Uber is one of the most recognised brands in the world. But in India, it's losing ground — to a government-backed taxi app, a newer competitor, and its own shrinking margins. So it's making a surprising bet: instead of fighting harder for your weekend ride, it wants to drive you to work. The B2B transport market it's entering has been run by specialists for decades. And those specialists aren't sure whether to be worried or not. Tune in. Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India’s...
Mar 13, 2026•13 min•Ep. 705
Akasa Air wants to be India's most efficient low-cost carrier. Founded in 2022 by veterans who watched Jet Airways and Go Air collapse, the airline is copying IndiGo's early playbook — single aircraft type, ruthless cost discipline, long-term thinking. It has 35 planes, 5% market share, and serious backing from the Jhunjhunwala family. But Boeing strikes delayed deliveries, pilots left, two co-founders have exited, and airport slots remain locked up by bigger players. Meanwhile, IndiGo is stumbl...
Mar 11, 2026•9 min•Ep. 704
Karnataka just announced it wants to ban children under 16 from social media. Goa and Andhra Pradesh are considering the same. And on paper, it sounds like exactly the kind of protection kids need — platforms like Meta have spent years knowingly exposing children to addiction, exploitation, and harm, while spending millions lobbying against any legislation that would stop them. So a ban feels like the only way. But here's the thing: when Karnataka made the announcement, Meta's response was more ...
Mar 10, 2026•15 min•Ep. 703
Indians put more than half their household wealth into real estate. But almost all of it goes into one kind: residential. Commercial property like offices, shops, warehouses, barely features in the average Indian portfolio. Some investors argue that that might be a mistake. Commercial real estate offers higher rental yields, steadier returns, and in some cases, fewer headaches than the family flat. And today, you don't even need a crore to get in. REITs, SM REITs, and AIFs have opened the door t...
Mar 09, 2026•17 min•Ep. 702
Swish launched less than a year ago with a simple promise: hot food in 10 minutes. It's already raised 16 million dollars, with another 30 to 35 million reportedly on the way. But the giants who tried this before — Zomato, Zepto, Swiggy — have all stumbled, scaled back, or shut down. The problem isn't the idea. It's the math. Small order sizes, a lack of dedicated riders and razor-thin margins. Swish and its investors thinks it has an edge the others didn't. But can a one-year-old startup crack ...
Mar 09, 2026•13 min•Ep. 701
Yesterday, Reuters reported, Indian refiners have rushed to secure prompt cargoes of Russian crude as the war involving Iran disrupts supplies from the Middle East. The crisis has choked traffic through the Strait of Hormuz — a route that normally carries around 40% of India’s oil imports — forcing companies to scramble for alternatives. The shift is striking. New Delhi had spent months cutting back Russian imports under U.S. pressure. But with India holding only about 25 days of crude reserves,...
Mar 06, 2026•14 min•Ep. 700
Deepinder Goyal, the founder of Zomato, has a new startup. It's called Temple — a wearable that tracks blood flow in your brain. His theory is that improving that flow could slow down aging. Doctors aren't convinced. Investors seem to be. Temple is valued at 190 million dollars. The science behind it hasn't been peer reviewed. And India has a rapidly aging population that could genuinely use some answers. So who exactly is this for? Tune in. Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, Ind...
Mar 05, 2026•17 min•Ep. 699
When Ozempic began changing how the world lost weight, most slimming companies panicked. But VLCC didn’t. Backed by Carlyle, it’s opening more clinics than ever before. Because to Carlyle, Ozempic isn’t a threat—it’s just another doorway into India’s beauty economy. In this episode, we look at how VLCC’s new owners are turning an existential challenge into expansion, why its products are taking a back seat to real estate, and what the future of India’s weight-loss industry looks like in the age ...
Mar 03, 2026•13 min•Ep. 698
Across India, many heirs are stepping away from running their inherited businesses to run family offices instead. They see investing as more flexible, more global, and less tied to daily operations.Their parents built factories but they are more interested in managing portfolios. It’s a practical shift but one that’s changing how old wealth works and what it values. What’s driving this change and does India’s next generation of uber-rich business owners still want to build anything at all? Tune ...
Mar 02, 2026•12 min•Ep. 697
In late January, a plane crash in Maharashtra killed the state's deputy chief minister, Ajit Pawar. It also exposed something few had been paying attention to: India's booming private charter industry, where demand is surging, corners are being cut, and the regulator is struggling to keep pace. There are now over 430 non-scheduled aircraft in the country. The top operator alone has 17 planes and 70-plus pilots. But between periodic audits, years-long crash investigations, and operators who'd rat...
Mar 02, 2026•14 min•Ep. 696
Private equity has been buying up some of India's most prestigious schools. The pitch: better governance, professional management, and much-needed capital for a struggling sector. But inside some of these acquisitions, something else is happening. Teacher training budgets are shrinking. Salaries are stagnating. And in at least one case, a school is paying 65% of its revenue in rent — to a landlord owned by the same firm that owns the school. Some investors have made it work. Others have changed ...
Feb 26, 2026•31 min•Ep. 695
This week, on Tuesday, India announced a sweeping overhaul of how it calculates GDP, fixing a measurement system the IMF had flagged as outdated just last November. It includes a new base year, better price data, and a wider net to count the informal economy. The number seems to be getting closer to reality. But that raises a harder question. For a country that has built its global identity around being the world's fastest growing major economy, what happens when the arithmetic changes? And does...
Feb 25, 2026•13 min•Ep. 694
The next frontier of AI isn't in your phone. It's supposed to be around your neck, on your face, in your ear and out in the world with you. Tech companies have spent billions on that pitch. The generation they were counting on to buy it coined the term "hammerbait" instead. Today: the wearable AI moment, what it gets wrong, and the one version of this technology that might actually be worth wanting. Host Rachel Varghese explores. Tune in. Read Song's review of Friend here . Rachel here! I didn't...
Feb 25, 2026•18 min•Ep. 693
China’s stock market has delivered strong returns over the past year and a half. It has outperformed the US, which has long been the preferred global market for Indian investors. Even now, Chinese valuations appear relatively reasonable. But Indian investors face limited access. Only two mutual fund schemes currently accept fresh investments in Chinese stocks. Even if more options open up, experts advise restraint. The rally is tempting but experts warn investors from getting carried away. Tune ...
Feb 23, 2026•16 min•Ep. 692
Hosur built India's EV industry. Now it's running out of room — and a city many haven't heard of (mainly because it used to be Aurangabad) is quietly filling the gap. Sambhajinagar doesn't have Silicon Valley-style VC money or flashy government announcements. But what it does have is something harder to manufacture: a generational automotive ecosystem of factory owners, built over decades, now scaling up for an electric future. Toyota noticed. And Ather. And JSW. This is the story of how a small...
Feb 22, 2026•15 min•Ep. 691
India hosted the world's biggest AI summit this week — 100+ nations, $200 billion in commitments, and enough billionaire handshakes to fill a highlight reel. But beneath the spectacle lies a sharper question: when will it be India’s turn to build AI, instead of just buying into it? Snigdha breaks down the gap between infrastructure ambition and intelligence sovereignty. In other news, Mark Zuckerberg walked into a US courtroom as Meta, YouTube, TikTok and Snapchat face a landmark trial. The alle...
Feb 19, 2026•14 min•Ep. 690
Big Tech is preparing to spend $650 billion on AI infrastructure this year, a figure that rivals national economies. The focus is agentic AI, systems designed not just to generate answers but to execute tasks independently. The vision is software that can read your messages, access your calendar, contact your friends, move money and complete transactions without step by step supervision. In effect, technology that can act in the world on your behalf. To function, these systems require sweeping a...
Feb 18, 2026•14 min•Ep. 689
Anthropic just set up in Bangalore, announcing partnerships across health, education, and government. The "ethical AI" company is positioning itself as the responsible alternative to OpenAI. But the Wall Street Journal revealed the US military used Claude to help capture Venezuela's former president—violating Anthropic's own guidelines prohibiting violence and surveillance. Now the US government wants Anthropic to drop those restrictions entirely. The company is caught between its founding princ...
Feb 18, 2026•16 min•Ep. 688
Over the past six months, Blinkit has been making a structural shift that most customers would never notice. For years, its fresh fruits and vegetables were sourced by Hyperpure, its own parent company Eternal’s business-to-business arm that also supplies restaurants. As Blinkit grew into Eternal’s primary revenue driver, Hyperpure grew with it. In FY25, more than 60% of Hyperpure’s revenue came from Blinkit. Then Blinkit decided to source its own inventory. Hyperpure’s revenue more than halved ...
Feb 16, 2026•9 min•Ep. 687
A mutual fund executive told our colleague something shocking: "SIPs are a problem." Part of the shock came from the fact that it was coming from someone in an industry that was basically built on "SIP sahi hai." Now a new research paper backs up that controversial take—and the findings contradict what millions of Indian investors have been told about systematic investment plans. Turns out the marketing narrative around SIPs has some serious gaps. The math tells a different story. And with small...
Feb 15, 2026•10 min•Ep. 686
On February 12, 2026, Adani Power formed Adani Atomic Energy Ltd, a new unit to generate, transmit, and distribute nuclear power. This follows the SHANTI Bill opening India's nuclear sector to private firms. Both Adani Power and Tata Power, coal giants with long-life thermal plants, now lead the shift. Coal powers 74% of India's grid today. These firms profit big from it. So what happens when they control nuclear's pace too? Snigdha explores the conflict. In other news, top AI researchers have b...
Feb 12, 2026•14 min•Ep. 685
On February 10, 2026, reports said nearly 100 NDTV employees were put on performance improvement plans, often seen as a prelude to layoffs. This comes after the Adani Group acquired NDTV in December 2022 for about ₹600 crore, followed by several high profile exits. A similar moment unfolded at Jeff Bezos-owned The Washington Post last week where hundreds were laid off and multiple sections and bureaus shut. Both Adani and Bezos run highly profitable core businesses. News is not one of them. So w...
Feb 11, 2026•13 min•Ep. 684
In early February, Indian IT stocks crashed 6% in a single day—the worst selloff in six years. ₹2 lakh crore vanished. Wall Street lost $300 billion. The trigger? Anthropic launched Claude Cowork, an AI agent that can organize files, parse spreadsheets, and write reports autonomously. For the first time, AI doesn't just assist—it executes entire workflows with minimal supervision. Investors panicked, and experts coined the term "SaaSpocalypse." But is this really the end of software companies, o...
Feb 11, 2026•13 min•Ep. 683
PhonePe is heading to the public markets as India’s largest UPI player. On 21 January, the company made its IPO papers public, setting up one of the most closely watched fintech listings in years. PhonePe dominates transaction volumes, but it is listing after Paytm, whose 2021 IPO reshaped how investors value payments companies. Since then, Paytm’s stock has fallen sharply from its debut even as its business has evolved. PhonePe is seeking a valuation premium while still reporting losses and fac...
Feb 09, 2026•10 min•Ep. 682
In November, Decathlon began piloting two-hour deliveries across 10 Indian cities. It's a surprising move for a company that just swung into losses—and it raises a question the rest of the sector is watching closely: can the economics of fashion quick-commerce actually work? More than 50 million dollars has flowed into the space in 18 months. At least one startup has already shut down. The problem isn't speed. It's frequency, inventory, and unit economics that refuse to close. Tune in. If you ha...
Feb 08, 2026•15 min•Ep. 681
Karnataka keeps talking about decentralizing tech beyond Bengaluru. Its neighbors are actually doing it. Tamil Nadu, Telangana, and Andhra Pradesh are building tech cities from scratch—tier-2 clusters with land banks, fast-track approvals, and statutory bodies with real power. Major companies are choosing Visakhapatnam and Tirupati over Bengaluru now. The difference? Decision-making authority. Karnataka's development body is stuck in a promotional role while other states hand their institutions ...
Feb 05, 2026•24 min•Ep. 680
Two days ago, the United States said it would cut tariffs on Indian goods to 18%, down from levels that had gone as high as 50%. Markets reacted fast. Stocks rose. The rupee strengthened. The first feeling was relief. It sounded like the trade fight with Washington and Donald Trump was easing. Then more details emerged. U.S. officials said India would commit to buying over $500 billion worth of American goods. They also said U.S. tariffs would stay at 18%, while India would allow zero tariffs on...
Feb 04, 2026•13 min•Ep. 679
Amazon fired 16,000 workers last month. Oracle is set to cut up to 30,000 more. Tech layoffs have increasingly been attributed to AI. But Oxford Economics found something strange: there's no macroeconomic data showing AI is actually replacing jobs or boosting productivity. In fact, output per worker is slowing, not accelerating. So what's really happening? Host Rachel Varghese breaks it down. Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India’s first subscriber-only business news platform....
Feb 04, 2026•15 min•Ep. 678
In December, India’s top agricultural research body sent a letter to 74 universities with a clear message: natural farming is now a subject of national importance. Campuses are responding fast, planning new courses to train students for a sector under pressure. Export markets want cleaner food because consumers are paying closer attention to what they eat. In response, agri-input companies are adjusting their products. But Indian agriculture still runs largely on chemical inputs. Farmers face re...
Feb 02, 2026•12 min•Ep. 677
ChatGPT butchers Punjabi with spelling errors and Bollywood-style Hindi bleeding through. Hindi bots trained on newspapers miss dialects like Awadhi and Bhojpuri entirely, while Tamil AI ignores the rich variations between Kongu and Madurai speech. Sure, Gurugram collected ₹200 crore in taxes using Hindi AI calls, but that's because Hindi dominates datasets. Most other languages remain stuck in translation hell. Private companies optimize for speed over nuance, government corpora like Bhashini s...
Feb 02, 2026•13 min•Ep. 676
