August 24, 2016 - Andhra Pradesh raises toast to Olympics silver medalist PV Sindhu

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Invite Friends Blog Sree Vijaykumar From the Editor's Desk Sam Shank, 43, (CEO of HotelTonight) was like a lot of other startup CEOs, flush with cash from earlier rounds and so focused on the day-to-day he didn't notice that VCs had suddenly become parsimonious. After a painful but quick round of layoffs, he told his employees that there would be no more layoffs and that the company was aiming to become profitable by August without killing growth. Employees started making decisions based on whether it improved the company's earnings. They slashed marketing, stopped wasting money on discount sites and coupons, and added features that led to more app users booking rooms. The company cut its annual infrastructure costs by $500,000 - a 40 percent drop - by renegotiating licensing deals, moving from one software platform to another and so on. One employee won a weekly "Frugal Not Cheap" award by simply telling a credit card processor they wanted to pay less, saving $8,000 per month. Every week, Shank updated the company on its burn rate, and every morning, employees got an e-mail with such key metrics as gross bookings value, year-over-year growth and gross margin. HotelTonight turned profitable in April and things are going well enough that Shank is ready to say what much bigger startups continue to duck: He wants to take the company public, possibly by late 2017. Indian unicorns, are you listening? Our advertisers help fund the daily operations of TradeBriefs. We request you to accept our promotional emails (B2B Decision-Makers, B2C Decision-Makers, TradeBriefs Premium). Sports Andhra Pradesh raises toast to Olympics silver medalist PV Sindhu Hundreds of folk artists beat drums and danced to welcome PV Sindhu and Pullela Gopichand. Sindhu's father accompanied her on the bus ride. 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HR Lockheed's pitch to India: F-16s, jobs and a strategic blow to Pakistan Lockheed’s proposal may allow India to choke off key supplies to Pakistan, which has relied on F-16s as its main aerial defence for decades Logistics Another one follows: Gujarat Assembly ratifies GST Bill GST Bill: The ratification of the bill comes in quick succession after the Chhattisgarh assembly passed it unanimously on Monday.   Logistics Pranab Mukherjee lauds look East, act East policies, GST President lauds Look East, Act East policies, GST Logistics APM Terminals inks deal with Mahindra Susten, a leading renewable energy brand for solar panels from China for a 260 MW plant in Andhra Pradesh APM Terminals Inland Services Pvt Ltd, South Asia, has won an exclusive Third Party Log Logistics States queue up to get GST network to build back-end process to get ready for the April1st 2017 target launch date GSTN is a not-for-profit entity owned by Centre, states and non-govt financial institutions, and is building the technology backbone for new tax regime. 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