Namaste, Sat Sri Akaal, and Salaam. 🫡

Today we’re diving into -
- JSW Steel’s big push into bumping up capacity
- MX Player’s future after the Amazon no-quisition
- BYJU’s sob story (literally, he started crying)

Our read time is 4 minutes and 38 seconds - faster than when Pathaan broke out of that railway prison. 🤫

Let's dive in. 👇

Market Vibe Check

JSW Steel puts pedal to metal. 🏎️

TLDR -
- Steel production capacity to increase 35% in 2 years.
- Input costs are moderating + markets are stabilizing. (so margins will get fatter)
- Acquisition targets are being hunted across the world - all with the focus of expanding manufacturing capacity.

JSW Steel is the largest steel maker in India.

And they want to up their advantage by a ton. 22 million tons to be exact.

They just dropped plans to supercharge their steel arm - and it’s packed.

Steel production capacity is gonna to from 28.5 million tons/year to 38 million tons/year by 2025 end, and 50 million tons/year by 2028 end.

This is the business equivalent of going straight from 3rd gear to 6th.

The reason they’ll be able to ramp things up so quick?

One word - Brownfield.

Think about it this way - it would be much cheaper to start a restaurant if you moved into a pre-built kitchen.

That’s exactly what JSW is gonna be doing.

They’re gonna buy up/move into production units that others companies have already paid for and started using.

Only downsides are that most brownfield land is contaminated and generally in pretty bad shape.

But hey - if someone else has done all the capex, paid for the depreciation, and you can swoop in for cheap - not a bad deal.

Heavy metal. 🤘🪨

MX Player hunts for funds post-Amazon discussions. 💸

TLDR -
- Amazon acquisition plans now lie in dust - no billion-dollar exit.
- Cash now needs to be preserved and business direction is gonna change.
- GONE are the days of blind customer acquisition =)

MX Player is a social media giant that services Tier 2/Tier 3 India - and they’re shuffling their deck a little.

Up until recently, MXP was considered by Amazon as a very serious acquisition target.

But due to diligence issues, the deal had to be called off.

Now, MXP wants to blitz the Tier 3 world while conserving cash at the same time. (cause no one but Adam Neumann can raise big money in this market)

The new plan seems to be a big push for original content.

Tier 2/ Tier 3 media consumers are tired of Holly/Bollywood films being dubbed over in their native language.

This means that original series/shows garner a cult-like fan following very fast if marketed well.

More retention means a much meatier LTV and in turn, more profit.

Solid way out. 🗺️

BYJU’s starts sobbing. Literally. 
😭

TLDR -
- New Delhi, Gurgaon, and Bangalore offices got shut down.
- Employees are not gonna be fired (thankfully) and will instead be shifted to other business units.
- BYJU’s founder Byju himself apparently started crying after a govt raid on his offices. 💀💀

The BYJU’s mess keeps on getting worse day-by-day.

Some of their biggest officers are being shut down completely, and the ED put a raid on a few of them too.

While all of this was going down, Byju baba was taking calls in his Dubai condo and apparently “breaking down in tears”.

As with almost all things in life, this is related to money problems.

The issues all began in 2021, when BYJU's picked up a $1.2 billion term loan.

After the market got shaken, their investors started to sour and demanded a $200mn instant repayment PLUS a higher interest rate.

But Byju baba had already spent hundreds of millions on acquisitions, so they managed to breach some of the T&Cs on the loan and "technically defaulted".

Investors got angry, and that set the dominoes toppling.

Crazy stuff. 😅

In other news… ☕

Gucci’s owner picks up a 30% stake in Valentino worth $1.7bn (BBG)

Netflix starts hiring AI product managers - and paying them up to $900k (TC)

ECB raises rates to a record high (FT)

Amazon chops up their grocery division (BBG)

Ford begins to drift away from the EV dream (FT)

And that’s the tea the chai for today.

Thanks for reading, and we hope you enjoyed it.

Lots of ❤️,

Team CC