Google is facing internal scepticism over the performance of its latest AI model, Gemini 4 Argon, with some employees questioning whether its benchmark results accurately reflect how well it performs in real-world use, particularly on coding tasks. People familiar with the model’s internal evaluations told Bloomberg that while Gemini 4 has performed strongly on widely-used benchmarks, some employees have found it inconsistent when handling practical coding tasks. Concerns have also been raised about its capabilities in front-end development. The views inside Google are not uniform. Some employees believe competing models from Anthropic and OpenAI are improving at a faster pace…
Author: HRK News Bureau
Zypp Electric has granted employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs) worth Rs 11 crore to more than 250 employees, expanding its employee- ownership programme as the EV logistics company prepares for its next phase of growth and potential IPO journey. The latest ESOP allocation covers 22 per cent of the company’s workforce and extends ownership across employee groups, including more than 50 EV technicians and field teams. Zypp operates a fleet of more than 30,000 electric vehicles across eight cities and is targeting 1 lakh vehicles across 20 cities by FY28. The company said the latest allocation is intended to broaden…
Saudi employees will be counted under Saudi Arabia’s Nitaqat Saudization programme only if they have no more than five employment contracts registered during the preceding 52 weeks, according to the Qiwa platform under the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development. For an employee to be counted towards Nitaqat, the employment contract must be valid and registered on Qiwa. The employee must also have a registered monthly salary of at least SR4,000 and must not be classified as a part-time employee or student. Qiwa has also set a separate limit on the issuance of new contracts. A Saudi employee cannot…
Gautami Vinayan has joined Utsav Group of Companies as chief operating officer and HR, bringing experience across human resources, operations, recruitment, compliance and employee engagement. In her new role, Vinayan will combine her HR and operational experience to support the group’s workforce priorities and business operations. Prior to joining Utsav Group, Vinayan worked as a human resources consultant with Bennett Coleman & Co. (The Times of India), where she served from January to August 2026. Before that, she was deputy manager at Food+ by Compass, where her experience included compliance management and employee engagement. She had earlier served as manager…
HCLTech will pay some freshers four times what it pays others. The top of its campus pay scale starts at Rs 18 lakh a year. The bottom starts at Rs 4.5 lakh. The company has completed its FY27 fresher hiring after visiting engineering campuses across the country from July onwards. Ram Sundararajan, chief people officer, HCLTech, has said the intake is likely to be similar to FY26, at roughly 11,000. The headcount may be steady. The value attached to different skills is not. The Rs 18 lakh floor applies to what HCLTech calls its Elite Engineer cadre, which it has…
A former Ford employee has sued the automaker, alleging that its performance- management system was used to facilitate workforce reductions and disproportionately affected older employees and workers approaching retirement milestones. The lawsuit, filed on 28 September in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, was brought by a 57-year-old former data analyst who worked at Ford for 28 years. The complaint alleges that her termination was part of a broader workforce- reduction strategy in which performance ratings were used to create grounds for dismissing salaried employees rather than conducting formal layoffs. The allegations have not been established…
DoorDash has opened its first office in India in Hyderabad, beginning operations with around 500 employees and planning to expand its workforce to more than 3,000 over the next two years. Located in HITEC City, the new facility will house the company’s customer experience and integrity (CXI) and general and administrative teams. The centre will support DoorDash’s global operations and serve as an internal customer- support hub. The Hyderabad facility is one of three DoorDash-owned CXI centres globally, alongside locations in Tempe, Arizona and Mexico City. The company plans to gradually expand the capabilities of the India centre, with potential…
A former JPMorgan Chase employee has sued the bank, alleging that he faced discrimination and retaliation linked to his sexual orientation and his involvement with the company’s LGBTQ+ employee group, and was ultimately pressured to resign. Brian Larson, a former senior associate in JPMorgan’s Chase Associate Programme, filed a lawsuit in Manhattan federal court alleging that his supervisor, Peter Bergman, repeatedly criticised the amount of time he spent working with PRIDE Tri-State, the bank’s LGBTQ+ employee group. According to the complaint, Larson was confronted by Bergman during an unplanned Zoom meeting in June 2022 and questioned about whether his involvement…
Uncertainty over Flipkart’s potential public listing is increasingly becoming an employee concern, with some current and former employees seeking greater clarity on when they may be able to realise the value of their stock options. The Walmart-owned e-commerce company has been expected to eventually tap the public markets, but it has not set a timeline for an IPO. The lack of clarity is emerging as a point of frustration for employees who have accumulated ESOPs over several years and are comparing their experience with peers at companies that have already gone public. The issue comes amid a series of senior-level…
Shweta Govil Singh has joined Shriram Farm Solutions, a unit of DCM Shriram, as chief human resources officer. She brings more than two decades of experience across consulting, FMCG, banking, analytics and talent strategy. In her new role, Govil Singh will lead the HR function for the business, which marks a move from a global talent and professional development mandate at McKinsey to a broader business HR leadership role. She most recently spent more than 14 years with McKinsey & Company, where she held a series of roles spanning HR, talent acquisition, professional development and talent strategy. Before joining Shriram…
Deepak Somasundaram spent nearly 15 years at a cement company. His new employer also runs schools. On 29 September, he took over as chief human resources officer of Chettinad Group. Cement is one of its businesses, but far from the only one. The group also operates across logistics and transportation, construction and infrastructure, real estate, semiconductor materials, textiles, plantations and agriculture, healthcare and education. It is a considerably more varied business landscape than the one from which Somasundaram arrives. He comes from Dalmia Bharat, which he joined in February 2012. His last role there was assistant executive director – HR…
Patrick Branco Ruivo, director general of the Eiffel Tower since 2018, will leave his post at the end of this year after a controversy involving the removal of women staff during a religious group’s visit. The operating company SETE said an internal probe found serious organisational flaws that led to female employees being sidelined, which it called unacceptable. The incident occurred on 5 September when the Bochasanwasi Akshar Purushottam Swaminarayan Sanstha (BAPS), a Hindu spiritual movement linked to India’s ruling party, visited the monument. The group had asked to limit interactions with women. SETE admitted those conditions should never have…
Hero MotoCorp has appointed Nikhil Diwan as head – human resource, bringing into the two-wheeler major an HR leader whose career has been built largely across industrial businesses. Over 23 years, Diwan has worked across steel, cement, chemicals, petrochemicals, metals and mining. Plants, mines and manufacturing operations have been a recurring feature of his assignments, as have industrial relations, employee welfare, statutory compliance and workforce management. He joins Hero MotoCorp after nearly seven years with Aarti Industries, where he steadily moved through the HR leadership ranks. Diwan joined the speciality chemicals company in 2019 as GM & zonal HR head,…
Shalu Sood has moved up to vice president-corporate HR, talent & strategic initiatives at JSW Energy, continuing an internal progression that has steadily expanded her remit since she joined the company nearly five years ago. Sood took on the vice-president role in April 2026. Her current mandate spans corporate HR, talent and strategic people initiatives, bringing together areas she has worked across during her time at JSW Energy. She joined the company in December 2021 as head-HR, strategy, organisational development, performance & M&A. In that role, she worked on enterprise HR and organisational effectiveness, partnering with business leadership on transformation,…
Atul Pandey has taken over as group human resources director at Victory Group, bringing nearly three decades of HR experience built largely across manufacturing and industrial businesses. In his new role, Pandey will lead the group’s HR agenda, drawing on a career that has taken him through auto components, electronics, FMCG, footwear, speciality films and other manufacturing environments. Pandey most recently served as chief human resources officer at Aamor Inox, where his work focused on HR transformation, employee engagement and using data more extensively in people decisions. According to the career details available, he held the role from May to…
ColdStar Logistics has increased its workforce by 15 per cent as it prepares for a projected 20-25 per cent rise in demand over the next few months during the festive season. The Tuscan Ventures-backed temperature-controlled supply chain company now has more than 4,500 employees across over 45 sites. The additional workforce is expected to strengthen operational capacity as volumes rise across categories such as gifting, sweets and confectionery, ready-to-eat foods, ice cream and healthy snacking. ColdStar operates 23 distribution centres serving more than 7,000 pin codes across over 200 cities. The company currently delivers more than 1.2 million units every…
EY has approached the Supreme Court challenging a Delhi High Court ruling on the tax treatment of payments made for employees temporarily deputed from overseas offices to India. The appeal, filed on 15 September, challenges the High Court’s 18 June ruling, which held that payments made by EY India to its US counterpart for employees deputed to India could be treated as fees for technical services rather than reimbursement of salary costs. The Supreme Court website shows that the appeal is awaiting assignment to a bench. The case concerns employee secondment arrangements, under which employees of an overseas entity are…
Veranda Learning Solutions has announced the resignation of its chief human resources officer, Vivek Sapre. His exit became effective at the close of business on 28 September 2026. The company confirmed the development in a stock exchange filing under SEBI’s disclosure rules, noting that Sapre had submitted his resignation directly to Chairman and Executive Director Kalpathi S Suresh. In his letter, Sapre reportedly said the decision followed careful thought and was driven by a desire to pursue an external opportunity aligned with his long-term career goals. The company has acknowledged his contribution and expressed appreciation for the services rendered during…
Arshia Singh has moved up to vice president-leadership, talent and learning at Tata Consumer Products, continuing an internal progression that has taken her through five roles in nearly seven years with the company. Singh has held the position since July 2026, according to her LinkedIn profile. In her latest role, she is responsible for leadership development, talent management, learning and organisational capability building. She joined Tata Consumer Products in January 2020 as manager-talent management and learning, with responsibility for the function globally. She was promoted to senior manager in April 2021 and then associate director-talent management and learning in April…
Pankaj Mittal has taken over as group chief human resources officer at Integris Medtech, returning to a full-time HR leadership role after spending the past year-and-a-half working in fractional CHRO and advisory assignments. At Integris Medtech, a medtech platform operating across cardiovascular and laboratory solutions, Mittal will lead the group’s people strategy, HR operations and workforce transformation agenda. His remit also includes business transformation and talent upskilling. Mittal most recently worked as fractional CHRO and HR strategy advisor at Translumina Therapeutics between May and August 2026. Before that, he spent more than a year advising an auto ancillary company, where…
Pooja Venkatram has taken over as director and head-HR at BASF India, moving from Mattel Asia Pacific after more than six years with the toy company. Based in Mumbai, Venkatram comes to BASF after a career spent largely across consumer-facing businesses. At Mattel, she was regional HR head-South Asia, leading the people function across India, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore. She joined Mattel in January 2020 and remained with the company until July 2026. The role gave her a regional mandate spanning markets with different workforce and business requirements, extending her experience beyond a single-country HR remit. Before Mattel, Venkatram was…
Andhra Pradesh has operationalised long-pending promotion pathways for four categories of Swarna Ward Secretariat employees, providing career progression opportunities to municipal grassroots staff recruited in 2019. The state government has issued orders covering Ward Administrative Secretaries, Ward Data Processing Secretaries, Ward Sanitation & Environment Secretaries (Grade-II), and Ward Planning & Regulation Secretaries (Grade-II) working across urban local bodies. The framework has been introduced following State Cabinet approval and is designed to create promotional opportunities through cadre restructuring without adding financial liabilities or displacing serving employees. As part of the restructuring, the Municipal Administration & Urban Development Department has rationalised 915…
Sudeep Anurag has moved from Deloitte to IndiGo as director-HR analytics and transformation, taking his experience in people analytics and workforce transformation from consulting into an operating organisation. Based in Gurugram, Anurag will focus on strengthening HR analytics and transformation at the airline. His remit covers the use of data, analytics and technology across workforce planning and organisational decision-making. Anurag spent four years at Deloitte, most recently as associate director. His work there covered human-capital transformation, AI and GenAI in HR, people analytics, workforce planning and HR data strategy. He also worked with organisations on skills-based models, job architecture and…
Priyanka Nayak has moved from Bain & Company to HDFC ERGO General Insurance as vice president-HR, talent strategy & employer brand, taking on a broader enterprise talent mandate after more than four years with the consulting firm. Based in Mumbai, Nayak will drive HDFC ERGO’s talent strategy, employer branding and internal communications, with a focus on strengthening the organisation’s employee proposition and culture. At Bain, where she was senior manager-HR, Nayak led learning and talent initiatives for the firm’s India offices, working across consulting and business-support teams. She joined the firm in January 2022 and remained there until June 2026.…
Punjab government employees and pensioners will receive dearness allowance and dearness relief at 50 per cent, following an eight percentage-point increase notified by the state government with effect from 1 September 2026. The revised rate, up from 42 per cent, applies from 1 September and will be reflected in September salary and pension payments. Separate notifications have been issued for employees and pensioners. Around eight lakh people are expected to benefit from the decision. The notification follows weeks of friction between the government and employee organisations over pending DA payments and other service-related demands. The increase was agreed after chief…
A senior employee holding the same post cannot be paid less than a junior unless there is a valid reason for the difference, the Supreme Court of India has ruled. A Bench of Justices Dipankar Datta and Sheel Nagu set aside an Allahabad High Court order and directed the Uttar Pradesh government to bring the salary of a senior college teacher on par with that of his junior. The case involved Jai Prakash Singh, a Reader in the Department of Education at Dharam Samaj College, Aligarh, and his colleague Dr Pradeep Kumar. Both had joined as lecturers on the same…