One Thing Today in Tech

In today’s episode I bring you the gist of Qualcomm’s latest State of Sound report, but first a few headlines.  Headlines India’s department of telecommunications has used facial recognition to disconnect more than 6.4 million illegal phone connections over the last six months, Moneycontrol reports. It detects when a photograph has been used multiple times to procure SIM cards and flags instances...

In today’s episode H1B visa rules will soon change significantly, but first a few other headlines caught my attention. Isro, announced last week the successful test of “In-flight Abort Demonstration of Crew Escape System (CES)” at Mach number 1.2 with the space agency’s newly developed Test Vehicle, followed by Crew Module separation & safe recovery. This is in an important milestone in India’...

In today’s episode, I ask if we are headed for a talent crisis in core engineering streams, but first a couple of headlines. Headlines Agnikul Cosmos , has raised $26.7 million in Series-B funding from investors including Celesta Capital, Rocketship.vc, Artha Venture Fund and Artha Select Fund, the Chennai startup said in a press release on Oct. 17. IBM yesterday announced the signing of three mem...

There’s been a surge in children’s sexual abuse and exploitation online since the Covid pandemic, experts agree, and lawmakers around the world are trying to grapple with this threat with new policies and rules. Online businesses should be pushed to design their products and services to be age appropriate, Google proposes, but opposes stringent use of ID based verification on the grounds that such...

In today’s episode find out why TCS sacked 16 employees, but first a few headlines. Headlines After losing the IPL streaming rights, which has contributed its loss of some 20 million subscribers, Disney Hotstar set a new world record for concurrent viewers on Saturday when 35 million people logged on to the digital platform to watch the India-Pakistan cricket match in the ICC World Cup. Apple may...

In today’s episode I take a quick look at how applications development and maintenance, which is about two-thirds of India’s IT sector revenues, is changing, but first a few headlines. Beyond Next Ventures , a Japanese fund focused on early-stage deep tech startups in Asia, is targeting up to ¥25 billion (about $168 million) for BNV Fund 3, its third fund, TechCrunch reports. And yesterday, BNV sa...

What do customers want from their SaaS vendors? Sridhar Vembu, founder and CEO of Zoho Corp., weighs in on this question, speaking with Forbes India at the company’s annual Zoholics conference on Oct. 9 in Bengaluru. Zoho remains steadfastly bootstrapped, but for the VC funded ventures, Vembu speaks about how a new funding cycle will eventually return and hopes that this time there will be more fo...

In today’s episode, Acumen, last week, announced the first Indian cohort of sustainability and renewable energy focused startups it will train, with support from Apple, but first a few headlines.  SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son said he believes an artificial general intelligence (AGI) that surpasses human intelligence in most areas, will arrive within 10 years, Reuters reports . Google yesterday relea...

In today’s episode we take a quick look at an expanded partnership between NVIDIA and Infosys that seeks to equip an army of AI specialists trained in the AI chip giant’s technologies, but first one other headline that caught my attention yesterday. WhatsApp continues to roll out new features in India that will allow users in its largest market by userbase to do much more without leaving the insta...

In today’s episode it’s all about Apple. And of course, the company didn’t disappoint with the many incrementally faster, better features with innovations that combine both hardware tech and software ingenuity, as it launched the iPhone 15 series of smartphones and the Apple Watch 9 series, yesterday. For example, a double tap of your thumb and your index finger, of the hand on which you’re wearin...

In today’s episode we take a quick look at the rise of global capability centres, as they are called, but first a few headlines. Headlines Apple’s iPhone 15 event, the Wonderlust , is to be held later today, where we might get to see the company’s first smartphone with the standard USB-C charging port. It’s at 10:30 p.m. India time and you can watch the event on Apple’s website. Tata Consultancy S...

In today’s episode one quick takeaway from Freshworks’s first investor day since the company went public two years ago, but first a few headlines. Headlines NVIDIA and Reliance Industries, on Sep. 8, announced a collaboration to develop India’s own foundation large language model trained on the nation’s diverse languages and tailored for generative AI applications to serve the world’s most populou...

In today’s episode we take a quick look at Zoho’s latest milestone, with the Indian SaaS leader crossing 100 million users, but first a few headlines. Headlines HeromotoCorp will invest up to Rs. 550 crore in a rights issue of Ather Energy Private Limited, the Indian two-wheeler giant told stock exchanges on Sep. 4 in a statement. Atomicwork , a cloud software provider of productivity software, ha...

In today’s episode we take a quick look at edtech funding, from a report published by Tracxn. But first, a few headlines.  Headlines Telecom operators in India want internet companies to compensate them for using their telecom networks, a recommendation they’ve made to the local regulatory body, echoing a viewpoint that is gaining some momentum in other parts of the world, TechCrunch reports. Pent...

Today, five takeaways on the future of India’s SaaS sector from the perspective of an early-stage VC investor, but first, a few headlines. Headlines India’s Aditya-L1 satellite, our first space-based solar observatory, was launched successfully on Sep. 2 at 11:50 a.m. local time, Isro said in an update . Microsoft is ending WordPad, the basic word processor that’s been included with Windows since...

In today’s episode, sales of robots are down by almost a third from the first six months of last year. But first, some headlines that caught my attention. Headlines that caught our attention India's first indigenously developed nuclear power plant unit has started operations at full capacity, Business Today reports . The plant, in Kakrapar, Gujarat, had two existing 200 MWe units. This third u...

In today’s episode, we take a quick look at India’s opportunity to expand its digital technologies ecosystem to tier-2 cities, but first, some headlines that caught my attention. Headlines that caught our attention Google is expanding its generative AI search experience to markets outside the US, starting with India and Japan, TechCrunch reports. The new AI-powered search feature, also known as SG...

Apple yesterday announced Sep. 12 as the date for its annual press event, where usually the company launches new iPhones. The event will be held Apple’s headquarters in Cupertino, California, and it is widely expected that the iPhone 15 series and new Apple Watch models will be launched. In India, Apple’s fifth-biggest market according to Counterpoint Research, contract manufacturer Foxconn is alr...

Terry Gou, the founder of Foxconn Technology Group, one of Apple’s biggest contract manufacturers, which is also expanding its operations in India, is entering the contest to be Taiwan’s next president as an independent candidate, with elections due in 2024. Gou is widely seen as an advocate of Taiwan’s return to the “One China” framework and for cross-Strait talks to resume between China and Taiw...

Britian’s first lady Akshata Murty’s ownership of Infosys is in focus again, ahead of a free trade agreement that her husband, UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, is negotiating with India. The India-UK FTA talks started some 19 months ago and are said to be in their final stages. UK is the Indian IT sector’s biggest market after the US. While some British papers have suggested India is pushing for mor...

European lawmakers took a significant step towards regulating artificial intelligence (AI) with the advancement of new draft legislation, Reuters reports. The legislation aims to ensure that AI serves people, society, and the environment, emphasising the importance of protecting fundamental rights. Also in this report, Zoho said it's making investments across its portfolio of products to accel...

Accenture plans to invest $3 billion over three years in its Data & AI practice, joining the roster of global tech services and consulting giants investing heavily in generative AI, including Indian rivals Infosys and Tata Consultancy Services. Accenture also plans to double its AI workforce to 80,000. This news comes three months after the company announced 19,000 job cuts to reduce costs. Al...

The government of India has tasked the country's Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) with investigating an alleged data breach revealing personal details of people vaccinated against Covid-19. Minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar tweeted that a "Telegram bot" accessing previously stolen data was the culprit and that there was no direct breach. Reddit went down yesterday after thousan...

India’s OTT businesses are pushing back against a government mandate to curtail the glorification of cigarette and tobacco use online. The Internet and Mobile Association of India has flagged “fundamental concerns” and “practical difficulties” in complying with the new rules that the government issued last month, Economic Times reports. Meanwhile, Disney+ Hotstar is looking to win some users back,...

Infosys expects to achieve its revenue growth target of 4-7 percent in constant currency terms for the financial year 2024, company executives told investors in a conference with Morgan Stanley yesterday in Mumbai, CNBC TV18 reports. Also in this report, Germany’s Thyssenkrupp is close to a multi-billion-dollar deal to build six submarines for the Indian Navy, offering the engineering and tech kno...