Global Fintech Fest opens in Mumbai, with UPI AutoPay portability expected
The seventh edition of the Global Fintech Fest begins today at the Jio World Centre and Trident, BKC, Mumbai, running through September 11. Prime Minister Narendra Modi is set to inaugurate it — his third consecutive year at the event.
This year’s theme is Potential to Impact: Trusted, Connected, Global Systems for Inclusive Finance, built on three stated pillars: agentic AI, tokenisation and quantum. Organisers put attendance at over 1,00,000 people and delegations from more than 80 countries, with support from the RBI, SEBI, IFSCA and PFRDA. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, RBI Governor Sanjay Malhotra and SEBI Chairman Tuhin Kanta Pandey are among the speakers. Day one is invitation-only; standard delegate passes cover September 9–11.
What to watch for. NPCI, one of the co-organisers, is reported to be preparing interoperability for UPI AutoPay mandates. Mint, citing four people aware of the plans, reports that users would be able to move eligible recurring-payment mandates between UPI apps without cancelling and recreating them, and to view active mandates across apps. That covers OTT subscriptions, insurance premiums, SIPs, EMIs and utility bills.
If it lands, it removes one of the strongest sources of lock-in in Indian payments — the reason people stay on one app is often that all their standing instructions live there. Merchants get a parallel benefit: the ability to move mandates between payment service providers when switching gateways, without asking customers to re-register.
The category is growing fast enough to justify the attention. The top ten banks processed close to 1.8 billion UPI e-mandate transactions in July 2026, more than triple the roughly 585 million a year earlier.
NPCI is also reported to be working on common infrastructure for UPI soundboxes, so merchants could take confirmations on a single device regardless of which app a customer pays from.
Note: none of this is confirmed by NPCI yet. Treat announcements as expected, not made.
Apple’s event is tomorrow — and there’s no standard iPhone 18 in it
Apple’s confirmed special event is Wednesday, September 9, at 10:30 p.m. IST. It is the first iPhone launch under CEO John Ternus, who took over from Tim Cook on September 1. Cook is now executive chairman.
The expected lineup is iPhone 18 Pro, iPhone 18 Pro Max and Apple’s first foldable. Reports point to the standard iPhone 18, the next 18e and a second-generation iPhone Air moving to spring 2027 — a genuine break from Apple’s usual all-at-once September pattern. Supplier Pegatron indirectly signalled the same split on its June earnings call.
Apple has announced no names, specifications or prices. Circulating figures are estimates: the Wall Street Journal has put the Pro at around $1,299 and the Pro Max at $1,399, while Indian estimates run to roughly ₹1.35–1.40 lakh for the Pro and ₹1.55 lakh and above for the Pro Max. The foldable is estimated at ₹1.9–2.1 lakh, with top storage variants reported higher.
Going by last year — iPhone 17 Pro unveiled September 9, Indian pre-orders September 12, deliveries September 19, with India in the first wave — a similar window is the reasonable expectation for pre-orders this Friday.
Nvidia buys Hugging Face for about $13 billion — its largest acquisition ever
Nvidia announced on September 3 that it is acquiring the open-weight AI platform Hugging Face for roughly $12.93 billion, the biggest single acquisition in the company’s history. The deal is expected to close in the first half of 2027, subject to regulatory approval.
Nvidia said Hugging Face would remain an open platform for the wider AI ecosystem, and that it would continue supporting open-weight and open-source models. Nvidia describes itself as the largest contributor of open models and data on the platform.
The purchase sits inside a much larger pattern. Nvidia disclosed that its equity investments in AI companies reached $99 billion as of July 26 — up from about $7 billion a year earlier and roughly $2.2 billion two years before that. The company has committed over $40 billion in new financing deals in 2026 alone, with CFO Colette Kress saying close to $50 billion of the portfolio sits in frontier AI labs.
That places Nvidia among the largest strategic tech investors globally, though still behind Alphabet and Amazon, both of which reported equity holdings above $100 billion in recent earnings. Separately, Nvidia announced partnerships in August aimed at mobilising more than $500 billion in GPU financing, and said it would provide up to $105 billion in conditional credit support for an OpenAI data centre in Ohio.
The open question: a chip company that also funds its largest customers, owns stakes across the stack and now owns the default open-model repository is a different kind of entity than a component supplier. Whether regulators read it that way is unresolved.
Adobe names Anil Chakravarthy as next CEO
Adobe’s board announced on September 3 that Anil Chakravarthy will become president and chief executive officer effective December 1, 2026, joining the board at the same time. Shantanu Narayen, CEO since December 2007, moves to executive chair.
Chakravarthy currently leads Adobe’s Customer Experience Orchestration business and worldwide field operations. He joined Adobe in January 2020 to run its Digital Experience business, added worldwide field operations that September, and became president of both in December 2021. Before Adobe he spent four years as CEO of Informatica, following roles at Symantec, VeriSign and McKinsey.
The India angle. Chakravarthy holds a B.Tech in computer science and engineering from the Institute of Technology, Varanasi — now IIT (BHU) — and an MS and PhD from MIT. He follows Narayen, also of Indian origin, in the role.
The succession process started in March, when Narayen indicated he would step down once a successor was identified. Lead independent director Frank Calderoni, who chaired the selection committee, said the board’s decision was unanimous.
Context matters here: Adobe’s stock is down roughly 18% this year after falling over 21% in 2025, with investors pricing in pressure from AI-native competitors including Figma and Canva. David Wadhwani, president of Adobe’s Creativity and Productivity business and a contender for the job, announced his departure after five years.
Tesla’s Cybercab hits public roads — and draws a federal investigation within hours
Tesla put its first Cybercab robotaxis on the streets of Austin, Texas last week. Hours later, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration opened an investigation into the decision to operate the vehicle on public roads with no steering wheel and no pedals.
The Cybercab is a two-seat EV with scissor-style doors, built to run entirely on Tesla’s Full Self-Driving software. Production began in April. Tesla did not disclose how many vehicles are on the road, when the service opens to the public, or whether it has the regulatory approvals needed for full commercial operation — which are the questions that actually determine whether this is a business.
Analyst reaction was split. Morgan Stanley’s Andrew Percoco treats the launch as more consequential than a typical Tesla product event, attributing roughly $120 of his $400 price target — about 30% — to the autonomous taxi business. Others were cooler, arguing the event delivered visuals rather than the operational data that would move earnings forecasts: fares charged, daily rides completed, and whether remote safety operators are still required.
Waymo remains ahead on public-road testing and commercial operations. Tesla’s argued advantage is cost and manufacturing scale, with per-vehicle costs estimated at around $23,000–25,000 against LiDAR-equipped Waymo vehicles.
Also worth a look
- IFA 2026 wrapped up in Berlin, where TP-Link announced what it billed as the first Wi-Fi 8 lineup, including the Archer 8 Ultra router and Deco 8 Ultra mesh system.
- Cisco patched three critical vulnerabilities as part of what it described as a comprehensive internal security review.
- UPI posted a record 24.51 billion transactions worth ₹29.82 lakh crore in August 2026, per NPCI — up 22% year on year by volume.
Sourcing: Global Fintech Fest details from organisers (PCI, NPCI, FCC); UPI AutoPay portability reported by Mint and not confirmed by NPCI. Apple event date confirmed by Apple; all product and pricing details are analyst and supply-chain reporting. Adobe and Nvidia figures are from company announcements and disclosures. Cybercab details from NHTSA and press reports.