Former BharatPe MD Ashneer Grover said tax payers are the meaningless minority as far as elections are concerned. He said politicians can get away with whatever they say on tax in rallies because "only 0.5% of the voters pay any meaningful income tax". The remarks come amid controversy over Congress' Sam Pitroda calling the US' inheritance tax an "interesting idea".

Mint Butterfield, the 16-year-old daughter of billionaire and Slack Co-founder Stewart Butterfield, is missing. She is believed to be in San Francisco's Tenderloin area and was last seen late on Sunday night in Bolinas, a community on the other side of the Golden Gate Bridge. The sheriff's office said it is "working with SFPD detectives to try and locate" Mint.

Zerodha Co-founder Nikhil Kamath has bought a significant part of Flipkart Co-founder Sachin Bansal's stake in electric two-wheeler maker Ather Energy. "Among my private equity investments, this will be among the largest bets that I have made," Kamath told ET. "I am looking to have a good amount of exposure to Ather for the next decade," he added.

Zilingo's Co-founder Dhruv Kapoor and ex-COO Aadi Vaidya have responded after the fashion startup's Co-founder Ankiti Bose accused them of cheating, fraud, criminal intimidation and sexual harassment. Dhruv and Aadi said the allegations were "completely baseless and untrue". "A thorough investigation has already proven her wrongdoing based on which she was terminated from the company," Dhruv said.

The Central Consumer Protection Authority has asked quick commerce players like Blinkit, Swiggy Instamart, Zepto and BigBasket (BB Now) to prove that they're delivering in "10 minutes or less" as claimed in their ads. The platforms have been asked to share data which shows their median delivery times across major cities like Bengaluru, Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, and Chennai, Moneycontrol reported.

Control One AI, an AI-first Robotics Startup, has raised $350,000 in a pre-seed funding round led by a group of prominent investors in the United States and India. Kunal Shah (Founder, CRED), Chaitanya R (Co-Founder, Wakefit), and Amit Singh, Silicon Valley-based Top Supply Chain executives from Tesla, Amazon, Walmart, eBay, Mercedes-Benz, and General Electric, participated in the round.

Adukale, a D2C snacks brand, has raised Rs 11 crore in a pre-Series A funding round led by Force Ventures, with participation from Aanya Ventures and angel investors such as Subrata Mitra and Radhika Pandit. The brand offers more than 75 products through over 20 'Adukale Experience Stores' in Bengaluru and Mysore, its online store and e-commerce platforms.

Koo, the Indian microblogging app once seen as a rival to X (Twitter), has stopped paying salaries to all its employees from April 2024 onwards citing financial constraints. Multiple Koo employees had raised concerns about salaries being halted from April, and the company confirmed the development in an emailed response to Inc42.

Bengaluru-based food delivery giant Swiggy has secured approval from its shareholders for an initial public offering (IPO) worth INR 10,414.1 Cr. The fresh development comes on the heels of Swiggy converting into a public limited company. The startup’s name was changed from ‘Swiggy Private Limited’ to ’Swiggy Limited’ by deletion of the word ‘private’ from its company name.

MatchLog Solutions, a sustainable container logistics and supply chain optimization player, today announced the close of $1.5 million in pre-series A funding led by Motion Ventures and July Ventures, with participation from other investors. The startup is revolutionizing the logistics sector by optimizing cargo, container, and trailer movements, significantly reducing operational wastage.

AI search engine startup Perplexity AI has raised $62.7 million in funding led by Daniel Gross, former head of AI at Y Combinator. Other investors who invested include Stan Druckenmiller, NVIDIA, billionaire Jeff Bezos, Tobi Lutke, and Garry Tan, among others. The round takes Perplexity's valuation to a striking $1.04 billion.

From a humble start with ₹99, entrepreneurs, Aashay, Atulya and Manish built PrepInsta into ₹200 Cr company within 5 years. Their edTech revolutionized job market preparation, offering affordable, comprehensive courses. Recognized by Forbes, their vision of accessible education earned them a spot on the 30 under Forbes 30 list. With over 2 lakh subs, PrepInsta's growth is not slowing down.

The Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA) has reportedly asked quick commerce players Blinkit, Swiggy Instamart, Zepto and Big Basket to prove their ‘10 minute’ delivery claims. According to a report by Moneycontrol, the CCPA, has asked the aforementioned companies to share median data for delivery times across major cities like Bengaluru, Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, and Chennai.

Plane, an open-source project management platform, has raised $4 million in a seed funding round led by OSS Capital. Alongside, Plane has introduced 'Plane One', a new pricing plan tailored for self-managed instance owners in growing companies. Plane One aims to make instance governance, security, and performance easier for both new and existing Plane admins at these companies.

Swiggy shareholders have passed a resolution for an initial public offering that could potentially raise ₹10,414 crore, NDTV Profit reported citing regulatory filings. The food delivery startup reportedly plans to raise up to ₹6,664 crore via offer-for-sale and ₹3,750 crore via fresh issue of shares. Swiggy recently also converted to a public limited company from a private entity.

Enterprise tech startup Clueso has raised $1.4 Mn in its seed funding round, led by f7 ventures. The round also saw participation from existing backer Y Combinator. Founded by IIT Madras alumnus Akash Anand, Prajwal Prakash, and Neel Balar in 2023, Clueso leverages generative AI to help companies create instructional videos and documentation for employee training and customers.

In Ranchi, a touching act of kindness from a Swiggy delivery boy has captured the hearts of many online. Nandini Tank, who was having severe period cramps and unable to walk, in a post on X, said "..ordered food...and asked the delivery agent if he could buy me a medicine. He was really kind enough to get me one."

Endimension Technology, an IIT Bombay-incubated healthcare AI startup, has raised Rs 6 Crore in a pre-Series A funding round led by Inflection Point Ventures, with participation from Sucseed Indovation, SINE IIT Bombay and individual angel investors. The startup's end-to-end AI platform enhances radiologist efficiency and accuracy by streamlining diagnostic processes and improving detection rates.

Health care and Insurtech company Flashaid has raised $2.5 million in a pre-Series A funding round led by Piper Serica Angel Fund and global venture capital firm SOSV. Early-stage investors Z21 Ventures Fund and ZNL Growth Fund participated in this round. The startup offers a full-stack health solution with proprietary pre-underwritten products, open APIs, and embedded solutions.

Singapore's investment giant Temasek and U.S. financial services firm Fidelity are reportedly in advanced talks to invest about $200 million in Peyush Bansal's Lenskart. According to an ET report, the deal, which will be conducted through a secondary share sale, would boost Lenskart's valuation to an estimated $5 billion.

The Canada Pension Plan Investment Board on Wednesday sold a 2.8% stake in logistics startup Delhivery for ₹908 crore through the open market. The Canadian investor held a 5.96% stake in Delhivery as of March this year. Capital Group, Fidelity Investments and HSBC were among the buyers of Delhivery shares, as per NSE data.

Fintech major Phonepe has introduced an AI-powered voice search feature for 10 Indian languages on its Android app marketplace Indus Appstore. Using the new features, users of Indus Appstore can browse for apps available in Indian regional languages like Hindi, Bengali, Kannada, Tamil, and Telugu, apart from English, the app marketplace said in a statement.

Truck aggregator startup LetsTransport has raised $22 million in Series E round led by Bertelsmann India Investments and other investors. The startup plans to use the raised capital to expand market presence, scale adjacent business verticals and to achieve profitability. Its plug and play platform offer its clients multiple assets across use cases in last-mile, mid-mile, and EV space.

Mumbai-based Network-as-a-Service (NaaS) provider CloudExtel has raised Rs 200 crore in external debt. The company received Rs 150 crore from NIIF Infrastructure Finance Limited (NIIF IFL) and an additional Rs 50 crore from Aditya Birla Finance Limited (ABFL). The funding is aimed at expanding its network of small cells and fiber optics.

Zomato is now piloting a new feature in parts of Bengaluru and Mumbai that offers priority deliveries to users at an extra charge. A user in Bengaluru was offered the option of availing food delivery within 16-21 minutes by paying an additional INR 29, as per a Moneycontrol report.