Nissan rolls out 'Teana' in Mumbai

MUMBAI: Automobile major Nissan on Saturday launched its luxury sedan 'Teana' here and said it expects to sell 350 cars in the country this fiscal. Teana would be imported from the company's Kyushu plant in Japan and is priced at Rs 20.67 lakh, Nissan India Director Neeraj Garg told reporters. He said the company would deliver the first 20 units to Leela group of hotels. In March, Nissan announced the setting up of a manufacturing facility in Chennai with Renault and Mahindra.

Indian American named Small Business Person of the Year

NEW YORK: Indian American businessman Jay Reddy has received the State Small Business Person of the Year award in this year's Small Business Administration's (SBA) nationwide search. Virginia-based Reddy, Chairman and CEO of ProLogic, Inc., received the award April 24 at a glittering ceremony held in Washington. Reddy got the award for West Virginia. Reddy formed ProLogic, an IT firm, in 1995 and steadily built it into a successful business, providing quality software development, IT products and systems integration and engineering. With SBA's help, Reddy won several federal contracts leading to a 400 percent increase in employment and a 600 percent rise in revenues in the last four years, according to SBA.

Read more at Economic Times

ICICI Bank to raise Rs 20,000 cr in June

Biggest fund-raising by an Indian firm: Rs 15,000cr public offer, Rs 5,000cr ADR.

ICICI Bank, the country’s second largest bank, will raise Rs 20,000 crore in June this year - a combination of Rs 15,000 crore follow-on public offer in the domestic market and Rs 5,000 crore American Depository Receipts issue. This is the biggest-ever fund-raising plan by an Indian bank.

The bank will also consider exercising a greenshoe option, which could almost double the bank’s net worth of Rs 24,313 crore as on March 31, 2007.

Read more at Business Standard

Mittal richest person in UK for 3rd straight year

NRI Steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal today for the third successive year topped the list of the richest person in Britain with a wealth of 19.250 billion pounds even as the Hinduja brothers and Lord Swraj Paul emerged as the second and third richest Asians in the UK.According to The Sunday Times Rich List 2007, 56-year-old Mittal, President and CEO of Arcelor Mittal - the world's largest steel producer, saw his wealth shoot up from 14.881 billion pounds in 2006 to 19.250 billion pounds this year, an increase of staggering 4.369 billion pounds in one year.The wealth of Sri Chand and Gopi Chand Hindujas, Chairman and President respectively of the Hinduja Group, registered a steep increase during the last one year - from 3.6 billion pounds to 6.2 billion pounds catapulting them to the position as the second richest Asians and fourth richest in the UK.Similarly, Lord Swraj Paul, founder-Chairman of the Caparo Group, also witnessed substantial growth during the year with the total wealth increasing from 465 million pounds to 1.5 billion pounds this year. The 76-year-old Lord Paul's wealth is almost five times that of Queen Elizabeth II, whose wealth has been estimated at 320 million pounds.

IT majors sit on growing cash mountain

The top five Indian IT firms have piled up net cash in excess of Rs 20,000cr.

Riding high on a booming economy and growing outsourcing opportunities, the top five Indian information technology players – Tata Consultancy Services, Infosys Technologies, Wipro, Satyam Computer Services and HCL Technologies – have piled up net cash in excess of Rs 20,000 crore.

The net cash figure jumped 31 per cent to Rs 21,148.42 crore in 2006-07 from Rs 16,151.36 crore in the previous year. Analysts estimate the figure to increase by 60 per cent in the current financial year.

The logic lies in the revenue and net profit numbers of these companies. For instance, the total turnover of the five companies for the 2006-07 financial year stands at Rs 57,397 crore — a jump of nearly 40 per cent over last fiscal’s number of Rs 41,033 crore. Read more at Business Standard

Emirates group to bid for Indian airports

DUBAI: Dnata, the ground handling, ticketing and reservation arm of Emirates Group, will submit proposals for strategic partnership with the Airports Authority of India (AAI) to offer ground handling solutions for its airports.

As part of its privatisation drive, the Indian government is currently in the process of modernizing over 40 airports in the country. The deadline for submission of proposals is April 30.

"We are going to submit proposals to Indian authorities for ground handling projects in four days as the April 30 deadline is very close," Gary Chapman, President of Group Services and Dnata, said.

At present, Dnata looks after ground handling operations in nine international airports including Dubai, Singapore, Changi, Guangzhou, Iran and Karachi.

"By 2010, we will have presence in more than 30 international airports as we are aggressively pursuing opportunities in India, China and other Asian markets," Chapman was quoted as saying by the Gulf News. "After India, China is very strong in our plans and we are looking at opportunities in major Chinese airports," he added.

Inflation unchanged at 6.09%

Inflation based on the wholesale price index (WPI) was unchanged at 6.09% for the week ended 14 April.

Prices of vegetables, which shot up over 23% during the previous week contributing the most to inflation, declined 5% in the week under review.

Besides vegetables, prices of fruits, urad, coconut oil, naphtha, brass sheets and strips also declined. This was offset by the rise in prices of non-vegetarian food items, gram, groundnut oil, cotton seed oil and ferro silicon. Prices of other products moved in a narrow range.

Vedanta open offer for Sesa Goa stakeAdd to Clippings

MUMBAI: Anil Agarwal-led Vedanta Resources Plc on Friday made an open offer to the shareholders of India's biggest private iron ore exporter Sesa Goa for acquiring 20 per cent stake in the company for up to Rs 1,603.05 crore.

The open offer was made after the recent announcement by Vedanta for acquiring Japanese firm Mitsui & Co's 51 per cent stake in Sesa Goa for $981 million (around Rs 4,070 crore) in cash.

The company has made an open offer to acquire up to 78,72,404 equity shares representing 20 per cent stake in the equity share of the Sesa Goa at a price of Rs 2,036.30 per share payable in cash, Sesa Goa said in a filing to the Bombay Stock Exchange.

Vedanta Resources clinched the deal from bidders like Arcelor-Mittal and the Aditya Birla Group, who were also in the fray to acquire 51 per cent stake in India's biggest private iron ore exporter Sesa Goa Ltd.

Read more at Economic Times

India's FDI into London second biggest

LONDON: India has become the second-biggest source of new foreign investment into London, behind only the United States, a report released on Friday said.

According to the Financial Times, a new report from Think London, the capital's foreign direct investment (FDI) agency, says that India has accounted for 16 per cent of all new foreign investment into London between 2003 and 2007.

That has helped investment into London jump to 52 billion pounds (76.1 billion euros, 103.4 billion dollars), from 38 billion pounds two years ago. The United States topped the list, with 31 per cent of new investment, while France was third with seven percent. China, Japan and Canada with six percent each followed.

"London does not have the same resonance in China, Russia or Brazil as it does in India," Think London's chief executive Michael Charlton noted. The United States still dominates total foreign investment into the capital, though, accounting for about half of it, followed by France with 12 per cent.

Read more at Economic Times

Inflation at 5.74 pc on March 31

NEW DELHI: India's wholesale price index rose 5.74 per cent in the 12 months to March 31, lower than the previous week's increase of 6.39 per cent, data showed on Friday. The figure was below a forecast of an annual 5.81 per cent in a Reuters poll of analysts but above the central bank's projection of 5.0-5.5 per cent for the end of the financial year. March 31 was the last day of the 2006/07 financial year.

The annual inflation rate was 3.98 per cent during the corresponding week of the previous year.

The wholesale price index is more closely watched than the consumer price index, which is published monthly, because it covers a higher number of products and is published weekly.

Karnik to exit Nasscom

NEW DELHI: Raw treatment meted out to Indian information technology sector by Union Finance minister P Chidambaram in his Annual Budget 2007 seems to have taken a toll upon the main lobbying body for Indian software, Nasscom with its president Kiran Karnik bowing out of office.

The decision, formally announced by Nasscom on Thursday, confirmed what was being talked about in hushed tones by the industry captains for the past few weeks.

In a terse statement, Nasscom said it had appointed search firm Korn Ferry to look for Karnik’s successor in consultation with him and key organisation members. This, it said, was part of the mission to “institutionalize” Nasscom through appropriate structures, systems and processes “for which well-defined HR policies had been laid down”.

Read more at Economic Times

Nandan Nilekani to become co-chairman of Infy

BANGALORE: The Board of Directors of Infosys Technologies Limited today approved changes at the senior level management, with Nandan M Nilekani becoming Co-Chairman of the Board, effective June 22.

S Gopalakrishnan would assume the role of Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director, and S D Shibulal the Chief Operating Officer of the NASDAQ-listed software major.

Jet, Sahara seal deal, finally

Tribunal's nod for Rs 1,450cr merger; Jet to make staggered payments stretching till 2011.

Settling its ten-month-old dispute, Jet Airways has agreed to buy out Air Sahara for Rs 1,450 crore. The three-member tribunal headed by British judge Lord Stein today approved the proposal by the two airlines.

The terms of the deal, signed at 1.20 pm today, were announced at two separate press conferences in Mumbai and New Delhi by Naresh Goyal of Jet Airways and Alok Sharma, president of Air Sahara, respectively.

Jet Airways has already paid Rs 500 crore as a deposit to Air Sahara which, in turn, has accepted a generously staggered payment schedule stretching till 2011. Jet will pay only Rs 400 crore on or before April 20. The remaining Rs 550 crore will be paid in interest-free equal instalments (Rs 137.50 crore each) from March 30, 2008, to 2011.

Taking the savings on interest (at existing rates), the net present value of what Jet will pay is Rs 1,200 crore. After the deal was signed, Naresh Goyal, chairman of Jet, said, “We have got the airline for 40 per cent less than the original price offered in January 2006.” Read more at Business Standard

BCCL acquires 17% stake in Bangalore firm LLIS

BANGALORE: Bennet Coleman & Co Limited (BCCL) has acquired close to 17% stake in Bangalore-based Leisure & Lifestyle Information Services (LLIS), which owns the travel community portal — Holiday IQ.

The investments by BCCL will constitute both equity and convertibles. This will be the second round of institutional funding for Holiday IQ as it has earlier received investments from Erasmic Ventures and Vireet Investments.

According to Holiday IQ CEO Hari Nair, the portal serves as a neutral and independent information provider on various tourist destinations. The portal was set up to fill the multiple gaps in sourcing good quality information in the leisure travel sector, Mr Nair added.

Read more at Economic Times

Spice sells 48% stake in SSL to McorpGlobal

MUMBAI: Spice Ltd has sold its 48.22 per cent stake in Spice Systems Ltd (SSL) to B K Modi controlled MCorpGlobal.

The move would give MCorpGlobal 96.27 per cent control in SSL, engaged in office automation.

McorpGlobal acquired 81.50 lakh shares of Spice Systems through 'inter-se transfer' on March 31, a regulatory filing on the BSE shows.

Spice Ltd (formerly known as Spice Net) manufactures servers, PCs and other equipments.

McorpGlobal's focus and strategy is on expanding the scope of its operations to various businesses like real estate, health care, telecom & IT, finance & asset management,

Earlier on April 2, Spice Ltd in a meeting had said that its Board of Directors has approved the sale of 81.50 lakh shares, constituting 48.22 per cent holding in SSL at Rs 13 per share.

Infy investors to make moolah with 130% dividend

BANGALORE: IT bellwether Infosys Technologies Ltd Friday declared a final dividend of Rs 6.50 per share, 130 percent on par value of Rs 5 per share for fiscal 2006-07, amounting to Rs 3.71 billion ($86 million).

In a notification to the stock exchanges here, the company said with an interim dividend of Rs 5 per share (100 percent of Rs 5 per share), amounting to Rs 2.78 billion, the total dividend for the entire fiscal (FY 2007) would be Rs.11.50 per share. This would be 230 per cent on par value of Rs 5 per share, with a payout of Rs 6.49 billion.

The decision to reward its shareholders handsomely was taken by the company's board of directors, which met here to approve the financial results for the fiscal under review.

For the previous fiscal (FY 2006), the blue-chip firm rewarded its investors with a silver jubilee dividend of 600 percent and a 1:1 bonus issue.

Forex reserves up $1.43bn at $199.18bn

Foreign exchange reserves increased $1.43 billion to $199.18 billion during the week ended March 30, according to the weekly supplement released by the RBI today.

Foreign currency assets rose $1.53 billion to $191.9 billion. While gold reserves declined $99 million to $6.78 billion, SDRs were unchanged at $2 million.

The Reserve Tranche Position with the IMF was unchanged at $469 million.

Future Group plans 55 Brand Factory stores

Brand Factory, the discount store format of the Future Group that runs retail business chains like Central and Big Bazaar, is planning to open 55 outlets in 40 cities by 2010.

The group launched its first Brand Factory store in Pune (the fourth in India) on Friday, and is planning to open store each in Hyderabad and Ahmedabad next week.

Vishnu Prasad, president and chief executive officer, Central Bazaar and Brand Factory business for Future Group, said the company is planning to invest about Rs 500 crore by 2010 for the 55 stores. The stores will offer 15-25% discount round-the- year on a wide range of national and international brands. "These will be in the apparel, footwear and jewellery segments," he said.

Biyani launches Future Money

he Kishore Biyani-promoted Future Group today launched Future Money, a consumer finance company, that will initially provide credit of up to 70-80% for purchases made by customers at the group’s retail stores.

Future Money will subsequently look to extend its services outside the retail outlets of Future Group and even enter the home loan and car loan segment.

Future Money falls under the Future Capital Holdings (which has three private equity funds under it) and will be headed by former Citifinancial banker Rakesh Makkar.

While Makkar refused to comment on the initial capitalisation of Future Money, he said funds were currently being raised from Future Capital Holdings (FCH). "We are still working out all the details. For instance, we are in talks with some banks to come on board for the back-end. Let us see whether we do everything on our own or whether a bank joins us in this initiative," he said.

Read more at Business Standard

Royal Bank of Scotland eyes India licence

NEW DELHI: The 280-year old British banking giant Royal Bank of Scotland is learnt to be considering applying for a banking licence in India.

Sources in the industry say that the $71 billion financial powerhouse, which is among the top 10 financial services groups in the world, is keen to roll out its retail and corporate banking operations in India.

“The group is looking to apply for a banking license in India. India is on its radar for its banking operations,” said a source close to the development. Besides a 1,000-people IT development centre in India, the group, is yet to have a presence in India. The group currently provides retail banking, wealth management, consumer finance and insurance to its customers.

“I can confirm that we are recruiting to spearhead our strategy of organic growth in India. This recognises the growing importance of this region to our corporate, institutional and wealth management customers. RBS has not applied for a banking licence from the RBI at this time and we don’t speculate on the future,” a Royal Bank of Scotland spokesperson said.

Read more at Economic Times

Hershey leaves Amul with a bitter taste

NEW DELHI/MUMBAI: Chocolate maker Hershey has left a sour taste in Amul’s mouth. It seems that the US choco maker was wooing India’s premier milk co-operative for a possible distribution alliance even as it was seeking government permission to strike a joint venture with Godrej Beverages and Foods.

What has outraged a section in Amul is the fact that when its senior officials met the Hershey team as late as February 28 (the day ET reported details of Hershey’s application dated February 19 to the Foreign Investment Promotion Board seeking permission for the JV with Godrej) and asked if the report was true, Hershey officials rubbished it saying “don’t trust media reports”.

This prompted Amul to consider Hershey’s proposal for a possible distribution alliance so seriously that a team of senior executives had even planned a visit to Hershey’s manufacturing facility in the US sometime in May.

Read more at Economic Times

Honda hikes car prices by up to Rs 5,000

NEW DELHI: With the central sales-tax holiday enjoyed by Honda Siel Car India in Uttar Pradesh coming to an end, it has hiked the price across different models by up to Rs 5,000.

Post the price hike, the company's popular mid-sized sedan "City" will be costlier by Rs 2,000 while the other model "Civic" will be dearer by Rs 3,000.

The company's premium luxury car "Accord" will see the highest hike of Rs 5,000, a company official said.

The company had been given a 4 per cent central sales tax exemption since its inception at its plant in Greater Noida.

The company has absorbed most of the increase in the prices of vehicles, following the expiry of the tax holiday.

Read more at Economic Times

Arcelor-Mittal, Birlas in final leg of Sesa takeover

MUMBAI: The race for Mitsui Corp’s 51% stake in iron ore major Sesa Goa has reached the home run with Aditya Birla group and LN Mittal’s Arcelor-Mittal as the top contenders. According to people in know, the two companies lead the group of possible final bidders that also includes Vedanta Resources and Brazilian mining major CVRD. Sesa Goa is India’s largest private exporter of iron ore.

The bids by the two leading contenders are believed to be near Rs 2,000 per share. This is much below the range of Rs 2,500 per share that prevailed in second round of the bidding. “The Budget proposal to levy a duty of Rs 300 per tonne on iron ore exports has had an impact,” said sources. “In fact, Rio Tinto, which was earlier a front runner for the stake, backed out after the announcement,” they added.

Read more at Economic Times

Indian Hotels in $60m buyout overseas

MUMBAI: Indian Hotels, a Tata group company, has informed the BSE that it has approved the proposal to acquire, through its 100% subsidiary company, San Francisco based Hotel Campton Place for $60 million (including estimated transaction costs).
The hotel is intended to be acquired in partnership with financial investors, company officials said. While the sale-purchase agreement has been signed on April 2, 2007, the transaction closure is scheduled for April 30, 2007. The share price of Indian Hotels closed marginally lower by 0.7% on BSE on Tuesday.
West coast based Hotel Campton Place is a 14 storey, 110 room luxury boutique hotel situated in Union Square in San Francisco. Renamed Campton Place Hotel in 1983, the hotel occupies two historic and picturesque buildings dating back to the early 1900s.

Read more at Economic Times

Chandra does a Packer with India Cricket League

Sets up body with Rs 100 crore corpus to rival BCCI.

In a daring move reminiscent of Australian media giant Kerry Packer, the Subhash Chandra-promoted Essel Group today announced the launch of India Cricket League (ICL), a body parallel to the Board for Control of Cricket in India (BCCI), to promote cricketing talent in the country.

The Essel Group had lost out on the rights for all cricket matches, one-dayers as well as Tests, organised by BCCI in India up to 2011. Today’s move will help it develop cricketing content for its fledgling sports channel, Zee Sports.

The venture will initially have a corpus of Rs 100 crore and will have six teams, each comprising four international cricketers, two Indian cricketers and eight young talents. The number of teams will grow to 16 within three years. ICL will also set up nation-wide residential cricket academies that will nurture young talent. Read more at Business Standard

M&M-Renault Logan @ Rs 4.28 lakh - Video

The much awaited product from the Rs 700 crore joint venture of utility vehicle maker Mahindra and Mahindra (M&M) and Europe's leading car brand Renault today launched the Logan sedan into the domestic market.

The car will be built at the company's Nasik facility which will have a annual production capacity of 50,000 cars a year. By July, the JV intends to bring the production under optimal utilisation, depending on the market response. The company, however, could even hike the figure.

Renault will initially import the engines for the Logan from Romania and Spain, but the company has already started its work to localise it here in India.

The car, targetted at the existing customers of the B segment and the first time buyers of the entry level C segment, is available in the price band of Rs 4.28 lakh to 6.51 lakh. It will be available in three variants; the 1.4 litre and the 1.6 litre petrol priced between Rs 4.28 lakh to Rs 5.69 lakh. The 1.5 litre diesel variant will be available between Rs 4.35 lakh to Rs 5.76 lakh. Rajesh Jejurikar, MD of the Logan project has however cautioned that the current price is just the launch price and the company may be forced to hike it if there is change in input prices.

Read more at Business Standard

Import duties on portland cement abolished

n the latest attempt to contain inflation, the government today made cement imports duty-free. It also indicated its willingness to remove the dual excise duty structure on cement announced in the recent budget.

The government has also abolished with immediate effect the countervailing duty of 16% on 65% of the import price and 4 % additional customs duty on the remaining 35% of portland cement, which is widely used in construction. The countervailing duty has been removed to make cement imports cheaper so as to contain domestic prices.

At the moment, cement imports are insignificant. The duty cut is expected to increase cheaper imports, thereby increasing supplies.

Meanwhile, the government has kept an open mind on rolling back the dual excise duty structure, said Hema Ambika Priya, spokesperson, Central Board of Excise and Customs.

Read more at Business Standard