Tech Story

Alten – Global Tech Consulting And Engineering Firm.

Alten is a leading provider of IT and Engineering services. With over 37,000 engineers spread across over 30 countries, Alten has emerged as a pioneer in outsourced R&D, engineering, and IT services in under 30 years. The company’s engineers work on intricate and highly technological projects for the most prestigious businesses in all industries, services, and telecommunications.

About The Company

Incorporated in France in 1988, Alten is a global tech consulting and engineering firm. It has a presence in over 25 countries and over 33,700 employees. The shares of Alten are traded on the Euronext Paris market in compartment B. They are included in the SBF 120, IT CAC 50, and MIDCAP 100 indexes and are qualified for the Deferred Settlement Service. In 2018, the company had a revenue of over €2.269 Billion. Forty-five percent of the Group’s business is focused on the French market. Over the past few years, Alten has acquired several companies like Calsoft Labs, Bardenheuer, Enea Consulting (Sweden) cPrime Inc., EclipseIT BV, and Quick Release (UK), and Volansys.

History

Three engineers from prestigious universities, Simon Azoulay, Laurent Schwarz, and Thierry Woog, formed Alten in 1988. Between 1988 and 1997, the company built up its presence in France and expanded its operations. In 1999, the company debuted its IPO on the Paris Stock Exchange. In 2012, expansion was made toward Asia and USA. Since then, the Group has focused on making strategic business acquisitions in Europe consistent with its core business, especially in 2016. Thus, the international percentage of Group revenue in 2019 was 56.8%.

A wholly owned part of the Alten Group, Alten India offers engineering, technology, and digital transformation services. In India, it provides a wide range of services in numerous industries, from concepts to aftermarket services. Embedded. General Engineering, Aftermarket Support, and Digital are some of the company’s services. With over 3500 engineers, Alten in India has expanded since its founding in 2010 to help in areas that specifically cater to customer demands. In India, It has regional offices in Noida, Hyderabad, Pune, Bangalore, and Chennai.

Company Profile

Alten is a global technology consultation and engineering firm. It offers design and research projects for the technical and information systems departments in the industrial, telecommunication, and service industries. It works on technological product research and development for technical divisions. The business also builds IT solutions for information systems divisions and offers networks and telecoms design.

Alten offers services in various sectors, including information technology, defence, aviation, networking, and telecommunications.

Controversies

Alten Spain fired over 100 workers between July and December 2012 under the pretext of declining sales. Alten Spain attempted to terminate 140 employees in December 2012 and reduce the compensation of the remaining staff by 10%. As a result, employees issued a strike notice in January 2013.

In violation of the permitted uses of the trademarked terms “Engineer” and “Engineering,” Alten unlawfully markets its business across Canada as an engineering and R&D outsourcing firm. The company has never obtained a Certificate of Authorization from a professional engineering licensing organization in Ontario or any other Canadian jurisdiction. The company’s business is officially registered in Canada to provide staffing services, specifically office support and temporary help services, under the name of a subsidiary company of Proex Inc.

Founder – Simon Azoulay

Simon Azoulay, a French entrepreneur and the founder of Alten, formerly served as the chairman and chief executive officer of 18 different businesses. He is currently the CEO and Chairman at Alten. He is a Supélec alumnus. He created ALTEN with two other engineers in 1988 after overseeing the R&D department of Thalès.

Sandhya Gupta

I am a law graduate from NLU Lucknow. I have a flair for creative writing and hence in my free time work as a freelance content writer.

Shopee – Southeast Asia’s Largest e-Commerce Platform.

Shopee is an online platform that provides customers with a simple, safe, and quick online purchasing experience. With over 343 million monthly active users as of 2021, it is regarded as Southeast Asia’s largest e-commerce platform.

About The Company

Shopee is a multinational technology business based in Singapore that primarily focuses on e-commerce. The company is headquartered in Singapore Science Park. It is part of the part company Sea Group. Shopee began its operations in 2015 from Singapore. The company also offers online shopping and selling services to buyers and sellers in numerous European and American nations.

History

In 2015, Shopee, a socially driven, mobile-centric platform where customers can browse, shop, and sell, made its debut in Singapore. This platform makes online shopping simple and safe for buyers and sellers by integrating logistical and payment assistance. In order to compete successfully with other e-commerce platforms in the market like Coupang, Lazada, Tokopedia, and AliExpress, Shopee, which was earlier an app, developed its own website. The company uses its own escrow service dubbed “Shopee Guarantee” to guarantee online shopping security as a way to set itself apart from competitors. It withholds payment from merchants until customers have received their items.

In 2019, the company inaugurated its new headquarters at Singapore Science Park. The new facility is six times bigger than the previous one, which was located in the Ascent Building, and has over 244,000 sq. feet of area that can house over 3,000 employees. WeWork in Singapore had previously leased this structure. Due to Shopee’s quick expansion, the lease was later given back to it. By doing this, it intensifies its effort to enter the digital economy.

Business Model

Shopee began as a C2C (consumer to consumer) marketplace but has subsequently transitioned to a hybrid C2C and B2C format. To help its users logistically, it collaborates with more than 70 delivery service companies across its markets. For item pickup and drop in Singapore, Shopee partnered with logistics startup NinjaVan. In India, it collaborated with Delhivery and Ecom Express for the delivery of products. However, in 2022, the company announced that it is shutting its operations in India.

New Launches

An initiative named “Shopee University” was introduced by Shopee in 2016 to help local company owners and entrepreneurs establish their online stores in the Philippines. In the Philippines and Singapore, it introduced Shopee Mall in 2017, which featured over 200 brands. The specialized portal offers thousands of products from top regional stores and brands. Shopee Mall was developed to provide a more varied online shopping experience and to serve more established brands better.

2018 saw the opening of Shopee’s China Marketplace platform, which gives consumers in the Philippines and Singapore simple access to goods and products from Chinese vendors without paying shipping or agent costs. Shopee Philippines introduced Shopee Cares PH, a social-media customer support division active on Twitter and Facebook, in 2021. In 2021 it also introduced its food delivery services in the Malaysian and Thai markets.

Controversies

In 2019, Shopee Philippines was accused of defrauding Filipino fans of the Blackpink. #ShopeeScam became a trending topic on Twitter around the world. The 568 top spenders on Shopee Philippines’ online store were given tickets to a Meet and Greet session as part of a campaign. However, a number of fans claimed that after receiving confirmation that they had won tickets, It then withdrew them. Others shared screenshots demonstrating how Shopee had altered the rules of the contest a day before this event. Currently, the Department of Trade and Industry is looking into Shopee.

Founder – Forrest Li

Forrest Li founded Shopee in 2015. He is a multibillionaire businessman from Singapore. He also founded Sea Limited. Garena and Shopee are subsidiaries of Sea Limited. Li, a Chinese national born in Tianjin, moved to Singapore soon after receiving an engineering degree from Shanghai Jiaotong University. He also has an MBA degree from Stanford Graduate School of Business.

CEO – Chris Feng

Chris Feng is the CEO of Shopee. He is also the CEO of Sea Group’s division for financial services and digital payments, called Seamonkey. Feng oversaw the mobile games department at Sea Group before assuming his present position. Before joining Sea Group, he was a member of the Southeast Asia core team of German startup Rocket Internet, which helped launch online stores like Lazada and Zalora. He was also Lazada’s chief purchasing officer and a regional managing director at Zalora.

Sandhya Gupta

I am a law graduate from NLU Lucknow. I have a flair for creative writing and hence in my free time work as a freelance content writer.

Krafton Inc, The Company Behind The Famous PUBG Game.

Leave a Comment / Story, Tech Story / By Sandhya Gupta

Founded in 2007 as Bluehole, Krafton Inc. creates, produces, and markets home video games domestically and abroad. It provides games for consoles, smartphones, and PCs. It’s one of the most popular games is PUBG. Other popular games developed and published by Krafton are Mistover, Thunder Tier One, The Callisto Protocol, and New State Mobile.

About The Company

Krafton Inc. is a South Korean company that is in the business of developing and distributing video games. The company is renowned for creating TERA, PUBG: Battlegrounds, and NEW STATE Mobile, the latter two under its subsidiary PUBG Studios. The company was formerly known as Bluehole. In 2018, Bluehole underwent a reorganization to become a Krafton subsidiary. It is headquartered in Seongnam, South Korea.

History

Following PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds’ popularity, which resulted in funding from Tencent Holdings as well as studio expansion and acquisition, Bluehole decided to create Krafton in 2018 as a holding company for its video games operations. In April 2021, Krafton decided to launch its IPO. The company intended to raise US$5 billion at a valuation of US$27.2billion.The IPO launch took place on August 10, 2021, and although Krafton’s valuation declined from the initial list price at the end of a trade by 8.8%, it was still valued at US$19.32 billion.

Due to new limitations put in place by the Chinese government, shares of various Chinese and foreign videogame firms, including Tencent, the leading video game developer in China and a facilitator for foreign firms to release games in their country, decreased. Video games, mainly shooting video games, are perceived as “electronic drug” and a “spiritual opium” by the Chinese government because they are believed to encourage violence. Due to its high population density, China is a critically valuable market for video games, so video game firms like Krafton suffered greatly.

Subsidiaries

Since its inception, Bluehole has bought a number of development studios. On November 5, 2018, Krafton Game Union became the new parent company for all its subsidiaries. The popular subsidiaries of Krafton are Bluehole Studio, Striking Distance Studios, Dreamotion Inc, RisingWings, PUBG Studios, Thingsflow, 5minlab Corporation, and Unknown Worlds Entertainment. PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds (PUBG), one of the first battle royale games, was created by PUBG Studios (formerly PUBG Corporation), an internal studio of Bluehole. PUBG game set a new record in 2017 by selling $100 million before release copies in just 79 days. Due to concerns about data privacy, the Indian government banned PUBG Mobile in September 2020, along with several other apps made by Chinese companies, including Tencent Games. In order to relaunch the game in India, Krafton regained ownership of the game’s Intellectual Property (IP) from Tencent. In 2021, Battlegrounds Mobile India, a visually upgraded version of PUBG Mobile, was released for both Android and iOS. This time, Krafton, Inc. published the game.

Founder – Chang Byung-gyu

In 2007, Chang Byung-Gyu founded Krafton, initially known as Bluehole. Chang Byung-gyu started Bluehole Studio in Seoul in 2007. Along with seven other co-founders, Chang founded Neowiz in 1997. He later founded the search engine company, First Snow, in 2005 and sold that business in 2006. Tencent made a $500 million investment in Bluehole in 2018 for a 10% ownership, elevating the company to unicorn status. As per Forbes, Chang is one of South Korea’s seven gaming billionaires, with a net worth of over $2.9 billion.

CEO – Kim Chang-han

In 2020, Kim Chang-han was named the CEO of Krafton. Before that, he was the CEO of PUBG Corporation( now PUBG Studios). He started his career in the gaming industry in 2000, engaging in production, development, and engineering for a couple of studios before joining PUBG Corporation. He has attended the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, where he received a Ph.D. in computer science.

Sandhya Gupta

I am a law graduate from NLU Lucknow. I have a flair for creative writing and hence in my free time work as a freelance content writer.

Larsen & Toubro, Started With Dairy Equipment To Leading Indian Multinational Corporation.

Leave a Comment / Story, Tech Story / By Sandhya Gupta

Founded in 1946, Larsen & Toubro is a market leader in almost every industry. The conglomerate has achieved and maintained leadership in its primary business sectors for more than eight decades due to a robust, customer-focused strategy and a never-ending pursuit of world-class quality.

About the Company

Larsen & Toubro, also known as L&T, is a leading Indian multinational corporation with business operations in various industries like construction, engineering, technology, manufacturing, financial services, and information technology. L&T is ranked among the top five construction firms worldwide. The company is headquartered in Mumbai, India. L&T Group consists of 118 subsidiaries, 25 joint ventures, six associates, and 35 joint operations corporations. The company is listed on the NSE and BSE. In 2022, it had a revenue of over $20 billion. It serves clients from various industries in more than 50 countries.

History

In 1938, Henning Larsen and Soren Toubro, two Danish engineers, formed a company in Bombay. The company started as a business that imported and sold Danish dairy equipment. Unfortunately, import limitations that came into effect after Germany invaded Denmark in 1940 severely hurt the company’s business. Despite their difficulties, the pair decided to stay in India and establish a local workshop to provide services and technical work. During World War II, they discovered a profitable commercial opportunity to construct and repair ships. As a result, Larsen & Toubro was founded. In 1940, the company received its first significant order to build a soda ash facility/plant for the Tata Group. The calibre of service and prompt service of L&T delighted numerous national and international businesses. They started working with lots of foreign players. Gradually, L&T also became a representative of various British equipment manufacturers for producing soaps, glass, hydrogenated oils, etc. In 1945, the company made a deal with the US-based Caterpillar Tractor to market earth-moving machinery.

In 1946, L&T was incorporated, and it established offices in Madras, Calcutta, and New Delhi. In 1950, it went public and became a listed company. The company was selected as a contractor for constructing nuclear reactors in 1965. L&T was invited by Dr. Homi Bhabha, the Atomic Energy Commission’s (AEC) chairman at the time, to provide vital parts for atomic reactors in the 1950s. L&T began to obtain major projects from the ISRO in the 1970s and 1980s. In order to design weapon and missile systems, it also collaborated with DRDO.

Operations

L&T is also a top supplier of design-to-delivery services for India’s defence industry. It builds underground facilities, military installations, and storage facilities. Additionally, L&T provides a selection of defence-related vessels, such as warships, submarines, support vessels, and unique naval platforms. An important participant in India’s Public-Private Partnership (PPP) initiatives is L&T Infrastructure Development Projects Ltd. It has finished significant projects in several important industries, including renewable energy, transmission and distribution lines, ports, water supply, etc. The world’s largest metro project under PPP form is the L&T Metro Rail in Hyderabad. It extends over three corridors for 69.2 kilometers.

Founders – Henning Holck-Larsen, Søren Kristian Toubro

Henning Holck-Larsen and Soren Kristian Toubro, two Danish engineers, established L&T in Bombay in 1938. They were equally dedicated to enhancing India’s engineering capacity to fulfill market demands. Danish classmates Henning Larsen and Soren Toubro, who were studying India in history classes, perhaps never imagined that they would one day write the history of that auspicious country. The two companions made the decision to leave the conveniences of living in Europe in 1938 and launch their own business in India instead.

CEO – S N Subrahmanyan

S N Subrahmanyan is the CEO and Managing Director of Larsen & Toubro. He has been serving as the company’s CEO since 2017. In 1984, he started working with Larsen & Toubro’s ECC Division. He has an MBA from Symbiosis, Pune and also attended London Business School.

Sandhya Gupta

I am a law graduate from NLU Lucknow. I have a flair for creative writing and hence in my free time work as a freelance content writer.

Swiggy – A Bangalore-based Food Ordering And Delivery Platform.

Leave a Comment / Story, Tech Story / By Suhani Jain

Swiggy is a leading Indian food ordering and delivery platform which also provides services like on-demand grocery delivery known as Instamart and a same-day package delivery called Swiggy Genie. It was founded eight years ago in July 2014 by Sriharsha Majety, Nandan Reddy, and Rahul Jaimini, headquartered in Banglore, India, with its business expanded across 500+ Indian cities (2021). Naspers owns it. SuprDaily and Dineout are its two subsidiaries. Besides the founders, Dale Vaz, who is the Chief Technical Officer of Swiggy, contributed a lot to it and is one of the key people. It achieved a revenue of 2,776 Crore INR in 2020.

History

In 2013, Sriharsha Majety and Nandan Reddy devised an e-commerce website to provide shipping and courier services called Bundl in India. It was discontinued due to various reasons. They decided to rebrand it to enter the food delivery industry. The food delivery industry was in chaos at that time because of the rising competition. The different startups like Foodpanda, acquired by Ola Labs, Ola Cafe (later discontinued), and TinyOwl, purchased by Zomato, were struggling. Swiggy founders joined hands with a former senior software engineer at Myntra, Rahul Jaimini, and established Swiggy and Its parent company Bundl Technologies in 2013.

In 2019, Swiggy started Swiggy Stores, a general product delivery service, sourcing items from local stores. The firm launched an instant grocery service known as Instamart with the help of dark stores in August 2020. Swiggy Stores were closed in early 2021, and the firm decided to expand its services using Instamart. In September 2019, Swiggy came up with a new service, a pickup and delivery service known as Swiggy Go which provided services such as delivering documents, laundry, parcels, etc., from business owners to retailers, and was rebranded as Swiggy Genie.

Unfortunately, In May 2020, Due to the covid-19 pandemic, it fired over 1000s of employees, and later in 2021, it decided to cover vaccination costs for its delivery partners.

Revenue

The company experienced growth in revenue from 2015 (0.11 crores INR) to 2020 (2,693 crores INR), which got reduced in 2021 (2,145).

Acquisitions And Investments

In 2015, Accel and SAIF partners invested 2 million U.S dollars in Swiggy. It also received additional investment from Norwest Venture Partners. In 2016, it obtained an investment of about 15 million U.S dollars from its investors, including some new investors such as Bessemer Venture Partners and Harmony Partners. Naspers entrusted funding of 80 million to Swiggy in 2017. Due to this growth of investments and investors, Swiggy’s value increased to 3.6 million USD in April 2020.

It acquired 48East, a Banglore-based Asian Food start-up in 2017 and Mumbai-based Scootsy Logistics, a fashion and food delivery service which was later shut down. Also, in September 2018, it purchased a Mumbai-based milk delivery start-up SuprDaily and invested about 31 crores INR in a ready-to-eat Mumbai-based food brand, fingerLix, in 2019.

Partnerships

It has partnered with several renowned brands such as Burger King, Google Local Guide, Sodexo, ICICI Bank and ANRA Technologies.

Founders – Nandan Reddy, Sriharsha Majety, Rahul Jaimini

Rahul Jaimini is the Co-founder of Swiggy and Pesto Tech, born in Banglore. He also worked as a senior software engineer at Myntra, a member of technical staff at NetApp, and a research lab intern at Philips Research. Rahul holds a Bachelor’s and Master’s dual degree in computer science and engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur.

Co-founder Nandan Reddy is also a BITS Pilani alumnus and worked as a consultant. He also built a start-up around tablet-based POS for different restaurants and Café and has been in the core management team of India’s first rural BPO, Source Pilani. Bundl, a logistic platform, was also built by him.

CEO – Sriharsha Majety

Chief Executive Officer Sriharsha Majety is also the co-founder of Swiggy and Bundl. He also worked as an associate member in Nomura International, Recruitment coordinator in IIM Calcutta, and holds a degree in finance from the Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta.

Suhani Jain

I am a student pursuing my bachelor’s in information technology. I have a interest in writing so, I am working a freelance content writer because I enjoy writing. I also write poetries. I believe in the quote by anne frank “paper has more patience than person

Sega Corporation – World’s Most Prolific Arcade Game Developers.

Leave a Comment / Story, Tech Story / By Suhani Jain

Sega Corporation is a Japanese-Based Multinational Video Game and entertainment firm. It is headquartered in Shinagawa, Tokyo, and was founded in 1960. It has its other subdivisions overseas. One is established in Irvin, California, known as Sega of America. The other is Sega Europe, located in London. It is a subsidiary of Sega Group Corporation (Sega Sammy Holdings) which develops video game consoles. It has a division called Saga Games which develops arcade and home video games. They were different entities that merged in 2020. It has achieved a revenue of 247.7 billion Japanese Yen in 2020. They have about 3,000 employees working in the firm. Key people who contributed a lot to the corporation are Haruki Satomi (Chairman and CEO), Yukio Sugino (President and COO), Shigeru Yamashita (vice-chairman), Ian Curran (President, Sega of America), and Gary Dale (President, Sega Europe).

History

Sega Corporation was founded on 3 June 1960 by American Businessmen Martin Bromley and Richard Stewart as Nihon Goraku after it acquired the fortune of its predecessor, Service Games of Japan. After five years, its name was changed to Sega Enterprises, after the acquisition of a coin-operated game importer, Rosen Enterprises. The firm created its first-ever coin-operated game in 1966 which was called Periscope. But In 1969, it was sold to Gulf and Western Industries. In the early 1980s, it experienced a downturn and initiated the development of video game consoles such as SG-1000 and Master System, but there was great competition with companies like Nintendo Entertainment System in the market.

Subsidiaries

It has various subsidiaries.

Amplitude Studios
Atlus
Creative Assembly
Hardlight
Ignited Artists
Play Heart
Relic Entertainment
Sports Interactive
Two Point Studios
TMS Entertainment

Renowned Products

The firm has developed numerous multi-million-selling game franchises, which include Total War, Sonic the Hedgehog, and Yakuza Sonic. It has developed several long-running series such as Virtua Fighter and Initial D Arcade Stage. It is mainly renowned for its game consoles, creative approach, and innovative thinking.

Acquisition

In 2001, the firm stopped the production of game consoles and decided to become a third-party developer and publisher. In 2004, it was acquired by Sammy Corporation. After that, its profit started increasing and its name was changed to Sega Games Co., Ltd. The different domains like entertainment, arcade, and toy were divided into various companies which merged in 2020 as Saga Corporation.

Achievements

Sega Corporation is known as the world’s most abundant arcade game developer. It has more than 70 franchises, 500 + games, and 20 arcade system boards since 1981 and was recognized by Guinness World Records for the same. The Sega Genesis is one of the best consoles.

Founders – Martin Bromley, Richard Stewart

Martin Jerome Bromberg also known as Martin Jerome Bromley was born on 8 August 1919 and died on 7 September 2008 at the age of 89. He was a great entrepreneur and was one of the primary founders of Service games, a predecessor of Sega before its merger with Rosen Enterprises in 1965. He worked in coin-operated amusements with his father at Standard Games and also participated in World War II with his duty at a shipyard.

Richard Stewart was born on 5 January 1995 in Texas, United States, and died at the age of 74. He served as a key executive member of Sega and was a great American businessman.

CEO – Haruki Satomi

Haruki Satomi is the Chief Executive Officer of Sega Corporation born on 11 January 1979 in Tokyo, Japan. He has been a key executive member of Sega Sammy Holdings, Sega Networks, and Sega of Japan. He is a Japanese Businessman and holds a Bachelor’s degree in Arts.

Suhani Jain

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