Arvind's Newsletter

1.Demergers are back in vogue as market growth is slowing down and there is a pressure on market capitalisation of conglomerates (and not just in India). In India, Reliance Industries is looking to de-merge its financial services business, which has been on the anvil for awhile while French drug maker Sanofi plans to hive-off its consumer business in India. And in China, e-commerce giant Alibaba is splitting its businesses into six units and assuming a holding company structure like Alphabet.

2.India is hunting for new spyware with less publicity than the controversial Pegasus system, which has been blacklisted by the US government, while rival surveillance software makers prepare bids for lucrative deals from Narendra Modi’s government (as reported in Financial Times)

Defense and intelligence officials from the South Asian country have decided to acquire spyware from NSO Group’s less exposed competitors, the Israeli makers of Pegasus, according to people familiar with the move, who are trying to rake in up to $120 million through new spyware deals to spend

About a dozen competitors are expected to participate in the bidding process, filling the void left by pressure from human rights groups and US President Joe Biden’s administration on NSO, according to two people with knowledge of the talks.

India’s move shows how strong demand for this sophisticated — and largely unregulated — technology remains despite mounting evidence that governments around the world have been abusing spyware by targeting dissidents and critics.

3.Turkey gave Finland the green light to join NATO. Sweden and Finland had both applied to join after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, but Ankara blocked them until they fulfilled various demands. Finland met those demands, and the Turkish Parliament voted unanimously to allow its accession. The NATO Secretary-General said he looked forward to raising Finland’s flag when it is formally admitted in July, and told Politico that he hoped Sweden would follow after Turkey’s elections in May. Finland’s Prime Minister, Sanna Marin, while popular overseas, faces a close fight in elections on Sunday and may be voted out: The Finnish public is concerned over the state of the public finances.

4.Tesla is said to be looking to build a battery plant in the US. The catch? The electric vehicle maker wants to do it with China’s dominant EV battery manufacturer. Tesla wants to pursue a deal similar to one that Ford Motor announced last month in Michigan with the battery maker, known as CATL, to construct a plant wholly owned by the US carmaker.

Tesla is in expansion mode, deploying its US$22 billion in cash to crank up production volumes and lower costs as it faces increased competition. CATL, which makes lithium iron phosphate batteries, a chemistry that is cheaper than the nickel-based batteries used in the West, is key to that plan.

The carmaker is considering building the battery plant in Texas to supply its EV assembly plant there, though a location has not been finalised, some of the people said. Like the Ford deal structure, Tesla would own and operate the factory while licensing the technology from CATL.

5.Why did humans evolve curly scalp hair? Human hair is unique: Members of no other species have hairy heads on relatively hairless bodies. Traveling long distances in the hot sun put our ancestors’ massive brains at serious risk of heat damage. Compared to bald scalps or those with straight hair, curly hair is the most effective at keeping the head cool