September 3, 2025

Happy Tuesday with some spicy business and tech updates from India! BigBasket, the online grocery giant owned by Tata, is gearing up for a big leadership shuffle. After nearly five years steering the ship, CEO Hari Menon is expected to step back from daily operations. Sources say he's working closely with the board to find a fresh face from outside to inject new energy. This big move comes as BigBasket wrestles with fierce competition from Blinkit, Swiggy Instamart, and Zepto in India's lightning-fast quick commerce battle. Did you know? Hari Menon cofounded BigBasket in 2011 along with four friends. Even after Tata Digital's 64.3% takeover in 2021, only one original cofounder has left. BigBasket is now worth a whopping $3.2 billion! But it’s not all rosy—the company’s B2C revenue dropped 3% to Rs 7,673 crore in FY25, and losses grew to Rs 1,851 crore. With Tata Digital's CEO Sajith Sivanandan coming aboard in September, a fresh BigBasket boss is crucial to reigniting growth and winning the 10-minute delivery race. From groceries to games, India's real-money gaming apps have seen a shocking dive after the brand-new Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Bill, 2025 banned money-based games online. Between August 20-30, daily downloads for top apps fell like a stone: Winzo tumbled 70%, Zupee crashed 95%, and MPL’s popular games dropped 73%! Layoffs have begun too. MPL’s cofounder Sai Srinivas grimly told staff the new law “eliminated” its income in India. Others like Dream11 and Probo have stopped real-money gaming, obeying the law for now. But one brave firm, Head Digital Works (maker of A23 poker and rummy), has taken this fight to the Karnataka High Court, marking the first legal challenge. In a fresh twist, Union IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw met online gaming groups for the first time since the ban. The government advised companies to safely store or return users’ funds stuck in game wallets before the law arrived. Meanwhile, Krutrim, Ola’s AI wing, is in trouble. Following two earlier rounds of layoffs, they have let go nearly 50 more people in the linguistics team, including key leaders. This “strategic realignment” comes after their big linguistics project finished, but insiders say losing text-to-speech experts weakens their force. This is alarming as Krutrim races to finish its big AI model, Krutrim 3, and boost its AI helper Kruti, which has 207,000 downloads since June. Despite $50 million raised last year, challenges in funding, product popularity, and technology remain. On a brighter note for startups, Gurugram-based community commerce platform CityMall raised a juicy $47 million. The round was led by Accel with many investors joining in. Even though the company's valuation slipped from $350 million last year to $320 million, it plans to use this cash to grow in current markets, expand nearby, and hire more people. Battery innovator Offgrid Energy Labs also grabbed $15 million led by Archean Chemicals and Ankur Capital. The Noida startup aims to build a pilot factory in the UK within a year and boost its work on zincgel batteries. In other quick bites: Flipkart took majority control of popular youth platform Pinkvilla, Amazon India cut some seller fees ahead of festive sales, and Infosys changed bus schedules in Bengaluru to help staff balance long commutes with calls to US clients. So, India’s tech and business scene is buzzing with big changes—from grocery carts and gaming phones to AI brains and electric batteries. Stay tuned for more masaledar updates!

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Tags: Bigbasket, Hari menon, Leadership change, Real-money gaming ban, Krutrim layoffs, Startup funding,