Google may start manufacturing its flagship Pixel smartphones in India as early as next quarter. This and more in today’s ETtech Top 5.
Also in this letter:
■ Venture debt funding trends in 2023
■ X disagrees with govt blocking orders
■ Nvidia rides AI dragon in Q4
Google to make Pixel smartphones in India by next quarter: report
After Apple iPhones, it might soon be made-in-India Google’s Pixel smartphones. In a major push to the government’s Make in India initiative, Alphabet’s Google is set to begin manufacturing its flagship smartphone Google Pixel in India by the next quarter, according to a report.
Make in India: This is part of the tech giant’s plan to ship more than 10 million Pixel phones from India this year, the report said, citing people in the know.
Google will prepare production lines for its high-end Pixel 8 Pro smartphones in the coming weeks and start producing phones in the April-June quarter, the report added.
Plan laid out: The report didn't clarify the number of phones to be produced, or if the phones will be sold locally, Google had earlier made commitments of this nature in October. At the ninth edition of the Google for India event, the company announced that it would start manufacturing Pixel phones in India soon.
Rick Osterloh, senior vice president, devices and services, announced that the first set of India-made Google Pixel 8 devices will debut in 2024.
India champion: Google considers India a key market. And, like Apple, this move will help Google diversify its supply chain away from China.
The company began manufacturing its Chromebook laptops in India in October, in partnership with HP to enhance accessibility to affordable and secure computing for Indian students. It also announced new capabilities to its generative AI experiment in Search, Search Generative Experience (SGE), in India by including images and videos.
Apple’s local push: Apple significantly ramped up iPhone production in India in 2023, breaching the Rs 1-lakh-crore mark, a substantial increase from the previous year. Notably, Rs 65,000 crore worth of these iPhones were exported from India between January and December.
India one of the toughest markets out there: Uber CEO
Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi (R) with Infosys non-executive chairman Nandan Nilekani
Uber’s CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said India is one of the “toughest markets” for the company, and a gateway to the rest of the world.
Details: In a fireside chat with Infosys non-executive chairman Nandan Nilekani in Bengaluru during his India visit, Khosrowshahi said, “India is one of the toughest markets out there. Indian customers are so demanding, they don't want to pay for anything. So, if we can succeed here, that sets the standard for us to succeed in other markets.”
On DPI: The CEO praised India’s Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) model, and talked about the firm’s ambitions for emerging markets like India. As a technology company, Uber views open-source tech stacks with a lot of interest, he added.
In a post on X after the discussion, the CEO said the impact of DPI is stunning. “I’m excited to see how @Uber can step up its collaboration with the ‘India Stack’,” the post read.
Next expansion idea: "One of our biggest growth strategies is to expand into the low-income base... Our biggest opportunities are two, three wheelers, and the Uber Bus... we don’t just want to be an upper-middle-class product (sic)," Khosrowshahi said.
ONDC partnership: On Thursday, Uber India also signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) to explore a potential integration for expanding the platform’s range of ride-hailing offerings. The firm did not elaborate on the partnership.
T Koshy, managing director and chief executive of ONDC, called this a major step forward for the network, for which mobility is a critical sector.
Also read | Uber India FY23 revenue jumps to Rs 2,666 crore, net loss widens
Consumer, fintech top sectors for venture debt funding in 2023: report
In 2023, fintech and consumer were the two stand-out sectors for raising funds through venture debt in India, suggests the ‘India Venture Debt Report 2024’. Both sectors led in deal volume and total funding raised, the report by venture debt firm Stride Ventures said.
Report findings: About 190 startups raised $1.2 billion last year, marking a 50% increase, while venture debt globally stood at about $60-65 billion in 2023. Fintech led with an over 55% share of the total investment, followed by the consumer sector at around 25%.
Jargon buster: Venture debt refers to a variety of debt financing products applicable specifically to venture capital-backed companies. These are growth-stage firms that may lack positive cash flow, and tangible collateral but have secured investments from venture capitalists.
Indian landscape: The robust Indian venture debt landscape is in stark contrast to a decline in venture debt fundraising in the US last year. According to the report, in 2024, founders and venture debt firms expect cleantech, especially electric vehicles (21.6%), consumer (19.5%), and fintech (15.8%) sectors to raise more debt.
Expert take: Attributing two reasons for the outperformance of the Indian debt market compared to the global market, Apoorva Sharma, managing partner, Stride Ventures, said, “One, that the asset class practically started eight years back. So, there was a lot of under-penetration, so the momentum of growth was much higher. Second, our LP base is largely domestic. So, we are raising domestic money.”
She added, “Venture debt has actually become a very critical alternate source of financing, especially in the funding winter when venture capital was not actively available.”
Farmers' protest: X disagrees with govt blocking orders, but complies
Elon Musk's social media platform X (formerly Twitter) said on Thursday that it had to take down certain accounts and posts related to the ongoing farmers' protest in parts of northern India, to comply with the executive orders issued by the government. However, it said it disagrees with such a move.
Word for word: “In compliance with the orders, we will withhold these accounts and posts in India alone; however, we disagree with these actions and maintain that freedom of expression should extend to these posts,” the company’s global government affairs team said in a post.
Making it public: The intermediary said it had provided the users whose accounts and posts were withheld in India due to the order with a notice of the action taken by the policies of the platform.
“Due to legal restrictions, we are unable to publish the executive orders, but we believe that making them public is essential for transparency. This lack of disclosure can lead to a lack of accountability and arbitrary decision-making,” the post on X said.
Complying with local laws: Last year, after X was asked to take down a BBC documentary on Prime Minister Narendra Modi that created a social media and political stir, Musk had said that “being compliant with India's laws is better than having employees go to jail.”
Speaking to the BBC, he said, “If we have a choice of either our people going to prison or us complying with the laws, we will comply with the laws.”
Nvidia's Q4 revenue, profit soar thanks to demand for its AI chips
Chipmaker Nvidia Corp, which has seen its value skyrocket over the past year thanks to soaring demand for its graphics chips used for artificial intelligence (AI), posted stronger-than-expected results for its fourth quarter, with revenue more than tripling from a year ago.
Financial details:
- Revenue for quarter ended January 28 at $22.1 billion, up from $6.05 billion
- Profit at $12.29 billion, compared to $1.41 billion a year ago
- Nvidia earned $5.16 a share in the latest quarter
Riding the AI wave: The boom in its financials is driven by its specialised chips, which are key components that help power different forms of AI products, including the latest generative AI chatbots such as ChatGPT and Google's Gemini.
Continued growth: Jensen Huang, Nvidia's cofounder and CEO, Huang, said much more growth for the company lay ahead. "We are one year into generative AI," he said. "My guess is we are literally into the first year of a 10-year cycle of spreading this technology into every single industry."
Also read | Nvidia stock surges as revenue forecast tops estimates, AI demand continues
Today's ETtech Top 5 newsletter was curated by Gaurab Dasgupta in New Delhi and Vaibhavi Khanwalkar in Bengaluru.
