Product categories such as paan masala, mouth fresheners and alcohol spend a large chunk of their advertising budget during the IPL since it is the peak summer season. However, the Union Health Ministry has banned all forms of tobacco and alcohol advertising, including surrogate advertising. The directive is clear and flouting it will be difficult. There will be much more scrutiny. Tobacco and alcohol constitute 20-25 per cent of IPL advertising in volumes and value. JioStar is eyeing Rs.5000 crore in ad revenues from the IPL. The move will ensure more ethical advertising this year (2025). It may disrupt IPL revenue.

Though there were government directives in the past, there was weak enforcement. There should be stronger penalties for violations, mandatory undertakings from advertisers and tighter monitoring of advertising.

The beer brands active in summer are likely to feel heat. However, brands from segments like BFSI, e-commerce, q-commerce and auto will mitigate the impacts of the absence of tobacco and liquor brands.

The industry will have to define what constitutes surrogate advertising. Was King Fisher airlines a surrogate or logical business extension? There should be self-regulation. The impacted categories will have to innovate with experiential marketing and other avenues.

India’s advertising industry is worth Rs.1.2 lac crore. Ahead of IPL season 2025, the Competition Commission of India (CCI) has raided several media agencies to investigate collusion between the top broadcasters and tech companies with member agencies of AAAI contravening the anti-trust rules under the Competition Act, 2022.

The collusion manipulates advertising rates and discounts and may even tinker with advertising inventory. Accordingly, some players dominate the digital advertising platforms (digital advertising constitutes 60 percent of total advertising spending in India).

The trigger to investigation was a routine GST enquiry at one of the top five ad Agencies in India which provided evidence of cartelization.

There were searches at the top media agencies, as well as the Indian Broadcasting and Digital Foundation (IBDF). Group M was targeted, which is owned by the WPP, UK. Even otherwise ad market is in turmoil following the merger of Walt Disney and Reliance India which controls 40 per cent of the TV and streaming ad market.

Price control and fixing ad rates are illegal. These inflate costs artificially. Small advertisers are adversely affected — they are out of the playing field. Consumers are prevented from taking informed decisions. There are kickbacks to the agencies in the form of commission.

If proven, it means large advertisers are overcharged due to manipulation. The media agencies will face financial penalties — a part of their annual turnover.

The IPL viewership in 2024 is 620 million. There were more than 100 advertisers in IPL 2024. The IPL 2025 ad spends are estimated to be between Rs.6000 crore — Rs.7000 crore. Many fence sitter advertisers could back out.

While speaking at Nvidia GTC 2025 event, LeCun, AI Chief Meta describes LLMs as just token generators which are in discrete space. He is interested in next-generation model architectures. These should be able to do your things — understand physical world, have persistent memory, be capable to plan and reason.

LLMs learn through text data which cannot achieve human-level AI. A typical LLM is trained on 20 trillion tokens or words equalling 10 to the power 14 bytes — one with 14 zeros behind it. Huge amount of information. However, a child of four years receives the same amount of information through visual system. In four years, a child is awake for about 16000 hours. Information reaches its brain through optic nerve. It is about 2 megabytes per second. Calculation shows that it equals 10 to the power of 14 bytes. Thus, a child of four years is exposed to the same information as the biggest LLM. It means we can never get human level AI by just training on text.

Meta itself has not released a new version of Llama in a while. OpenAI is trying to scale LLMs. It is to be seen how things go, and which approach works out. Meta is bearish on LLMs and expects a technological breakthrough to enhance the performance of AI systems.

On Thursday, 20th March, 2025, Eli Lilly, the US pharma company, launched its international best-seller drug Mounjaro ( tirzepatide) in India.

It is priced at Rs.14000 for a 2.5 mg monthly dose — Rs. 3500 per vial. The price for a 5 mg monthly dose is going to be Rs.17500 — Rs.4375 per vial. In the US, the drug costs $1000 for a monthly dose. Thus, it is available in India at a fraction of its cost in the US.

The drug is used for type II diabetes and obesity.

Novo Nordisk’s Ozempic and Wegovy have made waves across the world. Nordisk is a Danish drug maker. Nordisk proposes to introduce Wegovy in India in 2026. However, it may release the drug even earlier. Its oral version — Rybelsus — has been launched in India in 2020 but it is not as efficacious as its injectable counterpart.

Nordisk had become Europe’s most valuable company and had a market share value in 2023 that was higher than its native country’s GDP. In 2022, over 65 per cent of all drug prescriptions were for Ozempic alone.

Globally, today the most powerful anti-obesity drug is Mounjaro. Doctors are flooded with prescription requests. However, it is advised to take the drug under medical supervision and advice, since there could be potential side effects.

Monjuaro has been launched after the approval from CDSCO — Central Drugs Standard Control Organization. Pharmacologically Mounjaro activates both GIP (glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide) and GLP-1 (glucagon-like peptide 1) hormone receptors.

Domestic firms in India are working on genetic version of semiglutide, a key drug in the GLP-1 class. Sun Pharma is working on utreglutide, Cipla is working on generic version of Wegovy, Biocon is working on litraglutide, GLP-1 version. Natco is developing a generic version of Ozempic.

There are 101 million diabetic patients in India. Half of them have poor glycemic control. According to WHO estimate (2022), one in eight in the world live with obesity. Obesity causes diabetes in 44 per cent of all diabetes cases, 23 per cent ischemic heart diseases and 7-41 per cent of all cancer cases. At least, 44 million women and 26 million men (over 20 years) are clinically obese (Lancet study).

These drugs in India will have more takers for obesity or weight management. Eli Lilly says Mounjaro will be used as an adjunct to reduced-calorie diet and increased physical activity for chronic weight management in adults.

There is the arrival of spring in Paris, France. There are signs of economic improvement. The city is expanding. Still there are signs of wealth moving out of the city. Residents have plans either to move to Switzerland or to Dubai.

London too is experiencing migration of non-doms and banking exiles. In Paris, the taxes are rising. Once upon a time, there was run for Paris — it was a banking hub of choice. French financiers drawing seven-figure salaries doubled in four years. Today, the hiring plans have been called off.

There is a fight for global talent. Paris benefited on account of Brexit. J P Morgan expanded its manpower four-fold. However, these days private equity and hedge funds rush to Dubai and near-by Abu-Dhabi which are tax free. Madrid and Milan fare better but still cannot hold candle to the UAE. The UAE attracted 6700 millionaires in 2024 (Henley and Purners).

In the UAE, there was property binge in 2008. There were efforts at creating a financial center. Oil wealth and expanding tourism were diversified. Revolut’s CEO spends more time in the UAE. In Europe, there are regulatory and hiring obstacles. Young consultants prefer Abu Dhabi.

In France, high-income households (10 per cent) contribute 75 per cent of IT returns. In the UK, it is more than 60 per cent. The tax base is narrow and could be eroded further. There could be defensive responses like exit taxes.

The shine could come off the UAE if regional geopolitical tensions worsen. Paris has to reinvent itself beyond tourism, luxury and politically connected corporations. Europe is an option. France could be a financial hub if it plays its economic cards well. Paris must be made more liveable. Youngsters who want to start a family could find it attractive — child care and tax credits. Office property could be converted into residential property. There should be investment in infrastructure. Engineering manpower must be made available. There should be investment in education. Till then, the migration continues.

AI has transformative potential, but organizations lack a structured approach to its integration. AI systems require continuous data access, making them vulnerable to cyber-attacks and privacy risks, especially in AI driven user analysis. Organizations overlook the security risks that come with AI adoption.

Companies must embed cyber security into their AI strategies from day one to minimize risks and unlock its full potential.

Kokilaben Hospital deployed Check Point’s AI and ML-powered solutions to get real-time threat detection and remedy the situation. Alkem Laboratories faced cyber threats. Check Point helped here too with automatic threat prevention, secure remote access.

AI adoption is no longer optional but a necessity. However, at the same time, organizations must address critical concerns regarding cyber security.

Google has acquired Wiz for $32 billion and it underscores the growing cyber security risks.

The AI Readiness Index of Cisco reveals that only 18 percent organizations in India are fully prepared to deploy AI technology (down from 26 per cent in 2024). It underscores growing security challenges.

It is assumed that traditional controls suffice. Organizations must adopt zero-trust AI architectures. There should be Chief Information Security Officers who can take accountability. The security measures are still evolving. AI systems themselves are being attacked. In multiple agent systems, attackers can orchestrate automated cyber-attacks. AI-driven automation expands the attack surface. The security must be embedded at every stage of cloud deployment.

Wiz is a privately owned five-year old cybersecurity firm. Google made a bid in July 2024 to acquire Wiz for $23 billion but failed. A less than a year later in 2025, Google offers $32 billion for Wiz.

There are many cybersecurity firms which could be takeover targets. Why Wiz? There is one distinction — it is focused on cloud computing — its software identifies corporates vulnerabilities in their cloud-based data. Google competes with Microsoft and Amazon.com in corporate cloud services. It requires a competitive advantage here.

However, it has paid too much. It’s a leap of faith. It may not face any anti-trust action, but there is a potential of lengthy anti-trust probe.

The deal is small, considering the overall size of Google. Still, it is its biggest over acquisition. Google’s market value took a dent of $60 billion and stood at a little under $2 trillion. Though 50 per cent of it could be attributed the fall in Nasdaq, still there is a sizeable hit on account of sticker-shock. There are misgivings about decent returns. There is a further risk of Google investing in M&A in future which are pricier.

Google must convince regulators the deal will not stifle innovation and choice in cloud security. It must convince shareholders that no deal would have cost them more in future.

ChatGPT signifies a God-like entity for OpenAI. There is a race among tech companies to attain a lofty concept of artificial general intelligence (AGI) that either matches the cognitive capabilities of humans or surpass it. The top management of tech companies were striving for financial prosperity that could be beneficial to humanity.

Despite the noble intentions, it goes without saying that the efforts of the tech companies put their financial results first and foremost. The altruistic objectives seem to have fallen by wayside. The generative AI boom has become a race to win.

There are various opinions about the timeline to achieve AGI. Anthropic sees it coming by 2027. Altman of OpenAI puts it away ‘by a thousand days’. SoftBank predicts a two-three years’ timeline. All these leaders are not settled about one definition of AGI. Hassabis treats it as software that can perform at ‘human level.’ Altman feels AGI would ‘outperform humans.’ Microsoft calls it ‘nonsensical benchmark hacking.’ AI’s top leaders dance around various definitions of these North Star, while continuing to move towards it. Some draw a gloomy picture by associating it with existential threat. The door is vaguely defined. The consequences are not known.

There is no evidence that any of the existing players have AGI, but they are confident that once there they will tackle the most complex problems facing the world — cancer cure, climate change.

In their attempt to build AGI, the existing players strived towards building the bigger models in the hope that the bigger is better.

The idea should not be to build gods since the benefits are still not certain

As we know, Microsoft has already invested in OpenAI about $13 billion. It also backs BlackRock. Elon Musks XAI is the rival firm for OpenAI. Both Microsoft and BlackRock are investing in XAI to build $30 billion AI infrastructure. Nvidia is the technical advisor to the group.

Microsoft is increasingly developing AI outside OpenAI partnership. It has created in-house AI models that could compete with OpenAI. Since AI development requires huge capital investment in data centers, the US has taken a stargate initiative. The Microsoft-Backed group will be called AI Infrastructure partnership (AIP). BlackRock’s CEO Larry Fink wants to bring pensions and insurers together for such long-term infrastructure projects.

Microsoft BlackRock tied up in 2024 MGX, a UAE investment vehicle that is also involved in Stargate.

They have tied up with energy companies to accelerate the scaling of the project. By

Micro-dramas are vertical dramas on videos under two minutes and are very popular. It will create a $13 billion dollar market globally by 2027. In India, it is becoming mainstream entertainment. Some of the Indian shows produced by KUKU are My Idiot Hero Husband, Secret Billionaire, Study God.

It is bite-sized, emotionally, charged storytelling. These videos are produced in vernacular. Slatforms such as YouTube Shorts, Instagram Reels have noticed this trend.

The trend has picked up after data consumption has become affordable and there are smartphones. The success of bite-sized video content is addictive.

Some players in this market have adopted subscription model. There are subscriptions for different time durations. There are premium subscriptions. In monetizing the content, there could be ads or product placements. In future, brands can be made part of the narrative.

The production cost of micro-dramas is very low. A single micro-drama takes Rs.5000-Rs.10000 per episode to produce. There is real cost advantage in the distribution model itself — as these are sent direct to platform, the middlemen are eliminated. They thus reap quicker returns on investment. AI-driven content can further bring down costs.