The Venture Intelligence Blog

US, Australian states to pay cos. to keep jobs local

eFunds to open center in New Jersey, shift jobs from Mumbai

Financial services-focussed BPO firm eFunds Corp. is to shift call center jobs from its Mumbai office back to the US. In response to criticism from local politicians, the New Jersey state government has asked eFunds to open a new center in the state to provide support services for its unemployment welfare program. The state government will now pay eFunds 20% more for the outsourced services than envisaged in the original contract.

eFunds' new center at Camden, New Jersey is expected to employ about 10 workers earning $10-12 an hour as against the $2-3 earned by its agents in Mumbai, reports Rediff.com. To compensate for the increased cost of operations, the New Jersey government will pay eFunds $73,800 a month over and above the current monthly payment of $340,000.

Under its original contract beginning in February 2002, eFunds was redirecting toll free calls from New Jersey residents seeking information about electronic welfare or food stamp programs to its contact center in Mumbai. Upon reading local media reports about the contract, New Jersey state senator Shirley Turner had proposed a bill banning outsourcing of state government work to overseas locations. The bill had inspired similar legislation moves in other US states as well.

For more information:

New Jersey decides to move call center from Mumbai to Camden
Rediff.com

New Jersey is microcosm of protectionism debate
IDG News Service

Australian state might subsidize Telstra for not outsourcing

Prompted by a strident campaign in a local newspaper, Australia's Victoria state is offering to subsidize the country's largest telecom company, Telstra, to employ local IT workers rather than outsource work to Indian companies. Steve Bracks, Premier of Victoria, has said the State Government is willing to offer the subsidy since it would have "long-term benefits (for) employment in Victoria".

Victorian newspaper, Herald Sun, published a series of reports last week "revealing" how Telstra was using about 100 Indian IT workers from Infosys Technologies and Satyam Computers "on sweatshop wages" of $820 per month (as against Australian IT workers who would earn about $5000 a month). "The telco giant-- which is on track to report a $3.66 billion profit this year--would save $15-$18 million on the deal," the paper reported quoting an internal Telstra memo.

For more information:

Telstra worker tells of pay woe
Herald Sun

Telstra, Indian companies deny 'sweatshop' claims
The Sydney Morning Herald

EY Tops League Table for Transaction Advisors to M&A deals in 24

Moelis & Company & PwC claim the No.2 & No.3 slots Ernst & Young (EY) topped the Venture Intelligence League Table for Transaction Advisor to M&A Deals during 2024, advising 34 deals worth $4.1 Billion. Moelis & Company stood second advising 2 deals worth $3.9 billion. PwC followed with 18 deals worth $3.3 billion. Citi ($2.5 billion across 1 deal) and Advay Capital ($2.3 billion across 1 deal) completed the top five. Among the largest M&A deals in 2024, Citi advised $2.5 Billion acquisition of the Indian business of American Tower Corporation by Brookfield , Advay Capital and Moelis & Company advised the $2.3 Billion acquisition of Care Hospitals by Aster DM Healthcare . Jefferies & Co., JP Morgan and Moelis & Company advised the $1.6 Billion acquisition of Bharat Serums & Vaccines by Mankind Pharma. Among the other notable M&A deals in Q4 2024, EY advised the $685 million acquisition of ITD Cementation ...

Morgan Stanley tops League Table for Transaction Advisors to M&A deals in 2020

Morgan Stanley , which advised the $10.1 Billion strategic investment by Facebook and Google into Reliance Industries' telecom arm Jio platforms (among other Private Equity investments in the company), topped the Venture Intelligence League Table for Transaction Advisor to M&A Deals for 2020. Ambit Corporate Finance - which advised 3 deals worth $4.0 Billion, including Brookfield's $3.7 Billion acquisition of Reliance Tower Infrastructure Trust - took the second spot. JM Financial ($3.7 Billion across 5 deals), Metta Capital ($3.4 Billion across 3 deals) and ICICI Securities ($3.4 Billion across 2 deals) - all of whom (along with Citi) are advisors to the $3.4 Billion acquisition of Future Group's retail related ventures by Reliance Retail, announced in August - completed the top five. The Venture Intelligence League Tables , the first such initiative exclusively tracking transactions involving India-based companies, are based on the value of PE and M&A tra...

Everything you wanted to know (and some things you didn't care to know) about ChrysCapital's Ashish Dhawan

New Delhi-based private equity fund ChrysCapital is vastly different from its former avatar, Chrysalis Capital. While Chrysalis began life (in Mumbai) as an venture capital firm focussed on start-up investments, today's ChrysCapital is best know for its late-stage investments (often in already public companies). The fascinating part of this transformation is that one of the fund's original partners - Senior Managing Director Ashish Dhawan - has been firmly in the driver's seat throughout the process. It's a story that needed to be told. As a cover story. Kudos to Business Today for telling it first. Thankfully, unlike the glowing profiles that BT is famous for - including the one featuring infamous stock brocker Harshad Mehta with his Lexus on the cover - this one has a lot of facts. Some well known. And others less so. That ChrysCapital's first fund would have been a disaster but for the pioneering investment in Raman Roy founded BPO firm Spectramind i...

Why did Sony Entertainment Television's CEO quit?

Businessworld has a cover story on the corporate battle that resulted in Kunal Dasgupta, the CEO of Multi Screen Media (formerly Sony Entertainment Television), quitting just a few months before his contract was due to end. Dasgupta’s abrupt exit was the culmination of six years of tension between majority shareholder Sony Pictures Television International (SPTI) that owns 61 per cent of MSM, on one hand, and Atlas Equifinn on the other, which is a consortium of Indian shareholders (Singapore-based Rakesh Aggarwal, World Media Group director Sudesh Iyer, Shemaroo Entertainment Managing Director Raman Maroo, MobiApps Holding’s Jayesh Parekh, B.R. Sule, Sushil Shergil and actor Jackie Shroff ) holding 32 per cent. Capital Japan and some financial institutions own the rest 7 per cent. And of course, the third protagonist is Dasgupta, who walked a tightrope and managed to keep his job for over 14 years despite the fact that neither group of shareholders was too happy with him. Very little...

VC Interview: Shailendra Singh of Sequoia Capital India

In a recent interview to Venture Intelligence, Shailendra Singh discussed some of the firm’s newer investments in the early stage segment including in the online payments space, the progress at a few existing portfolio companies and the active role the firm is playing in helping its portfolio companies scale and succeed in India and globally. Prior to joining the firm in 2006, Singh was a strategy consultant at Bain & Company in New York and before that, an entrepreneur in the digital media industry. Venture Intelligence: How does Sequoia go about identifying potential early stage investments in India? Is there anything different you are doing today than, say, a couple of years back? Shailendra Singh: There is a lot more focus on technology investing and early stage investing. In general, as you might remember a few years ago, we were doing primarily growth investing but in the past 18-odd months, we have had a very strong focus on early stage and that’s continuing. In terms...