26, Feb 2026
Solar Service Searches Rise 43% Across India: Justdial Data Reveals
Bengaluru, Feb 26: Justdial Limited has reported a significant year-on-year increase in searches for solar-related and electrician services across India, based on an analysis comparing search volumes between February 2024 – January 2025 and February 2025 – January 2026. The data reflects rising consumer interest in energy upgrades, infrastructure readiness and long-term power solutions across both metropolitan and emerging cities.
At a national level, Solar-related Services recorded a robust 43% growth, indicating heightened adoption of solar installations and allied solutions. Electrician Services followed with a 9% increase, suggesting parallel demand for technical expertise to support installations, upgrades and maintenance requirements.
City-wise data reveals sharp momentum in select markets within the Solar-related Services category. Patna registered a remarkable 206% increase, more than tripling year-on-year search interest. Delhi followed with a 153% surge, while Bangalore recorded an 81% rise. Hyderabad saw a 53% increase, and Chennai posted a 35% growth. Pune (+21%), Surat (+17%), Lucknow (+14%), Mumbai (+13%) and Nagpur (+32%) also reported steady upward trends, signalling widespread traction across regions.
Within Electrician Services, Ahmedabad led with a 14% increase in searches. Chennai, Pune and Surat each recorded a 12% rise, while Delhi, Mumbai and Indore posted 11% growth respectively. The data indicates consistent demand for skilled electrical services across urban centres.
The parallel growth in solar and electrician-related searches points to a broader shift towards energy-conscious investments and infrastructure preparedness. Rising electricity costs, increased awareness of renewable energy benefits and a growing focus on long-term operational efficiency may be contributing factors. The trend may also reflect commercial and industrial expansion alongside sustained residential demand.
The findings underscore evolving consumer behaviour, with users actively exploring structured energy solutions and professional services to support power transitions across India.
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- By Neel Achary
26, Feb 2026
Indian School of Hospitality Launches B.Sc. in Global Business & Entrepreneurship
Gurugram, Feb 26 : The Indian School of Hospitality has launched a four-year B.Sc. in Global Business and Entrepreneurial Leadership, expanding its academic portfolio beyond hospitality-focused pathways into integrated business leadership education aligned with India’s evolving economic structure.
India’s services sector contributes over half of the country’s GDP and is supported by complex networks of logistics, digital infrastructure, capital flows and consumer markets. As enterprises operate within increasingly interconnected environments, industry demand is shifting toward graduates who understand how pricing, supply chains, working capital and governance decisions influence one another.
The new program has been structured around that integrated view of business.
Rather than organising learning around isolated management functions, the B.Sc. in Global Business and Entrepreneurial Leadership (GBEL) is designed to help students understand how business decisions create consequences across an entire enterprise. Students will examine how consumer demand shapes revenue models, how operational design affects margins, how capital allocation influences growth and how governance frameworks shape long-term performance.
Academic progression moves from foundational business literacy in the first year to enterprise-level strategy and capstone integration in the final year. The curriculum includes structured internships and applied decision exercises across all four years.
The degree will be awarded by Gurugram University and operates under academic direction from Les Roches, part of the Sommet Education network.
Kunal Vasudeva, Managing Director and Co-founder of the Indian School of Hospitality, said the launch reflects a broader institutional alignment.
“India’s next phase of growth will be shaped by professionals who understand how complex enterprises function. Business is not a collection of subjects. It is a chain of consequences. Pricing affects demand. Demand affects operations. Operations affect cash. Cash affects growth. Education must prepare students to think in that interconnected way. This program extends our liberal hospitality philosophy into broader business leadership aligned with India’s economic direction.”
With this launch, ISH extends its academic framework beyond hospitality-focused pathways into integrated business leadership education while sustaining its liberal hospitality philosophy and allied services foundation.
26, Feb 2026
Africa’s Green Economy Summit 2026 Charts a Course from Vision to Viability
The gathering is built on a singular premise, that Africa’s environmental challenges are, in fact, its greatest economic opportunities
CAPE TOWN, South Africa, Feb 26– The Africa’s Green Economy Summit (AGES) 2026 opened its doors in Cape Town today, marking a pivotal moment in the continent’s economic trajectory. Convening a powerful coalition of policymakers, financiers and innovators, the summit signals a decisive shift from conceptual ambition to concrete, bankable action in the pursuit of a sustainable African future.
Under the banner of “From Ambition to Action: Scaling Opportunities in Africa’s Green and Blue Solutions,” AGES 2026, proudly sponsored by Sanlam Investments, is not merely a forum for discussion but a catalyst for deal-making and partnership. The gathering is built on a singular premise, that Africa’s environmental challenges are, in fact, its greatest economic opportunities.
“Ambition lights the path, but it does not pave it. To transform our economies and uplift our communities, we must move beyond rhetoric to robust execution,” said Lerato Mbele, Summit Moderator. “This summit is a marketplace of ideas where we connect visionaries with investors, ensuring that Africa’s green transition is not just sustainable, but also scalable and profitable.”
The strategic focus of this year’s agenda is underpinned by compelling data. The summit is shining a spotlight on the blue economy, a colossal yet often under-leveraged asset that already injects nearly $300 billion annually into the continent’s GDP and sustains 46 million livelihoods through fisheries, tourism and logistics. Simultaneously, the green economy, with agriculture and renewable energy at its core, is projected to unlock a staggering $10 trillion in global business value over the next decade, positioning Africa to generate an estimated 300 million new jobs for its burgeoning youth population.
These are not distant prospects, but immediate frontiers for investment and innovation.
Echoing this sentiment, the Honourable Naren Singh, Deputy Minister of Forestry, Fisheries and Environment, addressed delegates with a call for holistic progress. “Our journey towards a low-carbon future must be defined by a fundamental truth: sustainability is a three-legged stool, balancing the health of our planet, the prosperity of our people and the creation of shared value,” he stated. “By investing in our natural capital, we are investing in the most resilient infrastructure of all our communities.”
Over the next two days, the summit floor will be a hive of activity. Attendees will engage in high-level interactive sessions, witness live project pitches from Africa’s most promising green entrepreneurs, and participate in curated networking forums designed to fast-track collaboration and knowledge transfer.
AGES 2026 is more than an event, it is a declaration that Africa is ready to build a future where economic resilience and environmental stewardship are the same.
26, Feb 2026
Colliers Identifies 30 Emerging Industrial & Warehousing Growth Hubs Across India
Colliers identifies 30 high-potential industrial & warehousing hotspots across India, driven by infrastructure expansion, manufacturing growth and policy push
New Delhi, Feb 26: India’s industrial and warehousing market is entering a phase of accelerated transformation, driven by strong policy support, infrastructure augmentation, evolving consumer behavior, supply-chain recalibration, and rapid technology adoption. With India’s manufacturing sector currently contributing around 17% to GDP and projected to reach approximately 25% by 2035, the industrial and warehousing sector is emerging as a high-growth frontier supported by rising demand for modern Grade A facilities and growing institutional investments.According to Colliers’ latest report, India’s Emerging Industrial & Warehousing Corridors: Mapping the Next Growth Frontier, multiple cities are poised to lead the next wave of industrial and logistics growth. This momentum is backed by corridor development programmes, the PM Gati Shakti initiative, the National Logistics Policy, and infrastructure investments spanning industrial corridors, smart cities, multimodal logistics parks (MMLPs), textile parks, and greenfield ports and airports. Sector-focused interventions such as the BioPharma SHAKTI Scheme and Semiconductor Mission 2.0 are further expected to catalyze growth in smaller industrial hubs.30 Cities Identified as Future Industrial & Warehousing HotspotsColliers assessed over 100 cities using a proprietary analytical framework based on five key parameters:
- Enhanced connectivity along strategic industrial and freight corridors
- Upcoming industrial smart cities
- Proposed Multi-Modal Logistics Parks (MMLPs)
- Expansion of sea and airport linkages
- Development of large integrated textile hubs
Additional factors such as maturity of industrial ecosystems, manufacturing cluster presence, infrastructure completion stages, multimodal connectivity, availability of Grade A stock, MSME activity, and e-commerce penetration were also considered. The final shortlist includes 30 high-potential cities categorized into Prime, Emerging, and Nascent hubs.Cluster-Wise ClassificationPrime Hubs (8):
Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi NCR, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Mumbai, PuneEmerging Hubs (12):
Bhopal, Bhubaneswar, Coimbatore, Indore, Jaipur, Kochi, Lucknow, Nashik, Patna, Rajpura, Surat, VisakhapatnamNascent Hubs (10):
Amravati, Guwahati, Hosur, Jammu, Jamshedpur, Kanpur, Nagpur, Prayagraj, Raipur, VijayawadaThe geographical distribution reflects balanced growth across Northern, Southern, Western, Eastern, and Central India. Prime hubs are established demand centers expected to absorb new supply rapidly. Emerging hubs are likely to gain momentum as key infrastructure projects near completion, while nascent hubs are anticipated to scale gradually with continued policy and infrastructure support.Infrastructure to Drive Grade A Warehousing UptakeIndia’s industrial and warehousing transformation is anchored in cohesive national programmes such as the National Industrial Corridor Development Programme (NICDP) and the PM GatiShakti National Master Plan.Infrastructure Development Snapshot:
- 11 Industrial Corridors under development
- 5 Dedicated Freight Corridors
- 20 Industrial Smart Cities
- 35 sanctioned Multi-Modal Logistics Parks (5 approved)
- 7 PM MITRA textile parks
- 800+ projects under the Sagarmala Programme (200 completed)
- 8 international airports under construction
This infrastructure push is expected to significantly boost Grade A warehousing demand.Demand Outlook: 50+ Million Sq. Ft. Annual Uptake by 2030Driven by strong demand from 3PL players and sectors such as automobiles, engineering, FMCG, and e-commerce, annual Grade A space uptake across the top 8 cities is projected to exceed 50 million sq. ft. by 2030.Market Trends & Long-Term Outlook:
- Demand expected to grow from ~37 million sq. ft. in 2025 to 50+ million sq. ft. by 2030
- Total stock projected to increase from ~300 million sq. ft. in 2025 to ~500 million sq. ft. by 2030
- Long-term potential to reach over 2 billion sq. ft. by 2047
Vijay Ganesh, Managing Director, Industrial & Logistics Services, Colliers India, said:
“The next wave of industrial and warehousing growth will be strengthened by expanding industrial and freight corridors, multimodal logistics parks, smart industrial cities, and major sea–airport expansion projects. Budgetary allocations and sector-focused interventions will not only boost established markets but also unlock investments across emerging and nascent hubs.”
Vimal Nadar, National Director & Head, Research, Colliers India, added:
“Policy-driven domestic manufacturing growth and infrastructure expansion will remain pivotal to the sector’s transformation. Grade A warehousing stock across the top 8 cities is projected to cross 500 million sq. ft. by 2030 and could potentially scale to 2 billion sq. ft. by 2047, fostering balanced regional growth and positioning smaller cities as new growth frontiers.”
With sustained infrastructure development, demographic shifts, and strengthening consumption patterns, India’s industrial and warehousing sector is poised for exponential expansion over the coming decades. The evolution of the sector will be marked by increased efficiency, automation, supply chain integration, sustainability, and advanced technology adoption, reinforcing its role as a cornerstone of India’s long-term economic growth trajectory.
26, Feb 2026
Benin Tourism agency to join ITB Berlin 2026 to advance Benin’s international reach and tourism growth
Cotonou, Feb 26 — Benin Tourism announces its participation in ITB Berlin, the leading trade show for the global travel and tourism industry, taking place March 3–5, 2026, in Berlin, Germany. Through this strategic presence, Benin aims to further strengthen its position as a forward-looking destination on the international stage by combining institutional visibility, industry engagement, market development of its tourism offering, and the promotion of its cultural identity. This participation builds on Benin’s recent presence at major international tourism events, following its participation in IFTM in Paris and FITUR in Madrid in recent months. It extends the country’s broader international outreach strategy to enhance Benin’s attractiveness, deepen relationships with travel industry stakeholders, and accelerate the commercialization of the destination across priority markets.
ITB Berlin: A key international platform for promoting Destination Benin
ITB Berlin is a must-attend event for any destination seeking to build a lasting position on the global tourism stage. Since 1966, the show has established itself as the world’s leading platform for the travel industry, and the 2026 edition will be especially significant as it marks the event’s 60th anniversary, taking place March 3–5 in Berlin under the theme, “Discover the stories behind 60 years of legacy.” With its structure organized both geographically (by destination) and by market segment (including adventure tourism, business travel, luxury travel, medical tourism, travel technology, and more), ITB offers a unique environment for visibility, strategic intelligence, and business development. The scale of the event underscores its importance: the previous edition brought together more than 170 countries and territories, 5,800 exhibitors, and nearly 100,000 trade visitors. Benin’s participation in 2026 is the result of long-term planning: after attending last year as an observer, Benin Tourism returns this year with a fully structured pavilion, building on preparatory work launched in 2025.
A delegation structured around experience and commercialization
For the 2026 edition of ITB Berlin, Benin Tourism has chosen to work alongside partners that reflect the growing strength of Benin’s tourism ecosystem, bringing together complementary stakeholders from across the value chain. The Benin pavilion will feature Benin Tours S.A., which is being mobilized to support the commercialization of Destination Benin and the structuring of its tourism offering, with the goal of expanding distribution opportunities and partnerships with international travel professionals. Alongside it, Ouidah Golf Club will highlight Benin’s potential across leisure, experiential tourism, and hospitality segments, while Sofitel Cotonou Marina Hotel & Spa, a flagship property, will showcase the rising quality of the country’s hospitality infrastructure and its ambition in the high-end travel segment. Together, these partners reflect a clear objective: to present in Berlin a destination that is not only inspiring, but also market-ready, programmable, and well-positioned for integration into international tour operators’ catalogs and travel offerings.
A pavilion designed as a living showcase of Benin
Beyond its institutional dimension and B2B engagement, the Benin pavilion will offer an immersive discovery experience designed to leave a lasting impression on visitors, spark the
interest of travel professionals, and embody the full richness of Beninese hospitality. A dedicated tasting area will be set up to introduce visitors to flavors and products from Benin as part of a sensory storytelling approach to the destination. This tasting experience will play a central role in telling Benin’s story, highlighting the quality of its products, the diversity of its culinary traditions, and the refinement of its culture of hospitality. The goal is to give visitors a tangible first encounter with Benin through an experience that engages the senses and creates lasting recall. Conceived as a space for exchange, discovery, and projection, the pavilion will bring together the cultural, tourism, and commercial dimensions of the destination within a scenographic concept aligned with Benin’s positioning.
An artistic and cultural program at the heart of the pavilion’s identity
Benin’s presence at ITB Berlin will be brought to life through an ambitious artistic and cultural program designed as a central driver of differentiation, visibility, and appeal. The program is intended to make the Benin pavilion a vibrant, recognizable space deeply rooted in the country’s cultural expressions.
In this spirit, Pépit’Arts will play a major role in the pavilion’s artistic and musical programming through the presentation of FAADJI, a percussion-based creation presented in formats tailored to visitor flow and the trade show environment. This performance concept will establish a strong sonic and stage presence, creating an experience that is immediately distinctive and memorable.
The pavilion will also welcome Akonhoun Delidji, a cultural ensemble from Abomey renowned for its traditional dance performances, including Zinli and the Akonhoun dance. The sequences presented will highlight the expressive power, symbolic depth, and heritage significance of these dances, echoing the history of the Danxomè Kingdom and the imagery of strength, courage, and pride associated with the Amazons. Through this presence, Benin will deliver a powerful cultural performance that is identity-driven, visually striking, and fully aligned with the story it is bringing to the international stage.
More broadly, these cultural performances will strengthen the identity of the Benin pavilion, showcase the country’s intangible cultural heritage, and affirm Beninese artistic creation as a core pillar of the national narrative presented in Berlin.
A clear objective: elevating and selling Destination Benin
Through its participation in ITB Berlin, Benin Tourism is pursuing a clear ambition: to combine international visibility with the market development of the destination. The trade show will provide a strategic platform to engage with tour operators, travel agencies, key industry influencers, specialized media, and institutional partners, while presenting a tourism offer that is more clearly defined, more competitive, and more distinctive.
Benin’s participation in this major international event reflects a resolutely modern approach to destination promotion, one that goes beyond simply showcasing assets. It is an approach that builds connections, creates emotion, structures commercialization, and establishes a lasting brand image. By leveraging the complementarity between public and private stakeholders, and between hospitality, culture, and distribution, Benin is affirming its ambition to claim its full place in the global tourism conversation.
Sindé CHEKETE, CEO of Benin Tourism, said: “Benin’s participation in ITB Berlin 2026 is part of a consistent strategy to strengthen our presence on the world’s leading tourism stages, following our participation in IFTM in Paris and FITUR in Madrid. It reflects our determination to steadily advance the visibility, credibility, and commercialization of Destination Benin. In
Berlin, we will present a structured tourism offering, supported by complementary stakeholders from across our ecosystem, and a pavilion designed as a space for engagement, experience, and forward-looking dialogue.”
26, Feb 2026
Best Companies to Work For in India 2026: NVIDIA, Google, and Apple Lead Employee Satisfaction Rankings
Feb 26: Workplace community platform Blind has released its 2026 rankings of the Best Companies to Work For in India, revealing key insights into employee satisfaction, employer desirability, compensation trends, and job market sentiment.
Highest-Rated Companies in India (2026)
Based on overall satisfaction, the top 15 highest-rated companies in India this year are:
NVIDIA, Google, Apple, Akamai Technologies, VMware, Adobe, Target, CRED, Nokia, ThoughtWorks, Airbnb, Lowe’s, Autodesk, Zoho, and ServiceNow.
Compared to last year, NVIDIA, Google, Apple, Akamai Technologies, VMware, Target, Zoho, and ServiceNow maintained their top-rated status, while Adobe, CRED, Nokia, ThoughtWorks, Airbnb, Lowe’s, and Autodesk newly entered the top 15.
Lowest-Rated Companies in India (2026)
The 15 lowest-rated companies based on overall satisfaction are:
DP World, Ola, Sprinklr, Groupon, Tekion Corp, Paytm, OYO, Zeta, Samsung Electronics, HCL Enterprise, Deliveroo, Compass, Rippling, Infosys, and Cashfree.
DP World, Paytm, Tekion Corp, Zeta, and Sprinklr remained on the lowest-rated list, while the other companies newly appeared in 2026.
Best to Work For vs. Most Desired to Work At
Blind also analyzed where Indian professionals most aspire to work. The most desired employers in 2026 are:
Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Atlassian, Flipkart, Zeta, InMobi, Tekion Corp, Uber, Walmart, Salesforce, Adobe, Meta, Oracle, and ShareChat.
While there is overlap, some globally recognized firms such as Amazon, Microsoft, and Meta rank high in desirability but do not feature among the top satisfaction leaders. Conversely, NVIDIA, Apple, and Akamai Technologies lead in satisfaction but do not rank among the most desired employers — suggesting brand perception and prestige influence job interest independently of employee experience.
Top Paying Companies and Satisfaction Correlation
The companies reporting the highest median total compensation packages in India for 2026 include:
Meta, Broadcom, Apple, Amazon, Uber, Google, LinkedIn, AMD, Atlassian, Salesforce, Intuit, Confluent, Palo Alto Networks, VMware, Cohesity, Twilio, NVIDIA, Walmart, Adobe, and Intel Corporation.
Fewer than a third of the top-paying companies appear among the highest-rated employers, highlighting that compensation alone does not consistently translate into employee satisfaction.
Search Trends: Layoffs, Mobility & Global Aspirations
The most searched companies by India-based professionals over the past year were:
Microsoft, Google, Uber, Amazon, Salesforce, Meta, Atlassian, Apple, Qualcomm, and eBay.
Trending search keywords included “layoff,” “offer,” “H-1B,” “Meta India,” “Google India,” and “Meta London,” reflecting job security concerns and strong global mobility aspirations.
Since May 2020, Blind has collected verified employee reviews and compensation data across approximately 248,000 companies worldwide, enabling professionals to make informed career decisions.
Methodology
The rankings are based on 40,686 cumulative verified employee reviews submitted through 2025 by Indian professionals on Blind. Only companies with at least 50 reviews were included. Companies were evaluated across overall satisfaction, career growth, work-life balance, compensation and benefits, company culture, and trust in management.
The “Would you work here?” rankings reflect cumulative poll responses visible only to non-employees of the evaluated company.
Compensation rankings reflect median total compensation submissions through 2025 from companies with at least 100 verified entries.
Search rankings reflect the most searched companies and workplace-related keywords by India-based Blind users across web and app platforms over the past year.
26, Feb 2026
Lightrun Launches Industry’s First AI SRE With Live Dynamic Runtime Context
NEW YORK, Feb 26 — Lightrun, a leader in software reliability, announced the industry’s first and only real-time AI SRE built on live, in-line runtime context. This allows AI agents and engineering teams to create missing evidence dynamically without redeployments, prove root causes with live execution data (“ground truth”), and validate fixes directly in live environments.
The mass adoption of AI agents and coding assistants has accelerated code generation, outpacing reliability. This has shifted developer time from writing code to verifying and fixing issues, and moved the development bottleneck to runtime, where behavior is complex and often non-deterministic. As enterprises accelerate investment in AI-driven reliability and autonomous operations, this has created a market for AI SREs valued at billions of dollars.
Despite this growth, most available ‘AI SRE’ tools are optimized for post-incident workflows and limited to relying on traditional, static telemetry that was already captured. When logs are missing, traces are incomplete, or execution context is unclear, teams are left to guess. Engineers are forced into long reactive cycles of redeploys, rollbacks, and manual validation.
Lightrun’s AI SRE closes this gap by bringing live, code-level runtime context directly into the reliability loop. Lightrun has been recognized in the 2026 Gartner® Market Guide for AI Site Reliability Engineering Tooling.
Instead of passively observing telemetry, the Lightrun AI SRE can safely interact with live systems via Lightrun’s patented Sandbox to create new evidence, test hypotheses, and validate outcomes against real execution behavior. This capability transforms AI SRE from a reactive post-incident advisor into a trusted, runtime-verified autonomous engineer that ensures reliability by design.
Built on Lightrun’s Runtime Context engine, the AI SRE supports reliability across the entire SDLC, from proactive issue detection during development and testing (“peace time”) to autonomous investigation and remediation during live incidents (“war time”). It enables teams to understand how code truly behaves in runtime, close visibility gaps without redeploying, and resolve issues with confidence. Lightrun is designed for every team responsible for the behavior, reliability, or outcomes of running software.
“Lightrun addresses a structural visibility gap in the emerging AI site reliability engineering workflows (SRE) market,” said Jim Mercer, Program Vice President, Software Development, DevOps, and DevSecOps at IDC. “By integrating dynamic instrumentation into SRE workflows, the company enables validation of root cause and remediation against live execution, reducing reliance on static, pre-instrumented telemetry and strengthening reliability across the software development lifecycle.”
With Lightrun’s AI SRE, engineering and reliability teams benefit from:
● Root cause analysis based on new evidence from live environments, without requiring prior instrumentation.
● Runtime-validated code changes to eliminate guesswork and reduce rollback-and-redeploy cycles.
● Live issue debugging in safe remote sessions with execution-level behavior inspections.
● Dynamic telemetry to running systems to fill visibility gaps that traditional observability tools cannot address.
● Reduced reliance on expensive war rooms, due to autonomous remediation and the ability to receive a code fix of incidents before escalating to a human.
● Resilience to “unknown unknowns” introduced by multiple AI agents across the SDLC.
Zahi Kapeluto, AVP Engineering, AT&T, stated, “Modern, AI-driven software reliability depends on connecting telemetry to real execution context. Without understanding how code behaves in live environments, alerts and metrics alone don’t tell the full story. Lightrun helps our teams close that gap by exposing runtime behavior directly, enabling faster investigation and more confident remediation.”
“AI cannot resolve what it cannot see. Lightrun’s runtime context engine allows AI to see application behavior at a single line level of granularity, which positions us to streamline remediation for any software issues in real-time,” added Ilan Peleg, CEO of Lightrun. “Trusted by Fortune 100 companies and the largest enterprises in the world, Lightrun is proud to lead the way in making self-healing software a reality.”
26, Feb 2026
Liquid Intelligent Technologies Announces Debt Repayment and Agrees New Credit Facilities
LONDON, United Kingdom, Feb 26 — Liquid Intelligent Technologies, a business of Cassava Technologies (www.CassavaTechnologies.com), has confirmed the full repayment of its ZAR term loan and USD revolving credit facility.
In tandem with this repayment, Liquid has agreed $410 million in new ZAR and USD credit facilities from a syndicate of commercial and development finance lenders. Cassava Technologies is further reinforcing Liquid’s financial position by injecting $195 million in fresh capital into the business.
Commenting on these developments, Hardy Pemhiwa, President and Group CEO stated: “These transactions, alongside the recent sale of a minority stake in a data centre subsidiary in South Africa, are part of a significant strengthening of our capital structure as we position the Group for accelerated growth. Through our One Cassava ecosystem, we are delivering innovative AI, cloud, data centre, payments, and low latency broadband connectivity solutions to enterprise customers across Africa.”
Africa Data Centre Holdings (“ADCH”) remains a wholly owned subsidiary of Cassava Technologies as the minority stake sale was in the ADCH South Africa business.
Looking ahead, Liquid intends to issue a new $300 million bond to replace its existing $620 million bond in advance of its maturity in September 2026. This move will reduce Liquid’s overall leverage and further strengthen the company’s balance sheet.
25, Feb 2026
Wootzwork raises $6.6M to bring predictability to offshore manufacturing
Wootzwork is scaling a new manufacturing model that gives global OEMs a single, accountable partner for complex industrial programs across India and Southeast Asia.
Houston, Dallas – Feb 25; As global manufacturing shifts across regions, supply chains, and regulatory environments, execution risk has quietly become one of the biggest constraints on industrial growth. For many OEMs, the challenge is no longer access to factories, but the complexity of coordinating dozens of suppliers, quality systems, timelines, and interfaces across borders. Wootzwork was built to solve that problem. Today, the company announced a $6.6 million Series A round to scale a new model of manufacturing execution built around single-point accountability.
The round was led by Z47, with continued participation from Nexus Venture Partners and AdvantEdge Founders, and the addition of Stride Ventures. The capital will be used to expand Wootzwork’s global engineering and program teams, support larger and more complex OEM programs, and scale its manufacturing control systems across regions.
As industrial supply chains globalise, execution has become increasingly fragmented. Programs now span multiple countries, dozens of suppliers, and different quality frameworks, creating coordination gaps that lead to delays, rework, and cost overruns. It is estimated that 15 to 30 percent of anticipated offshore savings are typically lost through these breakdowns. What should be a strategic advantage often turns into an operational burden that absorbs time, talent, and leadership attention.
Wootzwork was built as an alternative to that model. The company operates as a single, accountable manufacturing partner to global OEM’s for complex industrial programs across India and Southeast Asia, with on-shore manufacturing where required in customer markets. This allows OEMs to execute at scale without managing factories, interfaces, or execution risk internally. Wootzwork operates with engineering and program teams across India, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Germany, enabling close coordination with enterprise customers while retaining deep on-ground manufacturing control.
“Most companies treat manufacturing complexity as a risk to be minimised,” said Karan Anand, co-founder and CEO of Wootzwork. “We treat it as a competitive advantage. When the system is engineered properly, complexity becomes leverage – not chaos.”
No factory in the world is fully efficient for any complex product. Modern OEM programs involve high-mix parts, specialised processes, and sequencing that rarely exist under one roof and often shouldn’t, for economic reasons. Even when capacity exists, the right machine, process maturity, or quality discipline is usually fragmented across suppliers. By mapping, qualifying, and governing manufacturing capacity across regions, Wootzwork orchestrates the journey of a product from concept to factory-level output in weeks rather than years. For global enterprises, this translates into faster time to production, fewer internal teams tied up in supplier coordination, and full visibility and control from raw materials through final delivery which allows them to stay focused on product, engineering, and customers instead of execution complexity.
Over the past year, Wootzwork has executed highly complex, cross-border manufacturing programs for more than 22 global enterprises across 12 international trade lanes spanning North America, Europe, and APAC. These include the US, UK, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Australia, and New Zealand.
The company has activated a network of more than 300 suppliers, executing over 30 million parts and assemblies across precision components, heavy and structural fabrication, industrial fasteners and hardware, custom industrial machines, process equipment and skids, and multi-part assemblies. Programs span industries including food processing, packaging, renewable energy, data centres, automotive engineering, material handling, warehousing, and industrial hardware. Across these programs, Wootzwork has maintained greater than 98 percent on-time delivery and quality compliance under stringent international quality frameworks.
“Even as a relatively new partner, Wootzwork moved very quickly to support us across a broad range of work, including programs tied to demanding end customers,” said Felix Franke, managing director at Saxonia-Franke GmbH & Co. KG. “Their ability to ramp up fast while maintaining quality gave us confidence early on.”
“Working with Wootzwork has been a seamless experience,” added Curtis Bishop, director of sales at AFC Industries. “The team stands out for its responsiveness and ability to stay flexible as our requirements evolve. Their quoting process is extremely thorough, and they remain highly adaptable to our needs. We look forward to continuing our partnership with Wootzwork in 2026 and beyond.”
Under the hood, Wootzwork overlays its proprietary engineering, governance, and execution systems on top of existing factory infrastructure, enabling manufacturing partners to operate at global standards without being replaced or rebuilt. “Scale usually breaks quality because systems don’t scale with it,” explains Himanshu Uniyal, co-founder and COO of Wootzwork. “We built the system so quality scales with execution, not against it.”
“Wootzwork represents the kind of founder-led global ambition in advanced manufacturing that we want to back from India,” said Sudipto Sannigrahi, Managing Partner and Investor at Z47. “Karan and Himanshu have built deep execution capability in a space where trust is earned over years, not quarters. We are happy to see the AI driven manufacturing engine that Wootzwork has built and the quality of global customers they are adding value to. We’re proud to support them with patient capital, conviction, and partnership as they build a globally relevant manufacturing company.”
The Series A will enable Wootzwork to expand its engineering footprint, deepen its manufacturing control capabilities, and take on larger, more mission-critical OEM programs. As global supply chains continue to rebalance, the company believes the next phase of industrial manufacturing will be defined less by geography and more by who owns execution.
25, Feb 2026
Amid a Shifting Publishing Scene, Ascot Media Group Reaches 18-Year Milestone
Texas-based firm reflects on nearly two decades of helping authors find visibility in a fast-changing media market
HOUSTON, Texas, Feb. 25 — From the rise of self-publishing to growing concerns over AI-driven scams, authors today face a complex path to visibility. Ascot Media Group, now celebrating 18 years in operation, continues to work with writers across genres to help their stories reach journalists, producers and readers in an increasingly crowded media environment.
“For nearly two decades, our mission has been to help authors share their voices with the world,” said Trish Stevens, founder of Ascot Media Group. “Every story has the power to touch someone’s life. We just make sure it reaches the people who need to hear it.”
The Story Behind the Stories
Founded 18 years ago in Friendswood, Texas, Ascot Media Group has become a trusted bridge between authors and the media. From debut writers to NY Times bestselling authors and public figures, politicians, judges and celebrities, the company has helped clients across every genre find their audiences — and, in some cases, even movie deals.
“Every day, our inbox fills with fascinating people and powerful stories waiting to be told,” Stevens said. “Whatever the topic, whatever the genre, chances are we’ve worked with an author who has brought one of those stories to life.”
A Reputation Built on Access and Approachability
Behind Ascot’s success is Stevens’ belief that every author deserves a fair shot at being heard — not just those with big budgets or big names. Known for her compassion toward “struggling authors,” she offers a range of affordable publicity plans designed to meet writers where they are.
“I never want cost to be the barrier between an author and their readers,” Stevens said. “Some of our most inspiring clients started with nothing more than a manuscript and a dream of making it big.”
That approach has earned Ascot both loyalty and respect. Many authors return with every new book, and other PR firms even turn to Ascot behind the scenes to execute their campaigns — a testament to the firm’s results and professionalism.
Expanding Services for a Changing Market
In 2026, Ascot Media Group plans to expand its services to include additional support across the publishing process, such as editorial assistance, back-cover copy development, publishing guidance and audiobook production. The expansion reflects broader industry shifts as authors increasingly seek integrated support beyond traditional publicity.
Transparency in an AI Era
As AI-driven scams flood the publishing world, it’s become more important than ever for authors to do their due diligence when it comes to doing business with agents, publishers and marketing firms. Ascot Media Group stands apart because it operates with full transparency, credible testimonials (www.ascotmedia.com/testimonials) and a long track record of real results.
A Partner to the Media
With countless media relationships built over the years, Ascot remains a go-to resource for journalists and producers worldwide in search of credible guests and compelling story ideas.
“If you need stories, we have them — all of them,” Stevens said. “Because stories are what connect us, and helping share them is what drives us.”
