- Arvind's Newsletter
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- Arvind's Newsletter
1.India’s IT Services Majors may Recruit 40% Less in FY24
IT services majors are estimated to hire between 50,000 to 100,000 employees during fiscal 2024, according to data from staffing firm Xpheno. This will mark a precipitous decline from the nethiring of over 250,000 by these companies in the previous year.
In the first quarter of FY24, India’s top IT exporters — Tata Consultancy Services, Infosys, HCLTech, Wipro and Tech Mahindra — reported a cumulative dip of 21,838 in net headcount.
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2.How NHAI plans to dodge a debt trap
India’s premier highway construction body is in a race against time to monetize its assets and pare its debt, opines Sumant Banerji in a Long Read in Mint.
In the last eight years, NHAI has built more roads than ever and single-handedly shouldered the burden of meeting the government’s gigantic targets of constructing highways. But in doing so, it has borrowed money from the market and ran up a substantial debt profile. Between 2014and 2023, its debt has rocketed from just ₹23,797 crore to ₹3.43 trillion.
Concerned with its debt overhang, the government has now forbidden NHAI from borrowing from the market. Instead, it is being encouraged to monetize its assets and become self-sufficient. But in a market where response from investors to long gestation projects like highways is often lukewarm, will NHAI find a way to be successful?
NHAI’s debt is so long term in nature that it would only be cleared by 2049-50. But beyond 2029, the pressure would start to ease off—provided it does not borrow more in the interim. The next few years will be critical.
So how does NHAI intend to raise the amount needed to pay its debt? Its big bang monetization plan rests on three pillars—the toll-operate-transfer (TOT) model; the infrastructure investment trusts (Invit) bonds; and toll securitization. Read on.
3.China’s trade fell faster than expected last month, new data that points to weakening demand as the country grapples with a slowing economy.
Exports to the United States and European Union fell by even greater proprtion than the overall decline, a signal of mounting diplomatic tensions taking a toll on trade.
The latest figures came as Western officials pressed for Beijing to lower import and export barriers: The EU’s trade commissioner told the Financial Times the China-EU relationship was “very unbalanced,” and that he would press for greater market access at high-level talks next month, while Australia’s trade minister told CNBC Canberra wanted “impediments removed” remarks that echo those from the U.S. trade representative.
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4.Will A New Superconductor LK-99 Change The World?
Experts push back against extraordinary claims of a room-temperature superconductor. But even a flop could open up new materials research pathways reports Quartz.
For a video with the potential to change the world, “Magnetic Property Test of LK-99 Film” has disappointingly few views on YouTube: barely 240,000 views in the last five months. It lasts all of 47 seconds and shows a chip of metal, coated with a material called LK-99,being repelled by both poles of a magnet held by a gloved hand. Without context, it’s mystifying; a cat video has more obvious appeal.
If LK-99 is what it claims to be, though, that video will be enshrined as a historical artifact. The researchers at Quantum Energy ResearchCenter in Seoul, who first made LK-99, have argued that it demonstrates some properties of superconductivity.
One of them is the diamagnetism shown in the YouTube video. But as squads of scientists around the world race to replicate those results, the jury is still out on whether LK-99 is a true superconductor: a material that offers no resistance at all to electricity.
5.Meanwhile, the Financial Times reports that TSMC to build €10bn chip plant in Germany as looks to diversify its manufacturing footprint away from Taiwan.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, along with three corporate allies, is to go ahead with a €10bn plant in Germany as the world’s largest contract chipmaker seeks to diversify globally in response to customer concerns over geopolitical tension.
The Taiwan-based group has teamed up with automotive supplier Bosch and chipmakers Infineon and NXP to build the factory in the eastern city of Dresden, a statement from the four companies said on Tuesday.
TSMC’s board of directors approved an equity investment of up to €3.5bn in European Semiconductor Manufacturing Company GmbH.
The German government has offered TSMC half of the total — €5bn — in subsidies to support the project, according to a person familiar with the details. The economy ministry in Berlin said its support was in line with the criteria of the European Chips Act, adding that it had issued an exemption permit to allow construction to begin quickly.
The move adds to Berlin’s strategy to become a leading European hub for chip manufacturing, backed by generous state support. The EU as a whole is, meanwhile, seeking to double its share of the global semiconductor market from 10 to 20 per cent by the end of the decade.
Tuesday’s announcement comes on the heels of a decision by Intel in June to build two wafer fabrication sites in eastern Germany in the single biggest instance of foreign direct investment in the country’s history. The chipmaker Infineon, meanwhile, broke ground on its chip factory in Dresden in May.
The joint venture unveiled on Tuesday, of which the Taiwanese company will own 70 per cent while its European partners will each hold one-tenth, aims to start construction in the second half of next year. Production was scheduled to start by the end of 2027, the companies said, adding that the final investment decision depended on the amount of funding from the German government.
