Hotels announce discount for first time voters

Mangaluru, Jan 17: Soult, a Mangaluru-based startup, today announced its official global launch at TiECon Mangaluru 2026, unveiling the world’s first Digital Life Vault designed for comprehensive legacy management.

Soult enables individuals and families across the world to securely organize financial assets, critical documents, personal memories, wishes, and life instructions within one private and structured platform. It addresses a universal challenge of the digital age — lives are increasingly digital, but legacies remain fragmented.

Unlike conventional cloud storage or document repositories, Soult is purpose-built for legacy continuity. The platform brings together financial preparedness and the preservation of personal values, stories, and guidance intended for future generations, creating a new global category in digital life infrastructure.

Soult chose the recently concluded TiECon Mangaluru 2026 as its global launchpad. The inaugural flagship conference of TiE Mangaluru brought together entrepreneurs, investors, policymakers, and ecosystem leaders to spotlight Coastal Karnataka – India’s emerging “Silicon Beach” – as a hub for innovation and investment. Launching Soult at TiECon Mangaluru underlines the belief that globally relevant products can be built from focused regional ecosystems like Mangaluru.

Soult is founded by Sanketh Kandlikar, an enterprise SaaS product and technology leader with over two decades of experience building and scaling B2B platforms, leading complex digital transformation programs, and managing global product lifecycles across industries and geographies. As Founder, he brings deep expertise in architecting secure, scalable cloud platforms and translating real-world human problems into thoughtful, productized solutions.

Co-founder Saleem, a Dubai-based Mangaluru-born serial entrepreneur, complements this with years of experience building and backing ventures across the Gulf and India. As an active ecosystem enabler for Mangaluru-origin founders, he anchors Soult’s ambition to emerge from the coastal region and serve a truly global user base, while staying rooted in Mangaluru’s values of trust, community, and long-term relationships.

“Soult was born from a very personal realization that while we carefully build our lives, we rarely organize what we leave behind in a way that is clear, complete, and compassionate for our loved ones,” said Founder Sanketh Kandlikar. “Launching from TiECon Mangaluru is symbolic — it signals that products solving global problems can emerge from new innovation corridors like Coastal Karnataka, not just the usual metros.”

Privacy and security are fundamental to Soult’s design. Built on zero-knowledge architecture with strong encryption and user-controlled access, the platform ensures that personal data remains private and inaccessible to Soult itself. The company follows a strict no-advertising and no-data-monetization approach.

As digital lives continue to expand worldwide, Soult positions itself as quiet but essential infrastructure for individuals seeking certainty, dignity, and continuity for what they leave behind.

Mangaluru: Mangaluru’s skyline is set for a high-end transformation as the coastal district of Dakshina Kannada prepares to shed its reputation for lacking premium hospitality. In a massive show of confidence, entrepreneurs have committed nearly ₹500 crores toward the construction of four new five-star hotels, a move experts say will finally plug the "luxury leak" to neighboring states.

For years, Mangaluru International Airport (MIA) has served as a gateway for high-net-worth travelers who, upon landing, promptly departed for Kerala or Kodagu due to a dearth of elite accommodation in the city. These new projects, three of which are backed by local visionary investors, aim to turn Mangaluru into a destination rather than just a transit point.

Mapping the Luxury Boom

The expansion is already in motion, with two major landmarks leading the charge:
•    Gurupura Property: Construction is already underway on a premier resort-style hotel.
•    Kuloor Hub: A sophisticated urban luxury hotel has been proposed for this strategic area.
•    Timeline: All four projects are slated for completion within the next 24 months, promising to fundamentally alter the region's tourism profile by 2028.

Why Now? The Investor Demand

The push for five-star infrastructure isn't just about tourism; it’s a direct response to the city’s industrial and academic evolution. Stakeholders from the IT and corporate sectors have long flagged the lack of premium suites as a hurdle for international business investments.

"Mangaluru is an powerhouse of mega-industries, medical excellence, and a burgeoning IT scene," noted a senior Tourism Department official. "It is an anomaly that a city with this much economic muscle has lacked a five-star anchor. By offering premium hospitality, we aren't just housing tourists; we are inviting global investors to stay, engage, and invest more deeply in our coast."

Strategic Retention

The "drain" of visitors to the neighboring state of Kerala has been a long-standing grievance for local businesses. With these new properties, the district administration expects a significant multiplier effect—benefiting local sightseeing, high-end retail, and the burgeoning medical tourism sector. As Mangaluru accelerates on its development trajectory, the message to the world is clear: the coast is finally ready to host you in style.

Donald Trump has linked his repeated threats to seize Greenland to his failure to win the Nobel Peace Prize, in a letter to Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre.

The authenticity of the letter, in which Trump says he no longer feels obligated to “think purely of peace,” was confirmed by Støre to the Norwegian newspaper VG.

“Considering your country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped eight wars plus, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of peace,” Trump wrote, adding he can now “think about what is good and proper for the United States.”

Støre said Trump’s letter was in response to a short message he had sent earlier, on behalf of himself and Finland’s President Alexander Stubb.

Trump has escalated rhetoric toward Greenland, a self-governing Danish territory, insisting the US will take control “one way or the other.” Over the weekend, he tweeted: “Now it is time, and it will be done!!!”

On Saturday, Trump threatened a 10% tariff on imports from Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, the UK, the Netherlands, and Finland from 1 February until the US is allowed to purchase the island. EU diplomats met for emergency talks on possible retaliatory tariffs and sanctions.

In his letter, Trump argued Denmark “cannot protect” Greenland from Russia or China, questioning Danish ownership: “There are no written documents; it’s only that a boat landed there hundreds of years ago.” He added that NATO should support the US, claiming the world is “not secure unless we have complete and total control of Greenland.”

Trump’s stance has unsettled the EU and NATO, as he refused to rule out military action to take control of the mineral-rich island.

The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded by the independent Norwegian Nobel Committee, not the government. Trump had campaigned for last year’s prize, which went to Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado, who dedicated her award to him.

Støre reiterated that the Nobel Prize decision rests solely with the committee.