One quick thing: TCS witnesses first annual revenue decline since going public in 2004
In today’s newsletter:
UPI turns 10: What comes next?Swiggy co-founder Nandan Reddy to log outSpace wars: Who really controls the satellite?
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Top 3 Stories
UPI turns 10: What comes next?
10 years was all it took to transform how India pays and reshape the entire landscape
Driving the news
UPI is turning 10 and has emerged as the country’s most preferred digital payments method.
Powered by ease of use and speed, the platform now has around 400 million users and processes over 750 million transactions a day, making it the world’s largest real-time payments system.
Its next targets are just as ambitious:
A billion transactions a dayA billion users over the next decade
To put its growth in perspective, UPI processed Rs 21 lakh crore worth of transactions in FY20. In March 2026 alone, it crossed Rs 30 lakh crore.
Faint of money
Dwindling government subsidies mean that ecosystem players are left with less capital to reinvest for the next stage of growth.
“While the ecosystem has thrived on adoption, the underlying economics remain thin for the players who have heavily invested in the infrastructure, security, consumer awareness and merchant acquisition,” PhonePe co-founder and CTO Rahul Chari told us.
Turning scale into monetisation
NPCI, which operates UPI, is asking ecosystem players to take various credit products to the masses, possibly half a billion in the next decade.
Credit products on UPI attract MDR, a commission that payment firms collect from merchants.
“UPI has an incredible opportunity to democratise credit. There are a few more structural pieces that have to fall into place, and it will happen sooner than later,” Sharath Bulusu, senior director at Google Pay and Wallet told us.
Swiggy co-founder Nandan Reddy to log out
Swiggy is witnessing the exit of another founder. The company is also hitting ‘re-order’ on its board structure.
What’s happening?
Nandan Reddy, co-founder of Swiggy and head of innovation, has quit with immediate effect. He is also giving up his board seat.
Reddy is set to start his own venture, sources tell us. Why it matters?
Reddy’s departure is significant for two main reasons:
First, he is the latest co-founder to exit the firm, leaving Sriharsha Majety as the last remaining member of the original founding trio.
Phani Kishan, now also a co-founder, was an early employee who was elevated to the role in 2021.
Second, Reddy is also the second senior-level departure at Swiggy.
Earlier this week, we exclusively reported that Abhishek Agarwal, head of investor relations (IR) and vice president (VP) at Swiggy is also leaving.
These exits are at a time when the company’s share price is under pressure and it continues to incur losses.
Board restructuring
Prosus, Swiggy’s largest shareholder, is also making changes to its board representation.
Roger Clark Rabalais will step down as nominee director and will be replaced by Renan De Castro Alves Pinto, also an executive at Prosus.
In addition, Swiggy has proposed inducting two senior executives to the board: Kishan and chief financial officer Rahul Bothra, subject to shareholder approval.
Space wars: Who really controls the satellite?
In space, the real question isn’t who owns the satellite. It’s who can switch off access to it.
Driving the news
Planet Labs’s move to restrict imagery over Iran (based on directions of the US government) may seem tactical. But for India’s spacetech startups with American ties, it raises a deeper concern around control.
The trigger: US-aligned firms can be directed to limit access in conflict zonesThe implication: Space data isn’t purely commercial. It’s strategicThe shift: Indian space startups which also have operations in India, operate in overlapping regulatory and geopolitical spheres
As Chaitanya Giri of Observer Research Foundation puts it, compliance in US-linked ecosystems is often “not optional,” especially in defence-linked contexts.
Structuring for a fragmented world
For companies like Digantara who have set up subsidiaries in the USA, the response is structural.
CEO Anirudh Sharma told us how they are solving for this challenge:
Separate entities across geographies to avoid centralised controlIndia holds core IP; global arms operate via licencesMarket-specific capabilities (example: missile tracking in the US vs SSA in India)
Sharma says the real risk lies in centralised decision-making, something the company has tried to avoid by design.
The rise of a ‘corporate foreign policy’
Legal and policy experts say this is no longer optional. It’s foundational.
Multi-jurisdiction structures help navigate export controls and sanctionsLocalising R&D and IP enables operational autonomyNeutral jurisdictions and distributed control centres are emerging as strategies
According to Ashok GV, partner at Allied Law Practices , spacetech firms must now embed geopolitical risk into their core business planning and even develop a “corporate foreign policy.”
Capital, compliance, and control
Ownership is only one part of the equation.
Authorisation for satellites sets the legal baseline, but geopolitics shapes real-world operationsCapital flows, supply chains, and export controls create “pressure points” India’s balancing act
India is trying to walk the tightrope between global integration and strategic autonomy.
IN-SPACe is pushing domestic capacity through PPP models. However, government funding remains skewed toward R&D rather than infrastructure scale-up.