India's Latest Big Bang Electronics Projects, Where Will They Land?

• <00:56> Tata Steel sacks 38 employees, Sets A New Benchmark For Disclosures 
• <04:07> India's Latest Big Bang Electronics Projects, Where Will They Land? with Neil Shah
• <15:03> Hmm…IVF clinics are under the tax man's scanner
• <18:39> Mark Zuckerberg and Meta launch Threads, A Twitter Alternative, 10 million downloads and counting
• <19:32> The CEOs Diet: The How & Why Of Breakfasts In Our Busy Lives

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TRANSCRIPT

NOTE: This transcript contains only the host's monologue and does not include any interviews or discussions that might be within the podcast. Please refer to the episode audio if you wish to quote the people interviewed. Email [email protected] for any queries.

Good morning, it's Friday, the 7th of July and I'm Govindraj Ethiraj coming to you from Mumbai, India's financial capital and most rocking city in the world !

Our top reports for today

• India's Latest Big Bang Electronics Projects, Where Will They Land?
• Tata Steel sacks 38 employees, Sets A New Benchmark For Disclosures
• Mark Zuckerberg and Meta launch Threads, A Twitter Alternative, 10 million downloads and counting
• Hmm…IVF clinics are under the tax man's scanner
• The CEOs Diet: The How & Why Of Breakfasts In Our Busy Lives

Tata Steel has 65,000 employees spread out over 5 continents, it's the 10th largest steel producer in the world and produces around 34 million tonnes of steel annually, figures as of last year.

Sacking 38 employees in that context should not seem like such a large number, though do note it is sacked and not laid off.

The company's chairman N Chandrasekaran told shareholders at its AGM on Wednesday that they had sacked 38 employees for breaching the company's code of conduct.

Of these 38, 35 were apparently suspended for ‘unacceptable practices bordering on ethical issues' and the other three for sexual misconduct.

Tata Steel took this action against its employees apparently based on complaints received by several whistleblowers on issues such as misuse of authority, conflict of interest and contract management agreements.

The Times of India reported quoting the company saying they received 875 complaints last fiscal year of which 158 were related to whistleblowers, 48 were regarding safety and 669 were on HR and other behavioural issues.

Mr Chandrasekaran apparently said it was a good thing and this is because of the ‘open culture' created by the company. He added that the employees are encouraged to record their grievances.

"As a company, we are a global benchmark, so we will continue to push the culture where we uphold the highest values and have a zero-tolerance policy," reported TOI quoting Chandrasekaran.

Just a few weeks ago, 6 employees were sacked at IT major Tata Consultancy Services, a group company for accepting favours from certain staffing firms in the appointment of contractual workers.

TCS had also informed its board members with details of the development and its version of it, a point we spoke of in The Core Report a few weeks ago.

So the Tatas are evidently going all out to disclose even before asked or so it appears.

The reason I say this is companies are usually wary or find it unnecessary to discuss sackings of this nature and surely don't announce them, unless they feel word might get out either way.

Companies might feel and rightly so that the matter has been addressed internally and to everyone's satisfaction and conscience, moral and corporate and therefore it could be laid to rest.

Maybe Tata Steel felt word might get out but this is still extreme disclosure if such a term could be used. Though I should quickly add that there is nothing like more disclosure and surely a problem with less disclosure.

Such announcements would obviously put all employees in large conglomerates like Tatas on alert and drive home, through one kind of example, the larger culture of the organisation that is being created or built. To give you some context here, Tatas have over 935,000 or close to a million employees across the group.

Meanwhile, Tata Steel also said they are looking at organic investment and inorganic acquisitions to achieve its 2030 target of an overall 40 MnTPA capacity in India.

India's New Semiconductor Announcements, Where Will They Land?

The sector that has perhaps the most interest and intrigue is semiconductor and electronic manufacture, given that investments in this space also signify are often, geo-strategic apart from being business critical, almost like oil, unlike some other areas which are important and job creating but less strategic.

In the last few weeks, we have seen two announcements of consequence, the first by semiconductor major Micron where it talked about a 22,500 Crore investment in Gujarat, in Sanand and specifically for a chip manufacturing assembly.

And second Google saying it will bring production of its Pixel phone to India. For various reasons, Google has been on and off on this proposition and presently it is on.
But in general, action in this space is hotting up with major investments on the anvil and some ready to go, including of course Foxconn who will invest, with or without Vedanta as is being reported.

To get the latest insights on what Micron's investment could translate into and a technical breakdown of its project as well as others lined up, I caught up with Neil Shah, Vice President at Counterpoint Research

Markets Continue Their Run

You might yawn now but every time or every day, stock markets hit a record high, I reckon one must document it.
Yesterday, I touched upon how foreign portfolio investors are switching away from markets like China into India.
This is not new in itself but there seems to have been a tipping point of sorts, amidst, perhaps, several other tipping points.
So, indices hit fresh record highs on Thursday. The S&P BSE Sensex touched a new lifetime high of 65,833 intra-day before ending the session at 65,786, up 340 points.
And the value of stocks is also hitting new highs, with the market capitalisation of all BSE listed companies touching the Rs 302 trillion or 302 lakh crore rupee mark.
The Nifty50 hit a new peak of 19,512 and closed 99 points higher at 19,497.

Hmmm…India's tax department goes after IVF Clinics. What Does It Mean?

India's tax department and officials are today better equipped than ever before to track where money is being spent and how. Thanks to their ability to examine and get alerted from patterns that either reveal something or don't.

What I mean is that the tax department obviously takes note when there are inexplicable spends. Equally, it could start wondering why you are spending too less or earning too less, including as a company ? And send you a notice to that effect. Because this could mean that you are converting to cash somewhere along the chain. This is a real example by the way.

After all, the trajectory for tax collections has to always be upwards, or so all tax departments believe. Because their targets are like that.
With this as the backdrop, it is always interesting to see who the tax department is gunning for which in turn reveals two things, one that there is more of that activity happening, second, that this activity is not seeing as much documented income as perhaps it should.

The Times of India is reporting that the Central Board of Direct Taxes has decided to keep close tabs on transactions done at in vitro fertilisation or IVF clinics, medical colleges providing admission under NRI quota, hospitals, hotels, banquets and sellers of designer clothing, watches and luxury brands.

Some of these seem logical, like hospitals, hotels, luxury brands and watches. I know with some certainty that some of the biggest bulk transactions in, for example, high end Swiss watches, happen ahead of weddings and the wedding season in India. In cash of course.

To come back to patterns, it is interesting to see that IVF clinics stand out.

A quick definition. The Mayo Clinic says In vitro fertilisation (IVF) is a complex series of procedures used to help with fertility or prevent genetic problems and assist with the conception of a child. It also says that IVF is the most effective form of assisted reproductive technology.

Now, If this were a case of income not being reported accurately as opposed to the quantum of business or consultations going up, this would suggest that India is facing a fertility challenge in some segments.
In the last year, some 78 million income tax returns were filed, in contrast to 73 million the previous year, according to reports.

Real Estate Goes Bonkers

Speaking about rising incomes, Bangalore headquartered realty firm Puravankara Ltd on Thursday said its sales bookings jumped over two-fold to Rs 1,126 crore in the first quarter of this fiscal on better housing demand and higher price realisation.

Notably, the company said this was the highest ever performance.
Of course, Puravankara could be benefiting from a different cycle than other realtors or is benefiting from higher prices from more or more premium properties which all came together somewhat suddenly.
Either way, India's real estate market is still holding strong as is borne out by figures elsewhere too.
In general, residential units above Rs 1 crore now account for nearly 30% market share of sales, consulting firm Knight Frank said just the day before, one indicator of the higher values in sales numbers.
Second is that overall residential sales volumes are at 9 and 10 year highs in different parts of the country.

Instagram Threads Are Here.

Meanwhile, if you are one of those who is either bored, tired or fed up with Twitter, Mark Zuckerberg has an alternative, with Meta Threads, an Instagram offshoot which looks quite similar to Twitter.
Meta is saying they got 10 million subscribers in hours, which is most likely the fastest such signup but also because most would have wandered in from Instagram which has some 2 billion active users every month.
Twitter has 450 million users.

Threads was launched in 100 countries on Thursday morning and has already seen signs up from celebrities like Kim Kardashian and Jennifer Lopez. "Let's do this. Welcome to Threads," Zuckerberg wrote in his first post on the app, along with a fire emoji.

CEO's DIET

And finally before I go, let's speak to Dr Nandita Iyer, writer of the CEO's Diet on www.thecore.in. This week she talks about breakfasts and she joins me to talk about the significance of breakfasts in our lives and particularly in our busy lives.

Read the whole article by Dr Iyer on www.thecore.in and have a great weekend ahead.