Consumer products king Hindustan Unilever is apparently in early talks to buy a majority stake [https://www.livemint.com/companies/news/hul-in-discussions-to-buy-spice-maker-mdh-11647887626973.html] in India’s 2nd largest spice company, MDH — valuing the business at about ₹10 to ₹15K crores. MDH needs no introduction — started by the late Dharampal Gulati

What’s poppin’ — after making more than 5+ investments so far this year, Reliance Retail has now acquired an 89% stake [https://techcrunch.com/2022/03/20/reliance-clovia/] in a direct-to-consumer women’s undergarment brand called Clovia for about $125 million. Clovia [https://www.clovia.com/], operating since 2013, runs

What’s poppin’ — the prolonged Future Retail and Reliance saga has reached an interesting turn, where the cash-strapped Future is now accusing its savior Reliance [https://www.livemint.com/companies/news/future-says-reliance-s-takeover-of-stores-came-as-a-surprise-pledges-action-11647428639195.html] of forcibly taking control of thousands of its stores, vowing to take them back. Some context: Future

What’s poppin’ — TechCrunch says Zomato has signed an agreement with the struggling [https://techcrunch.com/2022/03/15/zomato-and-blinkit-reach-agreement-for-merger/] grocery delivery player, Blinkit (earlier known as Grofers), to merge the operations of both companies — in an all stock deal estimated to be worth over $700 million in value! Folks

What’s poppin’ — Ebix Cash [https://www.ebixcash.com/introduction/], the India-arm of the global tech giant called Ebix Inc., filed its docs with SEBI to raise ₹6,000 crores from the public markets [https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/markets/ipos/fpos/ebixcash-files-draft-papers-with-sebi-for-rs-6000-cr-ipo/articleshow/90125247.cms] — joining a growing list of

What’s poppin’ — India’s top banking regulators last night dropped a bomb on the boys and gals running shop at PayTM, by stopping PayTM Payments Bank from onboarding any new customers [https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/business/rbi-directs-paytm-payments-bank-to-stop-onboarding-new-customers-orders-it-audit-8222121.html] until it’s technology is thoroughly audited. Fact is, bunch

What’s poppin’ — Entrackr says, Physics Wallah, an entrance-exam coaching company that started as a YouTube channel is in talks to raise roughly $100 million, its first outside money, from Westbridge capitalat a $1 billion valuation [https://entrackr.com/2022/03/exclusive-bootstrapped-startup-physics-wallah-pw-set-to-turn-unicorn-with-maiden-fundraise/] ! Until 2014, Alakh Pandey was on a regular

Another hot domestic consumer story is about to hit the streets, with Moneycontrol reporting Wildcraft [https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/business/ipo/sequoia-eyes-2022-ipo-8164771.html] , which makes affordable hiking gear, backpacks, tents, knapsacks and such, is prepping for an early 2022 bid. Quick backstory: the brand was founded in 1998 [https:

What’s poppin’ — the Good Glamm Group, which is building a content-led digital commerce empire, is reportedly buying out another content play [https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/tech/startups/good-creator-co-likely-to-acquire-video-commerce-startup-bulbul/articleshow/89755120.cms] — this time, influencer-commerce network Bulbul, in an all cash and stock deal. Bulbul [https://play.google.com/store/

What’s poppin — Indian local snack-king Bikaji Foods is all set to file docs for its upcoming IPO sometime this week — looking to raise over ₹1,000 crores [https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/industry/cons-products/food/bikaji-foods-looking-to-raise-1000-cr-via-ipo-at-1-billion-valuation/articleshow/89710142.cms] from public investors, at a $1 billion valuation! Like most iconic

What’s poppin’ — IBM continued to deepen its foray into hybrid cloud, [https://www.business-standard.com/article/companies/ibm-announces-acquisition-of-neudesic-adds-to-india-presence-122021501591_1.html] buying out [https://www.business-standard.com/article/companies/ibm-announces-acquisition-of-neudesic-adds-to-india-presence-122021501591_1.html] a  specialized cloud consulting platform called Neudesic. The Irvine, CA HQ’ed business [https://www.neudesic.com/] (with

What happened — the income tax department raided the house [https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/markets/i-t-dept-raids-residence-of-former-nse-md-chitra-ramakrishna-her-colleague-anand-subramanian/article65058527.ece] of the ex-CEO of the National Stock Exchange Chitra Ramakrishna, as well as the group’s COO Anand Subramanian, trying to uncover illicit gains and evidence of financial favors. Some backstory — the ex-CEO

In fitness tech — Cult.fit is acquiring [https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/tech/funding/mukesh-bansal-led-cult-fit-acquires-golds-gym-india-business/articleshow/89563097.cms] one of the most popular old-school gyms, Gold’s Gym’s India operations, for an undisclosed amount. For folks outside the tech circle, that’s a 6-year old startup buying out a 20-year

What happened — Sharechat is rumored to be buying out [https://techcrunch.com/2022/02/10/sharechat-mx-player-moj-mx-takatak/] short-video platform MX TakaTak in a $600-$700 million cash + stock deal, set to be signed off by the end of this month. SC will group TakaTak with its own TikTok-clone, Moj. That’s