The government’s Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) on Tuesday introduced an interoperable QR code that is set to transform the e-commerce landscape and empower every seller — from local artisans to neighbourhood shopkeepers.

Sellers have been limited by platform constraints, struggling to make their products visible to a wider audience.

The interoperable QR code, currently in its alpha phase, allows sellers to generate a unique QR code that customers can scan using an ONDC-registered buyer app, starting with magicpin and Paytm, and soon expanding across the entire network after initial testing.

“ONDC’s interoperable QR code breaks down the barriers that have held small businesses back. Now, every seller has the power to reach customers digitally, just like the e-commerce giants. It’s a massive leap towards an open, inclusive, and democratised digital marketplace,” said T Koshy, MD and CEO, ONDC.

With this, sellers can display their QR codes anywhere — on storefronts, products, marketing materials, or social media — instantly connecting with customers both offline and online, said the open network launched by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT).

Last month, in a bid to empower micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), the government announced an initiative to onboard five lakh MSMEs to the ONDC.

“Think of the local shopkeeper, the street vendor, the artisan — they can now be discovered and patronised by anyone, anywhere,” Koshy said.

“This isn’t just a new feature; it’s a catalyst for economic growth and digital inclusion. Millions of businesses will come online, creating new opportunities and driving India’s digital economy forward,” he added. AGENCIES

 Indian equity indices opened flat on Tuesday following mixed global cues.

At 9.38 a.m., Sensex was at 81,409, up 53 points. Nifty was up 24 points or 24,860.

The market trend remained positive. On the National Stock Exchange (NSE), 1,488 shares remained in the green and 538 shares remained in the red.

Among the sectoral indices, FMCG, realty, media, energy, and commodity were in the green. However, IT, pharma, fin Service, and pharma were the major losers.

Midcap and smallcap indices remained bullish as compared to largecap indices. The Nifty Midcap 100 index was at 58,537, up 175 points or 0.30 per cent, and the Nifty Smallcap 100 index was at 19,155, up 112 points or 0.59 per cent.

NTPC, Power Grid, Asian Paints, HUL, Tata Motors, and Tech Mahindra were the top gainers in the Sensex pack. UltraTech Cement, Bajaj Finserv, Sun Pharma, M&M, and Tata Steel were the top losers.

According to the market experts, “Sustained capital flows into mutual funds and the retail investor enthusiasm will keep the market resilient. The elevated valuations continue to be a concern, particularly in the broader market.”

“A healthy trend in the market now is that high-quality stocks with good earnings visibility are gaining strength on buying by institutions,” They added.

Global markets were trading with mixed cues. Tokyo, Jakarta, Seoul, and Hong Kong were in the green. Bangkok was in the red. US markets closed mixed. AGENCIES

 SK hynix, the world’s second-largest memory chip maker, said on Tuesday it plans to begin full-fledged production of its next-generation GDDR7 graphics memory chip in the third quarter.

The company said the GDDR7 boasts industry-leading qualities, with an operating speed of 32 gigabits per second, a 60 percent improvement from the previous generation.

When adopted for high-end graphics cards, the product can process data of more than 1.5 terabytes, equivalent to around 300 full-HD movies, in a second, reports Yonhap news agency.

The new chip also comes with improved power efficiency, by more than 50 percent compared with the previous generation, by adopting new packaging technology that addresses heat issues resulting from its ultra-fast data processing.

Lee Sang-kwon, head of the DRAM product planning division at SK hynix, said that GDDR7 is expected to be adopted by a wider range of applications, such as high-specification 3D graphics, AI, high-performance computing and autonomous driving.

“We will continue to work toward enhancing our position as the most trusted AI memory solution provider by strengthening the premium memory lineup further,” Lee said.

Meanwhile, SK Group will secure 80 trillion won ($58 billion) by 2026 for investments, mainly in artificial intelligence and semiconductors.

SK Telecom, the country’s leading wireless services providers, and telecommunications firm SK Broadband will invest 3.4 trillion won in establishing AI data centres by 2028, it said. AGENCIES

Aerospace industry leaders Thales and Garuda Aerospace on Tuesday announced a collaboration to promote the development of the drone ecosystem in India.

As part of the agreement, Thales will provide expertise in the field of unmanned traffic management (UTM) solutions, UAV detection and system integration, while Garuda will bring its skills in the manufacture and use of UAVs, as well as its expertise in the Indian market.

Established in 2015, Garuda Aerospace has a vast fleet of over 2,500 drones and 4,000 pilots across 400 districts.

This collaboration, said the companies, aims to foster innovation and advance the development of technological solutions that can enable safe and secure drone operations and help the growth of drone-based applications in the country.

The government is providing a robust foundation for the drone ecosystem, fostering opportunities for collaboration, innovation, and growth.

“This collaboration aligns well with the Aatmanirbhar Bharat (self-reliant India) vision, and seeks to support the country in realising its ambition to become a major global hub for drones by 2030,” said Ashish Saraf, VP and Country Director, Thales in India.

Thales has built end-to-end solutions for drone integration and the development of advanced UTM systems.

The company works closely with civil aviation authorities and air navigation service providers to deliver strategic UTM capabilities, including registration, authorisation and geo-awareness.

Agnishwar Jayaprakash, Founder and CEO, Garuda Aerospace, said that ever since Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched 100 Garuda drones in 100 villages, they cemented market dominance in the precision agri-drone segment, where 50 per cent of agri drones are from Garuda.

“Equipped with the largest fleet in India coupled with Thales’ UTM technology and their worldwide experience, Garuda Aerospace will aim to revolutionise the drone sector and play a key role in the transformation of India into a global drone powerhouse,” said Jayaprakash.

Present in India since 1953, Thales has over 2,200 employees in the country.

Founded in 2015 with a team of five, Garuda has scaled to a more than 200-member team. It manufactures 30 types of drones and offers 50 types of services. AGENCIES

 Tech giant Apple has responded to certain allegations regarding its AI models, saying it takes precautions at every stage — including design, model training, feature development, and quality evaluation — to identify how its AI tools may be misused or lead to potential harm.

The company said in a technical paper that it will continuously and proactively “improve our AI tools with the help of user feedback”.

It last month revealed Apple Intelligence that will offer several generative AI features in iOS, macOS and iPadOS software over the next few months.

“The pre-training data set consists of… data we have licensed from publishers, curated publicly available or open-sourced datasets and publicly available information crawled by our web crawler, Applebot,” Apple wrote.

Given our focus on protecting user privacy, we note that no private Apple user data is included in the data mixture, the company added.

According to the technical paper, training data for the Apple Foundation Models (AFM) was sourced in a “responsible” way.

Apple Intelligence is designed with the company’s core values at every step and built on a foundation of industry-lead privacy protection.

“Additionally, we have created Responsible AI principles to guide how we develop AI tools, as well as the models that underpin them,” said the iPhone maker.

The company further said that no private Apple user data is included in the data mixture.

“Additionally, extensive efforts have been made to exclude profanity, unsafe material, and personally identifiable information from publicly available data. Rigorous decontamination is also performed against many common evaluation benchmarks,” Apple elaborated.

To train its AI models, the company crawl publicly available information using its web crawler, Applebot and “respect the rights of web publishers to opt out of Applebot using standard robots.txt directives”.

“We take steps to exclude pages containing profanity and apply filters to remove certain categories of personally identifiable information (PII). The remaining documents are then processed by a pipeline which performs quality filtering and plain-text extraction,” Apple emphasised. AGENCIES

Google-owned YouTube is helping Indian creators unlock ‘fandoms’ in three ways — creation, monetisation and community – allowing them new tools to generate revenue directly from dedicated fans, Ishan John Chatterjee, Director-India, YouTube, said on Tuesday.

Speaking to IANS, Chatterjee said features like Super Chat, Super Stickers and Channel Memberships are allowing Indian fans to financially support their favourite creators while deepening their connection.

A decade ago, YouTube FanFest in Mumbai marked a pivotal moment in Indian pop culture, as fans embraced creators with the same fervour reserved for movie or sports stars.

“Today, marking the 10th anniversary of YouTube Fanfest, fandom has evolved into a powerful force shaping trends, communities, and the entertainment industry itself,” said Chatterjee.

A recent survey by Google and SmithGeiger noted that 62 per cent of Gen Z fans agree that they are a part of a fandom that no one they know personally is a part of.

“This diversity means there’s a fandom for everyone, and new communities are constantly emerging,” Chatterjee added.

He said that at YouTube, they offer more creative formats than other platforms to experiment and express yourself — from a 15-second short, to a 15 minute video, a 1.5 hour podcast or even a 15 hour livestream.

“We’re making our tools more intuitive and accessible, enabling fans of all levels to express their passion through creative content. From easy-to-use video editing features such as the Create App to formats like Shorts, we’re lowering the barrier to entry for fan participation and expression,” Chatterjee noted.

The YouTube Partner Programme established the first sustainable pathway for creators to thrive, giving creators more freedom, choice and opportunity to build a business and a community online.

“Besides, ads, subscriptions and our BrandConnect platform for sponsored deals, we give creators tools to leverage the power of community to earn in ways that are fun & engaging for them and their audience,” the senior company executive informed.

From posts and vertical live, multi-language audio and Gen-AI dubbing, the platform said it is giving creators the tools they need to connect with their fans on a deeper level. AGENCIES

Two children are confirmed dead in a knife attack on Monday in Southport, Merseyside, in northwest England, according to local police.

Nine other people have been injured, six of whom are in critical condition, Chief Constable Serena Kennedy was quoted as saying by Xinhua news agency.

It is understood that the children were attending classes at the “Taylor Swift Yoga and Dance Workshop” for minors aged seven to 11 when the attacker entered. Among the injured are two adults who were intervening in the attack. “We believe that the adults who were injured were bravely trying to protect the children who were being attacked,” the police said.

A 17-year-old boy from Banks in Lancashire has been arrested on suspicion of murder and attempted murder.

The motivation behind the attack remains unclear as the investigation is still in its early stages, the police said.

Police declared the stabbing a “major incident,” adding that it is not being treated as terror-related at this time.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the attack is “truly awful” and the “whole country is deeply shocked.”

The knife attack was reported at around 11:50 a.m. in a property on Hart Street, Merseyside Police said in a statement earlier on Monday. AGENCIES

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has called for “calm and restraint” as students resumed their protests that were suspended last week, according to his Spokesperson Stephane Dujarric.

Guterres “remains deeply concerned about the situation in Bangladesh”, Dujarric said on Monday at his daily briefing.

“He notes reports of the resumption of student protests today and reiterates his call for calm and restraint,” Dujarric said.

The UN has raised its concern with “relevant authorities, both in the capital, Dhaka, and here in New York, and we count on Bangladesh to respect and uphold human rights, including as a top troop-contributing country to United Nations peacekeeping missions”, he added.

The students had been protesting against a 30 per cent reservation in government jobs for relatives of freedom fighters who wrested independence for Bangladesh from Pakistan in a bloody civil war in which, according to Dhaka officials, 3 million people were killed in the genocide by Pakistani troops and their supporters.

After the Supreme Court slashed the reservations to 5 per cent, student leaders last week put the protests on hold.

But the demonstrations resumed on Monday because the students said that the government ignored their demand to release all their leaders.

More than 175 people, including police, have been killed and over a thousand injured in the upheaval that has shaken the nation.

Guterres is “alarmed by emerging reports about the excessive use of force by security forces and credible evidence of human rights violations” and “reiterates his call for all acts of violence to be investigated promptly, transparently, and impartially, and for those responsible to be held to account”, Dujarric said.

Last week, the UN said it had “serious concern” about reports that Bangladesh authorities had deployed vehicles with UN insignias during the riots.

Dujarric said on Monday that the UN had taken note of statements from Bangladeshi authorities that UN-marked vehicles are no longer being deployed within the country.

With 5,859 Bangladeshi troops deployed in UN peacekeeping operations, the nation is the third-largest contributor of personnel to current UN missions. agencies

Australia and New Zealand on Tuesday called for a “rapid and effective global response” to climate change in this “critical decade” while expressing their commitment to working together with Pacific partners to ensure the resilience and prosperity of the region.  

The two countries held a 2+2 Climate and Finance Ministers Dialogue in Brisbane which was attended by

Treasurer Jim Chalmers and Minister for Climate Change and Energy Chris Bowen attended the dialogue from the Australian side while New Zealand was represented by Minister of Finance Nicola Willis and Minister of Climate Change Simon Watts.

This was the second such annual discussion held between the two countries since the inaugural 2+2 Dialogue held in June 2023.

In the Joint Statement that was released after the meeting, both countries acknowledged the need for urgent yet orderly action to tackle climate change.

“Australia and New Zealand also recognise that climate change is the single greatest existential threat to the livelihoods, security and wellbeing of the peoples of the Pacific. We remain committed to working together with Pacific partners to ensure the resilience and prosperity of the region,” it mentioned.

During Tuesday’s meeting, the two sides agreed to conduct a review into regulatory barriers to the net zero transformation, with an initial focus on regulatory interactions with standards for batteries and electric vehicle charging.

It was also decided to convene sector-based roundtables with representatives from the maritime sector including exporters, shipping lines, ports and other stakeholders to identify the conditions required for trans-Tasman green shipping corridors and the opportunity to strengthen supply chain resilience. AGENCIES

  Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has urged all Australians in Lebanon to leave the country.

He told reporters on Tuesday that the government’s official advice is for Australians to avoid travelling to Lebanon amid the escalating conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, Xinhua news agency reported.

“The travel advice very clearly is don’t go to Lebanon,” he said.

“People who are there who are Australian citizens should ensure that they take advantage of the commercial flights that are available out of Lebanon at this time, he said.

Australia’s Smartraveller service, which is run by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT), on Monday issued a renewed warning against travelling to Lebanon due to the volatile security situation.

It said Australians in Lebanon should leave the country immediately, warning that the security situation could deteriorate rapidly with little or no notice.

Several airlines suspended flights to and from Beirut on Monday local time due to the security situation.

“This is a troubling area. We have been issuing these travel warnings for many months now, and it is important that people are cognisant of those warnings,” Albanese said on Tuesday.

In the 2021 Australian census, over 248,000 Australians reported having Lebanese ancestry, including 87,343 who were born in the Middle Eastern country.

According to the DFAT, approximately 15,000 Australians normally reside in Lebanon. AGENCIES