The year 2017 is quickly coming to a close. The last week has been an extremely interesting one, with an influx in investments and a growth in the startup world, we have had a lot to do! So without taking up too much of your time, we’d like to dive into the week that was.

1. Amazon Posts 67% Increase In Sales Growth 

The Indian of ecommerce giant, Amazon, reported a 67% increase in sales volume in the September quarter. According to reports, the ecommerce giant’s volumes rose by 66% in the last six months alone. However, there were reports that Amazon was lagging behind Flipkart in the September quarter. Amazon squashed all these reports and said that they have a very fruitful last quarter.

2. Paytm’s Annual Offline Shopping Festival 12/12

India’s largest ecommerce online payments platform, Paytm, recently held its second annual offline shopping festival on 12/12/2017. Customers were offered up to 50% cashback on payments made through Paytm. The aim of this festival was to drive sales for offline merchant partners who accept Paytm as a payments source.

3. Uber’s Top Trends Of 2017 – Year With Uber 

Taxi and cab aggregator, Uber, has had an interesting year. In 2017, the company hit the 500 millionth trip milestone in July, where the riders and driver partners have traveled over 5.8 billion kilometers together. Uber launched a micro website, yearwithuber.com, which takes riders through their years with Uber. The past year has been interesting and filled with scandals for Uber. The end of the year video is a new beginning for the highest valued startup yet.

4. Xiaomi To Enter Indian Electrical Vehicles And Payments Space 

China based smartphone and appliances service, Xiaomi, is all set to enter the Indian electric vehicles and payments space. Not just electric vehicles, Xiaomi is also planning on launching laptops, gaming consols, computer accessories and lifestyle products. Currently, Ola as well as Mahindra and Mahindra are trying to gain an upper hand in the electric vehicle industry in India. These companies are facing fierce competition from companies like Paytm and Flipkart.

5. Twitter Made Easier. New Threads Revealed.

Twitter has had an interesting year. From increasing the number of characters to introducing a host of new features, online social media platform, Twitter, has gone through a lot of changes. In the latest announcement, Twitter revealed an easier way for users to link multiple threads together as well as publishing a lot of threads together.

6. Flipkart Completes $ 100 Million Employee Stock Repurchase Plan

India’s largest ecommerce website, Flipkart, successfully completed the repurchase of employee stocks worth $ 100 million. More than 3,000 current and former employees of Flipkart, Myntra, Jabong and PhonePe took part in this repurchase. In further news, SoftBank showed interest in wanting to buy Flipkart stocks from existing and former employees. A recent valuation said Flipkart was valued at $ 10 million.

7. Swiggy Acqui Hires 48East And Team

Swiggy, the country’s fastest growing online food ordering platform, recently acquired the gourmet based food platform 48East. In order to broaden its horizons, Swiggy also took over the management of Bengaluru based 48East. In the last three years, Swiggy has acquired a delivery fleet of over 10,000 people as well. At present, along with Swiggy, foodtech startups such as Zomato and UberEats are competing for the lucrative restaurant discovery and food delivery industry.

8. Paytm Reports Triple Growth In 12/12 Festival 

Alibaba backed online transactions and online payments faciliator, Paytm, reported a three fold growth during their recent annual 12/12 offline sale. Post this sale, Paytm is also gearing up for its Grand Finale sale beginning on December 13. The company also has plans to spend close to $ 5 million to bring on board offline sellers, under their Retailer Inclusion Programme.

9. Microsoft Makes Bing Smarter Using Artificial Intelligence

Microsoft, the technology giant funded by Bill Gates, decided to make Bing smarter by using artificial intelligence. The company will be leveraging their AI research in order to upgrade the search engine. Also, this will help in building a new relationship with Reddit. Microsoft has also introduced a host of interesting new features like Intelligent Search and Intelligent Image Search.

10. CCI Approves SoftBank Investment In Flipkart And BigBasket 

Japan based company, SoftBank, has been keen for a while now to invest in homegrown ecommerce based startups. The first step to achieve that is through showing interest in ecommerce online shopping platform, Flipkart and online grocery delivery platfrom, BigBasket. The CCI has approved this move as well and now, things are going to be extremely interesting on the Indian ecommerce front.

11. Alphabet Inc,.Sells New Wireless Internet Tech To Andhra Pradesh 

Alphabet Inc., Google’s parent company, will be providing the Andhra Pradesh Government with high speed wireless internet technology. Alphabet’s X research division announced on Thursday, the AP government will be buying newly developed technology to provide internet to millions of people without laying any cables.

12. Facebook To Introduce Click To WhatsApp Messaging Button 

Since its launch, Facebook owned messaging service Whatsapp, has been advertisements free. However, in an attempt to monetize WhatsApp, owner of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, decided to introduce a new feature on the social network platform. WhatsApp claims to have over 1.3 million active users at the moment, while Facebook has over 1.37 million active users.

That’s all for this week! Subscribe to our portal to never miss updates from the startup world! If your startup has an exciting announcement coming up, you can even write to us at [email protected]. Catch up with the highlights of the week with our The News This Week section.