Business
Property tech ‘winter’ is over, but climate investment is still struggling, says Fifth Wall CEO
Fifth Wall co-founder and CEO Brendan Wallace.
Courtesy of Fifth Wall
A version of this article first appeared in the CNBC Property Play newsletter with Diana Olick. Property Play covers new and evolving opportunities for the real estate investor, from individuals to venture capitalists, private equity funds, family offices, institutional investors and large public companies. Sign up to receive future editions, straight to your inbox.
As with much of the real estate industry, property technology, generally defined as the use of tech and software to make real estate and property management more efficient, took a big hit in recent years.
Higher interest rates, a capital market retraction and a push by almost all venture capital into artificial intelligence collectively hit property tech hard. While there is, of course, some AI in property tech, it hasn’t been enough to really drive interest in a sector that has historically been extremely slow to modernize.
“I’d say we just lived through probably the most challenging three years that certainly I’ve ever experienced,” said Brendan Wallace, co-founder and CEO of Fifth Wall. “You saw a lot of companies and new businesses and venture funds die. We just lived through an extinction event.”
Fifth Wall is a venture capital fund managing over $3 billion in capital, the largest investment firm focused on technology for the built environment.
Wallace said the winter is over for property tech, citing last year’s IPO of ServiceTitan, a cloud-based field service management software for trades such as HVAC, plumbing, electrical and landscaping. The company raised about $625 million in its initial public offering, and shares jumped 42% in their Nasdaq debut.
Wallace also noted new unicorns, such as Juniper Square and Bilt, which bode well for the future of property tech investing. Bilt, a platform offering loyalty rewards for housing, raised $250 million in July at a $10.75 billion valuation in a funding round led by General Catalyst and GID, including a strategic investment from United Wholesale Mortgage.
“The amount of enterprise value destruction that happened to prop tech was unprecedented from 2022 to 2024, but the amount of enterprise value creation that has just happened in the last 15 months has also been unprecedented,” Wallace said.
That is not the case, however, in climate-related property tech. That space is becoming increasingly challenged due to the political winds in the U.S. that have shifted dramatically away from sustainability and climate resilience, not to mention climate science overall. As a result, the entire climate tech ecosystem in real estate is suffering.
Again, real estate has always been slow to modernize and was particularly slow to decarbonize. It got a huge boost, however, from President Joe Biden’s administration and billions of dollars in public funding, much of which went to decarbonizing real estate overall. Then, Wallace said, the world shifted under its feet.
“Many climate funds are struggling to raise. Many real estate owners are deprioritizing sustainability, decarbonization and ESG [environmental, social and governance], and there is a palpable, negative sentiment shift that has set on climate-related prop tech,” Wallace explained. “And so what that means is we’re still supporting our companies. We’re actually still seeing lots of good progress, but the sentiment is negative.”
Despite the shift, he said he is optimistic about the sector for one powerful reason: While national policy may be anti-climate, local governments are not. Cities are running out of money, and carbon taxes are a very attractive way of raising capital. New York City is a prime example. It is not only moving much further left in its politics, but it has consistently been more environmentally progressive.
Fifth Wall, one of the biggest investors in this space, is taking the long-term play, investing while the negative “halo” around climate persists because valuations are attractive.
“My view is the real estate industry is still responsible for 40% of carbon emissions. It’s still this industry that has shirked its responsibility for years, and it’s going to cost a lot to decarbonize. It’s a lot of money, and capital is going to flow into that space … which is one of the reasons why we’re still deploying capital, because we’re the only ones,” Wallace said.
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Tata Consultancy Services will announce Q2 results and consider a 2nd interim dividend on October 9, 2025.
TCS to declare 2nd interim dividend on October 09.
TCS Dividend 2025 Record Date: IT major Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) is all set to kick off Q2 earnings season with the declaration of its quarterly results for the July-September period, 2025, on Thursday, October 09. The board will also consider the 2nd interim dividend for the financial year 2025-26.
In a stock exchange filing, TCS said, “A meeting of the Board of Directors of Tata Consultancy Services Limited is scheduled to be held on Thursday, October 9, 2025, to approve and take on record the audited standalone financial results of the Company under Indian Accounting Standards (Ind AS) for the quarter and six-month period ending September 30, 2025.”
TCS Dividend 2025 Record Date
TCS has also fixed the record date for the proposed 2nd interim dividend for FY2025-26. TCS added, “The second interim dividend, if declared, shall be paid to the equity shareholders of the Company whose names appear on the Register of Members of the Company or in the records of the Depositories as beneficial owners of the shares as on Wednesday, October 15, 2025, which is the Record Date fixed for the purpose.”
For Q1FY26, the board had declared an interim dividend of Rs 11 per share.
TCS Q1 FY26 Results
TCS had reported a 5.98 per cent rise year-on-year (YoY) in its net profit to Rs 12,760 crore for the first quarter ended June 30, 2025 (Q1 FY26). On a quarter-on-quarter (QoQ) basis, the net profit grew 4.38%.
It had reported a net profit of Rs 12,040 crore a year ago and Rs 12,224 crore in the previous quarter.
The Q1 FY26 earnings are better than expectations. A Bloomberg consensus poll of analysts had pegged TCS’ Q1 FY26 net profit growth at a muted 1.9% to Rs 12,263 crore.
The company’s revenue from operations during April-June 2025 stood at Rs 63,437 crore, which is 1.13 per cent higher as compared with the Rs 62,613 crore reported last year. On a sequential basis, the revenue fell 1.61%.
Varun Yadav is a Sub Editor at News18 Business Digital. He writes articles on markets, personal finance, technology, and more. He completed his post-graduation diploma in English Journalism from the Indian Inst…Read More
Varun Yadav is a Sub Editor at News18 Business Digital. He writes articles on markets, personal finance, technology, and more. He completed his post-graduation diploma in English Journalism from the Indian Inst… Read More
October 05, 2025, 14:57 IST
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Companies that charge drivers fees for recovering parking ticket debts are operating with an average profit margin of more than 60 per cent, a Government document has disclosed.
The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) stated that this figure indicates a “market failure”, while the AA branded the margins “disproportionately high”.
Debt recovery agencies are employed by parking operators to pursue payment for unpaid tickets, often adding up to £70 in additional fees per ticket for drivers.
These charges were set to be banned when the then-Conservative government introduced a code of practice in February 2022, but this was withdrawn four months later after a legal challenge by parking companies.
A new consultation document setting out the current Labour Government’s proposed code stated the £70 cap is “likely to be higher than can be reasonably justified” but it is “seeking further evidence”.
It added that recovery agencies have “an average profit margin of approximately 63 per cent”.
This is “comparable to highly innovative companies” despite the businesses involved providing “standard services such as payment plan provision”, according to the document.
It continued: “We therefore do not consider them to be providing significantly innovative services, and as such the high profits may be indicative of these firms having too much control over the market, thereby indicating that there is a market failure.”
Parking operators can take drivers to court if they continue to resist paying for tickets.
The MHCLG said debt recovery agencies would break even with fees of approximately £26 per ticket, if the proportion of those paying was stable.
Jack Cousens, head of roads policy at the AA, said: “The 63 per cent profit margin feels disproportionately high for the services provided.
“This only highlights the need to curb the sector and ensure balance for all.
“There remains an overzealous cohort among some private parking operators where they hand over cases to debt recovery firms for seemingly innocuous charges.”
He added that the ban on debt recovery fees in the original consultation was “the right position” and claimed the latest version “falls short of the mark”.
Steve Gooding, director of motoring research charity the RAC Foundation, said: “The profit margins revealed by the Government help explain why there are now more than 180 private parking firms buying vehicle keeper records from the DVLA so they can send demands to drivers – it’s a huge and profitable business.
“The private parking industry’s failure over time to be more open about its activities is part of the problem and its ongoing reluctance to open its books to official scrutiny shows why ministers must follow through with plans to bring transparency and independence to this sector.”
Recent analysis by the PA news agency and the RAC Foundation found 4.3 million tickets were issued by private companies to UK drivers between April and June.
That was a 24 per cent increase compared with the same period last year.
A BPA spokesman said it “strongly disputes the Government’s profit calculations” and called on it to “publish the methodology behind these figures”.
He continued: “The numbers presented are misleading and fail to reflect the reality of the debt resolution sector.”
He insisted the purpose of debt recovery fees is “not to generate profit but to act as a fair and effective deterrent against deliberate non-payment”.
An MHCLG spokesperson said: “This Government inherited a private parking market that lacks transparency and protection for motorists.
“We share their frustration, which is why our private parking code of practice will drive up standards in the industry and hold parking operators to account.
“We consulted on the current cap on debt recovery fees and will publish our response as soon as possible.”
Business
India-EU FTA: 14th round of trade talks to begin on October 6; aim to finalise deal before year-end – The Times of India
India and the European Union (EU) are gearing up for the 14th round of free trade agreement (FTA) negotiations in Brussels on Monday, as both sides aim to smoothen out the differences and finalise the deal by the end of the year.Senior officials from India and the 27-member bloc will hold a five-day round of talks, beginning from October 6. An official said the discussions will aim to resolve outstanding issues to help conclude the negotiations at the earliest.Commerce and industry minister Piyush Goyal recently expressed confidence that the two sides will sign the agreement soon. He is also expected to meet EU trade commissioner Maros Sefcovic in South Africa later this month to assess the progress, with December set as the deadline to wrap up the talks, PTI reported. The pact seeks to boost two-way commerce and investments.Last month, Sefcovic and European commission agriculture commissioner Christophe Hansen travelled to India to meet Goyal and review developments in the negotiations.The proposed trade pact, revived in June 2022 after an eight-year pause, seeks to boost trade and investment flows between India and the EU. Earlier talks were suspended in 2013 over disagreements on market access.The EU is pressing for steep tariff cuts on automobiles and medical devices, lower taxes on products such as wine, spirits, meat and poultry, and stronger intellectual property protections. For India, the deal could make its exports, including ready-made garments, pharmaceuticals, steel, petroleum products and electrical machinery, more competitive in the European market, according to PTI.Negotiations cover 23 policy areas, including goods and services trade, investment, sanitary and phytosanitary measures, technical barriers to trade, rules of origin, customs and trade facilitation, competition, trade remedies, government procurement, dispute settlement, intellectual property rights, geographical indications and sustainable development.The EU is currently India’s largest trading partner for goods. Bilateral trade reached $136.53 billion in 2024–25, with Indian exports worth $75.85 billion and imports worth $60.68 billion. The bloc accounts for around 17% of India’s total exports, while India makes up 9% of the EU’s global exports.In services, bilateral trade stood at $51.45 billion in 2023.
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