TVS Motors looks at 15 pc sales growth
New Delhi: TVS Motors is looking at a 12-15 per cent sales growth for its two-wheelers at 1.7 million units for the current fiscal. According to Venu Srinivasan chairman and managing director TVS Motors the company aims to sell 15,000 units of its newly launched bike `Apache' by the festival season in September.

He also said the company's manufacturing facility in Himachal Pradesh would begin production by the end of this month. Besides this the company's Indonesian manufacturing facility would be operational by the end of this year and have a manufacturing capacity of 2,50,000 units per annum. The total investment in the facility will be around Rs 200 crore, part of which has already been invested.
Back to News Review index page  

NFCL achieves record urea production
Hyderabad: Nagarjuna Fertilizers and Chemicals (NFCL) has achieved a record urea production of 113.1 per cent of its capacity at a 13.79 lakh tonnes during 2005-06. The company has two units at its Kakinada plant that produce urea. While Unit-1 produced 7,03,645 tonnes, Unit-2 surpassed its capacity by producing 6,75,571 tonnes. The total capacity of the plant is 11,94, 600 tonnes.

The company says the higher production was achieved under optimal utilisation of energy. NFCL has also managed to dispatch the entire production to farmers. The company, a leading manufacturer of plant nutrients, also sold out its products which include Mahazinc, Zinc Sulphate, Zeta, speciality fertilisers etc.
Back to News Review index page  

Jet finalises sale of five Boeing aircraft
New Delhi: Jet Airways has concluded the sale and leaseback of five Boeing 737 aircraft in 2005-06. According to a statement from the company the transaction was concluded in respect of three Boeing 737-400 and two B 737-800 aircraft. The details of this transaction would be announced along with the results for 2005-06 the company said.

Jet, which plans to purchase 30 aircraft over the next few years, will continue with the sale and leaseback policy in order to maintain a balance of owned and leased aircraft in the fleet, the statement added.

The airline currently has a fleet of 19 owned and 34 leased aircraft.
Back to News Review index page  

TV9 Karnataka launch in June
Hyderabad: TV9 the highly watched Telugu news and features channel will soon launch its Kannada language channel - TV9 Karnataka - in early June.

According to SVL Narayan, the managing director of TV9 Karnataka, the channel's infrastructure is at an advanced stage of completion and over 70 people have been recruited.

He said the channel has made rapid strides in a short period of time and commands excellent viewership. He said the channel expects to repeat the success in Karnataka offering a diverse fare. He said though it will be based on a regional language, its look and feel would be that of international TV channel," he added.
Back to News Review index page  

SAB Miller hikes capacity at Aurangabad unit
Bangalore: SAB Miller India has hiked the capacity at its Aurangabad brewery to 84 lakh cases per year from 20 lakh cases as part of its $125-million investment plan that will be spread over five years, in modernising its breweries the company said.

In phase one of the modernization process the company would make improvements in the glass bottle packaging line, brew house, storage and fermentation tanks and other associated utilities.

The plant boasts of a fully automated brew house with modern control system and an online display of process parameters at a central control room. The plant would have an additional 15 UNI tanks, with fully automated control system ensuring quality beer, the statement said.

The modernisation will also create additional indirect employment of almost 50 per cent in bottle handling and warehousing operations. The phase two of the modernisation will begin in May and is expected to be completed by February 2007.
Back to News Review index page  

Voice-based SMS to be offered soon
Hyderabad: Roamware, a technology solutions provider for telecom carriers globally has test deployed the feature in about six carriers where over 20 million use voice-based SMS.

According to Avinash Chauhan vice-president - engineering, the company is in parleys with other operators, including several India telecoms to offer this service. The company will offer the solution in two routes, the first by deploying a platform that helps reach the service, offering it as a value-added service. The other option, which some companies prefer, is to host the service and collect transaction-based revenue he said.

Unlike the earlier option of a push-to-talk facility offered by some service operators, where the user had to buy a handset with a capability to access such a service, any handset can be used for voice SMS, he said.

The addition of voice capability to the network actually bypasses the issue of voice-mail service that some e-mail service providers currently provide. For instance, a user requires a PC and a headset to send a voice mail. But, an SMS voice mail can be sent on the same mobile phone. Given the penetration of mobile phones, this offers greater advantage, he added.

Roamware works with over 200 networks globally across 87 countries, including several carriers in India.
Back to News Review index page  

Satyam to increase headcount to 50,000 by March 2008
Hyderabad: The Deccan based consulting and IT services major, Satyam Computer Services is planning to ramp up its employee strength to 50,000 by March 2008 an increase of 66.7 per cent over its present employee strength. At present the company has a workforce of "close to 30,000.

According to a senior manager in the company the company has grown from around 8,000 employees to close to 30,000 within a span of a few years. Satyam had 9,759 employees on March 31, 2003 which increased to 14,032 by March 2004, which means an addition of 4,273 associates.

Till 2005, Satyam had added 5,132 more employees, bringing its total headcount to 19,164. The company increased its manpower by 4,268 within a nine-month period, bringing it to 23,432 associates on December 31, 2005.
Back to News Review index page  

Ethypharm likely to offer full solutions from India
Mumbai: Pharma company, Ethypharm India, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the France-based Ethypharm S.A., hopes to be able to offer end-to-end on its drug delivery technologies, after its manufacturing facility in India gets a European regulatory certification.

Ajey Kumar, chief executive officer, Ethypharm LL India, said scaling-up the plant to the EUGMP (European Union Good Manufacturing Practices) norms would help Ethypharm develop a technology from concept to commercial manufacturing. company hopes to apply for the EU certification of its plant at Ambernath, Maharashtra, in about six months.

At present, work that comes to India is sent back to France at different stages of development and obtaining EUGMP will help Ethypharm India supplement the work of its French-parent, besides supporting the company's client-base, thus keeping costs in check, he said.

It will put the manufacturing facilities in different areas to optimal use, as clients can be supported depending on their requirements, he added.
Back to News Review index page  

ONGC may acquire HPCL's 17 per cent stake in MRPL
New Delhi: Oil and natural gas exploration company ONGC is likely to acquire HPCL's 17 per cent stake in MRPL which at current prices, would work out to a price of Rs 1,500 crore. The company's plans of integrating MRPL as its downstream venture earlier got hit when former petroleum minister Mani Shankar Aiyar objected to its plans of expanding operations to non-core areas. At the time, the government was in favour of HPCL buying out the MRPL refinery.

However, Murli Deora - current oil minister -seems ready to help ONGC fulfil its dreams of taking over MRPL completely. Senior government officials confirmed that a Cabinet note is being prepared on these lines.
Back to News Review index page  

Star to enter five new businesses
Mumbai: Star India is planning to enter five new businesses by the end of the year. These include Internet, mobile TV, outdoor advertising, retail, publishing and movies.

The company's last acquisition included a 26 per cent in Balaji Telefilms a year-and-a-half ago.

Star India has already begun work on outdoor advertising, with News Corp's out-of-home subsidiary, News Outdoor India (NOI), setting up shop in India. On the retail front, Star is looking at getting into a strategic partnership with one of the upmarket coffee shops to set up a "Star" cafe. The company is also looking at venturing into the movie business either through distribution or production.

Also on the cards is a magazine, although its theme is still being explored. Similarly, the company is exploring the possibility of acquiring a gaming company to provide content to telecom service providers.
Back to News Review index page  

Genpact to expand to Poland, Philippines & China
Mumbai: Genpact, the largest BPO in India, is planning to expand overseas into Poland, Philippines and China. The company is opening centres in Poland and Philippines with 450-500 seats which will eventually grow to 1,500-2,000 seats. In China, the company is looking at opening a centre in Changchun. It already has a centre in Dalian with 1,800 people and plans to raise the headcount to 3,500. The facilities are on lease hence the investment is not very big.

Genpact has set up the centres with an investment of $5-10m. The company is looking at Philippines as an alternative destination for customer services and in particular for financial services. The Polish centre will service the European and German market.

Meanwhile Genpact's expansion into other Indian cities will continue, and the company is planning to open centres in cities like Indore, Nagpur, Bhubneshwar.
Back to News Review index page  

Raymond to hive off denim division
Mumbai: Raymond has received approval from its shareholders to sell or transfer its denim division. The shareholders through postal ballot, have authorised the board to sell off the denim division situated at Yavatmal in Maharashtra, the company informed the Bombay Stock Exchange.

The Raymond group has interests in textiles, readymade garments, engineering files and tools, prophylactics and toiletries.
Back to News Review index page  

RIL seen tying up with Chevron for exploration
New Delhi: India's largest private oil firm, Reliance Industries, seems likely to tie-up with Chevron Corp of US to make joint bids for oil and gas blocks on offer in the latest round of the New Exploration Licensing Policy (NELP).

Sources said Chevron is keen to expand its presence in India and has agreed to spend 300 million dollars to buy a 5 per cent stake in the refinery being built by Reliance.

In the previous NELP rounds, Reliance partnered with Niko Resources of Canada and Hardy Oil of the UK. Niko took 10 per cent stake in blocks Reliance won in NELP-I while Hardy also took minority interest in the blocks. The California-based Chevron, which did not take part in the previous five rounds of NELP, had expressed keenness to participate in the latest tender at the roadshows held in Houston last month to promote NELP-VI.

Chevron, which currently has a lubricant blending and marketing operation in India, was also looking at partnering Reliance for marketing natural gas produced from the Indian firm's D-6 field in Krishna Godavari basin off the Andhra coast, sources said.

Chevron earlier said it would spend about 300 million dollars to acquire five per cent of Reliance Petroleum Ltd (RPL), formed by Reliance Industries Ltd (Reliance) to own and operate a new export refinery at Jamnagar, Gujarat.

Reliance currently operates a 660,000 barrels per day refinery in Jamnagar.
Back to News Review index page  

Ashok Leyland hikes prices
New Delhi: Commercial vehicles maker Ashok Leyland has hiked the prices in all vehicle categories by 2.5 per cent and expects over 10 per cent sales growth this fiscal.

Ashok Leyland managing director R Seshasayee said, "We have hiked prices across all product categories by 2.5 per cent last week." He added that the commercial vehicle segment in India was expected to grow by about 10 per cent in 2006-07.
Back to News Review index page  

Tata Motors' export performance peaks
Kolkata: Tata Motors exported more than 50,000 vehicles during 2005-06 showing a growth of over 65 per cent over the previous year on the back of strong demand for Indian vehicles from markets like South Africa.

The company exported a total of 50,539 vehicles during 2005-06 as compared to 30,496 during 2004-05.

According to company officials almost one-third of its entire exports were to South Africa. At a figure of around 30,000 units commercial vehicles showed a growth of 50 per cent over the previous year's figure of around 20,000.

But the growth in export of passenger vehicles has been almost 80 per cent as it grew from around 11,000 in the previous year to 20,000 during the year, he said.
Back to News Review index page