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India surpassed North America to take the top global spot in the smartwatch market in the quarter that ended in September, according to a report from market research player Counterpoint. The festival sales and proliferation of affordable smartwatches helped grew the local market by 171% year-on-year.

The affordable smartwatch models getting bigger displays and adding features such as Bluetooth calling were key selling factors in India during the festival sales, Hong Kong-headquartered Counterpoint said.

“Indian brands expanding their product portfolios at affordable price points and emphasis on local manufacturing also contributed to the growth,” Counterpoint analyst Anshika Jain said in a statement.

“Bluetooth-calling emerged as an important feature, contributing a 58% share in total shipments, the highest ever share to date. Consumers are also preferring bigger display sizes, which is evident from the fact that over half of the total shipments in Q3 came from the 1.5”-1.69” display size.”

North America, which was the top market from Q4 2020 to Q2 2022, grew 21% year-on-year while China and Europe had a negative growth.

India’s growth meant that the country’s top brand Noise captured third place on overall shipment charts — thanks to a 218% year-on-year growth— only lagging Apple and Samsung.

The smartwatchmaker told TechCrunch that it aims to scale its local production from 50% to 80% by the end of the year. Local rival Fire-Boltt, which was only a percentage behind Noise in the market share, grabbed the fourth place in global rankings.

Apple grew 48% due to stellar sales of the new Apple Watch 8 series, which accounted for 56% of overall sales. Samsung grew 6% year-on-year despite registering a 62% shipping increase from the previous quarter.

Counterpoint report segregates smartwatches into two categories: High-level operating system smartwatches (HLOS), which include devices from companies like Apple, Samsung, Huawei, Garmin, and Amazfit; and what it calls “basic” smartwatches that feature a lighter operating system and are more affordable. Noise, Fire-Bollt, and BoAT operate in the latter category.

The research shop said that the HLOS segment grew 23%, whereas basic smartwatches grew by more than a double — resulting in commanding a 35% of the market share. Apple currently dominates the HLOS market with about 50% market share whereas Samsung sits second in the chart.

“This remarkable increase in basic smartwatch shipments shows us that the market base is rapidly expanding toward more accessible segments amid aggressive drives by the supply side. But still, in terms of revenue, the HLOS smartwatch overwhelms the basic smartwatch with a market size of almost 10 times due to its high average selling price (ASP),” Research Analyst Woojin Son said in a statement.

Earlier this month, analyst firm IDC published a report on India’s wearable market, noting that the smartwatch segment grew by 178% with more than 12 million units shipped in the quarter ending September. The report said that this growth could also be attributed to falling smartwatch prices in the region as the average selling price dropped from $60 to $41.9 in a year. This is an indicator that Indian consumers are likely to go for cheaper alternatives than the Apple Watch or the Samsung Galaxy Watch.

All the India-based smartwatch manufacturers have committed to rapidly increasing their local manufacturing output in the coming months to increase the production rate. This could help them bring down the device prices further and increase shipments to catch up with Samsung and Apple in unit shipments.

India pips North America to become the biggest smartwatch market by Ivan Mehta originally published on TechCrunch

Telegram has disclosed names of administrators, their phone numbers and IP addresses of channels accused of copyright infringement in compliance with a court order in India in a remarkable illustration of the data the instant messaging platform stores on its users and can be made to disclose by authorities.

The app operator was forced to shared the data after a teacher sued the firm for not doing enough to prevent unauthorised distribution of her course material on the platform. Neetu Singh, the plaintiff teacher, said a number of Telegram channels were re-selling her study materials without permission at discounted prices.

An Indian court earlier had ordered Telegram to adhere to the Indian law and disclose details about those operating such channels.

Telegram unsuccessfully argued that disclosing user information would violate the privacy policy and the laws of Singapore, where it has located its physical servers for storing users data. In response, the Indian court said the copyright owners couldn’t be left “completely remediless against the actual infringers” because Telegram has chosen to locate its servers outside the country.

In an order last week, Justice Prathiba Singh said Telegram had complied with the earlier order and shared the data.

“Let copy of the said data be supplied to Id. Counsel for plaintiffs with the clear direction that neither the plaintiffs nor their counsel shall disclose the said data to any third party, except for the purposes of the present proceedings. To this end, disclosure to the governmental authorities/police is permissible,” said the court (PDF) and first reported by LiveLaw.

A Telegram spokesperson declined to say whether the app operator shared private data.

“Telegram stores very limited or no data on its users. In most cases, we can’t even access any user data without specific entry points, and we believe this was the case here. Consequently, we can’t confirm that any private data has been shared in this instance,” Telegram spokesperson Remi Vaughn told TechCrunch.

India is one of the largest markets for Telegram, which has amassed nearly 150 million users in the South Asian market.

Telegram shares data of users accused of copyright violation following court order by Manish Singh originally published on TechCrunch

Over the past 11 years, eFounders has refined the startup studio model in Europe. The company has contributed to the launch of more than 30 different startups, including three unicorns —Spendesk, Aircall and Front.

While things seem to be doing well for the startup studio, eFounders is pivoting — sort of. As of today, eFounders is becoming Hexa, a holding company for different startup studios.

You could have seen this change coming as eFounders hasn’t been just eFounders for a while. In addition to its initial studio focused on the future of work, eFounders has already launched two new studios — Logic Founders for fintech startups and 3founders for web3 startups.

Hexa is going to run three different studios — Logic Founders, 3founders and, yes, eFounders. So what is happening with eFounders then?

“I started writing a LinkedIn article saying that it is the last time I’m writing as the founder of eFounders,” eFounders co-founder Thibaud Elzière told me. But he is not going anywhere as the eFounders core team is simply going to work for Hexa now.

Just like with Hexa’s other studios, there is a dedicated eFounders team with a head of studio as well as a core team of product people. Matthieu Vaxelaire is now at the helm of eFounders.

Combined, Hexa companies have hired 3,000 people and have reached a total valuation of $5 billion. And Hexa isn’t going to change its formula going forward. Hexa’s startup studios match an idea with a founding team.

The studio team then provides resources and help to launch a product. After raising some funding, startups gain their independence and the startup studio can move on and focus on new projects.

“We reached a limit when it comes to scalability. It’s a virtuous model but it’s also very much handcrafted work,” Elzière told me. In addition to supporting Hexa’s existing studios, the company wants to launch studios around new verticals, such as climate, education and health.

But it will depend on heads of studio that they meet and end up hiring. Hexa aims to launch two new studios next year.

“It’s a crazy bet for us. We are creating a brand from scratch. And we are doing that because eFounders is a strong brand when it comes to SaaS startups, but also because eFounders was outshining other studios,” Elzière said.

A 30% stake

“What we are doing with Hexa is that we are democratizing team entrepreneurship. We offer an alternative to traditional entrepreneurship” Elzière said. “Like a lot of things in life, when you work as a team, it works better.”

But that doesn’t mean that Hexa and its startup studios are launching new startups for fun. They are taking a significant stake in each new startup.

“We want to launch more startups. But it costs us around €800,000 to launch a company. We can either invest some money ourselves, or we could create a small fund like Y Combinator. Investors could contribute and they would end up on the cap table.”

When Hexa’s startup studios launch a new startup, they try to keep a 30% stake in the company after raising a seed round. With third-party investors, Hexa could lower its stake to something like 25%, and investors would get 5%.

Hexa’s own stake would be split between Hexa and each startup studio. “You would have 5 to 10% that would be allocated to the head of studio and their team,” Elzière said. The bottom line is that Hexa and its partners would still take a 30% stake. Then it would be split between multiple partners.

“That deal might seem a bit unfair,” Elzière said. But he thinks eFounders’ track record speaks for itself. With roughly 3 unicorns out of 30 portfolio companies, entrepreneurs are more likely to create a unicorn with the help of eFounders than without. Essentially, founders can potentially get a smaller portion of a bigger cake.

The life and death of startup studios

But where does Hexa come from exactly? It comes from the hexadecimal numbering system. In particular, hexadecimals are used to represent binary digits (0 and 1) in computing programming. Each hexadecimal character represents a succession of four binary digits.

“For me, it’s the simplest expression of the human-machine interface,” Elzière said. As a bonus, hexadecimal characters are also used by designers for color codes.

He believes that startup studios will work just like startups. Some of them will thrive, others will fail. “Studios will have a certain lifespan. At some point, they’ll run out of steam because the head of studio won’t be there anymore or there won’t be any opportunity left,” Elzière said. As always, we will judge the quality of Hexa’s work by the new startups that emerge from those studios.

eFounders morphs into Hexa, a portfolio company of startup studios by Romain Dillet originally published on TechCrunch

Disney paid $900 million to Major League Baseball (MLB) earlier this month to buy out the league’s remaining 15% stake in the streaming firm BAMTech, according to an SEC filing made public Tuesday.

The transaction makes Disney a 100% owner of the streaming company that powers Disney+ and the firm’s other consumer services.

The SEC filing noted that MLB’s interest in BAMTech was recorded in the entertainment company’s financial statements at $828 million, and in November Disney bought out MLB’s stake for $900 million. Last week, Disney announced that Bob Iger is returning to the company as a CEO to replace Bob Chapek. Since this transaction was undertaken earlier this month, it was probably one of the last big moves by Chapek.

In the filing, Disney said that Iger will “initiate organizational and operating changes within the Company to address the Board’s goals” in the coming months.

MLB founded MLB Advanced Media in 2000 to power its website and online streaming. It spun off the streaming division as BAMTech in 2015. A year later, Disney invested $1 billion for a 33% stake in BAMTech. In 2017, the entertainment conglomerate invested an additional $1.58 billion to acquire 42% more stake. In 2021, the National Hockey League (NHL) sold its 10% stake to Disney for $350 million— propelling Disney’s stake in BAMTech to 85%.

The move comes days before Disney+ is set to launch its ad-supported tier. In Q3 2022, the streaming service registered an increase of 12 million subscribers with a total of 164.2 million subscribers globally.

Disney coughs up $900M to acquire MLB’s remaining stake in BAMTech streaming company by Ivan Mehta originally published on TechCrunch

Gogoro, the Taiwanese company that’s commercializing battery swapping ecosystems for electric scooters, is targeting the Philippines as its next market. The startup said Tuesday it has partnered with Filipino conglomerate Ayala Corporation, telecomms provider Globe and corporate venture builder 917Ventures to launch a B2B battery swapping pilot in Manila in the first quarter of 2023.

917Ventures is a subsidiary of Globe, which is part of Ayala Corporation’s umbrella.

The partnership with heavy hitters in the Filipino ecosystem comes a few days after the Philippines approved the removal of import duties on electric vehicles and their parts for the next five years. The move is part of the Philippines’ Electric Vehicle Industry Development Act, signed into law this year, to promote clean energy innovation. Horace Luke, founder and CEO of Gogoro, told TechCrunch the tariff removal applies to battery charging and swapping equipment, as well, making it the perfect time for Gogoro to introduce its battery swapping stations and Smartscooters into the country.

“The Philippines is trying to electrify, so we’re progressively saying we’re gonna be the first one to really take a leadership position in that and lead the market,” Luke said. “We see a huge opportunity for us to grow the market because there just hasn’t been the mass adoption of two-wheelers yet. And as they adopt, it would be great if it goes towards electrification.”

Eventually, Gogoro wants to bring an open network battery swapping system to the Philippines, one that’s compatible with locally produced electric two-wheelers as well as Gogoro’s own Smartscooters — Gogoro has worked with electric two-wheeler manufacturers in India and China to integrate its own swappable batteries into their scooters for easier market entry, rather than having to also import its own Smartscooters.

The Philippines is a different type of market, though. Two-wheelers have not historically been as popular in the country, as compared to India or China, said Luke. Market adoption is starting to pick up now alongside the increase of delivery and logistics services, hence Gogoro’s strategy of entering the market with a B2B pilot focused on the logistics industry.

Gogoro wouldn’t announce which delivery provider it will initially partner with, but Ayala Corp does have its own dedicated unit, AC Logistics. Luke said by early next year, Gogoro will have sent through several hundreds of its Smartscooters and several hundreds batteries, as well as half a dozen swapping stations, which will be placed throughout Manila for delivery riders to use.

“We’re going to use B2B as the first step to really build what we call the base load,” said Luke. “Base load is basically the minimum amount of users using the network that allows you to actually create a business model that is proven to be workable. Now, given the gas prices in the Philippines, given the amount of logistics rider output everyday, this is an opportunity for us to demonstrate that the business model is viable.”

The pilot will last at least six months before expanding to new B2B partners or even private consumers, said Luke. During that time, Gogoro hopes to gain feedback from the market both on whether two-wheelers can be adopted in the Philippines and on whether battery swapping will take hold alongside two-wheeler adoption. Gogoro will also collect data from vehicles while they’re on the road in order to fine tune its system, said Luke.

“More than 25% of Taiwan’s quick commerce deliveries and almost all of their electric deliveries are powered by Gogoro’s battery-swapping technology, and we see this solution being most beneficial to a densely populated region like Metro Manila, which is also the hub of business districts,” said Patrick Aquino, director of the Department of Energy’s Energy Utilization Management Bureau in the Philippines, in a statement. “The success of this pilot will pave the way for a new sustainable business model in other cities in the country as well. Philippines can learn from Taiwan’s experience.”

Gogoro’s global network includes nearly 11,000 battery swapping stations at over 2,260 locations. The company, which has a market dominance in Taiwan, says it hosts more than 370,000 daily battery swaps with more than 360 million total swaps to date.

The company recently announced a similar B2B partnership with EV-as-a-Service platform Zypp Electric to electrify logistics fleets and last-mile deliveries in India. Gogoro expects to launch a pilot with Zypp in Delhi in December, which will compliment Gogoro’s existing consumer-focused partnership in India with local two-wheeler manufacturer Hero MotoCorp.

Gogoro also recently launched battery swapping stations and Smartscooters in Tel Aviv, and has a presence in China and Indonesia, as well.

Gogoro to pilot battery swapping and Smartscooters in Philippines next year by Rebecca Bellan originally published on TechCrunch

Prismforce, an India-U.S. startup that provides IT and tech services companies with tools to build better talent supply chain, has raised $13.6 million in a Series A round led by Sequoia Capital India.

IT providers spend a large part of their variable costs on hiring skilled employees. But finding those employees from the ever-growing talent market and deploying them effectively to get adequate results is one of the most significant pain points for the industry worldwide.

Prismforce is taking Amazon’s approach to matching the demand for talent with the supply for companies offering IT and tech services, said co-founder and CEO Somnath Chatterjee.

“We are treating this as a supply chain problem, where you have to standardize demand, standardize supply, make the match happen, almost as if you are an e-commerce engine and e-commerce marketplace trying to make a talent marketplace,” he said in an interview with TechCrunch.

After spending 14 years as a partner at McKinsey, Chatterjee founded Prismforce with Mohd Qasim in April 2021. Qasim also worked as a senior engagement manager at McKinsey.

While working at the management consulting firm, both co-founders served several IT providers, which helped them identify the problem that Prismforce aims to solve.

Prismforce’s product catalog includes SkillPrism, which uses AI over a skill inventory management application to automate talent profiling. The startup also offers IntelliPrism for an end-to-end resource management module with AI-driven search and match, OutlookPrism to enable workforce planning and resource forecasting and InsightPrism to offer CXO dashboards.

The Delaware-registered startup, which has a wholly-owned India subsidiary and offices in San Francisco, Mumbai and Bengaluru, is currently on track to amass 10 clients by the end of this year, with the smallest client generating $400 million of revenue while the biggest counterpart making more than $10 billion. Chatterjee did not disclose their names but said half of them have their presence in India, while half of them are U.S.-domiciled companies.

The executive said that he expects the geographical ratio of the startup’s clients shift over time, with 70–80% coming from English-speaking countries, such as the U.S., U.K. and Europe.

Although the primary focus of Prismforce is limited to companies offering IT and tech services, it also targets entities in the enterprise IT domain. The startup also plans to reach professional services firms in the future, including accounting, tax and consulting firms, Chatterjee said.

“It is a lot more pertinent for IT companies because the underlying skills are changing very fast, which is not the case for many of these consulting and professional services companies. But that could be the third horizon we can go to,” he noted.

With the fresh funding from Sequoia Capital India and global angel investors, Prismforce plans to scale up its go-to-market reach, enhance its product suite and grow its talent base from the existing team of over 60 members to a 120–140 group in the next nine to 12 months.

“The technology services industry, with a cumulative market cap of over $4 trillion and a global workforce of over 20 million, is a core pillar of the global digital economy. Despite that, there is no large vertical software vendor serving its varied needs,” said Abhishek Mohan, principal at Sequoia Capital India, in a prepared statement.

“Somnath and Qasim’s vision is to create the defining vertical software company for technology and professional services. Over the past year, this vision has been validated by multiple industry-leading IT providers, which have deployed Prismforce products to great impact.”

Prismforce has raised a total of $15.4 million to date, with $1.8 million infused in a seed funding round a year ago from an undisclosed group of angel investors that included serial entrepreneurs and SaaS founders.

Sequoia India backs Prismforce that helps IT companies build better talent supply chain by Jagmeet Singh originally published on TechCrunch