Revised Mauritius tax pact may hit overseas fund flows 

The two countries amended their 33-year-old tax treaty, bringing the curtains down on the Mauritius route, which government revenue officials and critics said had become synonymous with tax avoidance and abusive practices such as treaty shopping and round-tripping.  The new regime will apply on shares acquired on or after April 1, 2017, the finance ministry said in a statement. Investments made before that date will not be affected.

Unacademy raises $500,000 from Blume Ventures

Unacademy, a start-up that offers free video courses, on Thursday said it has raised $500,000 from early stage venture firm Blume Ventures and individual investors Rajan Anandan, Sumit Jain, Aprameya Radhakrishna and Phanindra Sama, to develop its product.  Unacademy, run by Sorting Hat Technologies Private Limited, started out as a YouTube channel with about 15 million views, and launched a web portal in January, featuring 1,500 10-minute video lessons on topics ranging from learning how to code in Hindi, to preparing for the civil services examinations. Anyone can become educators on the platform after they get through a screening process by the company.  Unacademy competes with companies such as Khan Academy, Coursera, and EdX.

Labinapp: 3D virtual laboratory startup for simulating science experiments 

Labinapp, a 3D virtual laboratory startup, is making this possible for school kids by simulating science experiments.  Focused on creating a virtual learning environment representing science laboratories, the Hubali-based startup says it is solving a larger problem of lack of science labs in schools. Pavan Shinde, a computer science engineer, cofounded Labinapp with his engineering college batchmates who were keen on designing and building games. The startup offers a license-based programme that includes experiments in general science, physics, chemistry and biology for class 9 to class 12. A 3D simulation makes a theory or concept come alive for students, allowing them to experiment, explore and visualize different possibilities and learn from their outcomes in a safe environment. 

Baxter emerges as frontrunner to buy KKR-backed Gland Pharma for $1.1-1.2 billion 

US pharma major Baxter has emerged as the frontrunner to buy Gland Pharma, a KKR backed drug maker, for over a billion dollars as global supply constraints have heightened strategic interests to acquire businesses that focus on injectables -- drugs that are widely used through vials, syringes and bags, as well as pumps used to deliver them and other fluids. 

Hyderabad-headquartered Gland is a leading contract manufacturers of injectables, supplying to pharma majors in India and US like Dr Reddy's and Mylan. The founders of Gland Pharma led by Ravi Penmetsa own close to 60% equity in the company with KKR owning the residual 40%. In November 2013, KKR had invested $191 million for their minority stake, valuing the company at $600-650 million at that time. KKR then had bought out another PE fund Evolvance India's from the company and infused s .. 

DreamWallets: How these entrepreneurs are brewing a crowdfunding platform from Jaipur

“DreamWallets is a platform where users can browse through a bouquet of ideas that appeal to them and be a part of the process to convert the project creator’s dream and passion into reality. The contributor in return gets rewarded in unique non-monetary ways full of gratification.” The idea of crowdfunding has been always there. With the online channel, anyone now has the potential to raise money from any part of the world.

Nikhil Agrawal, an investment banker, and Ravi Mittal, an investment manager, were both excited about the potential of crowdfunding. They started working on their idea and along the way got Manish Harodia, a seasoned entrepreneur, on board as the third co-founder. The idea was to create a reward-cum-donation-based crowdfunding platform – DreamWallets.

In the west, Kickstarter and Indiegogo started the trend but they still have limitations with respect to international projects. In India, Wishberry was the first to come to light after which others like Ketto.org and Catapooolt have been floated. DreamWallets is another idea in the same direction. Within six months, DreamWallets has a team size of 15 people and are helping ideators start crowdfunding campaign across 16 categories like Movies, Theatre, Events, Art & Craft, Music, Literature, Photography, Travel, Tech Product/ Service, Social causes, etc.

Gurgaon-based car pooling startup Derbii raises seed funding

Gurgaon-based startup Cab pooling app Derbii, has raised an undisclosed amount of seed funding from Accenture managing director Anurag Chauhan.

The funds will be used towards the improvement of technology, getting more users and increase the number of cabs. The startup is looking at another round of investment in the next three months and have received commitment from the existing investor. This year, ride-sharing sector has grabbed lot of attention with bigger players such as Ola Share, UberPool, and others.

There are other startups who are competing along with Ola and Uber, that includes MoveInSync Technology Solutions Pvt. Ltd that raised venture debt from InnoVen Capital in July, Online travel group Ibibo had launched a carpooling app named Ryde in April, PoolCircle, MeBuddie, CarPoolAdda, Zify,Poolmyride, Rapido and Let’s Ride. International companies like Brazil-based Tripda and French company Blah Blah cars entered the Indian market this year, which is still fragmented and in the nascent stage.

Flipkart taps into kirana stores to extend last-mile delivery

Ekart, the logistics arm of online marketplace Flipkart has signed on a network of 700 corner stores across 28 cities as part of its alternative delivery programme. Through the programme, the company plans on powering last-mile delivery using personnel at the corner stores in a radius of 500 to 800 metres. This would improve the success of delivery attempts by 10%, a significant number for Flipkart which currently delivers over 3 lakh shipments daily. As part of its alternative delivery programme, which has been in the works for the past eight to nine months, Ekart had set up experience centres and pick-up zones at tech parks, where office employees can collect their orders from a single outlet and also partnered with 280 outlets of Apollo Pharmacy, where customers can pick up their shipments, as reported by ET earlier this year.