Daewoo gets creditors' support
New Delhi: Daewoo Motors India has received support from banks and financial institutions for its ongoing restructuring programme.

The company is now planning to launch an updated model of its flagship car 'Matiz' and also introduce new models this year.

The company had started a massive exercise to cut costs by Rs 104 crore this fiscal. This included retrenchment of 237 workers in September at its idle engine, transmission and axle plant against a total employee strength of 1,951.
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IFCI sells DFHI, STCI stakes to IDBI
New Delhi: IFCI has sold its 3.01 per cent share in Securities Trading Corporation of India and another 2.75 per cent stake in Discount & Finance House of India to IDBI for a Rs 33.27 crore.

The Delhi-based financial institution sold its holding in DFHI and STCI through a negotiated deal with IDBI.

IFCI sold 15.05 lakh shares of STCI with a face value of Rs 100 per share at Rs 135 a share, collecting Rs 20.32 crore.

The FI also sold 5.51 lakh equity shares of DFHI having a face value of Rs 100 at a hefty Rs 235 a share, mopping up Rs 12.95 crore.
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Lucent drops Pricewaterhouse as consultant
Wilmington: Telecom equipment company Lucent Technologies will no longer use PricewaterhouseCoopers for consulting work, but retain the accounting firm as its auditor.

The PricewaterhouseCoopers move comes amid intense criticism of accounting firms performing consulting services for the same companies they are auditing.

Pressure to end the practice of accounting firms providing both auditing and consulting has sprung from the collapse of Enron, whose auditor, Andersen, was paid large fees for both consulting and auditing services.

Last year, Lucent had paid Pricewaterhouse $44 million for auditing services and $26 million for consulting.
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Merrill Lynch sets up new unit
New York: Merrill Lynch has set up a new business unit aimed at tapping market among the affluent Indian-Americans and other ethnic groups.

The new unit, the Multicultural and Diversified Business Development, is headed by Subha Barry, a former Bombay university student.

Jyoti Chopra leads the new units business strategy group.
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BSNL to launch nation-wide cellular services
New Delhi: The Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd will start its countrywide cellular services by July this year except in Mumbai and Delhi.

In the first phase, BSNL will cover over 1000 cities across the country for the GSM services.

Turnkey orders have already been placed with the selected vendors and they are likely to supply the equipment soon.

The BSNL will install 1.5 million lines during the first year out of the total four-million line GSM project.

It has already started its cellular service in parts of Kolkata and Bihar as the fourth operator.

The BSNL's vendors for its GSM project are Lucent-ITI, Ericssion and Motorola.
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Enron built fake office for new business
Houston: Enron built a make believe command centre to hawk a new venture to Wall Street at a 1998 conference. The company ordered employees to act like they were cutting deals months before it was operational.

Enron staffed the then-inactive nerve centre with employees who were ordered to act like they were working as two top executives. The workers were asked to enact an intricately choreographed show for financial analysts in 1998.

Former Enron Chairman Kenneth Lay and ex-President Jeffrey Skilling personally led a rehearsal the day before the show opened in a theatrical presentation of the sort that helped make the now-disgraced bankrupt energy trading giant the darling of Wall Street.

This was revealed by former Enron senior director Joseph Phelan.

The former executive said the sixth floor was gutted and outfitted with big screen televisions, computers and telephones to the tune of a half-million dollars, and converted into a war room that was touted to analysts as the heart of EES.
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ING Vysya Life plans forays into pension sector
Chennai: ING Vysya Life Insurance is planning to enter the pension sector besides coming out with an attractive whole life insurance product, Reward, this year.

The company, which at present had an initial capital of Rs 110 crore and an authorised capital of Rs 200 crore, is planning to pump in another Rs 90 crore this year into the business.

The company, which at present had its presence in Mumbai, Bangalore, Delhi and Chennai, is expected to have its operations in at least 20 cities by the end of 2002.
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Indian Oil plans own trading firm
New Delhi: Indian Oil plans to set up its own foreign trade desk in London. It will appoint a consultant to set up a trading desk by a London-based subsidiary.

IOC will invite proposals from reputed international consultants to set up its own oil trading and risk management desk.
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Boeing to cut 1,000 jobs
New York: Boeing is expected to cut about 1,000 jobs at its satellite manufacturing operations in El Segundo, California, the Los Angeles Times said in a report.

About 1,000 positions, in all areas of the unit, are expected to be slashed in the first round of cuts but Boeing officials hope to lay off about 500 to 700 people, with the rest taking early retirement or jobs at other Boeing units.

A second round of cuts, which Boeing officials hope to avoid or curtail, could include another 1,000 jobs, for a possible total of 2,000 this year, or nearly 25 per cent of the workforce at the unit.
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BWW signs pact for Tara Marathi
Mumbai: Broadcast Worldwide has entered into a co-production and marketing deal with 'Eternal Dreams', a city--based agency with experience in channel operations and marketing, to re-launch the Tara Marathi channel

Tara will now introduce new and varied programming content such as topical talk shows, autobiographies, non-stop blockbuster film festivals, plays and events along with new daily soaps for the viewer.

Star Hong Kong through some of its subsidiaries has picked up 6 per cent stake in the company by investing Rs 4.8 crore.

The revamped Tara would focus on rural and folk traditions of Maharashtra and would attempt to reflect the aspirations of the common Maharashtrian.
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EoIs invited for STC sale
New Delhi: The government has invited bids for the sale of its 65.02 per cent stake in the State Trading Corporation (STC) to a strategic partner, with transfer of management control.

Interested parties have been given time till 18 March to submit their expressions of interest (EoIs) to the government, which currently holds 91.02 per cent equity stake in STC.

Ernst & Young has been appointed as the global advisor for the disinvestment process.

STC is one of the country's largest trading companies, with a turnover of Rs 1,000 billion for the year ending 31 March 2001.
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Kuoni eyes P&O Travel
New Delhi: Kuoni India is planning to buyout International Travel House (ITH) and P&O Travel India. ITH is the travel wing of ITC Ltd, while P&O is the Indian arm of the UK-based Princess Cruises Plc.

Kuoni has appointed KPMG to overlook both the acquisitions.

Kuoni India is in the process of evaluating various companies in all segments including business travel.

Kuoni already has a 50:50 joint venture with P&O in Hong Kong, Bangkok and Singapore.

Last year, Kuoni India had acquired Tour Club Pvt Ltd.
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Herbicure launches pain-killer drug
Kolkata: Herbicure has developed a pain management drug that acts through a novel drug delivery system to protect the kidney and gastro-intestinal tract.

The Kolkata-based Herbicure has applied for patenting the drug with Indian and international patenting bodies.

The new product 'Panekure' will be available in the market by March. The company is yet to finalise the pricing of the drug.
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HAL to outsource components from pvt sector
New Delhi: Hindustan Aeronautics has invited large-scale private sector participation in its projects.

HAL will soon start joint manufacture with Russia of the multi-role Sukhoi-30 MKI combat aircraft, which was test flown at Irkutsk Aviation Production Association's airfield on 28 December last year.

HAL is also producing two-seater Jaguar deep-penetration aircraft in both trainer and strike versions, besides manufacturing the Advanced Light Helicopters for the airforce, navy and the Coast Guards. HAL has handed several of these choppers to the army.
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Jumbo World set to pick Mather pie in SWC
New Delhi: Jumbo World Holdings is in the process of buying out the shares held by group company Mather & Platt in flagship Shaw Wallace & Company.

Mather & Platt holds 233,966 shares in the liquor company which amounts to a 4.86 per cent stake. Manu Chhabria's shareholding in SWC is 39 per cent, while he controls over 50 per cent of the company along with friends and associates.

Jumbo had applied to the Foreign Investment Promotion Board to buy out Mather & Platt's 30.65 per cent stake in another group company, Falcon Tyres.
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Cosmo-Gujarat Propack merger okayed
New Delhi: Cosmo Films board of directors has approved the merger of Gujarat Propack with itself and will make another open offer for hiking its stake to 100 per cent within two weeks.

The board also approved the appointment of valuers for working out the share swap ratio, and counsels to finalise the legalities.The board will meet again in March first week to consider the scheme of merger.

After acquiring over 90 per cent stake, Cosmo has reconstituted the board of Gujarat Propack.
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New company to take over IDBI assets, liabilities
New Delhi: The government will set up a new entity under the Companies Act, 1956 to convert the Industrial Development Bank of India into a universal bank. The IDBI Act will be repealed, followed by the transfer of the financial institutions assets and liabilities to the new company.

The Bill is expected to be tabled in Parliament in the budget session. In case it fails, the government is contemplating an Ordinance. The Bill will then be tabled in the monsoon session.
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Softrak Tech inks educational deals with 4 states
Ahmedabad: Softrak Technology Exports Ltd (STEL) has bagged contracts for starting computer education for school children in Delhi, Rajasthan, Chattisgarh and Uttranchal.

The company will cover around 1,200 schools in these states, which would call for an envisaged investment of Rs 50 crore over the next one year.

Around 18,000 computers will have to be purchased in the first phase of the programme. Installing the computers alone will involve an investment of Rs 35 crore.

Since 1989, STEL has imparted computer education to more than 3,00,000 students in 300 schools in Gujarat.
STEL has recently tied up with Creative Infocity, a Florida-based information technology company for setting up the Infocity project in Gandhinagar.
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Citi Bank, ABN evince interest in BoP
New Delhi: Bank of Punjab is in talks with some foreign banks and a couple of foreign institutional investors for sale of equity stake in the bank.

Citibank along with ABN Amro are amongst the few banks that are looking at the portfolio of the Bank of Punjab.
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Infy process consulting for GreenPoint
Bangalore: Infosys Technologies had provided business process consulting, analysis and implementation for GreenPoint Financial's core business systems, improving productivity and reducing operation costs by more than $5 million a year.

An Infosys press release said dramatic shifts in mortgage rates had seen business volumes rapidly outgrow GreenPoint's existing business processes and information systems.

The Infosys-led project, which began in June 2001, streamlined business processes and improved the capabilities of the GreenPoint subsidiary's information systems to improve loan-processing output, reduce inaccuracies, improve response times and minimise operating costs.
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National Venture Fund invests Rs 37 crore in 17 companies
New Delhi: The Rs 100-crore National Venture Fund for Software and Information Technology (NFSIT), set up by the Small Industries Development Bank of India (Sidbi), ministry of communications and information technology and the Industrial Development Bank of India (IDBI), has so far invested Rs 37 crore in 17 companies.

NFSIT expects at least 20 per cent return from the investments.

NFSIT is also looking at mergers and acquisitions as a possible route to exit its investments because the initial public offering (IPO) market seems saturated.

The Rs 100 crore fund is planning to concentrate on high growth areas like IT Enabled Services (ITES), embedded software and language software companies.

NFSIT was set up about two years back with Rs. 50 crore funding from Sidbi, Rs. 30 crore by the government of India and the rest from IDBI.
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Reliance Infocom plans digital network
New Delhi: Reliance Infocom plans to lay down a digital distribution system that will connect 1,500 cities and towns in 18 states and link six lakh villages, said Mukesh Ambani, vice-chairman and managing director of Reliance Industries, in a keynote address at Supercomm Asia 2002.

"We plan to build an organisation of more than 10,000 professionals, thus building a large community of developers in numerous areas of IT applications", he said.
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Wipro conferred leading reseller award
Bangalore: Wipro Infotech has been conferred the Leading Reseller award by Cisco Systems.
The announcement was made by Cisco Systems in the recently concluded SAARC partnership meeting in Agra.

This award is testimony to Wipro Infotech's strong sales and support capabilities for the entire range of Cisco products.
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Tanishq eyes 45% growth in turnover
Kolkata: Tanishq, which posted a turnover of Rs 203 crore last year, is expecting a 45 per cent growth this year.

Tanishq's chief operating officer Jacob Kurien, who was in the city to launch the 'Tanishq Utsav', said: "Tanishq has exceeded the industry growth of 3-4 per cent." The eastern region contributes around 25 per cent to the company's turnover.

Utsav is a part of anniversary celebrations of the Tanishq Kankurgachi showroom in Kolkata.

Tanishq has 50 exclusive boutiques in 39 cities.
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AltaVista to stop free e-mail
Palo Alto: AltaVista will drop its free e-mail service next month as part of its effort to focus on making money from its online search engine.

About 400,000 e-mailboxes maintained by AltaVista will be closed on 31 March. Only half of those e-mailboxes were actively used, AltaVista said.

AltaVista has notified its e-mail accountholders of the decision to give them ample time to save important messages and line up an alternate service.
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Asianet to launch new channel
Mumbai: Asianet Communications Ltd is launching a new channel this year which will have science and cultural content. The company runs Asianet, the leading entertainment channel, in Kerala.

Asianet Communications is also setting up an uplinking centre in Trivandrum to make it the first teleport in Kerala.

Asianet Global will be taken to the Gulf region in May as a pay channel while the company is examining the logistics for a launch in US.
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Ruia Coatex set to acquire Jessop
New Delhi: Ruia Coatex is set to acquire a controlling stake of 72 per cent in Jessop & Company Ltd.

The company is engaged in the design and manufacture of a diversified range of products such as railway rolling stock, earth moving equipment, cranes, structural fabrication, hydraulic gates and paper machinery.

The price quoted by Ruia Coatex was the highest when the bids were opened by the government on 16 February. Ruia Coatex outbid Titagarh Industries Ltd.

The price quoted by Ruia Coatex is higher than the reserve price set by the government.
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Zee's open offer for ETC at Rs 31.52
Mumbai: Zee Telefilms Ltd (ZTL) will make an open offer to the shareholders of ETC Networks Ltd to acquire up to 20 per cent stake at Rs 31.52 per share.

ZTL had earlier announced that it had acquired 48.32 per cent of the promoters' stake in ETC. It is now planning to acquire up to eight per cent through preferential allotment.
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Jaiprakash Ind offers collateral for HP power project
Kolkata: Jaiprakash Industries has decided to offer itself as collateral security for fresh term loans worth Rs 167 crore from banks and financial institutions to its subsidiary, Jaiprakash Hydro-Power Ltd in an attempt to bail out the Baspa-II hydel project in Himachal Pradesh,

The project, being implemented on a build-own-operate (BOO) model, has suffered a substantial cost and time overrun due to the flash floods on the Sutlej River in Kinnaur district.

While the project cost has increased to Rs 1,612 crore from Rs 1,345 crore, the time overrun has been around 15 months.

Banks and financial institutions led by ICICI have agreed to bail out the project by giving additional term loans of Rs 167 crore provided the parent company, Jaiprakash Industries, stands guarantee as a collateral security.
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Motorola offers smallest GPRS handset
New Delhi: Motorola has launched its smallest, lightest tri band GPRS-enabled mobile handset V.66 in the country.

The mobile handset allows the owner to stay connected in Asia, Europe and the Americas. Weighing just 73 gm, the handset has been priced at Rs 22,995, and comes in radar blue and silver colours.
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Sundaram Info software for hire purchase sector
Chennai: Sundaram Infotech Solutions has announced the launch of a software to address the needs of the hire purchase sector.

Called Sarva Nidhi VSP, the software offers an end-to-end solution to non-banking financial companies covering the entire chain of a hire purchase contract - right from starting a contract to settlement.

Sarva Nidhi would provide all IT-related services including application software, hardware, system software and the network.
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Toonz forays into advertising
Thiruvananthapuram: Toonz Animation India has announced its arrival in the advertising industry by landing a series of production contracts with major Indian corporates.

Parry's, Henkel, Kelloggs, Malayala Manorama, Asian Paints, Amul, Kissan and Moti Sandal are some of the major corporates and brands with which the advertisement wing of Toonz has been associated either directly or through agencies.

Toonz has acquired the Mumbai-based Toonsense Animation and launched its second studio in Mumbai last September. The technologically advanced studio with 2D and 3D animation facilities is headed by the award-winning duo of Srirang Sathaye and Suhael Merchant.
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Pepsi set to launch new TV promos
New Delhi: Pepsi is coming up with two cricket-based television ad campaigns to coincide with the India-Zimbabwe cricket series. Pepsi is sponsoring both the test and one-day series between India and Zimbabwe.

The company will also be introducing several contests and promotions, which will revolve around the series. The contests include a slogan-writing contest, the winner of which will present the man of the match award and a `Pepsi meet-n-greet contest' in which a person is eligible to win a prize after answering three questions correctly.
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Colgate rated top Indian brand
Mumbai: Colgate has been rated as India's number one brand across all categories in A&M's annual survey of India's top brands conducted by TNS Mode.

The brand's power score rose to 56.2 in 2001 from 53.91 in the earlier year.

In the metro segment, Colgate leads with a power score of 62.8. In the urban segment, Colgate has a score of 57.4 and in the rural segment 55.1.

Dettol was ranked the number two brand with a score of 43.6 followed by Tata with a score of 43.2.
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Tata to sign car racer Karthikeyan
Mumbai: The Tata group is likely to sign on ace car racer Narain Karthikeyan, who aims to be India's first Formula One driver, as brand ambassador.

Karthikeyan, 26, became the first Indian to test-drive a Formula One car when he tested the Jaguar at Silverstone in June last year.
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M&M to expand LCV portfolio
New Delhi: Mahindra and Mahindra is expanding its product portfolio in the light commercial vehicle segment with a slew of new bus models. First to be rolled out would be a 2.5 litre minibus entitled the Mahindra Tourister.

The 15-seater minibus, to be officially launched on 26 February, will be available for sale from 10 March. Although the debut variant would be a diesel model, a CNG variant will be launched by May. The company is also planning to launch minibuses in the 25 and 32 seater category in six to eight months time.
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TCS plans largest ever IPO
Mumbai: Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) is looking at an initial public offering of a staggering Rs 3,000-4,000 crore.

This could be the largest ever capital offering to hit the primary market in India. This estimate is based on the preliminary valuation of TCS which is likely to be in the range of Rs 30,000-40,000 crore.

As per the Sebi guidelines, the infotech company will have to offload a minimum 10 per cent of its equity to the public.

TCS had clocked revenues of Rs 3,312 crore for the previous financial year with an operating profit of Rs 1,200 crore and is expected to end the current year with revenues of around Rs 4,100 crore and operating profit in the region of Rs 1,500 crore.
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PNC eyes stake in BMG
Mumbai: Pritish Nandy Communications is eying for a stake in Rs 45 crore BMG Crescendo (India), the joint venture between Bertelsmann Music Group, Germany and Suresh Thomas of Crescendo Music and Marketing.

BMG Crescendo India has the distribution rights for Virgin Records in India and had also acquired Pan Music last year.

The company distributes music for a large number of music labels in India including labels in the south such as Tharangini, Audiotracks and Atlantis in West Bengal.

The revenues of the company for the year are expected to be around Rs 45 crore including about Rs 15 crore through the alliance with Virgin.
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PNC to hive off Moksh into arm
Mumbai: Pritish Nandy Communications will hive of its Moksh brand of fitness-cum-entertainment centres into a different subsidiary.

The company has retained J M Morgan Stanley as advisors on the issue of subsidiarisation of Moksh into a separate company.

The company is also planning to franchise the Moksh brand and has planned one more centre in Mumbai and another one in Delhi which would be opened shortly.
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MTNL to outsource services for cell network
Mumbai: Mahanagar Telephone Nigam (MTNL) has decided to outsource its call centre requirements for the existing cellular network in Mumbai.

The decision is aimed at reducing operational costs. At present, the company offers cellular services under the Dolphin brand name and has a small team for its call centre needs.
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