Arundhati Ramanathan

Bangalore

Deputy Editor at The Ken

Deputy editor @thekenweb

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Articles

A Paytm lesson for Phonepe

1 month ago | the-ken.com | Arundhati Ramanathan

A weekly newsletter about how finance is getting supercharged by tech in India, and how you can make money work for you. Subscribe here Good morning [%first_name |Dear Reader%], You are reading our subscriber-only newsletter Ka-Ching!—a weekly commentary on fintech and personal finance Enter your email address to receive a daily curation of our latest newsletters, stories, and podcasts.
Juspay's battle with Razorpay-Phonepe has no safe side. Just ask its investors and merchants

1 month ago | the-ken.com | Arundhati Ramanathan

Arundhati is interested in how people use money in the digital age and how new economies will take shape based on that interaction. "The only choice is to kill or get killed," said a payments executive at a fintech. They were referring to one of the biggest fintech upsets of the year, when payment aggregators Phonepe, Razorpay, Cashfree, and Paytm* all decided to pull out support for orchestrator Juspay. Just in time to mess up its latest funding round, no less.
A Gujarat high for fintechs

1 month ago | the-ken.com | Arundhati Ramanathan

Good morning [%first_name |Dear Reader%], What do Indian fintechs really need? Depending on who you are and what you do for a living, you could say more capital; less regulation; better talent; more fees; less competition... the list is long. And if you were one of those who said Indian fintechs need to loosen up, guess what? Gujarat heard you. The western Indian state is doubling down on investments and offering more sops in an area where it has long lagged behind the rest of India. Booze.
Are banks done with India's credit card frenzy?

Dec 2, 2024 | the-ken.com | Rahel Philipose |Rohin Dharmakumar |Nuha Bubere |Arundhati Ramanathan

For the last five years, India’s new-found love for plastic has been pretty visible. More than 100 million credit cards had been issued by banks by Feb 2024. Banks, as we all know, are in a rush to sell more and more credit cards. To do this, they use a whole gamut of attractive offers. For example, free access to airport lounges became all the rage for the longest time. The footfall at these lounges went up significantly till banks slowly realised it was getting a bit too expensive.
Do we even need Product Managers?

Oct 11, 2024 | the-ken.com | Praveen Gopal Krishnan |Aakriti Bhalla |Debanjali Biswas |Arundhati Ramanathan

Good Morning [%first_name |Dear Reader%],You are reading the Two by Two newsletter—a weekly commentary on the most important business stories around you If you are a Product Manager, especially in India, you’re probably going through a crisis of faith and existence. As a career, Product Management in India has gone through multiple eras—in the early days, Product Managers (PMs) struggled to explain to people what they actually did.
Ashneer Grover turns the tables-on himself

Oct 10, 2024 | the-ken.com | Arundhati Ramanathan

Good morning [%first_name |Dear Reader%],This is not how I pictured Ashneer Grover going out. Settling seems so out of character for Grover, who once wrote “anything is possible as long as you negotiate hard” in his hurriedly written autobiography. In 2022, Bharatpe—the company he had co-founded—filed a case against Grover and his family members seeking over Rs 80 crore (US$9.5 million) in damages.
The Ken at 8:

Oct 3, 2024 | the-ken.com | Rohin Dharmakumar |Seema Singh |Jonathan Ananda |Arundhati Ramanathan

Dang, you’re out of gift subscriptions We currently limit the number of free gift subscriptions per subscriber. You’ll get more when you renew your subscription. In the meantime, if you want to tell someone about The Ken, gift them a story. Not now, thanks. Your email is on its way!To track your gifted stories, go to your Account Settings We’ve emailed your gift link. Want us to send some more?
Netflix’s last growth market

Sep 26, 2024 | the-ken.com | Praveen Gopal Krishnan |Gaurav Bagur |Vanita Bhatnagar |Arundhati Ramanathan

Good Morning [%first_name |Dear Reader%],If you are a premium subscriber of The Ken, you can listen to the latest full, subscriber-only episode of Two by Two on The Ken’s mobile app here, and on Apple Podcasts here. Our story begins in 2022. It’s 19 April, and Netflix has just reported its first-quarter earnings for the year. Just a few months earlier, Netflix had given investors a guidance that it expects to gain 2.5 million subscribers in the first quarter. A fairly conservative number.
What's next for Indian fintechs?

Sep 25, 2024 | the-ken.com | Arundhati Ramanathan

The fintech–bank relationship is getting yet another makeover A weekly newsletter about how finance is getting supercharged by tech in India, and how you can make money work for you. Subscribe here Good morning [%first_name |Dear Reader%],Indian fintech has grown from being hot to just… sad. The excitement from the Global Fintech Fest, held just a month ago, has already worn off and weariness has once again set in.
Health insurance in India is ripe for disruption

Sep 19, 2024 | the-ken.com | Rohin Dharmakumar |Aakriti Bhalla |Anand Kalyanaraman |Arundhati Ramanathan

Good Morning [%first_name |Dear Reader%],“Today, we are a K-shaped economy. There are two different angles at which the economy is progressing. There’s one set of customers, you know, who are upwardly mobile and sitting in the urban areas. And the other ones who are struggling, you know, for sustenance.”That was Shivaprasad Krishnan, one of the two guests we had on Episode 10 of the Two by Two podcast. And we were talking about the state of India’s health insurance sector.