Anders Bagge framträdande i Sveriges Television i går kväll slutade i tragedi.

Multi-stage global investment firm B Capital has closed its second Opportunities fund at $750 million. Details on this and more in today’s ETtech Top 5.
Also in this letter:
■ No slowdown in web commerce
■ Jitesh Shah of Byju’s joins Ola Electric
■ Explained: Nvidia’s Blackwell AI chip
B Capital cofounders Raj Ganguly (left) and Eduardo Saverin
Global investment firm B Capital, which has backed the likes of Byju’s, Meesho and Pharmeasy in India, on Tuesday said it has closed its second Opportunities fund at $750 million.
Fund details: Through B Capital Opportunities Fund II, the entity will make primary and secondary follow-on investments in late-stage portfolio companies across core sectors of technology, healthcare, and climate tech. It will look to back startups across North America and Asia.
A small portion of the new fund will also be invested across new investment opportunities.
Sarthak Misra
SoftBank India elevates Sarthak Misra: SoftBank India has elevated its investment director Sarthak Misra to a partner, sources told us.
Who is he? Misra joined the fund in 2019 from Matrix Partners India. He sits on the board of ecommerce firm Meesho and business-to-business etailer OfBusiness, and also works closely with companies like Swiggy and Lenskart.
Inside leadership structure: Sumer Juneja, managing partner, India & EMEA, heads the India and Europe market for the technology investment fund. Juneja has now been running the India investment team at SoftBank for more than five years.
Besides Misra, Narendra Rathi, investment director at SoftBank Investment Advisors, looks at deals in SaaS and business-to-business (B2B) sectors. Both Misra and Rathi will continue to report to Juneja.
Catch up quick: We reported on March 11 that homegrown investment fund A91 Partners, which has backed Digit Insurance, HealthKart, Blue Tokai Coffee, and Paper Boat, is in the process of raising its largest yet fund at $700-750 million. This will be among the fastest scaleups in terms of fund size for a domestic investment fund amid a broader appetite for the India market among limited partners.
BookMyShow’s Ashish Hemrajani at Startup Mahakumbh in conversation with Accel’s Prashanth Prakash
Live entertainment and sports are becoming big forms of entertainment for the youth, BookMyShow founder and chief executive Ashish Hemrajani said on Tuesday.
Shifting focus: “Roti, kapada, makan is done. Discerning people have got the money. Now they’re focusing on outside of science and maths. They are focusing on art, music, sport,” he said on the second day of Startup Mahakumbh in New Delhi. According to Hemrajani, these spaces are becoming commercial as well.
Quote, unquote: “We decided to jump into the live event space because we wanted to disrupt that and we created that for the youth and the younger demographic of India,” said Hemrajani. While there was initial concern that OTT platforms would kill theatricals, after Covid-19, OTT platforms took advantage of theatricals by investing heavily in content, he said.
Also read | Indian startups seen raising $10-12 billion this year: Peak XV’s Rajan Anandan
Catch up quick: The first day of the three-day Startup Mahakumbh saw a wide range of deliberations and sessions. A deeptech startup policy is in the final stages of inter-ministerial consultations, department for promotion of industry and internal trade (DPIIT) secretary RK Singh said.
Also read | Indians opting for premium products, say Lenskart, BlueStone founders
In a chat with Info Edge cofounder and vice-chairman Sanjeev Bikhchandani, Deepinder Goyal said quick-commerce platform Blinkit will become larger than its parent Zomato’s food-delivery business in a year.
Also read | India needs different approach to AI; focus on opportunities holds the key: Nasscom president Debjani Ghosh
Even with the end of Covid-era restrictions, and physical stores reopening for business as usual, web commerce has not slowed down as much as expected. The convenient contactless delivery from online shopping, which boomed during the pandemic years, seems to be sticking.
No slowdown: Whether it’s everyday treats like cookies or big-ticket items like TVs and refrigerators, online sales are going strong, as high, or even higher than during lockdown periods, according to data from NielsenIQ and GfK.
Changing ways: “This reflects a post-pandemic change in consumer behaviour, particularly in metro areas, where online shopping is gaining popularity due to its convenience, variety and competitive pricing,” Praful Babar, head of ecommerce for FMCG at NielsenIQ, told ET.
Breaking it down: Data shows online sales of FMCG products jumped in 2023.
Also read | Quick-commerce becomes the villain for neighbourhood kirana stores
Niche products: GfK data reveals online sales of electronics and appliances like refrigerators, washing machines and TVs surged in 2023, outpacing offline growth. Online sales of categories like frost-free refrigerators, front-loading washing machines, and bigger TVs (55 inches and above) doubled compared to their offline counterparts.
Also read | Ecommerce clicks dip in December, triggering growth concerns
Jitesh Shah
Ola Electric has brought in Jitesh Shah, the former business head of Byju’s exam prep and Aakash digital businesses, as the head of its after-sales and services division.
Tell me more: Shah, who began working at Ola Electric a few months ago, is spearheading an expansion of Ola’s service centres and fast-charging network, as well as an extension of warranty on all new scooter sales announced by the firm in February.
Byju’s stint: Shah was among the two senior executives heading business verticals at Bjyu’s. He was appointed right after the beleaguered edtech startup consolidated four verticals into two in August last year.
Catch up quick: The electric scooter maker is looking to expand its charging network ten times over to 10,000 fast-charging points by the end of the next quarter, while also expanding its service centre network from the current 400 to 600 by April 2024, founder and managing director Bhavish Aggarwal had said in February.
The company has also finalised plans to launch an electric autorickshaw meant to be sold directly to consumers, we reported. The vehicle, which may be launched later this month, is likely to be called Raahi.
Nvidia Corporation, the world’s largest manufacturer of artificial intelligence (AI) chips, unveiled a new generation of software — Blackwell — during its annual GPU technology conference (GTC) in San Jose, California, solidifying its dominance in the AI world.
Tell me more: The new generation of AI graphics processors is called Blackwell B200 GPU, with the first superchip named GB200, which pairs two B200 GPUs with a Grace CPU, set to be shipped later this year.
What does it do? Blackwell chips enable organisations like Amazon Web Services, Dell Technologies, Google, Meta and Microsoft to develop and operate real-time generative AI on trillion-parameter large language models while reducing costs and energy consumption by up to 25 times compared to chips like H100.
Growth trajectory: Nvidia’s shares have surged 240% over the past 12 months, making it the U.S. stock market’s third most valuable company, behind only Microsoft and Apple. It dominates the data center AI chip market, capturing roughly an 80% share last year.
Rivals in the AI race: Nvidia faces strong competition from rivals like Intel and AMD, both of which introduced new products to the market last year. In December, Intel unveiled a series of AI chips, including Gaudi3, a GPU intended to compete with Nvidia and AMD’s offerings.
Today’s ETtech Top 5 newsletter was curated by Megha Mishra in Mumbai.

Categories: Music