by RV Raman
‘That I’ll have to agree with.’
‘Now that I have you on the line, Nigel, can I ask you a question?’
‘Sure.’
‘Have you completed your DD process? I believe you’re acquiring FVG Tech’s stake today.’
‘Well…yes and no. I’ve just received the draft DD report that was found on Puneet’s laptop. We haven’t taken a final call yet.’
When Nigel hung up, he found that his discomfiture had deepened. Was it Gautam’s hesitation that had caused it? He had said that he would replace Moin quickly. But then, what else could he have said? Even if Moin had been a key employee, Gautam wouldn’t have owned up to it while on the verge of fund raising. No CEO would have. Nigel wouldn’t have either, had he been in Gautam’s place.
There was only one way to resolve this matter: Han Tuen. Han kept very close tabs on all his investee companies. He had excellent insight into the people there and the business they ran. If anyone could give Nigel an unvarnished perspective, it was him. And now that both he and Tuen were shareholders in the unicorn, they had a common interest.
Nigel picked up his phone.
‘Morning, Nigel,’ Tuen said as soon as he answered the call. ‘Thank you for the transfer. My CFO just informed me about the receipt of funds from you.’
‘Morning, Han. Do you have a minute? I wanted to check something with you. About MyMagicHat.’
‘Shoot.’
‘Who, in your opinion, are the key employees of MyMagicHat? Who do you think are virtually indispensable to the company at this time?’
‘Gautam, Nilay and Moin,’ came the immediate response. ‘I would hate to lose any one of them.’
‘Gautam and Nilay, I understand. Why Moin?’
‘Have you met him, Nigel? He’s a little genius. He may not have been designated the CTO, but that is what he is. MyMagicHat’s website and app are his handiwork, not to speak of the nifty algorithms he comes up with, admittedly, with Nilay’s help.’
‘What algorithms?’
‘Customer profiling and targeting, for one. They have many algorithms that they use – marketing, cross-selling, up-selling and stuff like that. Nilay and Moin make a great combination. They’ve done some pioneering stuff.’
‘I see… Have you heard anything from MyMagicHat today?’
‘No. Should I have?’
‘Well, I just heard that Moin was killed last night.’
‘What!’
Tuen, who seldom lost control or betrayed his surprise, had shouted out the word. ‘Moin, killed?’ he continued. ‘Are you sure, Nigel?’
‘My India partner just called to tell me. I also spoke to Gautam. He confirmed it.’
‘This is not good, Nigel. Not good at all. How did it happen?’
‘Some communal conflict, I was told. It went out of control and Moin got killed.’
‘Thanks for telling me, Nigel. I owe you one. Now if you don’t mind, I must call Gautam.’
‘One question before you go, Han.’
‘Yeah?’
‘First Puneet and now Moin. Is there a connection? Or is it just a coincidence?’
‘Hmm…don’t know, to be honest. Let me see what I can find out.’
So that was it. His suspicions hadn’t been misplaced. Gautam had, understandably, downplayed Moin’s death. But Vikram? His first loyalty should have been to Kantoff. Why, then, had he downplayed Moin’s death? Almost brushed it off, in fact? Was he not aware of Moin’s importance? Or was he afraid it might impact the deal if he owned up to the young man’s importance to the company? Either way, Vikram’s conduct was inappropriate.
A stray thought entered his mind: Vikram, he knew, was close to Raj, the eldest of the Puraria scions. What did that mean, if anything at all?
Nigel sat back and lit an electronic cigarette – a sign that he was ruffled.
What did Moin’s loss mean for MyMagicHat? How would it impact their competitiveness and ability to succeed in the crowded, dog-eat-dog Indian e-commerce market? It would take at least a couple of months for a new technology person to start work and come up to speed.
But more importantly, was there something amiss at MyMagicHat? The thought troubled Nigel deeply. If there was one thing he disliked in a deal, it was hidden risks.
He had already invested $140 million in the unicorn by purchasing FVG Tech’s stake, but nothing could be done about that now. The deal was closed and paid for. But there was another $500 million Kantoff had lined up, not counting others in the consortium. He would have to be careful with that.
Taking calculated risks was what private equity was all about. But when you didn’t know what risks you were up against, it was a dicey situation.
■
Gautam was a worried man. He had just got off the phone with Han Tuen. It had been precisely the kind of conversation he had wanted to avoid at this juncture. But Tuen’s questions were too specific to evade, too sharp, too informed. What had really rattled Gautam, though, was the information that Nigel had linked Puneet and Moin in his mind.
‘Are you sure, Nilay?’ he now asked the man sitting opposite him in his private study at home. Following the discovery of the electronic bugs, all sensitive discussions were being held in his house. ‘Are you sure that the attack on the mosque was just a cover to kill Moin?’
Nilay nodded wordlessly. He looked haggard and didn’t seem to have the will to argue. Gautam eyed him with concern. The last thing he needed now was for Nilay to crack. The last week had been extraordinarily difficult, but Nilay had taken it in his stride. It had even revved him up. But Moin’s death seemed to have broken him.
‘We’ll know when Inspector Dhruvi comes,’ Gautam continued. ‘But why would someone want to kill Moin?’
‘Everything is connected, Gautam,’ Nilay said tiredly, ‘the bugs, the engineered cash crunch, Puneet, Moin. Each one was a hostile act. We know that some e-tailers have dedicated analytics teams whose sole task is to bleed competitors. The analysis Moin and I did on Saturday shows that they have been successful in their endeavour. They bled us to a cash crunch.
‘And how did they glean information on our margins and gap-funding, do you think? By spying on our conversations! Once they bled us, they moved to scuttle the Kantoff deal by first eliminating Puneet and then Moin. The two of them were mere pawns.’
‘Hmm…from what Han Tuen says, they may have succeeded in scaring off Kantoff.’
Nilay sat up abruptly.
‘If that is so, Gautam, we must open discussions with other PE firms right away. We don’t have a day to lose.’
‘Yes, Nilay, but we are committed to exclusivity till Thursday. We can’t speak to the others till then.’
‘If we wait till Friday to open fresh conversations,’ Nilay countered, ‘we’ll run out of cash before the next investor comes on board.’
‘I know. But if we lose Kantoff, we lose Project Iskan too. All that we have worked towards will come to naught. Our best hope lies in convincing Nigel that all is well. And that’s where Han Tuen may come in useful.’
‘Let’s do both, Gautam,’ Nilay pleaded. ‘We must find a way to start fresh discussions through some third party so that Kantoff doesn’t come to know.’
‘That would be a breach of trust, Nilay. Do you want to risk that?’
‘If we don’t, we’ll run out of cash. Do you want to risk that? Which is the bigger risk? Which is more likely to materialize? We don’t have a choice, Gautam. We have our backs to the wall!’
Gautam fell silent. The worry lines on his face had deepened. He had nothing more to say and Nilay was right too. He couldn’t get himself to promise one thing and do something else on the sly. Besides, it was far too risky. There were few morals and fewer loyalties in the PE world. Word was sure to get around, sooner or later.
The silence lengthened, as both men sat deep in thought. So immersed was Gautam in his introspection that he didn’t hear the doorbell ring and was startled when the study door opened and a gr
im-faced Dhruvi walked in.
‘Good morning, Inspector,’ he greeted her, waving her to a chair. ‘Nilay believes that the attack on the mosque was just a cover to kill Moin. Is that right?’
Dhruvi shot a sharp glance at Nilay.
‘How did you know that?’ she asked.
Nilay shrugged tiredly. ‘It was obvious last night, wasn’t it?’
Dhruvi studied his face for a long moment and then turned to Gautam.
‘Yes, Mr Puraria,’ she confirmed. ‘That is right.’
She quickly gave him a gist of her conversations with Richard, Najeeb and Harry. She said nothing about Tau Squared or her encounter with the MLA.
‘That was quick work, Inspector,’ Gautam said, impressed. ‘You covered a lot of ground overnight.’
‘Well, Alex hasn’t slept all night and he’s not the only one. The force has been busy. The first couple of days are the most crucial for an investigation. Unfortunately, we are no closer to identifying the killer or the brain behind him.’
‘Why was Moin killed?’ Gautam asked, still struggling to assimilate what he had heard. ‘What could be the motive?’
‘That is where I need your help, Mr Puraria. I am reasonably certain that it was neither a communal incident, as it was made out to be, nor an act of revenge on the part of Harry and Manoj. That leaves MyMagicHat and its business. Somewhere there lies the motive.’
Gautam felt acutely uncomfortable at the rapidity with which the ground under his feet was shifting. Till a minute back, he had been deriving comfort from the assumption that Moin’s death was a communal incident that had nothing to do with MyMagicHat. Or, in the worst-case scenario, it had been Harry and Manoj’s way of exacting revenge.
But Dhruvi had just shifted the entire matter back to the heart of MyMagicHat. Was it, then, as Nilay feared? Was someone trying to kill MyMagicHat, by first starving it of cash and then sabotaging the Kantoff deal? Would that someone go to the extent of committing murder? Surely, there were other ways of killing a company?
On the other hand, in light of what Dhruvi had just said, Nilay’s theory – which Gautam had brushed off earlier – suddenly seemed plausible. It appeared very likely that all that had happened in the past week was interconnected in some way. And what about the data theft? Was that also connected in some way? At least to Moin’s death?
Gautam articulated that question and waited for the answer.
‘There are many missing pieces, Mr Puraria,’ the Inspector replied. ‘The puzzle is far from complete. I am hoping that you may be able fill in a few pieces.’
Gautam realized with shock that Dhruvi’s eyes were boring into his. The expression on her face, which she made no attempt to hide, was clear. She suspected that he had not told her everything.
The pause lengthened uncomfortably as he struggled to come up with a suitable response in his mind. The struggle must have shown on his face, for Dhruvi spoke quietly after a few moments.
‘We are now investigating a murder, Mr Puraria. Potentially, two murders. It is no longer just about data theft or corporate espionage. The matter has become far more serious. Now, is there anything you would like to share with me?’
Gautam let out a long sigh, making an effort not to look at Nilay. The earlier decision not to share everything with the police had been his, not the other man’s. By glancing at him, Gautam could potentially implicate his own VP.
‘I’ll tell you all that I know, Inspector,’ he said slowly. ‘But before I do, let me impress upon you that MyMagicHat stands at the edge of the proverbial precipice. The Puneet affair and now Moin’s murder have put the fund raising deal at great risk. If the deal falls through, as Nilay has been repeatedly warning, the company could collapse. That places hundreds, even thousands, of jobs at risk.’
‘I appreciate that, Mr Puraria,’ Dhruvi responded immediately. ‘I will do whatever is reasonable to ensure that I don’t get the company into deeper trouble. But having said that, please remember that all this is in the context of a murder investigation. Murder, as you will appreciate, is the most serious of crimes.’
Gautam nodded and leaned towards Dhruvi.
‘You already know about the electronic bugs,’ he began, speaking in a low voice. ‘Those bugs had been discovered by a Bengaluru-based company called KRS Surveillance Private Limited. KRS, I’m told, does work for other e-commerce companies too, but this was the first time we had hired them.
‘A few days later, I brought in Agate Electronic Security, a Mumbai-based electronic security company we have used before in the Puraria Group. They discovered some more bugs KRS had missed.
‘Now, I don’t know if KRS missed those bugs knowingly or inadvertently. It has also been suggested that they could have inserted these bugs themselves. For all we know, there could well have been no bugs in our office earlier and KRS used the cover of sweeping the office to instal them. These are mere speculations. At this point, I am in no position to make any allegations.’
‘When did you discover the new set of bugs?’ Dhruvi asked.
‘Yesterday morning.’
‘Okay. Go on.’
‘The other thing I have not yet shared with you is a discovery that Moin and Nilay had made last weekend. They found that some competitors had adjusted the prices and availability of specific products so that they would become unappealing to buyers. That pushed the buyers of those products in our direction.’
‘Why should that be a problem?’
‘The problem, Inspector, was that these products were very carefully chosen to bleed us. They were the ones on which we were offering so much discount that we were losing money hand-over-fist. Simultaneously, the same competition dropped prices of products on which we had been making profits. That forced us to drop prices too and sell at a loss.
‘You see what that means, Inspector? Someone outside MyMagicHat knows exactly where we lose money and where we make it. Down to the product and model level. How can someone know that, unless they have access to our confidential data or our internal discussions?’
‘I see,’ Dhruvi said thoughtfully, twisting a strand of her hair around her left index finger. ‘So you got hit on both sides – you sold far more loss-making products than you intended and the profits on some other products were wiped out. That sent you into a cash crunch. Is that right?’
‘Exactly!’ Gautam nodded appreciatively. ‘That was very succinctly put. Once our war chest was empty, we became vulnerable. But that didn’t matter so much, as we were on the verge of raising fresh funds from Kantoff. All we were waiting for was for Puneet to complete his due-diligence exercise. Then we would have gone on to consummate the deal.
‘But if, for some reason, the Kantoff deal fell through or got delayed, we would be in a very difficult position.’
‘And that is what happened,’ Dhruvi whispered, her eyes shining with understanding. ‘Puneet’s disappearance left the due-diligence exercise incomplete. And that delayed the deal.’
‘Precisely. Sabotaged it. And now, Inspector, you know everything I know.’
‘Where does Moin’s murder fit in? And the data theft?’
‘I’m not sure. The data theft may have had nothing to do with the rest, but Nilay believes that Moin’s murder could have been aimed at sabotaging the Kantoff deal. If the Puneet affair delayed the deal, Moin’s death could well be the last nail in its coffin.’
Chapter 18
Alex, along with Shivakumar from the Cyber Crime Division, was waiting for Dhruvi when she reached her office. While she had been busy elsewhere, the two men had interrogated Harry and Manoj about Tau Squared Analytics.
‘Tau Squared is not entirely unknown to us,’ Shivakumar began, as he sat down for a discussion with Dhruvi. ‘From time to time, we’ve heard rumours and mutterings about their market intelligence and speculations about how they source it. But so far, we’ve not come across anything specific enough to act on. Harry and Manoj may just have changed that. But let me start at the beginning
– I take it you know nothing about this company?’
‘That’s right,’ Dhruvi nodded.
‘Okay. On the face of it, Tau Squared runs a very legitimate business in the analytics and market intelligence space. As Harry told you, they specialize in e-commerce in India. Do you know what “bots” are?’
‘Are you referring to Internet bots or web robots?’
‘Yes.’
‘I believe they are small bits of software that automatically trawl the Internet for information. Don’t search engines like Google and Yahoo use them extensively?’
‘They do,’ Shivkumar confirmed. ‘While one of the largest uses of bots is to continually search the Internet to build directories of web pages and such like, bots can do a lot more. One of the things they can do is mimic human activity so well that it becomes very difficult to tell a bot from a human. That’s why web sites use techniques like captchas to differentiate between the two.
‘There is also a wide variety of malicious things bots can do, including bringing down websites, booking movie or train tickets so that the bot’s owner always gets the best seats, spamming and so on. Similarly, when an e-tailer opens a new sales campaign with some very attractive offers, bots can order those items before any human can.
‘Say, MyMagicHat opens a sales campaign at 8 a.m. and offers a hundred mobile phones at 80 per cent discount, bots can corner most, if not all, of the hundred by 8.01 a.m.’
‘Got it,’ Dhruvi nodded.
‘Now coming back to Tau Squared, they have hundreds of bots trawling the Indian e-commerce space to bring in data on price comparisons, web site traffic, buyer behaviour and so on. This, by the way, is completely legal. Tau Squared then analyzes the gathered data, combines it with other industry data and generates what it calls “actionable intelligence”.
‘We heard from an ex-employee of Tau Squared that they had enhanced the capabilities of their bots some time back. The bots, which used to compare only prices of products across several e-commerce websites, went a step further. They began comparing delivery costs and time frames and did that for a large number of pin codes. With their superhuman speed and ability to work round the clock, they could do this very effectively.
