Índex per November 7, 2016 a Open Magazine

EVERYTHING WAS READY for the launch of Help Us Green in early 2015. The company had started collecting flower waste from the banks of the Ganges in Kanpur. It had begun recycling the waste, turning it into incense sticks and organic vermicompost. The founders, Ankit Agarwal and Karan Rastogi, had successfully trademarked the term ‘flowercycle’. And local women self-help groups had already been contracted for both collecting waste and manufacturing the products. But there was one thing missing. The duo was still waiting for a sheet of paper they had planted a few weeks ago to sprout into a tulsi plant. The first shoot signalled that their work was now ready to be shown to the world. “We realised that there was no point in recycling if the packaging we…

IT IS 2016 and artificial intelligence, or AI, is now a slightly worn idea, a long-simmering sauce that we occasionally glance at to check if it has reached a boil. Of late, the heat has been turned up by the Goliaths of the tech world—Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, IBM and Microsoft—who are using it to make the tools we use every day tools smarter, and by its Davids: the startups that employ AI to predict disasters, hasten drug discovery, and build chatbots with the emotional quotient to engage patients with chronic ailments. With improved computational power derived from GPU acceleration and the ubiquity of connected devices, the tools of AI—computer vision, pattern recognition, machine learning and deep learning—are finally being harnessed to remarkable effect. The sauce, which had been reduced…

WHAT IF THERE is no real difference between French and English, Hebrew and Malayalam, Sanskrit and Swahili? What if every human language follows the same cognitive algorithm to express thought? And what if the underlying structures that constitute the grammar of a language are not just some immutable rules prescribed centuries ago, but a set of logical relationships between words? The idea is a dazzling one. It has been decades since Noam Chomsky, the American linguist and polymath, proposed the theory of a universal grammar: the idea that all languages are built on the same template and that children’s minds come programmed with this, which is why they can pick up language—any language—fast. A pathbreaking app for the iPhone and the iPad is now exploring how the brain learns language…

FROM A NONDESCRIPT garage-like office on the northern fringes of Bangalore, a team of young engineers is launching its dreams into the sky, one metal bird at a time. Among the few drone companies in India that design, build and fly commercial drones to survey large swathes of land and analyse the data captured, Aarav Unmanned Systems was an idea hatched at IIT-Kanpur over three years ago. The institute has a dedicated airstrip where students can test—and crash—their drones and Aarav’s founders did just that. Nikhil Upadhye, Suhas Banshiwala and Vipul Singh—Yeshwanth Reddy, with an MTech in Aerospace Engineering from IIT-Bombay, would join them later—shared a relish for aero-modelling and robotics and represented their alma mater in an international aero design competition organised by NASA, where they had to design…

India is a diversified finance market, driven by consumer sentiment and investment in retail assets. When we talk of consumerism, it can be perceived in context of both asset buying and also, intangible value attached to investments done by individuals. Indian investment growth has been propelled by the economic growth; which meant more disposable income on one hand and on the other; it meant adapting to a lifestyle. Caught between the paradox situation of rising inflation and new means of economic spending; there was a definite change happening in context of financial investments. People were investing in all forms to secure their future, for their loved ones or have a post-retirement lifestyle on their own terms. This led to change in the fundamental approach towards savings to investment. People were…

According to an India Brand Equity Foundation report, India’s insurable population is anticipated to touch 750 million in 2020, with life expectancy reaching 74 years. Furthermore, life insurance is projected to comprise 35 per cent of total savings by the end of this decade, as against 26 per cent in 2009-10. From the regulatory perspective, there are many positive changes happening; such as the recent approval by the Government to allow 49% FDI in insurance companies. This will only mean more money pumped into the Indian insurance economy, to make further inroads into the wide-spread market. Erstwhile, there are many demographic factors that are driving the huge change, as far as life insurance is concerned. There is a huge middle-class population in India, which is self-aware of health, wealth, and…

IT WAS THE winter of early 2014. Akash Agarwal had just reached Saharanpur, on his way from Delhi to see his grandparents, when he noticed milkmen with huge cans of milk standing on both sides of the road. It was late afternoon, and a curious Agarwal stopped his car to chat with them. “They were waiting for a pickup truck to take the milk to the nearest processing centre, which is 40-50 km away in Badaut,” says the 25-year-old. “There was no storage facility or cold storage nearby. If the pick-up didn’t happen for some reason, they would sell their milk at throwaway prices only because they couldn’t store it.” Agarwal left for Delhi the next morning, but the idea of doing something to help the milkmen stuck with him.…

The middle-class consumer is no longer willing to keep only an entry-level car, but has an aspiration to drive home a sedan or a luxury sedan. Flexible EMI options made this dream a reality, with most households in Metro cities now keeping a garage space for 2-3 cars. However, there is a rider attached to this whole formula of having more than one car—the maintenance, besides affordability of a BMW or an Audi for example. This alone led to a resurgence of sorts for used cars in India. Certified user cars sold by branded dealers is the new norm to buy your dream car now. If we look a bit deeper into the demand of the used cars, we realise that there is a wider opportunity for banks to provide…

Investment is a risk aversion or risk management? This is a question still most of us debate in our minds, which has just slightly drifted from a family savings norm to a market-led income growth. The arrival of financial instruments such as insurance—the sector which led an initial awareness for risk management in 2000s onwards—led to partial acceptance of risk assurance. A positive outlook for mutual funds came with promising economic reforms. There was an emerging segment of equity market investors, who would dig into the world of volatile market conditions; led by the small and mid-size cap funds. This is a growing trend in the emerging and developed economies and few of them have found their way on NYSE such as Makemytrip—a revolutionary online travel product. Small cap funds…

FOR THE SEVEN long years that she worked at pulling Kalakshetra out of its self-induced torpor, Bharatnatyam dancer Leela Samson stayed off the stage. It was a painful decision for a dancer in her prime and, as she points out wryly, few institutional heads bother to avoid conflict of interest. She is now 65, and back, with a hectic schedule of solo works and workshops planned across the globe. But it is Spanda, her 21-yearold dance company that is getting the most of her attentions. “Spanda suffered the most for my absence. Pulling a group back together takes time. Except Aditi (Jaitly), the team is entirely new and from different banis (styles) which makes for an interesting mix. But to get the dynamics of a collaboration going—the different personalities, styles,…

THE DAY AFTER he received his first promotion at consulting firm McKinsey & Co in 2011, Kunal Gandhi, then aged 30, unexpectedly decided to quit. He left his plush apartment and cabin in Brussels, where he was based, and returned to his hometown of Jaipur. He’d been away for a long time, studying at St Xavier’s College, Bombay, IIT Bombay and then IIM Ahmedabad, and he wasn’t sure what exactly he wanted to do next. All he knew for certain was that he wanted to become an entrepreneur. “It was a ‘now or never’ moment for me. When I was promoted at McKinsey, it suddenly hit me that if I took up the position, I would become entangled in the corporate web forever. It would be too late and I…

ON 24 DECEMBER two years ago, Chhattisgarh boy Geetansh Bamania turned 26 and he was going to celebrate it with his parents over dinner at a restaurant in Mumbai. His parents reached on time, but he called to inform them that he would not be able to make it. They had to go ahead with the celebration by themselves. Bamania was in another part of the city, delivering furniture to a client. After ensuring that it was lined up in the corner chosen by the client, he heaved a sigh of relief. He had started Rentomojo, a portal that would rent out furniture, furnishings, appliances and other home essentials, just a few days earlier. This was his first order and that it happened to be his birthday was just tough…

The real estate industry has seen a sluggish growth due to an economic slowdown, which in turn, meant real estate economy stakeholders facing a challenging time. There was a crisis situation evident, where many projects were built, but remained unsold. Add to it, the increasing pressure on the builders by a rising consumer sentiment that ‘deliver on time’ or face the legal consequences. Amid all this, banks grew at a rate of 19% during FY2016. This was achieved by offering better rates, increased retail focus and balance transfers of existing home loans. Government of India has devised a plan ‘Housing for All’ under which 20 million homes for the urban poor will be provided by 2022. Meanwhile, RBI increased the lending amount value for banks to give to the home…

As per ICRA’s estimates, the total housing credit outstanding in India as on March 31, 2016 was around Rs 12.5 trillion as against Rs 10.5 trillion as on March 31, 2015, indicating an annualised growth of 19% in FY16. The housing credit growth was witnessed by both banks and Housing Finance Companies (HFCs). Growth in HFCs was further characterised by small entrants in the segment. They were focused on financing affordable housing schemes, and tapping selfemployed and new borrowers. Buying home was also being considered actively in Tier II/III cities. With the Government also laying focus on the affordable housing segment, HFCs have largely focused to provide loan access in rural and semi-urban areas. These areas are usually underbanked and presented a ready opportunity. A wide-spread population base supplemented by…