TechThisWeek: WhatsApp gets nod for UPI payments; Inside Happiest Minds’ first earnings call

In the latest episode of the TechThisWeek podcast, Mihir Gandhi, a partner at PwC leading the consulting firm’s payments transformation practice, spoke to TechCircle reporters about NPCI’s go-ahead to WhatsApp Pay and how the initial restriction to 20 million users for the pilot launch makes sense. 

Late Thursday, the Mumbai-headquartered National Payments Council of India or NPCI said it approved two major changes to its four years old UPI (unified payments interface) ecosystem in the country.

Separately, NPCI also capped the share of UPI payments by volume for any third party app such as Google Pay or WhatsApp Pay to 30%.

Also in the podcast:

Ashok Soota led information technology (IT) services firm Happiest Minds Technologies reported a dip in revenue, in the first of its financials disclosure since its blockbuster listing at the bourses. TechCircle reporters explain why we can’t compare the company to Indian IT giants. 

Singapore-based cloud communications company Knowlarity Communications has tied up with Google Cloud, to use the latter’s services to launch a programmable speech analytics platform for Indian businesses.

Puma India picked customer relationship management giant Salesforce to enhance its online customer experience journey to provide customers with an online digital experience that would match the in-store experience.

British footwear brand Clarks has signed on Reliance-owned offline-to-online (O2O) omnichannel platform Fynd to accelerate its omni-channel strategy in India, as it goes about a digital expansion of its brick and mortar stores.

Flipkart closed two deals this week. However, it was a slow period, in terms of fundraising activity.