Latest News

YouTube , the online video streaming portal, has updated its mobile app for intuitive user experience. The YouTube app update applies Google’s Material design that brings host of new features and redefined the existing ones of the app. Here are the key new features added to the app: Design: The navigation tabs are moved to the bottom and now features two new tabs – Library and Account. The header is coloured in white so that the content can take the lead. Gestures: The app supports double tap gestures on the left or right side, which fast forward or rewind 10 seconds of a video. In the coming months, accoridng to the YouTube official blogpost, the app will get more gesture support that will allow users to jump between videos with a swipe of your hand -- swipe left to watch a previous video or swipe right to watch the next one.

Infosys founders participating in the Rs 13,000 crore buyback offer does not give any wrong signal to shareholders, the IT giant's former CFO V Balakrishnan has said. Infosys on Monday had said that some of the members of the promoter and promoters group of the company have communicated their intention to participate in the proposed buyback. "One can have some concern only if founders sell their holding in normal circumstances. Buyback is another form of dividend which is tax efficient in Indian context and hence the founders participating in that does not give any wrong signal to shareholders," Balakrishnan told PTI. He was replying to a question whether founders participating in the buyback offer would send a wrong signal that promoters are taking a bleak view on the company's future. "Buyback is a pro-rata right given to all shareholders and if exercised by all of them will ensure the economic interests levels of all shareholders remaining...

Chinese electronics company TCL will launch a full touchscreen smartphone under the BlackBerry name in October -- a month after Apple launches its new flagship iPhone 8 and a refresh of iPhone 7 devices According to a report in Engadget, TCL's François Mahieu said the new phone would respect BlackBerry's reputation for building hard-wearing devices for clumsy international travellers who will be working in all kinds of weather. "The main feature, beyond the full-touchscreen, is the (planned) IP67 water and dust-proofing, as well as a battery rated to last for more than 26 hours of mixed use," Mahieu was quoted as saying. It is clear that the company would keep durability and longevity as its biggest selling points. Mahieu claimed that a number of iPhone and Galaxy users would "make the switch" to BlackBerry come October. He said that BlackBerry's security know-how will enable TCL to deliver the "most secure Android phone in the ...

The government has notified the Banking Regulation (Amendment) Act under which it can authorise the RBI to issue directions to banks to initiate insolvency resolution process to recover bad loans. The banking sector is saddled with non-performing assets (NPAs) of over Rs 8 lakh crore, of which Rs 6 lakh crore is with public sector banks (PSBs). Earlier this month, Parliament had approved the Act, which replaced an ordinance in this regard. The government in May had promulgated an ordinance authorising the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to issue directions to banks to initiate insolvency resolution process under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016. Following the ordinance, the RBI had identified 12 accounts each having more than Rs 5,000 crore of outstanding loans and accounting for 25 per cent of total NPAs of banks for immediate referral for resolution under the bankruptcy law. The loan defaulters identified by the RBI include, Essar Steel, Bhushan Steel, AB...

Many Facebook users today reported experiencing an outage as they "struggled" to access the popular social media site. A section of users across geographies, including the US and Europe, reported that they faced log-in problems, while others had a difficulty in uploading videos, liking or commenting on posts, loading pages, or saw error messages. It could not be confirmed if users in India also faced a similar difficulty. An email sent to Facebook did not elicit any response. While reports put the number of affected users to thousands, not all users faced issues on the popular social media platform. Facebook has over two billion monthly active users globally. India is one of the biggest markets for the US-based firm. There were also reports of some users of Instagram — another Facebook-owned app — facing issues. Desktop and mobile app users both seemed to have faced problems although the reason for the outage was not immediately clear.

Infosys gained over 3% in trade on Monday to Rs 941 levels on the National Stock Exchange , after Nandan Nilekani assumed charge as its non-executive chairman over the weekend. The stock hit a high of Rs 953.95 and a low of Rs 938 on the NSE in morning deals. By comparison, the Nifty50 and the Nifty IT indices gained 0.4% and 0.8%, respectively. Given the development, brokerages have revised their price target for the stock and suggest that the worst may be over for the company as regards corporate governance issues are concerned. Infosys, they feel, can now get back to focussing on tackling business-related issues. Also Read: Reimagining Infosys: Nandan Nilekani has to restore credibility Here’s is a quick compilation of what leading brokerages and research houses said. JEFFERIES Co-founder Nandan Nilekani was appointed Non-exec Chairman of the board, with current Chairman, ex-CEO and two independent members stepping down. This brings stability to the board, alle...

Nandan Nilekani , non-executive chairman of Infosys, has promised to bring stability back to India’s second-largest software exporter in spite of a “complex environment”. He, however, has a bigger task at hand — building a strong and independent board. The abrupt restructuring of directors and the board’s U-turn from accusing N R Narayana Murthy to almost apologising to the Infosys co-founder immediately after Nilekani’s return, have left observers concerned. Analysts say it is unclear whether Infosys would make the Panaya acquisition investigation report public, one of the key demands of Murthy. This is despite Nilekani having made it clear that he would take a call after evaluating the reports. “ Who was actually in control of the company? The board has changed and the six directors have been changed. The CEO has also changed….,” said Shriram Subramanian, founder and managing director of InGovern Research, a proxy advisory firm. “From foreign institutional institution...

In a landmark judgement, the Supreme Court today termed triple talaq unconstitutional and striked it down triple by 3-2 majority. A five judge constitutional bench by a 3:2 majority judgement said there is no constitutional protection for triple talaq. Justices Kurien Joseph, Rohinton Fali Nariman and Udey Umesh Lalit held that triple talaq is not integral to Islam, is banned in law and lacks approval of the Shariat. However, Chief Justice J.S. Khehar and Justice S. Abdul Nazir, in a minority judgment, said triple talaq is integral to Islamic practices and enjoys constitutional protection. Khehar in his judgement urged parliament to pass a law to deal with the issue. He, however, injuncted Muslim men from pronouncing instant triple talaq for next six months within which he implored the political parties to shed their difference and enact a law. The Supreme Court by a majority verdict ruled on August 22 that the practice of divorce through triple talaq among the members of the Mu...

Megastar Chiranjeevi 's upcoming Telugu film has been titled "Sye Raa Narasimha Reddy", it was announced on Tuesday on the occasion of his birthday. The title logo and motion poster of the film was released by filmmaker S.S. Rajamouli here at an event on the special day of Chiranjeevi, who turned 62. The film, to be directed by Surender Reddy and produced by Ram Charan, will be based on the life of freedom fighter Uyyalawada Narasimha Reddy. It has been confirmed that the film will also stars Amitabh Bachchan, Kichcha Sudeep, Nayanthara, Vijay Sethupathi and Jagapathi Babu. Double Oscar-winning A.R. Rahman has been roped in to compose the music. Ravi Varman will crank the camera, while Rajeevan will take care of the art department.

Producer Shobu Yarlagadda must be buoyed by the phenomenal success of S.S. Rajamouli's " Baahubali " franchise. But he says the film steered its way through many problems to emerge successful. Speaking at the Indian Film Festival of Melbourne which concludes on Tuesday, Yarlagadda spoke about the problems he faced while making his movies. Rajamouli and Yarlagadda had previously worked together in Ram Charan's "Magadheera". Speaking on the length and budget of "Magadheera", he said: "The problem was the length - it couldn't fit into three hours. We weren't sure to let go of the story. "That's why we thought to do it as a two-part film. Rajamouli wanted to go back and try to accommodate it in a three-hour single film, but we stopped him from doing so." The team had to face a lot of problems before the release of "Magadheera", but Rajamouli's confidence helped steer through the obstacles. ...

Popular messaging app WhatsApp on Monday said it is exploring ways to check spread of fake news through its platform. WhatsApp software engineer Alan Kao termed the situation as "complex" because of the end-to-end encryption of messages on the platform that does not allow anyone -- except the sender and the receiver -- to read the messages. "We definitely do not want to see fake news on our platform and it's a complex problem in determining what is fake and what isn't. Because of the encryption, we can't read the contents of the messages," Kao told reporters in New Delhi. He added that the Facebook-owned company is looking at different ways in which they can tweak the product to "try and minimise" fake news. There have been a number of instances, including rumours of the new currency notes featuring a GPS chip and videos related to Muzaffarnagar riots, that were circulated and shared virally on WhatsApp as many took them to b...

Just three days after Vishal Sikka resigned as chief executive officer of Infosys , the country’s second-largest software company, went off the list of the top 10 companies by market capitalisation (m-cap) or value on the NSE. Infosys’ market capitalisation stood at Rs 2,00,617 crore on Monday, compared to Rs 2,12,067 crore on Friday at the closing price of Rs 923.25 on the NSE. A year ago, Infosys was ranked the fifth most valuable company in the country, with a market value of Rs 2,34,589 crore. Infosys, which fell to the 11th spot on Monday, was replaced by state-run Indian Oil Corporation. On the day of Sikka's resignation, Infosys lost Rs 22,418 crore of its market value. The stock on Monday closed at its three-year low on NSE, at a price of Rs 873, apiece. ALSO READ: Former CFO V Balakrishnan seeks exit of Infosys chairman, co-chairman These levels were last seen in August 2014. On Saturday, the Infosys board approved a Rs 13,000-crore share buyback. D...

With the festival season starting soon, banks are beginning to introduce their annual festive offers. The country’s largest bank, the State Bank of India (SBI) , announced a waiver of up to 100 per cent of processing fees on car loans, gold loans, and personal loans on Monday. In the second week of August, private sector lender ICICI Bank introduced the instant credit card for online shopping with a credit limit of up to Rs 4 lakh, based on pre-checked bureau scores. ICICI Bank has said customers can use the card for availing of offers on shopping, travel and entertainment offered by its online partners during the festive season. Punjab National Bank’s Monsoon Bonanza season has been running since June and it had waived processing fees for home and auto loans. City Union Bank is in partnership with Mastercard to offer the instant credit card with a credit limit of Rs 3 lakh. “ There could be some minor rate cut action in the coming days during the festival seaso...

Apple has more than $1-billion budgeted for original programming, Facebook wants its own version of “Scandal” and Google is ready to spend up to $3 million per episode on a drama. The three digital giants have signalled to Hollywood that they are serious about entering a television landscape that Netflix and Amazon shook up just a few years ago. Their arrival will make an already hypercompetitive industry even more ferocious. This year, there are expected to be more than 500 scripted TV shows, more than double the number six years ago. Although there have been some signs that the industry’s output may plateau - cable companies like A&E and WGN have said they are getting out of the scripted television business - the entry of Apple, Facebook and Google into the fray almost guarantees that the volume of shows will continue to grow, even as viewers grapple with a glut of programming and an expanding number of streaming platforms. With the prospect of a flood of tech mo...

The price of Infosys Technologies ' stock last week plummeted 10 per cent to Rs 923, thanks to the unsurprising exit of Vishal Sikka as the chief executive and managing director of the company. Worse, since his exit has been shrouded in controversies, the confidence that Sikka had built up in the stock since his appointment three years ago has also thinned significantly. The exit was indeed inevitable and that is clear from the fairly incisive questions raised by co-founder N R Narayana Murthy – now in the public domain. The questions dwell upon Sikka, the board’s conduct, the Panaya acquisition, and the severance package given to former chief financial officer Rajiv Bansal. The governance issues raised by Murthy give an impression that the board had not acted fairly on the whistleblower report highlighting malpractices during Sikka’s regime. In questioning the processes followed by the company’s board, Murthy represents himself and "some well-meaning shareholders...

Infosys on Saturday announced that it would buy back shares of up to Rs 13,000 crore, or 4.92 per cent, from investors at Rs 1,150 per share. The buyback price is a 24.5 per cent premium over Friday’s closing price of Rs 923. The stock closed at Rs 976.8 on Wednesday. On Friday, with Chief Executive Officer Vishal Sikka announcing his decision to quit, the share value plunged 9.6 per cent. “ The buyback offer size is 20.51 per cent of the total paid-up equity capital... The buyback offer will comprise a purchase of up to about 113 million equity shares, aggregating up to 4.92 per cent of the paid-up equity share capital of the company, at a price of Rs 1,150 per equity share,” Infosys said in its filing to the BSE. Infosys has been under pressure from investors to stop hoarding cash. The Bengaluru-based IT services major had cash reserves of Rs 39,335 crore on June 30. Even with the Rs 13,000-crore bounty for shareholders, Infosys will still have Rs 26,000 crore. The IT se...

With thousands of home buyers of Jaypee Infratech languishing with stuck projects, industry body Assocham on Sunday said the government and the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) must treat flat owners at par with banks under the insolvency law. An Ordinance, if needed, should be brought to amend the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC) for protecting the right of home buyers, it suggested. All efforts should be made to revive the housing projects of Jaypee Infratech whose 32,000 customers have not got possession of their flats, it said. Earlier this month, the NCLT admitted the insolvency petition filed by IDBI Bank against debt-ridden Jaypee Infratech, part of the Jaypee group. Bank of Baroda has approached the NCLT against Amrapali group for default on loan repayment. Assocham said in a statement that the government, the NCLT and the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board (IBB) should "treat home buyers in real estate projects at par, if not above banks in the peck...

Nowadays students can earn their pocket money by their own with the help of these top six applications. UrbanClap, India's largest mobile services marketplace, provides trusted services across 97 categories including photographers, electricians, home cleaning and repairs, yoga and guitar instructors, and many more. It is a platform also for teenagers, college students to use their passion, and earn during their college period. OlA cab service is India's most popular online transportation network company. They also have opportunities for the students who are above 18 whether they are college students or college dropout, all can apply here for the job of a driver. Notesgen is the best app for students in terms of getting information regarding their courses. This app aims to provide a platform where students can get handwritten notes related to their desire course subject. They can upload and download all the notes. Students can post notes which are relate...

During a recent outing to a fancy restaurant, Andy Rubin spotted an all-too-familiar tableau: A couple on what seemed to be a first date taking pictures of their food and then losing themselves in their smartphones for the next 10 minutes. Rubin is partly responsible for this anti-social behaviour; he helped create Android, which powers 85 per cent of the world’s smartphones. Rubin acknowledges the downsides to the smartphone revolution he helped unleash and says his new hardware company, Essential, is working on ways to solve the tendency to check one’s phone every five minutes. “We all lived happy lives before we had always-on internet,” he says in an exclusive interview at Playground Global, his Palo Alto, California, incubator. This week marks the debut of Essential’s first gadget. The Essential Phone is an anomaly: a sleek, premium smartphone not designed by Apple, Samsung or a discount Chinese brand. It has a mirrored ceramic back, titanium edges, a display that covers m...

Infosys stock fell 9.6% last Friday consequent to the announcement of resignation of its CEO, Vishal Sikka. Subsequently on Saturday, as proposed earlier, the company announced buyback of 11.3 crore number of shares from investors at a price of Rs 1,150 per share for total value up to Rs 13,000 crore through a tender offer on a proportionate basis. This is 4.92% of total paid up capital and at a premium of 24.5% on Friday’s closing price. We maintain our view that the wealth creation opportunity in the large IT stocks is not there at least for the next 3 years. Slowdown in the global economy and the base effect of the IT exports would make it difficult for the IT exports to grow in strong double-digits in the near future. However, we believe that the reaction to the stock on Friday was largely because of fear factor and it does not deserve such punishment: Infosys has emerged as an institution over the last 3 decades: With an annual turnover of around Rs.68,000 crore, a net ...

BITSAT or Birla Institute of Technology and Science Admission Test is an entrance examination conducted every year by Birla Institute of Technology & Science (BITS) for admission in to various engineering and other programmes. Successful candidates in BITSAT can pursue courses such as B.E, B.Tech, B.pharm and M.Sc from BITS campuses at Pilani, Mesra, Goa and Hyderabad. BITSAT 2018 will be conducted in the second half of May 2018. Application Forms will be available online from December 2017. Results will be declared in June 2018 on the official website. BITSAT 2018 Important Dates BITSAT is an online (computer-based) examination which is held across exam centres in 47 cities in India and also internationally in Dubai. Duration of BITSAT is 3 hours (180 minutes) and the exam cover following topics Part I - Physics; Part II - Chemistry; Part III - (a) English Proficiency and (b) Logical Reasoning and Part IV - Mathematics/Biology (For B.Pharm). There are 150 Multiple Cho...

India's largest lender, State Bank of India (SBI), has rationalised 716 offices (594 branches and 122 administrative offices) and several thousands of employees have been transferred beginning this fiscal, but, strangely, there have been no major protests, top officials said. Several hundreds of offices would be closed and thousands of staff would be moved in the coming months, officials added. Strangely one does not hear any major complaints of vindictiveness or arbitrariness from the normally vociferous banking sector employees. This, at a time when leading software companies are arbitrarily firing people at day's notice. Even the unions that strongly opposed the merger of six banks with SBI and were apprehensive about treatment of incoming staff by the SBI management agree that there is not much of vindictive or arbitrary movement of people till now, making one wonder as to how and why this happened. Around 70,000 employees (around 40,000 Class III and IV ...

In this age of digital disruption , one would have least expected a yoga guru with no formal education to shake the roots of established FMGC majors using a brick & mortar model, forcing them to rethink on their strategies. It’s intriguing as to how Patanjali managed to achieve so much in such a short time, basically the last 5 years. Among brand sagas, the one, which is firmly etched in the annals of marketing is Nirma which took on Hindustan Lever in the 1980s displacing the multinational to become the largest in the detergents space. The simple explanation for such phenomenal success would be to be in the “Right Place at the Right Time” with a flawless strategy executed well. However, if it was so simple, we would have had hordes of such stories. With Ramdev, it was a well-planned strategy built brick by brick over nearly two decades with an ability to manoeuvre oneself to be in the right place sprinkled with loads of good fortune of getting the timing right which helped hi...

The country's second largest telecom player Vodafone expects Jio's 'effective free phone' with unlimited calling to erode operators' revenues which are already under pressure and sought reduction in various levies imposed by the government as a breather to the industry. "...The new operator continues to aggressively under- price its services, including announcing launch of 'Effective Zero Price Feature Phone' with unlimited voice. "This is likely to cause further erosion in revenue for existing operators," the company in a letter to the Telecom Commission Member (Finance) Anuradha Mitra. RIL Chairman and MD Mukesh Ambani recently launched JioPhone, a 4G feature phone at a one-time fully refundable deposit of Rs 1,500 per unit. Jio has slated to beta-test the low-cost phone from August 15. The booking will start from September 24 online as well as through Reliance Retail and Jio stores. Vodafone said there is a continuous d...

Prime Minister Narendra Modi , from the ramparts of the Red Fort, rolled out statistics to defend demonetisation, while skipping mention of a lower dividend by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) as a pitfall of this move. In his Independence Day speech, Modi implicitly took on critics for blaming his government for not generating jobs, saying the MUDRA scheme is making youth a provider of jobs. He said the goods and services tax (GST) has led to a 30% cut in travel time by trucks, but did not refer to the transitory problems that have led to a contraction of the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) and Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI). He recalled that the first task of his dispensation was to constitute a special investigative team to underscore his government’s stance on corruption. “ I want to tell the countrymen proudly that we have confiscated black money worth Rs 1.25 lakh crore. The culprits would be brought to book and forced to surrender,” he said. He said d...

After the successful launch of Sansui Horizon 1 smartphones, the company introduced its second version, Sansui Horizon 2 in May this year. The Japanese company that is slowly and steadily making its place in the Indian smartphone market, comes up with a fully Made in India Horizon 2 model. Horizon 2 is only a bit costlier than its predecessor at Rs 5,299 and is available on Flipkart - a great value for its significantly beefed up specs. Business Standard used the Sansui Horizon 2 device for a couple of days to see if the phone delivers what it promises at such an inexpensive price. With Miravision display and Infra Red blaster as its highlights, here are our observations on the device’s performance on key parameters: 1. Display and design: One of the key highlights of the smartphone is the MiraVision display that offers a range of visual enhancements for images and videos, while preserving its battery. The colours on the screen are very sharp owing to its 720p IPS sc...