Elevation Capital’s Paytm bet pays off; Inside Joyalukkas’ 70-year journey

Hello,

A new era of work is here, and it’s bringing all kinds of disruptions with it.

According to Nitin Seth, former Flipkart COO and now Incedo CEO, the age of stable jobs is fading with the advent of AI.

His estimate of the impact is quite far-reaching—35% to 50% of existing jobs are expected to disappear within 15 years, a figure that translates to nearly two billion roles worldwide.

The key, he believes, lies in the workforce adapting to a world that increasingly favours agility, creativity, and ownership in its work processes.

Tech companies don’t have the luxury to complacently ride the wave either. A report by Bain & Co posits that a business-as-usual approach could erode revenue by 30% or more for tech services firms. 

In turn, it also recommended decisive action—firms will need to deploy AI not only in client solutions but also across their own operations. 

In the backdrop of it all looms the big test: Nvidia earnings. 

While analysts expect the chip giant to show more than 50% growth in both net income and revenue in Q3, there are doubts resurfacing, too: are the AI high rollers growing skittish in their spending?

In today’s newsletter, we will talk about 

• Elevation Capital’s Paytm bet pays off
• Inside Joyalukkas’ 70-year-journey
• How co-ops are empowering rural India

Here’s your trivia for today: Which animal famously served as a corporal in the Polish Army in WWII? 

Fintech

Elevation Capital’s Paytm bet pays off

Over the past week, India’s startup ecosystem has been obsessed with the wave of venture-backed companies finally heading to the public markets and the VC returns they are unlocking. Amidst this, Elevation Capital—still remembered in industry circles by its former name SAIF Partners—has just booked a blockbuster payoff on an 18-year-old bet: Paytm.

The VC firm, which had bought these shares for just Rs 12.88 crore at Rs 15.4 apiece, offloaded the stock at Rs 1,305 per piece, netting a fund of Rs 1,092 crore—an extraordinary 84.7x return in the public markets.

Long game:

• As per NSE data, in a bulk deal on Tuesday, Elevation sold a near 2% stake in Paytm, which it had held through SAIF III Mauritius Company Limited.
• A second entity, SAIF Partners India IV Limited, also exited a portion of its stake. Those shares, acquired for Rs 108 crore at Rs 305.6 each, fetched Rs 463 crore, translating to a 4.2x gain at the same selling price.
• As per Paytm’s Q2 shareholding disclosures, Elevation held its stake through two investment vehicles: SAIF III Mauritius Company Limited with 10.76%, and SAIF Partners India IV Limited with 4.57%.

Funding Alert

Startup: Tractor Junction

Amount: $22.5M

Round: Series A

Startup: Pidge

Amount: Rs 120 Cr

Round: Growth

Startup: Synthio Labs

Amount: $5M

Round: Seed

SMB

Inside Joyalukkas’ 70-year-journey

Working with local artisans and specialising in handcrafted South Indian gold jewellery, Joseph Varghese built a 200 sqft store that would eventually become the foundation of Joyalukkas Jewellery, a global fine jewellery brand valued at Rs 30,018 crore. 

His son Alukkas Varghese Joy fondly recalls, “For my father, jewellery was not merely an ornament, but a symbol of emotion, celebration and legacy.”

Etched in gold:

• A well-known brand in Kerala, Alukkas harboured a larger ambition—to take his father’s vision global. In 1988, he opened the company’s first showroom outside Kerala—in Abu Dhabi. Later that year, during Diwali, the brand launched another showroom in Deira, Dubai.
• Every piece, regardless of where it is made or sold, undergoes a multi-stage quality control process, Allukas emphasises. “We have centralised design and sourcing teams, state-of-art manufacturing facilities and stringent purity and artisanship checks at every stop.”
• Today, the brand has over 190 showrooms, all company-owned, across 12 countries, including India, the UK, US, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman, Singapore and Malaysia. India continues to be Joyalukka's largest market, with 109 stores and sales amounting to Rs 20,213 crore in FY25.

Social Story

How co-ops are empowering rural India

Every November, India’s vast cooperative network gets its moment in the spotlight during the All India Cooperative Week. This year, it is being celebrated from November 14-20, bringing together farmer groups, women’s collectives, dairy unions and rural credit societies. 

Read these stories from Karnataka to Maharashtra, which highlight how co-ops are supporting women, farmers and rural families to build more secure livelihoods.

News & updates

• Chips: Nvidia's move to use smartphone-style memory chips in its AI servers could cause server-memory prices to double by late 2026, Counterpoint Research said in a report. However, since each AI server needs more memory chips than a handset, the change is expected to create sudden demand that the industry is not equipped to handle, according to Counterpoint.
• IPO: AI firm Fractal Analytics plans to maintain high R&D spending ahead of its market debut. Fractal, which specialises in AI-driven decision-making for large businesses, will continue to invest 'significantly', and possibly increase its research outlay to stay competitive, CEO Srikanth Velamakanni told Reuters.
• Fly zone: Air India is lobbying the Indian government to convince China to let it use a sensitive military airspace zone in Xinjiang to shorten routes as the financial toll from a ban on Indian carriers flying over Pakistan mounts. The unusual request comes just weeks after direct India-China flights resumed. 

Which animal famously served as a corporal in the Polish Army in WWII?

Answer: A Syrian brown bear named Wojtek. 

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