Bharti gets top valuation, top funding
New Delhi: Debunking naysayers, Bharti Enterprises, which claims to have got a valuation of around 2 billion dollars, has also succeeded in raising a sum of 460 million dollars in the current round of financing. Bharti can now also raise a billion dollars more from the domestic debt market, leveraging this equity, thus taking its total fund-raising ability to 3 billion dollars to finance its operations.

In the latest round of funding, Bharti has received 460 million dollars from Singapore Telecom, which has already invested 450 million dollars in Bharti Televentures, a Bharti group company. It has now brought in another 200 million dollars, taking its total exposure in Bharti to 650 million dollars, the single largest investment by the company outside Singapore. Bharti has also received funding from private equity investors Warburg Pincus to the tune of 200 million dollars, taking Warburg Pincus' total investment in India to 300 million dollars, making this again the single largest investment for the company in Asia. .

Other investors include AIF Funds Management, which has put 35 million dollars, Washington based IFC which has come up with 20 million dollars, and New York Life, 5 million dollars.

This makes Bharti one of the most successful fundraisers in the domestic market, despite analysts' doubts regarding its fund raising ability vis--vis its balance sheet strength. Now the group even has an investable surplus of around 150 million dollars.

The funds would be deployed for the new mobile telephone ventures, to develop national long-distance operations, to fund synergistic acquisitions, to expand the existing services, and to emerge as a dominant player in the telecom market.
Back to News Review index page  

Bajaj Auto chalks two way strategy in China
Mumbai: Bajaj auto is close to finalising a two way strategy in China, by exporting its three wheelers to China, and import ungeared scooters from China for sale in the domestic market.

The plan is to tie up with a leading Chinese two wheeler manufacturer and send completely knocked down kits of its three wheelers, who will then assemble them in China. In turn, it will import ungeared scooters, where it is not so strong, for the domestic market.

Bajaj is in the process of finalising the partner, one among the top ten two wheeler players in the Chinese market. The most likely vehicle would be a joint venture, with equity from both partners.
Back to News Review index page  

Birla VXL chalks up huge losses
New Delhi: The SK Birla group company, Birla VXL, once a legend for its Digjam and OCM brand of suitings is now facing huge losses, and the prospect of becoming a BIFR case.

It has accumulated losses of Rs 111.05 crore for the period ended December 2000, and an eroded networth of Rs 100.76 crores, more than a 50 per cent erosion from its peak net worth (in the last four years) of Rs 294.82 crores. The company has called an extraordinary general meeting on May 22 to address the situation.

The downfall has come in the wake of poor demand, excess capacities, and competition from cheap imports. Since the company had already expanded capacities in anticipation of higher demand, it has paid in poor pick up and high finance costs.

The company has continued on its downward spiral despite implementing a turnaround strategy in consultation with Andersen Consulting.
Back to News Review index page  

VSNL ties up with Teleglobe for assured revenues
Mumbai: VSNL has joined hands with Teleglobe, a subsidiary of Canadian Telecom major BCE, for a fixed rate guaranteed revenue and traffic in the Asia -Pacific region. It proposes to cash in on its strategic geographic location, plumb in the path of voice traffic going from the West to Australia or the Far East.

This traffic was currently going to smaller private operators in the grey market, such as independent satellite service providers, companies with undersea cable capacity or entities with excess bandwidth willing to carry extra traffic at lower rates.

VSNL is also in the process of entering into quarterly payment arrangement with international telecom majors to even out its revenue stream. At the same time, VSNL is said to have dropped plans to enter the cellular and basic telecom business, and is discussing with National Long Distance Operators for excess capacity within the country. All these moves are seen as attempts to ensure steady sources of revenues.
Back to News Review index page  

Roche-Piramal tie-up will not change
Mumbai: The longstanding marketing arrangement between Nicholas Piramal India and pharma multinational Roche will continue, and Nicholas Piramal will continue to have the first right of refusal of its products, despite Novartis buying into the equity of Roche.

This was confirmed by Vijay Shah, managing director, Nicholas Piramal.

Roche has been routing all its products in the country through Nicholas Piramal, after the latter acquired Roche Products, a subsidiary of Roche, in 1993. NPIL has long tenure licenses for most of Roche products and brands such as Supradyn, Becozyme, Valium, Aerovit, as also its anti-cancer brands, anti-retroviral drug and drug to treat patients after transplants.
Back to News Review index page  

Ranbaxy in anti-AIDS foray
New Delhi: Pharma major Ranbaxy Laboratories has made a pitch in the Rs 120 crore domestic anti-AIDS market with three anti-AIDS formulations, and plans to come up with five more by July this year.

The company has priced its products at a five per cent discount to the Cipla versions of these drugs, in order to capture a share of the market, and would be marketing them through its division, Crosslands. Ranbaxy is also making a move to enter the herbal generics market.
Back to News Review index page  

SBI's insurance products to come in May
Mumbai: The State bank of India plans to launch its life insurance products by the end of this month, according to its chairman Janki Ballabh. The bank has set up an independent company for the purpose, in a joint venture with Cardiff, a wholly owned subsidiary of BNP Paribas. SBI is the majority partner, with 74 per cent share, while Cardiff holds 26 per cent. SBI hopes to leverage its extensive branch network of over 8,000 to steal a lead over others.
SBI chairman had earlier announced the bank's intention of giving greater thrust to the retail segment in order to circumvent the effects of a slowdown among bigger companies that were its traditional borrowers. Delays in infrastructure projects and the tendency among the bigger corporate houses to access resources directly from the market are the reasons for the bank's de-focussing from the bigger to the middle and smaller segment of industry.
Back to News Review index page  

McDonald’s now wants franchisee fees, royalty
New Delhi: Now that the McDonald's India operations have stabilised and are succeeding, McDonald's Corporation has asked the Indian operation to cough up initial franchisee fee of 45,000 dollars, and five per cent royalty on sales. The company is said to have postponed the initial franchisee fee due to it, in order not to burden the operations in its initial days.

McDonald’s India's application to the government to make such remittance is said to have been cleared by the Foreign Investment Promotion Board, and forwarded to the Commerce ministry.

The Indian operations have stabilised, with 26 restaurants opened and 42 new outlets in the pipeline. McDonald's India has invested Rs 450 crore over the past five years, of a total planned investment of Rs 850 crores upto 2003.
Back to News Review index page  

Gesco plans new unit for real estate in the South
Mumbai: GESCO Corporation is planning a new outfit to address the real estate boom in the south, thanks to the infotech surge in this part of the country. This could be a new division or a fully owned subsidiary company.

The new entity is expected to operate out of Bangalore.

Gesco will leverage the experience it has gained in this sector over the last eight years, where now it has 14 projected spread over 1.6 million square feet under project management.

Its activities would entail offering advisory and professional project management services to land owners to develop their land. This would give it exposure in prime developments, limited financial risk, and a steady cash flow and high returns, after the initial investment It is also looking at setting up service apartments.
Back to News Review index page  

Roofit commissions Pune plant
Mumbai: Roofit Industries, the flagship of the Rs 600 crore Motwani group has commissioned its Pune plant to manufacture 17 different grades of its Roofit dry premixed plaster. The new plant, set up at a cost of Rs 49 crore, has an installed capacity of 2,80,000 tonne per annum..

The company is also setting up another plant at Chennai with a similar capacity.

The basic Roofit dry mix plaster is a finely graded powder, pre-blended in the factory and delivered as one component, to be added with water at the work site. The product, made up of cement, finely ground sand and plasticisers and resins serves as a quick replacement to conventional plastering products.

The applications of the different grades are classified under different categories depending on the use -- renders, tile plasters, finishing plasters and special products.
Back to News Review index page  

Havell’s India to restructure businesses
New Delhi: Electrical engineering equipment manufacturer Havell’s India Ltd plans to restructure the group business of switchgears and energy meters. It has hired PriceWaterhouseCoopers for the purpose.

The plan is to have two holding companies, one for switchgears under Havell's India Ltd., and the other for electrical meters under TTL Ltd. HIL would have two subsidiaries — Crabtree India Ltd and Standard Electricals — with 60-per cent stake of Standard going to HIL and the remaining 40 per cent to the original promoter JP Gupta.
Back to News Review index page