go of its underperforming employees in line with its strategy to have a leaner organisation structure and make an optimum use of its monetary resources. Apparently, the company has already asked some 700-1000 of its employees to either resign or be sent off with severance pay.

Industry experts are considering this step taken by Flipkart as a response to the recent valuation slash down that the company faced by Morgan Stanley and its continuous trouble in finding funding from investors. Prior to this, Flipkart was in the news for deferring the joining dates of its IIMs campus recruits.

Currently an organisation of 30,000 employees, Flipkart's aim is to be profitable and sustain it. In the times, when the online retail industry is experiencing a lull period and witnessing a number of shutdowns, Flipkart’s strategy to strike a balance between its growth goals and costings seems like an intelligent decision on the part of the organisation.

Recently, the company even placed a cap on the salaries of its employees and put a curb on its discount pricing. It is also striving to cutback its monthly burn rate by approximately 50 percent from about $ 80-100 million in the first half of 2016 to $40 million.

Recent times have seen a number of startups going on a layoff spree in an effort to realign their resources and focus on their core areas. One of the major layoff this year has been Grofers which let go off 10 percent of its workforce this year in June. In addition to this, Hiree decided to fire about 80% of its workforce in April and was joined by InMobi letting go off close to 100 of its employees. January also saw more than 150 CommonFloor employees getting the pink slips when the former was acquired by Quikr.

In an effort to curb the rumours and regain the confidence of its employees, Flipkart has issued a statement stating, "As a performance oriented organisation, we have a transparent evaluation process in place. Employees are assessed in a fair, simple, transparent and development oriented manner. We use our review process to differentiate performance and maintain a high bar, which is reflected in our total rewards philosophy. The top performers are rewarded highly and promoted to the next growth level. The solid performers are accordingly recognized and groomed for future roles through mentoring, coaching and on-the-job learning opportunities. At times, we have employees who do not meet the performance bar. In those situations, we work closely with employees to enable them to improve their performance. In due course, if these employees are unable to make the desired progress, they are encouraged to seek opportunities outside the company where their skills can be better utilized. This is a fairly common practice across various industries- especially in high-performing internet organizations."

This is a developing story. Keep watching this space for more updates.

App Based Online Logistics Platform Transport on Demand Gets $150K from Investor Dhruv Taneja

Transport on Demand (ToD), a unique app-based online logistics platform for intra-city transport, will unveil an aggressive marketing campaign in August having closed a successful fund-raising of $150,000 ($0.15 million) from investor Dhruv Taneja. He is a director at Empezar Logistics, specializing in container transportation and yard management and has over 9 years of experience in the field of logistics.

ToD was founded in January 2015 by Ahmedabad-based Yash Vasant of Vasant Group. While 50% of the amount raised will be dedicated to marketing, the company will set aside 30% for beefing up its technology and 20 % for HR. It has already initiated a talent hunt with 10 new recruits on board for field execution of driver enrollments, foreseeing a bullish business growth.

ToD is based on a unique proposition of connecting potential customers directly with truckers. It’s bidding model play as the key differentiator. While every other competitor give a fixed rate, usually higher than the market rate, ToD works purely on the demand and supply model. This works in favor of the customer since he gets the best possible rate and also benefits the driver because he gets as many trips.

The aggregator app acts as a platform gathering registered single owner truck drivers for one to pick and choose from through innovative bidding.

“Our application allows reverse bidding by the drivers themselves who can double their income significantly. This indeed, is a boon for those who tend to lose out on a two-way trip and business. The indigenous innovation got our investor interested to begin with. We want to make sure we are sound operationally and the number of drivers who can bid are technology savvy and customer oriented,” said Mr. Vasant.

ToD is already eyeing its Round 2 fund of about $2 million to come through. Its services are offered within a 200 kilometer radius of Ahmedabad currently but an expansion through the franchisee model is up on the cards in the next six months. This is expected to boost the customer base from 300 now.

Although ToD functions mostly in the B2B sector, the app can also be utilized by anyone wishing to shift household goods from one city to the other, thereby making it B2C too.

Venture Catalysts Fuels Disruption in Business Communication by Enabling $150k Seed Investment into AppSay!

Furthering its vision of nurturing high-value global start-ups from within India, Venture Catalysts, India’s first seed investment & innovation platform, has recently enabled a seed investment into AppSay, a new-age business communications platform. Led by VCats angels Shreyans Shah and Mayank Shah, the $150,000 investment will allow AppSay to scale up its operations and develop its tech framework to further refine its product.

A long-term customer engagement and ‘qualified’ leads platform, AppSay has been built to provide businesses with a viable customer engagement channel that does away with the hassles and drawbacks associated with traditional messaging. The core team at AppSay comprises its Founder & CEO Vaibhav Shewale, an IIM–C alumnus with 20+ years of experience in global products and services, and Jeetendra Ghare, COO and Angel Investor with 17 years of global telecom and consulting expertise.

Speaking on the investment, Dr. Apoorv Ranjan Sharma, Co-founder, Venture Catalysts, said, “At Venture Catalysts, we have always been on the lookout for high-impact start-ups which leverage technology to disrupt their market segments. The investment into AppSay is therefore a measure of our faith in the operational model of the start-up as well as the vision and business acumen of the team behind it. Given how fragmented business communications and lead generation around the world is at present, we are confident that AppSay will be able to transform the sector through its tech-driven, user-centric approach.”

Vaibhav Shewale, Founder& CEO, AppSay,said, “We are delighted to be chosen for an investment by VCats, which is fast establishing itself as one of the most forward-looking seed investment platforms in the country. The funds will not only allow us to tap into newer markets to scale up our operations and sales, but will also help in significantly enhancing and refining our offerings as we get ready for the global launch of our product.”

The AppSay platform is built to protect customer information of businesses. It provides the end-user with a unique, non-intrusive way of reaching out to businesses like banks, schools, utilities, NGOs, hospitals, insurers and government departments for information, service and support. VCats’ move to enable seed investment into the start-up also underlines its commitment to nurture entrepreneurship by building a holistic, end-to- end start-up investment and support ecosystem across the country, including tier-2 and tier-3 cities. Venture Catalysts recently expanded its operations into Surat to an extremely positive response and will be looking to establish its physical presence in five cities in 2016 with an aim to expand to five more cities in the next two years.

Anuj Golecha, Co-founder, Venture Catalysts, added, “In a world that is fast going digital, there is a growing need to protect the sanctity of end-users’ information and respect their privacy and choice.However, businesses also require customer information and engagement in order to grow and develop. With its differentiated approach, AppSay has emerged as a viable customer engagement tool for businesses which also provides users with a non-intrusive way of reaching out to service providers. We believe the idea is disruptive enough to be a global success, and will be on the lookout for other such ideas which solve global problems through localised solutions.”

Speaking about what made him invest in AppSay, Shreyans Shah, said, " AppSay is a highly cost-effective global product that offers brilliant solutions to businesses around the world to tackle the growing hassles associated with bulk SMS and emails. Its pull-based approach has all the necessary features that can help in protecting customer information. Supported by a strong team and veteran founders with prior experience in the telecom sector, I see great potential for AppSay in the BFSI sector, and am confident that it will transform business communications across the globe through its disruptive technology.”

Having enabled over nine investments worth more than $3 million in promising start-ups such as vPhrase Analytics, Vahanalytics, Siftr and ConfirmTKT since the launch of its operations, VCats has already established its credentials as the fastest growing early-stage investment platform in the country. VCats has several strategic partnerships with leading industry players such as Cox and Kings, HDFC, Plug and Play, Zaffiro Venturesetc, giving its investee start-ups access to some of the biggest corporate companies in India and increasing their chances of success by enhancing business opportunities.

Venture Catalysts invests $100K – $250K in very early stage startups that has potential to create enduring value for over a long period of time. In 6 months’ time, Venture Catalysts successfully added 9 companies to its kitty. Looking to add more in coming months.

It prefer companies in IoT, Artificial Intelligence, Ad Tech, Virtual Reality, Education, E Commerce and Retail.

Oracle Buys Cloud Services Company NetSuite for $9.3B in an All-Cash Deal

Oracle has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire NetSuite, the cloud company. The proposed transaction is expected to close in 2016. Until the transaction closes, Oracle and NetSuite will continue to operate independently.

In 1998, NetSuite pioneered the Cloud Computing revolution, establishing the world's first company dedicated to delivering business applications over the Internet. Today, NetSuite provides a suite of cloud-based financials / Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and omnichannel commerce software that runs the business of more than 30,000 companies, organizations, and subsidiaries in more than 100 countries.

The addition of NetSuite will enable Oracle to expand its ability to support customers of any size in more industries and more countries.

“Oracle and NetSuite cloud applications are complementary, and will coexist in the marketplace forever,” said Mark Hurd, Chief Executive Officer, Oracle. “We intend to invest heavily in both products—engineering and distribution.”

“We expect this acquisition to be immediately accretive to Oracle’s earnings on a non-GAAP basis in the first full fiscal year after closing,” said Safra Catz, Chief Executive Officer, Oracle.

“NetSuite has been working for 18 years to develop a single system for running a business in the cloud,” said Evan Goldberg, Founder, Chief Technology Officer and Chairman, NetSuite. “This combination is a winner for NetSuite’s customers, employees and partners.”

“NetSuite will benefit from Oracle’s global scale and reach to accelerate the availability of our cloud solutions in more industries and more countries,” said Zach Nelson, Chief Executive Officer, NetSuite. “We are excited to join Oracle and accelerate our pace of innovation.”

The evaluation and negotiation of the transaction was led by a Special Committee of Oracle’s Board of Directors consisting solely of independent directors. The closing of the transaction is subject to receiving certain regulatory approvals and satisfying other closing conditions including NetSuite stockholders tendering a majority of NetSuite’s outstanding shares in the tender offer. In addition, the closing is subject to a condition that a majority of NetSuite’s outstanding shares not owned by executive officers or directors of NetSuite, or persons affiliated with Larry Ellison, his family members and any affiliated entities, be tendered in the tender offer.

International e-Sports Federation Partners with Alibaba Sports Group Alisports

International e-Sports Federation (IeSF) has announced a partnership, so called ‘Exclusive Strategic Partnership’, with Alibaba Sports Group(Alisports) in Shanghai, China on July 26, 2016.

Alisports and IeSF have first met in Beijing early this year. Although, it is a quite short period time to make something concrete between two different parties, both parties shared a same vision on future goals which made IeSF and Alisports to reach consensus for such partnership.

There are three specific goals which both shared. First of all, both parties want to have a tournament which all amateur e-Sports players and professional e-Sports players can participate. This means that IeSF will fully endorse WESG Game Series initiatives. Second, both parties will work together to let e-Sports to be recognized as sports. Last but not least, both parties will create the unique IP.

As IeSF World Championship’s journey has been begun from 2009, IeSF now has know-hows, experience, resources and more in operating tournaments as well as with its global coverage through its 47 member National Federations. These various strengths from IeSF will support the World Electronic Sports Games, WESG, hosted by Alisports to be a tournament which can benefit e-Sports players, fans, and officials.

IeSF has put great efforts to enter International Sports Society. IeSF has been approved as one of the official signatories of World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) in 2013. IeSF is currently an international member of The Association For International Sport for All (TAFISA) and IeSF is approved as counterpart for e-Sports discipline by Olympic Council of Asia (OCA). IeSF is preparing documentation to submit to International Olympic Committee (IOC) and Sport Accord at this moment. IeSF will now spread its wings to enter International Sports Society with support from Alisports.

To make sports market-oriented and gaming sports-oriented, Alisports hosts WESG with a total prize more than $5.5 million and total investment more than 1 billion yuan ($149 million), attracting e-Sports players from over 100 countries and regions in this inauguration. Meanwhile, Alisports is also planning to build the e-Sports Stadiums around China, hoping to make e-Sports become a way of life.

Alisports CEO, Mr. Zhang Dazhong addressed: “As the most authoritative international organization in e-sports industry, IeSF has been committed to promoting e-Sports movement into the mainstream, including pushing it into the Olympic Games, which is consistent with our ideal. We are honored to cooperate with IeSF as the exclusive global partners in a long-term. I believe the two sides will jointly promote the development of the global e-Sports industry. “

IeSF President, Mr. Byung Hun Jun said “This partnership is one big step to IeSF. I believe IeSF and Alisports will maximize each other’s strength by this partnership. I also believe e-Sports Stadium can be transformed to be a fashion place for Youth. IeSF will make our all effort to be with more e-Sports fans in more countries together with Alisports from now on.”

Talking to Lokesh Suji (Director - eSports Federation of India), he said "This has been so far the best news for eSports. The investment of 150 Mn$ is highest (excluding Twitch acquisition by Amazon for nearly 1 Bn $), till date in eSports worldwide and just to give an overview its nearly four times the cost of acquisition of Major League Gaming by Activision, Twice the money which MTG group had paid to get 76% stake in ESL.

With the vision of IeSF and support of AliSports, things will get bigger and better for eSports, as the Indian Federation and being part of IeSF we are super excited. We hope that more and more brands in India will start realizing the potential of eSports, please note that eSports is not "Gaming", its competitive video gaming and it's a Sport. Indian eSports community is pegged around 10 Mn and these are serious gamers who spend 3-4 hrs/daily competing against each other and have got 4X influencer effect, who would not want to reach out to them. Lots of good things are lined up for the Indian eSports community and will share details as we move forward".

Lokesh was the person who had introduced eSports to Mt. Dew and helped them conceptualize the "Dew Arena" (eSports Championship launched by Pepsi last month) and is also the Founder of Indian League Gaming.

Spark10’s Accelerator’s Nine Startups are Ready to Demo to the World

The nine startups, that participated in the intensive 13-week acceleration program at Spark10, are gearing up to pitch their business plans to a range of high profile investors, from the UK and India, on the evening of July 31^st, 2016. Few of these startups has already bagged commitments and ‘strong interests’ from some angel investors. It is rare to see startups coming from accelerators grabbing investors’ commitments before their Demo Day.

Spark10, India’s First European Accelerator, conducted a 13-week program, which commenced on April 25th, 2016 in Hyderabad. The nine startups have been selected from over 500 applications received from multiple cities across India and Romania, USA, UK, London, New Castle, New York, Spain, Boulder from New Colorado in USA, etc.

Spark10’s Founder and CEO Atal Malviya designed the program with the guidance of leading experts and minds in the startup acceleration domain in the UK. Their advisors include big names from the European startup ecosystem including Jon Bradford, Co-Founder of F6S and Tech.eu and Paul Smith, Founder of Ignite and Campus North.

The nine startups who underwent the program are BeHungry, Brisky, Carzip, DaddysPocket, FeltSo, Fliona, OhLook, Ornativa and Paysack

BeHungry is an online food ordering platform inspired by the thought of providing pocket friendly combo meals from restaurants nearby. They have served 12,000+ orders to 2500 users as of June 2016, and have more than 300 restaurants on board generating a revenue of more than Rs. 9 lakhs.

Brisky is a nightlife discovery app that personalizes the recommendations to the user based on their and their social groups’ preferences and provides information that answers the most common question – “Where should we go tonight?”. It boasts that 2,500 users have used the app within 30 days of its launch in Hyderabad with a total of 7500+ active users as of July 2016. Brisky has already on-boarded over 130 pubs and generated revenues of over Rs. 15 lakhs.

Carzip is a car care app connecting a network of standardized multi-brand service centers in Hyderabad with car owners helping them book any car service with the click of a button. They have dozens of service centers across the city on board as of July 2016 and have started their servicing operations recently with good response from the market.

DaddysPocket is India’s first sponsorship marketplace for college events that helps college groups get easy sponsorship which allows them to focus on organizing a quality event. They have over 20 high profile brands as sponsors on board as of June 2016, and are the official partner for Techfest 2016 happening at JNTU, Hyderabad at the end of this month.

Feltso is an artificial intelligence engine that collects, collates and analyses thousands of reviews from the web and presents a simplistic analysis of consumer sentiments for almost any product or service in the world. They have received an overwhelming response of over 30,000 unique visitors within two weeks of launch.

Fliona is an online fashion retail store that lets the customer design their own handbag based on their unique style and personality preferences at an affordable price. They have a few established handbag manufacturers on board as strategic partners to bring this unique proposition to Indian consumers.

OhLook is a subscription-based, daily-wear fashion rental service for men that lets them wear a different shirt every day. They have received over 100 requests within five days of launching operations.

Ornativa is a fashion jewellery brand which creates unique and beautiful designs taking inspiration from global fashion trends to make young women look adorable every day. They have already sold over 1100 units in the month of June 2016 alone totaling to over 11000 units since launch, generating Rs. 7 lakhs monthly.

Paysack is India's first mobile wallet for enterprise, looking to transform business banking services for the 21st century. This team has over 50 companies on-board ready to use their product upon launch.

Spark10 is committed towards producing sustainable and investible technology startups in this country and is bringing experts and strong connections from all over the world to make it happen – added Malviya.

NCR Emerged Ahead of Bengaluru as the Most Preferred Destination for Angel Investments : InnoVen Capital Report 2016

InnoVen Capital, Asia’s leading venture debt firm, announces the release of the ‘India Angel Report 2016’, the latest edition of its annual report analyzing investment trends by major angel groups in the country. The Report has been prepared in collaboration with the Association of Indian Angel Groups (“AIAG”) and is based on data provided by the following member angel groups– Mumbai Angels, Indian Angel Network, Chennai Angels, Hyderabad Angels and Calcutta Angels.

The Report reveals that deal activity by the angel groups grew significantly in FY16, amounting to Rs.1137 Mn in commitments across 69 deals, as compared to Rs.703 Mn across 47 companies last year. Valuations also rose, with the median pre-money valuation in FY16 at ~Rs.100 Mn, up 10% over the previous year.

In our ‘Startup Outlook Report 2016’ released earlier this year, we found that NCR had emerged the preferred destination for entrepreneurs, followed by Bengaluru. The latest Report reaffirms these findings, with NCR accounting for ~36% of angel deals. Reflecting India’s place as one of the largest consumer markets in the world, B2C startups attracted over two thirds of angel group investments, with consumer internet, food and e-commerce as top sectors. In the B2B space, startups in IT / ITES and marketing / advertising sectors received majority of the investments. A strong preference for revenue generating startups observed in recent years continued in FY16 , with ~71% of the startups backed by angel groups generating revenues.

This year, we also demographically analyzed startups and founders funded by angel groups. Our findings reveal that the average startup had two co-founders, and one-fourth of all startups in the sample had at least one female co-founder. Interestingly, the average founder had 8 years of experience prior to starting up and 28% of all founders were found to be serial entrepreneurs. Looking at academic backgrounds, ~67% of founders were engineering graduates and the majority of them had a post-graduate qualification, most commonly an MBA. 46% founders had an MBA whereas 15% had a post-graduate qualification in a technical subject. India’s elite academic institutions were well represented amidst founders – 23% of all engineering graduate founders were from the IITs, while 16% of all founders with an MBA were from the IIMs.

At an overall portfolio level, an analysis of over 150 investments made by angel groups between FY05 and FY15 reveals that of FY16, angel groups had exited 18% of investees, while 7% had wound down, with the remainder still operational, but not exited. More than 50% of these companies have raised follow-on rounds of funding within which 22% raised multiple rounds. Historically, almost 40% of investments made in companies in any given year have gone on to raise further equity eventually with 5% of the portfolio companies having raised more than 5 rounds of capital.

Commenting on the findings, Mr. Ajay Hattangdi, Group COO and CEO India said, “The India Angel Report is the product of our ongoing inquiry into the dynamics of the various components of the venture capital landscape. While by no means comprehensive, the Report seeks to provide some understanding of the trends within angel investing in India. It is meant for use by practitioners in the angel community, by venture capital firms who see the valuation trends as a bellwether for their own deal pipelines, by policy makers who have begun to appreciate the role of angel investments in the development of the entrepreneurial finance system, or by those generally interested in the venture capital industry.”

About the Report

The ‘InnoVen Capital: India Angel Report’ is an annual report that provides analysis and trends on Indian angel and angel group activity. The report has been prepared by InnoVen Capital India Private Limited (“InnoVen Capital”) in collaboration with the Association of Indian Angel Groups (“AIAG”) and is based on data provided by the participating angel groups to InnoVen Capital. The following angel groups participated in this edition of the report – Mumbai Angels, Indian Angel Network, Chennai Angels, Hyderabad Angels and Calcutta Angels. The full edition of this Report can be read here: India Angel Report 2016 and infographic version at http://goo.gl/lQ7mmB. The previous edition of the Report can be read here: India Angel Report FY15.

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Modasta Raises $1.5M Angel Funding from a Consortium of Mauritius Based HNI Investors

Senior technology and medical professionals have joined forces to found Modasta, the first India focused health content portal. The platform, which already has over one million registered users in a three month pilot, offers multi-lingual and credible health content curated by Indian doctors for the Indian health-seeker. The startupis founded bya team of entrepreneurs comprising Bikram Barman, CEO and Co-Founder of Modasta and ex Accenture & Yahoo executive, IIM alumnus PankajPandey, COO and Co-Founder, and Dr. Geethanjali, Chief Content Officer and Co-Founder. The three-member founding team, who comes with 40 years of cumulative experience in healthcare, technology, social business and entrepreneurship, raised US$1.5 million from a consortium of Mauritius based HNI investors. The funds have been strategically allocated for business growth, technology upgradation, talent acquisition and marketing outreach activities.

Indian health-seekers, who were earlier compelled to peruse international health portals like WebMD and Mayo Clinic, will now have an India centric platform as their first point of reference. The platformprovides content in English, Hindi, Telugu and Tamil, with plans on the anvil to extend the number oflanguages. Modasta, not only provides easy to access content in the format of articles and videos, but also offers health forums to exchange knowledge and experiences. The startup will also be expanding its range of offerings to include telehealth comprising online doctor consultation services, thus becoming the first holistic healthcare service provider for health-seekers across India.

Bikram Barman, Co-Founder & CEO, Modasta said, “The healthcare industry is witnessing a robust growth trajectory, and at Modasta, we are aiming for a large slice of this lucrative US$280 billion industry.As the first of its kind initiative in India, Modasta will service the length and breadth of the country with pertinent content on a plethora of subjects from lifestyle diseases, mental health, women’s health, men’s health, sexual health and pediatrics amongst others. At Modasta, we endeavor to become the first ever one stop shop for health-seekers, something which no other health-tech company has managed to achieve to date in this space.’’

Modasta has a medical and tech team strength of 50 employees comprising doctors and developers. There areplans to double the head count by next year. 

LED Bulbs Can Help Connect IoT Devices: Study

A recent study has sprung open some major new prospects for the Internet of Things (IoT) market. The study reveals that with some modifications, a consumer-grade light emitting diode bulb also commonly known as an LED, can be used for connecting devices such as wearable devices, toys, appliances, utilities and sensors that could consist the In
Consumer-grade light-emitting diode (LED) bulbs can, with some modifications, be used for connecting devices such as appliances, wearable devices, sensors, toys and utilities that could comprise the IoT.

Speaking at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH), Markus Gross from the Disney Research lab revealed that interconnecting sensors, appliances and a variety of other devices into the IoT may offer many potential benefits but making use of radio links to do the same will end up making the radio spectrum an even scarcer resource than it already is.

Markus further added, "Visible light communication (VLC) networks conserve the radio spectrum, while also making it difficult to eavesdrop for anyone out of line of sight of the network."



If individual LED bulbs are made to alternate between sending modulated light signals, and then doubling up as receivers of signals, one can create a network of bulbs that is capable of connecting devices and sending messages to each other, while having no major effect on the lighting of the room.

Such a VLC system was implemented by Disney Research's Stefan Schmid in ETH to demonstrate how feasible is a VLC system in interconnecting various devices within a room.

The findings of the study were revealed to the world recently in London at the IEEE International Conference 2016 on Sensing, Communication and Networking.

Talking about the study's findings, Schmid mentioned how they made use of the off-the-shelf and commercially available LED light bulbs as their study's starting point.

He shared since the LED bulbs are something which are easily available at a low cost and can be used in any lamp using standard sockets, they are a flexible and easy-to-setup testbed that can be easily replicated.

However, the LED bulbs used in the study were modified. In order to modify the bulbs according to the hypothesis, the researchers added a "System-on-a-Chip" which ran an embedded version of Linux to each of the LED bulb, as well as photodiodes in an effort to enhance the sensing quality of the incoming signals and an extra power supply for the electronics that were added.

Well, if the study is true, we sure have something major coming our way in the filed of IoT.

[Top Image - Shutterstock]

Paladion Appoints Veteran COO from Infosys’ EdgeVerve as its Chief Operating Officer

Paladion, a global cyber security leader, today announced the appointment of Sunil Gupta, a former COO from Infosys’ EdgeVerve as President and Chief Operating officer. In this new role, Sunil is responsible for the business strategies and outcomes in MEA and India, and will direct all business units and delivery.

Paladion’s Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder, Rajat Mohanty, said, “Security management is transitioning from slow people based processes to a more active posture by leveraging automation and analytics. Paladion has been at the forefront of these developments and delivers leading edge CyberActive services through a proprietary, high performance analytics and orchestration platform. Sunil brings a wealth of experience in building great organizations that deliver platform based services. He has a deep understanding of the dynamics that are playing out in enterprises as IT is transitioning to be more agile, secure and responsive. Sunil will help position Paladion effectively to solve the next gen challenges of security management.”

Over the past 30 years, Sunil has held several leadership roles; VP-Engineering in Aricent (erstwhile Hughes Software Systems), CTO in Symphony Teleca, COO in Logica India, and Edgeverve systems (an Infosys company). His expertise lies in translating strategic vision in to action, building high performance teams and helping businesses innovate and grow.  Sunil has led large change management programs helping organizations achieve agility, client centricity, and people focus which are also the key underpinnings of Paladion’s vision.

On his new office, Sunil Gupta, President and COO, Paladion said, “I am excited to have joined Paladion, a market leader in the cyber security space.   In my new role, my main focus will be to make Paladion a highly proactive, responsive, learning organization with clients and people at the center of the business. My immediate emphasis will be on operational efficiency and to expand Paladion’s footprint into new markets in the pursuit of growth.  We will also create new partnerships and business models to deliver greater value to our clients.  I look forward to a lasting association with Paladion and a reciprocally progressive impact on both”.

Sunil has a B-Tech in Computer Science from NIT Trichy, Madras University. He began his career in NCR working for companies like C-DOT and Hughes Software systems, and later moved to Bangalore and worked for Symphony Teleca, Infosys and EdgeVerve. He currently lives in Bangalore with his family.

Snapdeal Partners With Uber in a First-of-its Kind API Integration

Snapdeal, Indian online marketplace, has launched a first-of-its kind frictionless in-app integration with Uber, the world’s largest on-demand smart mobility app. Through this integration, Uber will make travel even quicker and easier for millions of Snapdeal customers who will now be able to request an Uber directly through the Snapdeal app.

Snapdeal has been a market leader and the first in its category to provide services of value to its customers that go beyond the traditional offerings of an e-commerce company. Snapdeal recently announced the launch of a range of services on its platform, allowing customers to book flights, order food and even pay bills directly through its app. Today, by integrating the Uber API, Snapdeal is giving its customers a holistic experience. When a user books a flight or a hotel from the Snapdeal app, they can travel to the airport or the hotel using Uber, booked from within the Snapdeal app itself without having the Uber app installed on their devices.

Tony Navin, Senior Vice President, Partnerships and Strategic Initiatives, Snapdeal said, “We are committed to building the country’s most reliable and frictionless digital ecosystem, that caters to the entire range of India’s consumption needs. Our unique partnership with Uber, a global leader in smart mobility, is an important step in that direction. We are confident that this integration will further provide an exemplary experience to our customers.”

Mahesh Bhalla, Head of Business, Uber India, said “In August 2014, we opened our API to developers globally and since then we’ve seen the creative ideas that app developers have come up with in order to make it easier for people to move around in cities. This partnership with Snapdeal is the first completely native Uber API integration in India and we are excited about this, as we share the same sentiment of building an ecosystem where we work together with other technology companies in order to give customers a hassle-free, end-to-end experience.”

*This service is currently available on Android version 4.0 (and higher), and will be rolled out for other platforms soon. Customers are requested to update their Snapdeal app.

Vikram Upadhyaya Ropes in Ex- President of PIMCO Japan and WiL; to Launch a Rs 350 Cr VC Fund for Indian Startups

Even as the thrill of a strategic tie-up with World Innovation Labs (WiL) continues, Gurgaon-based Green House Ventures (GHV) Accelerator is having more to celebrate. Mr. Makoto Takano, ex-President of PIMCO Japan Ltd., the world’s biggest asset management firm, joins GHV as a Board Member.

With his addition to the GHV family, the stronghold that they had in Japan is cemented permanently. Their strategic alliance with WiL in 2014 opened up the Japanese business ecosystem for GHV and now with Mr.Takano on board, it will only be strengthened. The trio has announced the launch of a INR 350 Crore fund for Indian startups.

Mr. Makoto Takano is the Founder of MT Partners K.K, whose core area of focus is extensive exposure in investing and management operation of ventures with future success potential. Presently, MT Partners assists 14 Companies including atomixmedia, inc., where Makoto Takano serves as CEO. He is also the Editor-in-Chief of Forbes JAPAN. Previously, he had headed the strategy team at Daiwa Institute of Research and the marketing team of Goldman Sachs Asset Management. He also serves as the Director of Nippon Finance Association, amongst others. Mr. Takano has an in-depth understanding of the startup world and is the Managing Director of Genuine Startups Ltd, which manages a VC fund (called the Genuine Fund). Mr. Takano is also the ex-President of PIMCO (Pacific Investment Management Company LLC), an American multinational investment management firm with over $1.52 trillion in assets under management, as on the 30th of June 2015.

Along with his counterparts, he brings with him a vast and exclusive network of potential collaborations and partnerships between the Indo-Japan startup ecosystems. Being an industry veteran, Mr.Takano is heavily equipped to accelerate the pace of India’s growth story. His mentoring, support and global expertise will prove to be critically beneficial to all the startups of GHV, especially when they look to raising funds.

With this alliance, Mr.Takano can look forward to relevant access and exposure to one of the fastest growing startup ecosystems in the world – India. He said, “India is a bullish economy and I am excited to be a part of many success stories from India, that we intend to create over time.”

Vikram Upadhyaya, is a Venture Capitalist and started his early investments as Angel Investor and has been investing in Indian Startups since 2007, some of the promising portfolios are Druva, Stayzilla, Loginext, CollegeSearch.  He is a Chief Mentor & Evangelist at GHV Accelerator. He said, “This partnership is just a pleasant validation of our efforts & commitment. Mr. Takano and WiL have provided us with a solid foundation and the confidence to forge ahead….”

World Innovation Labs (WiL) will continue to handhold and support the growth and expansion of GHV startups in global markets, targeting Japan and the US, to help them scale and go global. WiL is a VC fund based out of Japan & Silicon Valley with US$400 mn, typically invests $5-30 million in early as well as growth-stage technology and internet startups through multiple rounds of investments and will continue to follow the same investment pattern for GHV startups. WiL has promising portfolios like DoctorOnDemand, HMV, Mercari, Gumi, Raksul, GiGSky and many more.

"India today looks like what China was 10 years back and growth here will be much stronger in the next few years. We would like to fund a couple of companies from GHV if there is a strong connection to Silicon Valley or Japan. If we see benefits of cross-border mentorship and regular dialogue, the next step will be to set up a fund or facility which we can jointly run to continue our relationship," said Gen Isayama, Co-founder and CEO, WiL.

Recently, two portfolio companies of GHV – Applop and MyTaxiIndia bagged additional rounds of funding. One of their startups in the laundry space was in the news for operational breakeven.

About GHV

GHV Accelerator funds and mentor startups between the incubation and venture capital stages, and provides them a controlled environment, necessary resources, as well as sustainability funding (upto USD 3,00,000), so they can scale up and achieve healthy business metrics. GHV has portfolios MyTaxiindia, PickMyLaundry, Adurcup, PindropMusic, Istyleyou, Fitmein, Roadgods, Foodport and CarPM.

Chai Point Launches a Cloud Based Beverage Services Platform boxC.in

Chai Point, Indian Chai retail chain, has announced the launch of boxC.in – a cloud based beverage services platform which includes fully automatic and IOT enabled dispensers.

The core purpose of the platform is to provide 100% authentic Chai and filter coffee at office pantries. The cloud based platform distinguishes itself by ensuring much higher level of transparency in both beverage quality, billing basis and service levels.

The IOT enabled dispensers are based on Chai Point’s core value of 100% pure ingredients – quality tea leaves and ground coffee, fresh milk and water. The cloud platform offers strong customer service capabilities with a CRM dashboard and a centralized command center to act on customer issues and data generated by the IOT enabled dispensers.

The command center enables Chai Point’s repair and maintenance team to deliver timely quality service as it live monitors the dashboard getting information from its IOT enabled dispensers.

Announcing the launch of boxC.in, Amuleek Singh, co-founder and CEO, Chai Point said, “Chai and filter coffee is fuel for all offices – these beverages are now considered as a core utility by corporates. The more savvy ones see good quality beverages as a must have employee engagement service. That said, authentic Chai and Filter coffee solutions are rarely available – you get compromises. What corporates also miss is an effective platform that assures a high uptime level of beverage services and transparency on the billing basis -  boxC.in is aimed to solve just that.”

Chai Point – a venture of Mountain Trail Foods Pvt Ltd, is India's Chai retail chain brings the perfectly brewed cup of Chai made with fresh, natural ingredients to offices and working professionals around the country. With over 90+ stores, a popular Chai-on-Call delivery service and a Chai-at-Work service designed for corporates, Chai Point is revolutionizing the way that Chai is consumed in India. Beginning with the first pilot microhub set up in Bangalore in April 2010, Chai Point has rapidly grown to become the go-to brand for a perfectly brewed cup of Chai with over 1.5 lakh cups of Chai sold every day.

Karnataka Govt Unveils Booster Kit for Startups

The initial years of a startup are the most crucial ones. From figuring out its way in the market, to finding the connection with their users/customers, there is a lot to take care in a very limited amount of time. In order to provide a helping hand to all these early-stage startups in Karnataka, the state government recently announced a unique Booster Kit for Startups that will help in nurturing the startups in the state with funding and hand-holding till they are able to find a hold in their respective markets.

State IT & BT Minister Priyanka Kharge revealed that the booster kit will be providing startups with access to mentors, legal and consulting accountants, cloud credits, software tools, along with an easy access to government funding and all the government backed incubators.

The new minister announced a funding amount of Rs. 400 crore to be used over the next 4 years as an equity or grant for startups, micro and small BT and IT firms. He also announced that the Karnataka Biotechnology and IT Services (KBITS) will be an active participant in helping them with all the promotion and marketing related stuff.

According to Kharge, KIBITS will be helping startup entrepreneurs by sponsoring their participation in maximum networking events at both national and international levels, administer tax incentive and also assist them in the entire patent filing process.

In order to keep a tab on the progress, state IT & BT Minister Priyanka Kharge has planned to hold an open house event every month for startups so as to have a direct interaction with department officials and address all the issues related to their operations.

The first open house has been set for August 16, Tuesday, at the state-run 10,000 startups warehouse.

Bengaluru has climbed the startup chart like no other Indian city. In fact, it is currently the second fastest-growing startup ecosystem in the whole wide world and was also recently ranked among the 15 startup ecosystems the world over. Interestingly, Benagluru was the only Indian city listed on the list.

The state government is trying its best to keep up with the state's glorious performance on the startup front and keep the momentum rolling. Therefore, it has even set up a special cell in KBITS so as to implement all the policy initiatives and provide incubating startups with all the incentives. A Startup portal to educate prospective entrepreneurs on all the policies and benefits being offered under the booster kit is also in the pipeline and will be launched soon.

The Karnataka state government, in partnership with the IT industry's representative body Nasscom has built a good 725 seats in order to provide support to incubators in the warehouse. Out of these 725 seats, 325 are being made available for setting up startups at subsidized rates.

Mezi Raises $9M in Series A Round to Unleash the Power of AI Bots

Mezi, the leading AI-powered chatbot shopping app, has raised $9 million in Series A funding. Investors in this round include previous investor Nexus Venture Partners and new investors Saama Capital and American Express Ventures. Amit Singhal, former SVP and Head of Google Search, and Gokul Rajaram, Product Engineering Lead at Square, are joining as angel investors.

Mezi blends artificial intelligence and human expertise to learn shopping preferences and create a seamless, personalized shopping experience over messaging. The free app simulates the experience of shopping with your best friend through intelligent, humanistic chat conversations so engaging that over 40% of users return on a monthly basis to shop with Mezi. Since its launch in December 2015, Mezi has become the go-to daily shopping companion for users with over one million messages exchanged. Mezi simplifies mobile shopping by sifting through thousands of potential choices based on user price points, preferences, and learned habits. 25% of all purchases made through Mezi are for travel bookings, 21% for fashion items, and 15% for gifts for friends and family. Mezi bots are able to understand a wide range of requests and can even mimic speech patterns by learning from user conversations enabled through consciousness design and artificial intelligence.

“We are very honored that Mezi has become a member of our users’ close-knit network of friends to shop with. With Mezi, we have created the most advanced shopping bots that can anticipate our users’ needs and wants by harnessing the latest advances in artificial intelligence and consciousness design. We look forward to continuing to provide a shopping experience that delights and amazes our users with these world-class investors behind us,” commented Mezi Co-founder and CEO, Swapnil Shinde.

Mezi is powered by Smart Connect and Smart Assist, a proprietary technology platform, built using artificial intelligence, deep learning, and Natural Language Processing (NLP) to streamline intent detection, automatic replies, expert workflows, reduce response times, and provide personalized product recommendations. Mezi bots are able to handle 80 percent of common travel and flower requests from end-to-end without the need for human intervention in under two-minutes. The result is a rapid-fire conversational experience that makes them indistinguishable from human assistants. The investment will be used to support the company’s growth and accelerate Mezi’s product and artificial intelligence (AI) technology development around conversational commerce, AI, Natural Language Processing (NLP), and machine learning.

“Mezi has created an intuitive platform that helps consumers unlock something we all want – a personal assistant in the palm of your hand, whether you need to book travel, purchase a gift or buy a new wardrobe,” said Rohit Bodas, Partner, American Express Ventures. “The underlying technology behind Mezi’s bot combines the human touch with the power of artificial intelligence. We’re pleased to support Mezi with this investment.”

“We see the next generation of unicorns emerging from the chatbot and artificial intelligence space, and Mezi is trailblazing this market by developing core technologies that produce the most humanistic and engaging experience of any chatbot to-date,” commented Ash Lilani, Managing Partner and Co-Founder Saama Capital. “Our investment in Mezi reflects our belief in their core technology and their ability to shatter the vending-machine experience of past bots and provide a clearly superior product that delivers a truly personal experience for every user."

"Artificial intelligence has become deeply integrated into our daily lives - from climate control to smarter search - pushing technology into new frontiers. Mezi elevates AI to the next level by uniting human intelligence with machine intelligence that shatters today's current standard," said Jishnu Bhattacharjee, Managing Director, Nexus Venture Partners. "We look forward to our partnership with Mezi, to further the landscape of AI-human interaction and change everyday life for the better."

Mezi is available on the iOS App Store.

Celebrity Rannvijay Singh Invests in Istyleyou, Becomes Their Brand Ambassador

India’s leading Youth Icon, Rannvijay Singh backs fashion styling app Istyleyou (ISY), by investing an undisclosed amount and endorsing the brand. Rannvijay Singh, known for hosting the famous Roadies show, is one of the ‘most followed’ on social media, and his style inspires millions of youth in India.

Founded in Nov 2015 by Pallav Modi, Amit Kejriwal and Vinayak Khanijo. Istyleyou is a fashion styling platform, where users can interact with fashion stylists and also know what is trending as per their own style profile. Even though they are still in the early stage, 10,000+ users have interacted with 25+ fashion stylists, and accessed 5000+ styles and 1 lakh curated products. Their core focus has been on building a scalable product that their users love.

Rannvijay instantly connected with the Idea of styling, as he understands the pulse of the Indian youth. He knows that fashion and lifestyle is one of the biggest drivers of e-commerce in India, which is projected to be a $30 billion market by 2020. He found Istyleyou’s business model very exciting and believes it has the potential to disrupt the market.

An enthused Rannvijay said “ISY is a unique concept, they have rock solid team. Now its time to rock and roll.”

IStyleYou, run by Uninext Solutions Pvt Ltd, also gets product recommendations from e-commerce sites. The app gives each customer a personal stylist for free, and helps him or her find the clothes they love. Their target audience – the youth and the working professionals have a difficult time in putting together a wardrobe that is perfectly suited to both - their individual choices as well as the current fashion runways globally. And to add more fuel to this fire, they feel overwhelmed by the million choices screaming across from every social and fashion platform!

According to Pallav, CoFounder ISY – “We are super excited to have Rannvijay to be a core part of the ISY team. He will play a crucial role in making ISY a leading youth brand.”

Said an excited Vinayak, CoFounder ISY, “We hope to leverage his popularity and fan following in expanding the need and reach of our brand.”

ISY uses intelligent algorithms of man and machine; to help this audience achieve extremely high levels of personalized styling, married to current fashion trends. The stylists are highly curated and are onboarded after multiple rounds of interviews that test their knowledge and experience in the fashion world. While Delhi and Bangalore seemed to have the maximum number of users of this app, there seems to be a paradigm shift in the user base from the metros to the tier 2 cities as well. And unsurprisingly, there are more women than men, but the ratio seems to be shifting there as well. Fashion is an art, with starkly opposite and subjective choices  – all of which cannot be captured by technology alone. But yes, a right combination of technology and human intervention and appeal, can lead to a perfect styling recommendation platform.

In Feb 2016, ISY had received around INR 67 lakhs from Gurugram-based GHV Accelerator, on joining their unique and bespoke accelerator program. Recently, two portfolio companies of GHV – Applop and MyTaxiIndia bagged additional rounds of funding. One of their startups in the laundry space was in the news for operational breakeven.

According to Vikram Upadhyaya, Chief Mentor and Evangelist at GHV Accelerator, “This team has cleared the TESTPoC criteria – my personal mantra for a startup to both - sustain and scale. A highly self-driven and committed team; they are always open to different points of view and very adaptive. It has been and will continue to be a very interesting journey with them. I wish them luck.”

15-Year-Old Serial Entrepreneur Akshat Mittal Announces the Launch of His Second Venture, ChangeMyIndia.org

Having helped daily commuters in Delhi/NCR solve the problem of finding travelling partners with Odd-even.com, Delhi’s Akshat Mittal has now set his eyes on another cause – social change! The 15-year-old entrepreneur, who is currently associated with Gurgaon-based carpooling app Orahi’s advisory board as a technical and domain expert following the acquisition of Odd-even.com, has announced the launch of his second venture, ChangeMyIndia.org.

Counted amongst one of the youngest entrepreneurs in the world, Akshat initiated ChangeMyIndia.org after getting selected as an “Ashoka Youth ChangeMaker” by Ashoka Innovators for the Public, one of the largest networks of social entrepreneurs in the world. The portal, which will act as a web platform for Indian citizens to list their problems/issues, will also allow them to register as changemakers and actively contribute in successfully resolving social grievances through collective, collaborative efforts.

Commenting on the launch, Akshat Mittal, Founder, ChangeMyIndia.org, said, “When I was selected as an ‘Ashoka Youth ChangeMaker’ for Odd-even.com, I was already thinking about the next challenge – how to initiate a bigger social change in India. I noticed how there existed no single repository where citizens can list all the issues that they face on a daily basis. This was when the thought of creating a platform which brought together people who want a change and those who are eager to bring the change came to my mind. Our mission is to get close to around 1 million citizens and changemakers on board across the nation.”

Appreciating the development, Sameer Khana, Founder and CEO Orahi said “We would like to take this opportunity to congratulate Akshat on his new venture. It’s wonderful to see the enthusiasm and vision that he brings in at this tender age. We wish him best and will encourage him in every possible way.”

Launched as an initiative to bring about change, ChangeMyIndia.org endeavors to bring its changemakers closer to everyday real-world problems faced by Indian citizens and assist them in addressing these concerns by devising innovative tech and non-tech solutions. The team behind the idea, along with Ashoka Youth Venture, assigns some of the problems to these citizens and grooms them to come up with concrete solutions. The platform currently has more than 1000 citizens registered as a part of its growing network.

Mobile-first Learning Management Platform Byndr Gets $700K in Seed Round

Hyderabad-based mobile learning management platform Byndr has raised $700,000 in seed funding from the Education Design Studio (premier Ed-tech accelerator at the University of Pennsylvania), Ben Franklin Technology Partners, and a group of angel investors. The firm will utilize these funds to expand its sales and development team and grow the product scope in terms of giving more access to educational content for students and providing more administrative features for colleges.

Since its launch in March of 2015, Byndr has grown rapidly and is now used by more than 50 top colleges in India and has a total installed base of over 50,000 students on its platform.  The founding team (Joseph Freed, Praveen Vangeepuram and Marc Garabedian in Philadelphia and Satish Nampally and Prashanthi Vangeepuram in Hyderabad) noticed that in many emerging markets students in higher education had limited access to educational resources that were mobile-based, and a majority of students were not connected to their colleges on any online platform.  Byndr was incepted to plug this gap to become a single point of access for students in higher education to connect to their college and to educational resources. The app is now being used by colleges ranging from small set-ups to those amongst the 100 most prestigious institutions and universities in India, including Osmania College of Engineering and Chaitanya Bharathi Institute of Technology.

Commenting on raising the seed round of funds, Joseph Freed, Co-founder & CEO said, “In 2017 it is projected that 80% of the internet users in India will be mobile.  So the only way to truly create a single point of access for students in mobile-dependent markets like India is with a mobile-first product.  With Byndr, students stay engaged and connected to educational resources outside the classroom, enabling the concept of anytime and anywhere learning with a fast and light platform.  This round of funding will allow us to accelerate expansion and continue providing easy-to- use, and mobile-first products for all stakeholders in higher education.”

Bobbi Kurshan, Executive Director of Academic Innovations at The University of Pennsylvania GSE, and Chairman of the Education Design Studio, which participated in this round, said, “Byndr is changing the LMS model. It is creating a solution for emerging economies with lack of persistent internet, lower cost points and need for a lightweight solution. The new funding will be used to support and continue to grow the excellent team and to help expand the impact of this unique mobile solution across India and other emerging edtech ecosystems.

MebelKart Forays into B2C Ultra Luxury Furniture Category, Partners with Continental Group

MebelKart.com, Indian online furniture marketplace, today announced its entry into the B2C Ultra Luxury Furniture segment with the first-of-its-kind of tie-up with the Continental Group, a 50-year old conglomerate based in New Delhi.

With this alliance, MebelKart aims to reach out to the high net worth individuals (HNIs) across the country. MebelKart will be marketing and selling products from STROT, a South Delhi based lifestyle boutique of the renowned Continental Group. The products in the luxury furniture and home décor category will be available in the price range of Rs. 4,000 to Rs. 11.58 lacs. The products can be shipped across 7 cities including all key cities in the country.

This is the first of- its- kind- of tie-up for STROT, a lifestyle boutique selling luxury furniture. The wide range of products offered by STROT will allow homeowners to spruce up their living spaces with original designs of furnishings, furniture, glassware and ceramics.  STROT products are designed to lend a chic touch to your home with an eclectic mix of contemporary furniture from brands from France and Italy. The STROT products available on MebelKart will include a range of offbeat pieces, such as all natural root-inspired monkey-pot wood tables from Thailand, decorative vintage inspired trunks and fine leather sofas. STROT showcases some of the best quality lightbulb-shaped vases, patterned cushions, elegant picture frames and everything else needed to add a touch of luxury to a home.  Much of STROT’s stock could be considered as art, a fact reflected in the detailed furniture pieces of Philipino designers such as Veto Selma.

Speaking on the alliance, Rahul Agrawal, CO-Founder and CEO, MebelKart said “A heavy goods category like online furniture selling was unheard of back in 2012 when MebelKart was born. In a short span of time, we managed to disrupt this market and created a niche for our cost-affordable and aesthetically designed furniture products. Today, we are delighted to be entering the ultra-luxury online furniture retail market in India. The high-end luxury retail market is witnessing tremendous growth with the increased spending power of today’s customers.There is a high demand for these products but the same is not available across India. The high-end luxury retail market offers a huge opportunity to us as it is expected to cross $18.3 billion by 2016 from $14.7 billion in 2015, as per an industry report by ASSOCHAM.  I am very excited to be partnering with The Continental Group, one of India’s leading interior design solutions companies, as our first partners as we foray into the luxury furniture category. We are already seeing a huge demand for high-end luxury furniture products in India and are confident of making deep in roads in this largely untapped segment. Our aim is to be the one stop home décor solutions provider for everyone and this collaboration is a step in that direction.”

Added Sidhant Lamba, Founder and CEO, STROT, “In today’s times, increasing number of our existing and prospective consumers are online and connected. We believe that online commerce has the potential to catapoolt our business as we can reach out to buyers across the country, without investing in the overhead costs of opening physical stores. This is our first stint with online commerce. We are confident that MebelKart, with its reach across tier-1, 2 and 3 cities in the country, will enable us to reach out to newer markets and establish ourselves as the preferred brand in the luxury furniture and furnishings space.”

Indian Angel Network Invests Rs 3 Cr in Shared Accommodations Startup Square Plums

Shared accommodations startup – Square Plums aiming to become the largest chain of branded rental homes for young adults in India, raises Rs 3 crores from Indian Angel Network, the World’s largest network of angel investors. The funding round has been led by experienced entrepreneurs and IAN lead investors VGN Prakash, Amitabh Shrivastava, Krishna Jha and Ravindra Krishnappa. VGN Prakash is further joining the company board. The company is founded by professionals who have expertise in consumer Internet and hospitality industry. The technology built by Square Plums enables users to easily search for fully furnished homes in locations of their choice and matches them with up other likeminded individuals who can share the home with them.

In cities like Bangalore, finding an apartment to rent is a time taking process. One needs to engage a broker and visit multiple apartments before finding a suitable one. Online portals list many options, but often when the property is visited, users find that what was listed is not what is actually available.

This is a bigger problem for singles because many home owners reject renting to singles. Even when an apartment is available for singles, it comes with a heavy security deposit. Besides if a few friends get together and pool the costs of the security deposit and furniture, they face problems when one of the friends decides to move out for professional or personal reasons.

There are hardly any homes that come fully furnished and without heavy security deposits. Having been part of hospitality industry and providing technology solutions for hotels in india for several years, Rajesh spotted the opportunity and got in together with Hemant to solve this difficult but common problem.

“Our aim is to provide easy and affordable stay and disrupt the long stay accommodation market for young adults. Young professionals from Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities work in high end knowledge parks and MNCs but are often forced to live at substandard bachelor pads and PGs/hostels. This is mainly because good accommodations in premium gated communities in India are available in large sizes (34 bhk). For them staying at huge houses and premium societies is difficult. We at Square Plums create branded curated accommodation which is then fractionalized at a price point which is affordable to the young working professionals in the metro cities,” commented CoFounder & COO, Hemant Attray, a BITSPilani graduate and serial entrepreneur whose earlier startup ITFinity was acquired by Infosys spinoff Onmobile.

“While the problems faced by bachelors trying to rent apartments are oft repeated, we also tried to think from the perspecti ve of the hom e owner. An individual homeowner does not have the wherewithal to do background checks of tenants and chooses the safe option of renting his home only to families. It is quite expensive to furnish an apartment and there is no choice but to pass on this responsibility to tenants. Individuals moving to the city without a family find it a cumbersome cost to put down heavy deposits and purchase furniture for a short term that eventually turns into baggage that needs to be moved around, whenever the home is changed. The usual compromise is to settle into a shoddy PGs/hostels which offers poor accommodation and lifestyle options. So we came up with a solution that i s a winwin for both the home owners and the tenants,” commented CoFounder & CEO, Rajesh Kumar Kotta, a BITS Pilani Graduate and serial entrepreneur with successful ventures in Europe in Financial Domain and profitable bootstrapped ventures in India in Hospitality Domain.

Founders Rajesh Kumar Kotta and Hemant Atray commented on raising investment from IAN saying, “The team at IAN worked proactively and supported us all along the journey for creating a business that is viable in the long run. Extremely thankful to the angels for believing in us.”

Lead IAN investor VGN Prakash commented on the investment saying, “Square Plums focusses on providing ‘branded’ accommodation which we believe none of the other players in the market is currently providing. The proposition is very interesting targeting the large and upwardly mobile market of bachelors in the metro cities. At IAN, we always look for a product which differentiates from its competitors effectively. Square Plums is well poised to grow in this cluttered yet profitable accommodation segment in India.”

Currently, Square Plums accommodation options are available in Bangalore. The raised funds will be utilized for onboarding the properties as per Square Plums design standards and building a robust technology platform for tenants, apartment owners and prospective tenants. The company also plans to launch its mobile app to further offer a smooth experience to its customers.

Modi Government Using Big-Data & Social Media To Assess Public Mood and Trending Issues

The Modi government came to power two years ago in 2014, thanks to an aggressive campaign done by Modi himself and his party Bhartiya Janta Party(BJP). There is no denying the fact that a considerate amount of BJP's success goes to the digital and social media campaigning route that it adopted back in the year 2014 and the amazing way in which it used the big data. Well, even after two years of being elected one thing is absolutely clear, Modi and his party's fondness for social media (and Photoshop) has only gained by heaps and bounds with time.

Once such example is the Prime Minster’s Office (PMO) using big data analytics to process the citizen’s sentiments and ideas through the mygov.in crowdsourcing platform. Along with this, the Modi government is also quite active on social media as it helps them get an overall picture of the citizen's concerns and expectations on government work.

According to information disclosed by a news piece, the Modi government is making use of quite a large professional data analytics team to filter and process all the key points that rise in debate on the platform mygov.in and also assesses popular public mood about important issues from social media networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter. All the key findings from the mygov.in platform and the social media networking sites is then put together in special reports, along with concrete actionable measures. The Ministers are then requested to take into account all the findings of the report and take actions accordingly, especially on 19 key policy challenges that include job creation, energy conservation, expenditure reforms, skill development and famous government initiatives such as Clean Ganga, Clean India, and Digital India.



It is but natural that as the platform will gain more and more traction, scalability will be become a central issue. India currently occupies the second position in terms of world population and is most probably going to jump to first position by surpassing China by the year 2050. In fact, Modi has been politely asking and pursuing the Indian communities in Australia and America to make their contributions to mygov.in. According to experts, seeing the pace with which the platform is flourishing, a couple of years down the line, the platform will see an active contribution of about 30-50 million people.

Some experts see the PMO's use of big data in the project as a roadmap for democracy in the 21st century world. One of the biggest challenges that the governments face nowadays is how to be relevant to its citizens. If all the citizens of the nation are given the opportunity to collaborate, it will provide the administrators a grip over the nation's important needs rather than losing the message midway between the number of layers of bureaucracy.

In the west, most of the government treats their citizens as consumers, which is basically very upsetting and completely a wrong way to go. There is a need to understand that while a consumer pays the bills and cribs, a citizen on the other hand interacts in a different manner and owns up to his actions.

The current times are witnessing a criminal under-utilization of data by the federal departments. One of the biggest challenges that the big data faces with the governments is that it shouldn't supersede their ideologies and beliefs. In fact, statistics can be manipulated and twisted in order to give more fodder to ideologies. But, once it is pushed beyond correlation and into causality, data can become a major driving force.

One of the reasons that makes mygov.in platform highly distinguishable from others is the fact that it isn't just minting out data, but also transforming this data into actionable insights for helping out the Indian ministries.

In the current scenario where people are feeling extremely disconnected, disappointed and far from their governments, the Modi government's big data card could actually be a winner and revolutionise the way democracies function in the current century.

nexGTv Joins Hands with SAB Group to Intensify its Regional Content Offerings

In a major move, nexGTv, India’s largest subscription-led video entertainment app, has announced its partnership with SAB Group, one of the leading Media and Entertainment conglomerates in the country. As a part of the alliance, nexGTv has acquired the worldwide digital rights to broadcast the group’s most sought-after regional channels such as Masti, Dabang, Dhamaal, Maiboli and Dillagi for its users across the globe.

Started by brothers Mr. Gautam Adhikari & Mr. Markand Adhikari in 1985, SAB Group has gone on to establish its brand proposition as a pioneer in the field of Indian Media, pushing through various stages of growth over the last 25 years from a production house to a broadcaster. SAB Group has successfully identified the gap in the regional market and has emerged as a leader in the space by delivering highly relevant localized content.

Speaking on the announcement, Mr. Abhesh Verma, COO, nexGTv, said, “Since its inception, nexGTv has endeavoured to deliver the most tailored entertainment solutions to the rich and diverse consumer base it enjoys across the country. The partnership with SAB will allow us to curate and deliver popular regional entertainment solutions on-the-go to our viewers. We are confident that the latest addition will enhance our regional offering and add greater value to the mobile viewing experience of our users by providing them with seamless access to locally relevant video-based entertainment content.”

nexGTv’s latest association will no doubt delight the country’s digital viewership, who will now be able to view their preferred regional entertainment content at their convenience anytime, anywhere. All the channels from SAB Group are a part of the paid category at nexGTv, and can be accessed either through www.nexGTv.com or through the nexGTv mobile app for Android and iOS.

About nexGTv and Digivive:

With over 25 million downloads, nexGTV mobile App is the unmistakable TV button on your mobile. It is Digivive's flagship, multi award-winning application offering consumers unlimited and compelling entertainment across multiple devices (mobile, tablets or laptop/PCs). Choice includes an unrivalled suite of 150+ Live TV channels aside from a huge content library comprising of movies, TV shows and videos for every mood.

Besides ranking amongst the Top Entertainment applications in App stores, nexGTV has also won numerous awards including 'The Best Digital Experience' at the prestigious World Communication Awards 2014, in London. It runs seamlessly across 2G/EDGE/3G/4G and Wi-Fi networks across platforms such as Android, iOS, BlackBerry and Tizen, enabling consumers to stay entertained irrespective of bandwidth limitations and the operating platform.

The company has recently expanded its movie catalogue to 1000 by partnering with SAI Entertainment.

nexGTv has globally launched a kids- special app, ‘nexGTv Kids’. The new addition curates the most entertaining and educative content meant especially for the kids aged between 2 to 10 years. The Kids app is available for download on Google Play Store and can be accessed from all over the world. Recently, the company also announced the addition of Think Health content to its Kids app. Catering to children between the ages of 2 and 10, the Think Health content on nexGTv Kids will allow access to educative and informative animated videos which will teach young learners about various health and fitness-related issues in a fun, engaging way.

The company had introduced SPOTLight – India’s first mobile talent discovery platform, together with ace director and master storyteller Imtiaz Ali as the creative judge, enabling both amateurs and professional video enthusiasts to not only showcase their talent pan-India on nexGTv, but also earn off it, aside from Rs.100,000 cash award to one lucky winner who figures amongst the Top 5 most-viewed videos every month on the platform.

The company has also unveiled an original 14-part mobi-series in association with Priyanka Chopra and Fluence viz. ‘It’s My City’. The series premiered as a 14-episode premium, original series that revolves around the everyday lives and struggles of four young girls, living together in the same flat in Mumbai. In her inimitable style, Priyanka Chopra appears in and as herself assuming the mantle of an official landlady, unofficial guardian and protective friend. The series is available at nexGTv platform.

The company has also recently announced its exclusive news app, nexGTv News. Launched as the go-to destination for mobile-based video news content, the app will aggregate and deliver video news content from leading TV news channels, revolutionizing through enhanced accessibility, the way news is currently consumed in the country.

NexGTv has partnered with One Network Entertainment Pvt. Ltd (ONE) to launch the “Comedy One”. With the first-of-its-kind comedy app having premium original comedy content ranging from stand-up, gags and spoofs to sketches and web-series, the development will definitely have its audience in splits!

The company has recently announced the launch of its exclusive devotional app, iFaith. The app will enable anytime, anywhere access to devotional content for nexGTv users around the world by delivering well curated relevant content in highly immersive and engaging viewing environment. So whether you prefer to enjoy your favourite lilting bhajan, knowing your daily horoscope, watching devotional movies or listening to a calming HanumanjikiAarti on a Tuesday, you can now fulfill all your spiritual needs at the touch of a button!

With the growing demand of Yoga and traditional fitness methods among aspirational consumers, nexGTv announced the launch of their exclusive Yoga App, nexGTv Yoga.  The app will especially delight fitness enthusiasts, who will now have access to a host of videos on meditation, breathing techniques and yoga postures anytime, anywhere. The videos – catering to both beginners and experts – will lay emphasis on instant health improvement, increased body fitness, height increase, muscle toning, ENT treatments, joints and back bone pain relief, improving strength & vitality, detoxification, relaxation, increasing concentration and curing diabetes.

In a bid to deliver a highly convenient usage experience to its subscribers, nexGTv, India’s biggest subscription-led video entertainment app, has launched its ‘My nexGTv’ app. The app will serve as a wrapper/aggregator tool for all the apps from nexGTv and will allow users to manage, install and access multiple apps such as nexGTV Kids, nexGTV Yoga, nexGTV News and nexGTV Comedy One etc through one consolidated platform on their mobile.

Conceived by technology professionals together with deep consumer insights, Digivive focuses on creating offerings in line with trends, with best-in-class content, ease-of-use, availability and affordability, giving consumers an unparalleled and immersive viewing experience. Our partners include leading telecom operators and OEMs. Established in 2010, Digivive is a group company of Media Matrix Worldwide Limited which is listed on the BSE. It provides expertise across Direct to Consumer and Managed Value-Added Services.

Banks in India To Use Artificial Intelligence for Its Services

Life is all about keeping pace with time and evolving and changing yourself with the passage of time. If your footsteps match to that of the times', you're in; and if they don't, you're out. Following the mantra of "Change is the only constant," Banks in India are now warming up to the idea of Artificial Intelligence and are discovering the kind of potential it holds for bettering consumer experience in the financial sector.

So, what exactly is Artificial Intelligence and what is the hype about?

One of the founders of Artificial Intelligence (AI), John McCarthy, defines AI as the science and engineering of inventing intelligent machines, specially intelligent computer programmes. In simpler words, it is a technology which involves making the machines learn from the users' actions over a period of time and make their lives easier by taking decisions for them. That is, the machines will be able to do the designated task without any manual human intervention whatsoever.

AI in financial services- Why now?

Even though AI has been around the block for quite sometime now, it's potential in the financial services has been recently realised. A variety of factors are contributing towards introducing AI into the financial sector. The current digital wave in the banking sector, the fintech' sectors' strategy towards low-cost products, and the open source system and it's accessibility are some of the main factors contributing towards the adoption of AI in financial services.

AI in financial services

Even though the technology has just taken its baby steps in the Indian financial services sector; globally, it is being considered to be used for risk management, compliance, liquidity risk and anti-money laundering etc. For instance, selling derivatives to senior citizens in India is a huge task as a majority of them are very conservative. Here, the machine can help in telling which product is ideal for whom.

AI can be of a major help in bettering customer service. For example, currently, a lot of airports in Europe have virtual customer assistance at their gates. In this, the 3D holographic images of security people help the passengers in passing through security, and the international arrival gates and the UK border.

In fact, a number of fintech companies are developing mobile applications based around Artificial Intelligence. Experts suggest that there are various user content that one can build an Artificial Intelligence chat app on or just to search for information.

AI and banking

AI has a lot of potential when it comes to banking. Banks can make use of Artificial Intelligence for authenticating transactions, access to special rooms, floors or buildings, virtual personal teller assistants, surveillance in locations such as ATMs and security for public safety etc.

Banks are making use of AI in Virtual customer assistance for engaging with them in speech or text in their normal-language, learning from their activities/interactions, providing suggestions fit to them and understanding the their behaviour and taking action accordingly.

Singapore-headquartered DBS Bank Ltd. April launched Digibank app makes use of Artificial Intelligence for virtual assistance via speech and text in order to reply to the queries of the users.

In addition to all this, banks can also make use of the AI for virtual personal assistants. The machine will be responsible for studying behaviour and content, create and maintain data models (which it can use as a reference for drawing conclusions about contexts), people and content, predict the needs of the user, and then act on the behalf of the user. Currently, data analytics is used by companies for the above stated purpose. With the adoption of Artificial intelligence, the machine will be responsible for doing a job from start to end. As far as payments are concerned, it can also certainly used to complete the transactions. In fact, many fintech companies are currently working with various banks to make this available.

The future holds a lot of collaborations between AI and the banking sector. AI has the potential of completely transforming the way in which the interactive voice response (IVR) works for banking.

One of the best benefits that AI is capable of providing to banking is personalised and extremely intuitive customer experience.

[Top Image - Shutterstock]