Of aliens, and IPOs

Good morning

Elon Musk says he is an alien. 

On Friday, CRED Founder Kunal Shah tweeted Tesla Founder Elon Musk may, in fact, end up running over four $500 billion companies and asked the man himself how he does it. 

Kunal referred to Musk as the 'Dark Lord', in reference to the central character of Lord Voldermort.

And the SpaceX CEO promptly replied, “I’m an alien.”

In other news, dating and peer-to-peer networking app Bumble went public, and Founder-CEO Whitney Wolfe Herd became the latest female entry to the billionaire club.

On February 10, Bumble Inc announced the pricing of its initial public offering of 50 million shares of its Class A common stock at a price to the public of $43.00 per share.

The Interview

The year 2020 had been one of the busiest yet for philanthropic organisations as the pandemic created many challenges for people working on the ground. Rahil Rangwala, Director — India Programmes, Michael & Susan Dell Foundation (MSDF) says that speed was critical in ensuring that people got relief. MSDF had to work with many partners to maximise the impact, and had to take a long-term view on building resilience and sustainability.

Editor’s Pick: 

How homegrown microblogging app Koo achieved 10x user growth within a year of launch

While Twitter is at loggerheads with the government over blocking of certain accounts, there is one app that emerged as the clear winner out of the saga — Koo. The homegrown microblogging app has seen a massive surge in users over the last few days, crossing the three million mark. Founded by Aprameya Radhakrishna and Mayank Bidawatka, Koo also won the Aatmanirbhar App Challenge announced by the Indian government in 2020. Read more.

Startup Spotlight

AgriVijay aims to empower farmers with green energy solutions

While fossil fuels are slowly fading out of urban areas, many farmers still rely on them for cooking, running water pumps, operating milking machines, etc. To cut farmers’ dependence on fossil fuels, biogas executive Vimal Panjwani founded AgriVijay in 2020. The startup provides a wide range of green energy equipment tailored to the farmers' needs. Read more.

News & Updates

• Bengaluru-based EV startup Ather Energy unveiled its mega factory spread across 123,000 sq ft at Hosur, Tamil Nadu. Over the next five year, the company is looking to invest Rs 635 crore in the factory, which has an annual capacity of producing 110,000 scooters and 120,000 battery packs.

• Following a meeting between Twitter representatives and the Information Technology Secretary, Twitter has blocked over 97 percent of the accounts and posts flagged by the IT Ministry for provocative content and misinformation after the platform was issued a stern warning.

• Digital wellness startup HealthifyMe crossed $25 million revenue run rate for January 2021, which is a 100 percent growth over the last one year. It has projected that its annual recurring revenues (ARR) will cross $50 million in the next 12 months.

• Whitney Wolfe Herd, Founder and CEO of Bumble, became the latest female entrant to the billionaire club after the dating app's IPO on NASDAQ. In its trading debut, its shares soared by 67 percent, valuing Whitney’s stake at $1.5 billion.

• In a delightful Twitter exchange, CRED Founder Kunal Shah asked the richest man in the world, Elon Musk, how he managed four massive organisations. To his question, the Tesla CEO shot a witty remark, saying: "I'm an alien".  

Before you go, stay inspired with… 

"It’s really hard to build a business that sustains for a long period of time and a successful one at that. To do it, you have to reinvent yourself and do it multiple times over."

— Andy Jassy, CEO, Amazon Web Services

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