Nanobi Analytics, a Bangalore-based start-up, beat nationwide competition to walk away with the Microsoft BizSpark’s India Start-up Challenge 2013 title.
The financial analytics company, which builds information by compiling small pieces of data, beat the winners of the nine regional competitions. All 10 regional winners, who won $4,000 in prize money, made their final presentations at the finale held at the Microsoft office here on Friday.
The top three national winners won extra gadgets from Microsoft. This was the first time that the competition went national.
Delivering the final presentation that won them the top spot, Mahesh Ramakrishnan, CEO and Managing Director of Nanobi Analytics, summarising his enterprise, said: “Little drops make an ocean. That’s how we approach data analysis.”
The panel of judges had to choose from businesses such as ‘Intellocut’, a material planning software company from New Delhi aimed at saving material waste in the textile industry, which came second, and ‘Truetech Webs’, a fluid motion sensor enterprise from Mumbai, which placed third.
Flipkart sets record in sales
Online retailer Flipkart announced that on June 3 it broke its own record by selling 1 lakh books on its website. To celebrate the huge milestone, authors Chetan Bhagat, Amish Tripathi and Ravinder Singh visited the homes of select customers in Mumbai and Delhi and delivered books that they had purchased on Flipkart.
In a press statement, Ravi Vora, Senior Vice-President-Marketing, Flipkart, said: “This is a big moment for us and we wanted to celebrate it with the people who made it possible — the authors and our customers. Flipkart is focussing on growing the books category aggressively, especially genres such as children’s books as well as eBooks. At present, we have 1.5 lakh eBook titles and are looking to grow this to more than 3 lakh over the next quarter.”
The top five metros for book sales are Bangalore, Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai and Hyderabad.
GE inks healthcare pact
General Electric announced a public-private partnership with the Maharashtra government, under which the company will be involved in setting up advanced diagnostic facilities at 22 government district and women hospitals. It will operate on a 24x7 basis and provide services at government-recommended rate cards for the benefit of the broader population, a release from GE stated. In a release, John Rice, Vice-Chairman, GE, said: “Providing high-quality, accessible and affordable healthcare is one of the biggest challenges faced by governments all over the world. Through progressive public-private partnerships, patients are the biggest winners.”
Aakash manufacturer surges ahead
DataWind, the equipment manufacturer company behind the Aakash tablet, has taken the lead in the Indian tablet computer space, a research report from Cybermedia stated. According to the report for the quarter ending March, DataWind leads the space with a market share of 15.3 per cent, pulling ahead of Micromax and Apple which stand at 12.3 per cent and 11.7 per cent respectively.
Chief Executive Officer Suneet Singh Tuli said: “Unlike many in this industry who are focused on providing media tablets to the elite, our focus is to enable Indians with their first computer at an affordable price. The enormous demand for our products helps validate our focus on affordability and connectivity.”
DataWind’s flagship product, the UbiSlate 7C+, is also the world’s lowest cost phablet for only Rs. 4,999, he pointed out.
