A proxy advisory firm has raised objections to the corporate governance structure at Zee Learn, part of the Essel group, expressing concerns over the company’s capital allocation decision, related-party transactions and acquisition of MT Educare.

Consumer goods major Marico posted a 3% year-on-year (y-o-y) decline in net profit to Rs 204 crore for the quarter ended March 31, while the revenue from operations, at Rs 1,496 crore, declined 7% y-o-y.

The decision was taken after the state agriculture department approached the Central Institute of Cotton Research (CICR), Nagpur, seeking advice against the backdrop of the Covid-19 pandemic affecting the country.

The Tamil Nadu government has announced relaxations allowing industries, particularly export units, to resume operations with standard operating procedure as suggested by the Union government.

With an eye at coronavirus as an opportunity, to put its idle plants to work, state-run Bhel has offered its manufacturing facilities to be used by global manufacturing firms looking to shift base.

According to an official source, CCI had purchased more than 13 lakh bales in 2008 as that year too, cotton prices had nosedived due to the global recession.

With theatres being shut since for over a month now, many small and mid-rung production houses are understood to be in talks with video over-the-top (OTT) platforms for direct-to-digital launch of their unreleased movies.

Nearly 60% employees of GoAir’s will be put on “temporary leave without pay”, the airline’s promoters Nusli and Jeh Wadia in a joint letter informed employees.

Extension of lockdown in India, albeit with some major relaxations, fails to enthuse investors.

Wipro has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Maharashtra government under which it will repurpose one of its information technology campuses at Hinjewadi in Pune to a 450-bed intermediary care Covid-19 hospital in four weeks and hand it over to the state government by May 30.

Over 200 companies in Pune’s industrial belt of Chakan, Talegaon, Kurkumb, Baramati and Ranjangaon have resumed operations after restrictions were eased on Monday, even as the lockdown continues.

Despite the Gujarat government’s order to pay salaries to workers during lockdown period, lakhs of diamond artisans in Surat have not been paid their wages by their employers, said Diamond Workers Union – Gujarat.

India Ratings and Research (Ind-Ra) on Monday placed Shriram Transport Finance Company’s long-term issuer rating of ‘IND AA+’ on Rating Watch Negative (RWN).

The surge came at a time when the Nifty and Sensex gained 14.4% and 14.6%, respectively. Market experts say this could have been driven by intra-day trading.

Consumer demand for non-essential products with e-commerce firms has increased manifold after the government last Friday lifted the ban on sale of such products by e-tailers.

Hobbled by a shortage of workers, companies are finding it hard to resume operations at an optimal scale and with migrants moving back home, it could be a while before factories hum with activity.

Indian cotton prices have come down by 12-15% due to the ongoing lockdown and fears that the country’s cotton consumption will reduce, resulting in more carry-forward stocks by September 2020, officials of the Cotton Association of India (CAI) said on Tuesday.

The rights issue offers an opportunity for existing shareholders to reap the benefits from RIL’s new and emerging businesses such as digital, telecom and retail business.

With BSNL facing hurdles in its 4G tender for deployment of 50,000 new sites, the state-run firm has decided to upgrade existing 2G/3G sites, so that 4G services can be offered to customers in the coming four-six months.

A report by Jefferies shows that the benchmark Nifty in the last week of April had outperformed other global benchmarks such as Japan’s Nikkei 225, US’ S&P 500 and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng.

It said Axis Bank identified that more than 10% of its customers (25% of its loan book by value) as on April 25 availed the payment moratorium.

Significantly, this was the latest twist in the long battle over the will of Late Priyamvada Devi Birla being fought between the Birla family and the Lodhas.

The Covid-19 pandemic is expected to exert downward pressure on the credit quality of sugar mills by eroding operating profitability and shoring up debt in fiscal 2021.

The edible oils import declined by 34% to 7,90,377 tonne during April, mainly due to logistics related issues during the lockdown, industry body Solvent Extractors Association of India (SEA) said on Wednesday.

The Rs 75,000-crore paper industry, which has resumed production after relaxations were issued effective from April 15, may have a negative growth in the first quarter of this fiscal as demand lost in this lockdown cannot be compensated entirely.

Varun Beverages (VBL) reported a strong growth in volumes, Ebitda and earnings during Q1CY20. This was, however, led by the acquired territories of south & west not there in the base.

A Barclays report estimates that the central government’s revenue benefit from the additional hikes in fuel taxes could be as much as Rs 1.4 lakh crore on an annual basis.

SBI’s focus on the insurance business during a challenging year and SBI Life’s technology push to improve digital agent and client engagements remain crucial.

The National Stock Exchange (NSE) on Wednesday said it was working to equip its systems to handle crises such as that caused by the crash in crude prices.

The rating downgrade action took into account the increased stress in the wholesale portfolio, which could lead to a deterioration in the asset quality, and the consequent impact on the financial performance.

Nifty50 has seen a correction of 6.2% since the start of May after witnessing a strong pullback rally throughout March.

Suvarna Jagtap, chairperson, Lasalgaon Agriculture Produce Market Committee (APMC), told FE that three cases of coronavirus were reported at Lasalgaon at a distance of 3 km from the main market yard.

The bright spot in the Indian real estate market viz leasing is likely to see an abrupt end to its rental uptick cycle.

Lifting of the lockdown would release pent-up demand from incomplete repainting projects but we do not expect much new repainting work (especially in urban markets), nor a pick-up in fresh painting (construction activity).

With the upcoming trends in technology, and with the advent of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, India can meaningfully leverage its demographic dividend only with sustained efforts to upskill its large workforce

And in this age of AL, ML and blockchain that are network-based technologies, networking has gained a lot of importance, says Siddarth Bharwani, VP, Brand & Marketing, Jetking Infotrain.

Digital technologies have the potential to create $1 trillion economic value, says EY

Team-building and customer-connect are more effective than tall agendas

Threat trends show political and economic intentions of cybercriminals.

Ask yourself why did you decide on studying abroad?

The millennials are accustomed to having things at the click of a mouse. Want to watch a movie? Access Netflix. Want to plan a holiday? Do so on Makemytrip. Want to shop? Buy almost anything under the sun, any time, on Amazon or Flipkart. Want beauty treatment? Call Urbanclap. Want a date? Simply swipe right!

The telcos have also said the government should direct video streaming platforms  to offer only standard definition (SD) and not high definition (HD) content for the time being so as not to choke the bandwidth.  

The daily power demand in the country has fallen by a sharp 21% since March 16 with electricity requirement on March 25 being only 2,777 million units (MU), as most parts of the country is under shutdown.

Retail experts estimate that the current situation might wipe off 10% of e-commerce companies’ annual GMV in the country.

There are dozens of ways to access networks and today, remote offices are common.

Shashwati, a news analyst, is able to do research at home, but her effectiveness has dropped in the absence of the right infrastructure.

Making mindful choices might involve a bit more efforts, but it’s better than the hours spent running to work. Working from home, with right planning and efforts, can be as productive as working from office.

By expanding the scope of equalisation levy to cover foreign e-commerce platforms, India has rushed to incrementally cast its net wide insofar as the digital service user-base is concerned.

As IBM Watson has been able to achieve some scale, the company believes that by putting the NLP technology in commercial use it will be able to expand its capabilities much further.

Mindshare and GroupM have implemented their own tools that are better than the industry standards, and we use our own competitive advantage to give our clients better insights than they could get through an industry model.