Daybreak

In January this year, nearly every single employee of the OG E-grocer Big Basket received an email from their CEO, Hari Menon. It was supposed to be a rallying cry. The Tata-owned e-grocery giant had finally—after much hemming and hawing—embraced quick commerce.

For a long time, Bigbasket didn’t care much for quick commerce. Menon himself dismissed it in April 2023 as unnecessary and “thrust upon” consumers.

But now the Tata board has had enough. Quick commerce isn’t just a fad anymore, it is the industry. Which is why, the pressure is on for Big Basket to make up for lost time and get back on the right track. And that’s going to take a whole lot more than just an email. 

Tune in. 

Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India’s first subscriber-only business news platform. Subscribe for more exclusive, deeply-reported, and analytical business stories.

 Phonepe is all set to debut in the public market in the second half of FY26. That perhaps seems like the natural next step for the fintech giant. After all, it commands nearly half of the market share in UPI transactions today. 

Between 2020 and now, it has gone from catering to one in five Indians to one in three. And yet, the path to its IPO isn’t quite as simple as you would think. In fact, it’s a tough road ahead for the company. 

And that’s precisely because of the one thing Phonepe is best known for – payments. You see, as much as 96% of Phonepe’s topline in the last financial year was thanks to Phonepe’s payment business. 

You’re probably wondering what’s wrong with that. After all, payments were what put Phonepe on the map. Fair point. But the thing is, being over reliant on payments could hurt Phonepe. 

Think about it. If anything about the payments business were to go south, it would be almost impossible for Phonepe to pivot in time. Which is why the key is to diversify. And it’s not like Phonepe hasn’t tried. Five years ago it launched its own financial services arm – Phonepe insurance. 

But unfortunately, today, there still isn’t much to brag about.

Tune in.

Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India’s first subscriber-only business news platform. Subscribe for more exclusive, deeply-reported, and analytical business stories.

Every two years, SBI Cards, India’s only listed credit card company, valued at $9 billion, appoints a new CEO. This time, it's going to be Salila Pande, a career banker who has been with SBI for over 30 years. On the 1st of April, she will take the reigns from her predecessor, Abhijit Chakravorty.

However, it is going to be a tough few years for her. And the reason is like an open secret amongst SBI Cards executives.

They just don’t get along with any of their CEOs in general.

Tune in to find out why.

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Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India’s first subscriber-only business news platform. Subscribe for more exclusive, deeply-reported, and analytical business stories.

Remember that time in 2022 when India’s top digital payments companies Phonepe, Paytm*, and Bharatpe were in a no-holds-barred turf war? Looking back, it seemed like there was news almost every other day about some tiff between the three market leaders. In fact, former managing director of Bharatpe, Ashneer Grover, has spoken on record about “street fights” between companies’ employees over QR codes. 

A little more than two years later, there’s only calm. QR code scuffles are over. No one is beating each other up. 

Both the peer-to-merchant and peer-to-peer payments space have settled down into a tripartite peace. Phonepe, Google Pay, and Paytm—in order of market share—are the clear leaders. This raises some interesting questions: How many UPI apps do you have on your phone? And do you have a favourite one? We may have multiple, but only one of them is ever really used. No amount of cashbacks or fancy user experiences make people want to switch to something else. 

Is it brand loyalty that is preventing users from churning out of old platforms and into new ones? A former Paytm executive told The Ken, “There is zero brand loyalty for UPI payments apps…” 

Well then, what is happening?

*Paytm founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma is an investor in The Ken
*This episode was first published on December 30, 2024

Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India’s first subscriber-only business news platform. Subscribe for more exclusive, deeply-reported, and analytical business stories.

In this episode we fill you in on three standout stories from the past week. 

First, why the fight between every Indian’s favourite namkeen brands Haldiram’s and Bikaji just got spicier; 

second, the controversy around Urban company’s newest pet project;

and finally, the latest from Two by Two where our colleagues Rohin and Praveen discuss what the fourth wave of tech exports from India will look like.

Check out the stories and podcasts mentioned in this episode:

The latest edition of Long and Short
Why India's biggest employer of women gig workers refuses to listen to its own workforce
Two by Two: Ultrahuman and Kuku FM have broken out

The Ken is hosting its first live subscriber event! Join two long-term and contrarian CEOs, Nithin Kamath of Zerodha and Deepak Shenoy of Capitalmind, as they discuss the mental models, decision making frameworks, and potential outcomes related to a very real possibility: an extended stock market winter that lasts 24 months or more. Click here to buy your tickets. 

Pharma is slow, complicated and tangled in regulatory approvals and compliances. But, consumer healthcare is fast moving, has far fewer rules and enjoys better margins. Under the umbrella of consumer healthcare you will find a plethora of categories and products – all of which claim to improve some aspect of health or well being. Think supplements, or over the counter medications like Crocin or Sanofi’s own Allegra, even things like protein bars. 

These are products that you can toss into your shopping cart and purchase without the hassle of a prescription. 

Last year, Sanofi India decided to demerge its consumer arm and list it as a separate entity – Sanofi Consumer Healthcare. Sanofi even gave it a shiny new label: FMCH, or fast-moving consumer healthcare. And this approach seems to be working out well for the French company. Sanofi Consumer Healthcare has been picking up some of the slack. By Q1 of 2024, it was already contributing 30 per cent of Sanofi SA’s total sales and -40 per cent of its operating profit. 

But Sanofi didn’t invent this move. Zydus Lifesciences figured it out back in 2008 when it created Zydus Wellness, the entity behind Sugarfree and Glucon-D. And after that, we saw giants like GSK and Johnson & Johnson follow suit. But here’s the thing about Sanofi. Unlike Zydus, which clearly separates its pharma and consumer-health businesses, Sanofi blurs the line. A lot of its pharmaceutical products are being recategorized and sold as consumer care.

Tune in.

Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India’s first subscriber-only business news platform. Subscribe for more exclusive, deeply-reported, and analytical business stories.

The Ken is hosting its first live subscriber event! Join two long-term and contrarian CEOs, Nithin Kamath of Zerodha and Deepak Shenoy of Capitalmind, as they discuss the mental models, decision making frameworks, and potential outcomes related to a very real possibility: an extended stock market winter that lasts 24 months or more. Click here to buy your tickets. 

About three years ago, the government decided that it wanted India to become a global powerhouse in cell manufacturing. So it went ahead and dangled a very juicy carrot for companies to produce batteries locally. It promised over Rs 18,000 crore in subsidies for anybody who would help it make its battery dreams come true by the end of this decade. 

Cut to now, three years later, and those dreams are very quickly losing charge. You see, by now the government should have technically already disbursed Rs 2,700 crore to beneficiaries. 

But in reality, not even 1 per cent of that has reached any of them. Merely Rs 24 crore has been spent by the government this far, and most of it has gone towards paperwork, site visits and tender process. That's it. What's going on? 

Tune in. 

Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India’s first subscriber-only business news platform. Subscribe for more exclusive, deeply-reported, and analytical business stories.

The Ken is hosting its first live subscriber event! Join two long-term and contrarian CEOs, Nithin Kamath of Zerodha and Deepak Shenoy of Capitalmind, as they discuss the mental models, decision making frameworks, and potential outcomes related to a very real possibility: an extended stock market winter that lasts 24 months or more. Click here to buy your tickets. 

Private schools across the country are going through quite a crisis right now. 

Just last month, The Ken reporter Atul Krishna saw this play out first hand at a budget private school called Blossoms in Bangalore.  During a visit to its campus, he learnt that its once packed classrooms are now thinning down year after year. From 1,5000 students about five years ago, the count is less than half od that now. And unfortunately, the school’s principal Shashi Kumar predicts that that number will only drop further. 

Blossom’s is just a small piece of a much bigger puzzle. 

Between 2023 and 2024  alone, overall school enrolments across the country registered its steepest drop in five years. The enrolment numbers dropped by…wait for it…10 million. And funnily enough, private schools, which make up less than one third of all schools in the country, saw a drop of over 2.2 million student enrolments. 

That begs a rather obvious question – Where have all the children gone?

Tune in.

Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India’s first subscriber-only business news platform. Subscribe for more exclusive, deeply-reported, and analytical business stories.

The Ken is hosting its first live subscriber event! Join two long-term and contrarian CEOs, Nithin Kamath of Zerodha and Deepak Shenoy of Capitalmind, as they discuss the mental models, decision making frameworks, and potential outcomes related to a very real possibility: an extended stock market winter that lasts 24 months or more. Click here to buy your tickets. 

IV drip therapy has gone from being a fad among celebrities like the Kardashians, to becoming the wellness treatment for the uber rich. There is a growing consumer interest in quick, customisable wellness solutions and plush clinics across the country are cashing in on it. Whether you are looking to treat a hangover, get glowing skin, lose weight or simply optimise your overall well being – there is an IV infusion for you. 

The catch, of course, is that these treatments can cost anywhere from Rs 2,500 to Rs 80,000 per session. But the exorbitant prices of these treatments has hardly been a deterrant for its target audience. In fact, if anything, it’s only shot up to fame. 

The Ken reporter DVLS Pranathi spoke to multiple cosmetic clinics – from Kaya, to others like Reviv, Elixir Wellness and Kosmoderma. All of them see IV treatment as their key to tapping into India’s steadily growing health and fitness industry. In fact, today, some of these clinics are doling out thousands of IV drips every month. 

But in a country where the cost of healthcare is through the roof, and regulations around IV drips are still in the grey, this treatment is just as controversial as it is aspirational.

*This episode was first published on January 2, 2025

Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India’s first subscriber-only business news platform. Subscribe for more exclusive, deeply-reported, and analytical business stories.

The Ken is hosting its first live subscriber event! Join two long-term and contrarian CEOs, Nithin Kamath of Zerodha and Deepak Shenoy of Capitalmind, as they discuss the mental models, decision making frameworks, and potential outcomes related to a very real possibility: an extended stock market winter that lasts 24 months or more. Click here to buy your tickets. 

In this episode we fill you in on some of the biggest business and tech stories from The Ken newsroom. 

We will talk about Reliance and Airtel’s latest deal with Space X’s Starlink Internet; how Dhan, the stock broking underdog, is defying all odds; and finally, we discuss the market for treating farmed animals humanely. 

Stay tuned

Check out the stories and podcasts we mentioned in this episode:
Dhan is the stock-broking underdog that Chryscapital and Hornbill are after. But why?
How big is the market for treating farmed animals humanely?