Ola acquires Foodpanda India Unit

Ola, operated by ANI Technologies Pvt. Ltd, has acquired food delivery start-up Foodpanda India from its German Parent Delivery Hero AG in an all-stock deal that will see the ride hailing major infuse $200 Million in Foodpanda India operations. Under the deal, Foodpanda’s India business will be transferred to Ola in exchange for the latter’s stock.

The deal marks Ola’s foray into the online food ordering and delivery segment, a business shaped in India by the likes of Zomato and Swiggy, and one where Ola’s biggest rival, Uber, has been making strides recently through its unit UberEATS. Ola too tested what it called Ola Cafe in 2014, but shut down the unit shortly after. The collaboration between Ola and Foodpanda India unlocks the power of a partnership that will help Foodpanda India grow as the most preferred online food delivery service in the country.

The deal comes months after Bengaluru-based Ola raised a huge $1.1 billion (another $1 billion is likely to come in soon) from SoftBank Group and Tencent Holdings to strengthen its position in India. Mobility start-ups with terabytes of data on local routes and consumer app usage patterns are generally believed to be better placed in running a delivery business. In 2014, San Francisco-based Uber launched UberEATS as a pilot project and has since taken the service to 27 countries—and seven Indian cities in quick succession since May this year.

Foodpanda India was set up as the local unit of Berlin-based Foodpanda GmbH, a Rocket Internet portfolio firm, in 2012. The company has had a tough stint in India, given service quality issues, layoffs and ceding of market share to rivals. Last year, Delivery Hero acquired Foodpanda GmbH but the deal did not have a substantial trickle-down impact on India operations.

Oracle to buy Aconex

Oracle Corp. agreed to buy Aconex Ltd, an Australian company that makes cloud based collaboration software for construction projects, for 1.56 Australian Dollar cash as it tries to gain more customers in the rapidly growing market.

Redwood City, California-based Oracle has been looking to refashion its business around internet-based products. The strategy was dealt a setback last quarter when cloud-computing sales missed analysts’ estimates. The company also gave a disappointing forecast for cloud growth in last week’s earnings report, which sent shares falling the most in three months.

Oracle has been turning to acquisitions to accelerate its shift to the cloud, including last year’s $9 billion purchase of NetSuite Inc. This marks Oracle’s second acquisition of a cloud-based construction software maker so far. Last year, it purchased contract and payment management platform Textura for $663 million and combined it with its own construction management software, called Primavera, to form the Oracle Construction and Engineering Global Business Unit.

Founded in 2000, Aconex currently has offices in 30 countries and says it has been used to manage over $1 trillion in construction projects. The company claims 5.5 million project users, who can manage and communicate about building progress, documents, safety checklists and other issues on desktops or mobile devices. 

Swiggy acqui-hires 48East

Bengaluru based food ordering and delivery startup Swiggy has acqui-hired the management team of Bengaluru based gourmet Asian Food startup 48East in order to further broaden its senior leadership. Following this acqui-hire, the company looks to serve its consumers more efficiently and consequently grow in the market.

Swiggy Access, for the uninitiated, is an initiative aimed at reaching more customers and making its delivery more seamless. Geared towards facilitating the business expansion of partners on the platform, the new service allows restaurant partners to set up kitchen spaces in areas where they do not have a physical presence.

Swiggy currently has a presence in more than 10 cities across the country and claims to have tie-ups with around 20,000 restaurants in these cities. The Bengaluru-based startup has raised a total funding of $155.5 Mn (INR 1000 Cr) till date and clocks over 4 Mn transactions per month on its platform. By acqui-hiring 48East, the online food delivery platform is looking to bolster its presence in the market, amidst competition from highly funded players like UberEATS and Zomato.

Its biggest rival Zomato has also made a number of investments and acquisitions in the last couple of months. In the second of September, the foodtech unicorn took over Bengaluru-based Runnr, a B2B online service provider platform for hyperlocal logistics services. The move was aimed at strengthening Zomato’s food delivery capacity. A week later, the Gurugram-based company also invested an undisclosed amount of funding in the Hyderabad-based foodtech startup, TinMen.

Apple Buys Shazam

Apple Inc. agreed to acquire music-identification service Shazam, taking ownership of one of the first apps to demonstrate the power of the iPhone, recognizing songs after hearing just a few bars of a tune.

Apple Music and Shazam are a natural fit, sharing a passion for music discovery and delivering great music experiences to users. The Shazam app uses the microphone on a smartphone or computer to identify almost any song playing nearby and then point’s users to places they can listen to it in future, such as Apple Music or Google’s YouTube.

While Shazam has been popular with customers, it struggled turning its clever music service into a business that justified its valuation. It expanded beyond simple audio recognition in 2010 by adding capabilities that let television viewers “Shazam” an ad, which would then open a promotion from the advertiser on a user’s device. The company said this feature was used 700,000 times during the 2014 Super Bowl broadcast.

In November, Shazam had about 175 million monthly active users globally across iOS and Android, according to research firm App Annie. The U.S. is the largest single market, with about 20 million active users in November, while the U.K. had about 4 million in the same month. The acquisition would help Apple embed that capability more deeply into its music offerings. The company’s digital assistant Siri gained Shazam integration in 2014, so users could ask it what song is playing in the background.

AEON acquires Acadgild

AEON Learning Pvt. Ltd, which owns education technology platform Avagmah has bought Bengaluru based education start-up Acadgild for $10 Million in an all-stock deal.

Avagmah is a start-up focused on online degrees and skill development programmes. It claims to have 22,000 students across 66 countries, and has partnerships with more than seven institutes and universities. Acadgild offers skill-based technology courses in big data, deep learning and UI/UX design web development, among others. It works with businesses to offer around 35 skill development courses.

Acadgild had raised initial investment from venture capital firm Jupiter Capital and K. Ganesh of GrowthStory. It works with companies like General Electric, Capgemini, Cognizant Technology Solutions, and Oracle Corporation. Currently, around half of AEON Learning’s online students come from Tier-1 and Tier-2 cities like Pune, Hyderabad, Bengaluru and Delhi-NCR, Karthik added. The company has raised $6.5 million till date and expects to reach a student base of over 100,000 in the next five years.

According to a KPMG-Google, the online higher education market is expected to touch $1.96 billion by 2021. Re-skilling and online certification courses currently account for a majority (38%) of the online higher education market, the report added. There has also been a surge in investments in the online education sector, with online skill training start-ups shifting focus from a university-based curriculum to a more industry-oriented training approach.