Inside Ola Electric's plans to cut losses; Simplifying personal finance

Hello,

For 61-year-old table tennis player Ni Xia Lian, age is just a number.

On Wednesday, Ni was pitted against Olympic silver medallist Sun Yingsha, who is 38 years her junior. Although Ni lost, she got a standing ovation from the happy crowd at the Paris Olympics 2024. 

Truly, a living legend!

Speaking of legendary, TechSparks Bengaluru is back, with its 15th edition to be held on September 26-28. Grab your early passes now.

Moving on, the BYJU’S-BCCI saga continues.

The National Company Law Appellate Tribunal on Wednesday reportedly postponed its decision on approving the settlement of Rs 158 crore between the two parties amid allegations raised by the edtech company’s US-based lenders.

A previously elusive BYJU’S co-founder has surfaced amid the settlement talk: Riju Ravindran. 

And to those wondering who Ravindran is, The CapTable has you covered. 

In other news, content-to-commerce platform The Good Glamm Group saw its losses in FY23 widen to Rs 917 crore from Rs 362.5 crore in FY22 as it focuses on reaching profitability ahead of its IPO. Meanwhile, its operating revenue more than doubled to Rs 603 crore from Rs 211.4 crore a year ago. 

It’s the season of public outings. 

Kidswear brand FirstCry’s parent BrainBees Solutions Ltd will open its IPO on August 6. The company is seeking a valuation in the range of $2.9-3 billion in its public listing and will reveal its IPO price band today.

In today’s newsletter, we will talk about 

• Inside Ola Electric's plans to cut losses
• Simplifying personal finance
• Helping vulnerable communities

Here’s your trivia for today: Which is the earliest book describing a stock exchange?

Electric Vehicles

Inside Ola Electric's plans to cut losses

At an event, Bhavish Aggarwal, Founder and CEO of Ola Electric, laid down two themes that could help the company achieve profitability ahead of its IPO launch. Aggarwal said that the company is banking on high revenue and low costs as volumes rise.

Eye at profitability:

• He added that the company’s 4680 Lithium ion cell manufactured in-house—which combines high energy density and high power density—would help significantly reduce the costs of manufacturing vehicles.
• The company will start delivering its motorbikes to customers early next year and integrate its new Lithium-ion cells beginning next year.
• Also, in the wake of MapmyIndia's lawsuit against Ola Electric for allegedly misappropriating its data, Aggarwal called the move “opportunistic”. A spokesperson called these allegations “false, malicious and misleading”.

Financial Services

Simplifying personal finance

1% Club, the social and education platform for personal finance co-founded by finance influencer Sharan Hegde and Raghav Gupta, has expanded its offerings with the launch of financial services and products via partnerships. The idea is to assist members with relevant products, which they have learnt about through the masterclasses on 1% Club’s platform.

Financial planning:

• While 1% Club was originally conceived as an online platform, it has swiftly evolved to foster an exclusive offline community as well as to promote collaborative learning inspired by shared experiences.
• “We want to ensure that our members do not have to search for a suitable policy elsewhere and have direct access to it via our platform,” says Raghav Gupta, Co-founder of 1% Club.
• 1% Club has launched ‘Personal CFO’—a service provided under 1% Club’s SEBI-registered sister company ‘One Centurion’.

Social Impact

Helping vulnerable communities

Kolkata artist and curator Nobina Gupta's platform Disappearing Dialogues (DD) brings together communities, institutions, and the public to document and disseminate their knowledge to wider audiences through exhibitions and interactions in public spaces.

“For every community we work with, our goal has been to ignite a sense of pride and sustenance within, and inspire children and youth, who are also first generation school goers to imbibe their rich traditions...," says Gupta.

Conserving ecologies:

• Gupta decided to start her project in 2014 in Nang, Ladakh, where children had an understanding of the medicinal plants growing in their backyard, and the local doctor used their generational wisdom of the Himalayan herbs to treat people.
• To help the locals in Baghelkhand, DD partnered with Pipson Sebastian Mampilli, a sustainable living entrepreneur who worked with the locals to preserve traditional indigenous farming knowledge and textile designers.
• DD set up an interactive Young Curators Lab, where it held workshops and fieldwork at the wetlands, online mentorship, and exhibitions.

News & updates

• Tough job: Boeing on Wednesday named aerospace industry veteran Kelly Ortberg as its new President and CEO after a months-long search, tasking the former Rockwell Collins executive with the monumental job of turning around the struggling planemaker.
• Ad-free: Microsoft is making Skype ad-free in an update that will roll out to users across all platforms soon. The update also includes improved AI image creation tools on Skype for Windows and macOS. 
• Sports love: Adidas expects soccer's increasing appeal among consumers globally to be a trend that lasts into 2025, after sales of its jerseys in connection to this year's soccer tournaments surpassed its expectations.

Which is the earliest book describing a stock exchange?

Answer: Confusion de Confusiones. Written by Joseph de la Vega in 1688, the book describes the Amsterdam Stock Exchange. 

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