Godrej Agrovet to set up facility in Punjab
New Delhi: Godrej Agrovet (GAVL), a subsidiary of Godrej Industries (GIL), has entered into an understanding (MoU) with the Punjab Government to set up a greenfield processing plant that would become operational by March 2008. The company has earmarked an investment of around Rs 100 crore in the new processing unit that will produce the Real Good brand of fresh processed chicken and in further expansion of the company's rural retail initiative, Aadhaar.

Till now Real Good chicken was confined to the western and southern markets.

The company also has hopes from its ready-to-eat snacks brand Yummiez, launched last year.
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Paharpur Industries to invest Rs100-cr
New Delhi: Paharpur Industries (PIL), a wholly owned subsidiary of Paharpur Cooling Towers Ltd that makes a wide range of packaging products, plans to invest around Rs100 crore over the next five years in acquiring new machinery and technology.

The company is working on a five year rolling plan to invest around Rs80-Rs100 crore to acquire new technologies and machineries starting with a coater laminator that would cost around Rs 20 crore said company officials.

The company is also planning to acquire package-manufacturing units in different parts of the country. The company's key clients include Hindustan Lever, ITC, Dabur, Mother Dairy, Asian Paints, Heinz, Bayer, Tata Tea, Eveready, Britannia, Novartis, Henkel and Perfetti amongst others.

PIL also plans to enter into partnerships with countries like China, South Korea, Taiwan, Europe and the US for the acquisition of new machinery and technology in an attempt to increase its current domestic market share of 25 per cent in the specialised packaging solutions. The company estimates its market share in the Rs1,500-crore domestic organised packaging solutions market to be around 7 per cent. The company registered a turnover of Rs106 crore in 2005-06 of Rs125 crore in 2006-07 and of around Rs500 crore in the next five years.
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Infosys to continue with its global focus
Bangalore: N R Narayana Murthy chief mentor of Infosys said the company would continue to focus on global markets for growth.

He said Infosys was founded on the principles of globalization and was not constrained by national boundaries while interacting with visiting students from the Stanford Graduate School of Business at the Infosys campus here.

He said Infosys had developed certain products, which were doing well in India: "We evolved the core banking package and we command 60 pc of the market share in India.

As many as 25 students representing 12 nationalities took part in the interaction.

Another delegation from Cornell University, led by its President David J Skorton, also visited the Infosys campus on Saturday.

In a separate interview on television Murthy said he favoured MNCs in the sector saying consumers will benefit from their entry.

"When we have opened it (retail sector) to large Indian groups, which means that mom and pop stores are likely to suffer anyway, why not open it to large multinationals," Murthy told Karan Thapar on a CNN-IBN show Devil's Advocate.

When asked if he believes foreign direct investment should be permitted in the Indian retail sector, he said, "absolutely".
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Dubai World to invest Rs2,600-crore in West Bengal
Kolkata: Dubai World has announced a Rs2,600 crore investment for developing Kulpi port and for building a special economic zone (SEZ) in W Bengal.

The SEZ would be spread over 2,500 acres while the port would require 700 acres.

Addressing the media Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem, chairman, Dubai World, and chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee said the main task would be identifying the land.

The Centre had cleared the SEZ in 2003. The multi-product SEZ would be completed in 2-3 years and would host automobile, electronics, textiles, logistics and agro industries.

Keventer and West Bengal Industrial Development Corporation (WBIDC) would have minority stakes in the project.

On land acquisition for the SEZ, the chief minister said the benefits of the project would have to be conveyed to people.
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ONGC request to auction Mumbai High crude turned down
New Delhi: The request made by Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) to sell its output from Mumbai High fields to the refiners through market related price has been turned down by the government.

Official sources said that the Ministry has declined the request on the ground that if the company wanted to auction the crude, it should be the entire output from the fields and not just what is being sold to refiners. Besides, the price of the crude from Mumbai High fields was already discovered, hence what is the further advantage of this move was not clear, sources said.

The State-owned refiners such as Indian Oil Corporation, Bharat Petroleum Corporation and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation had also voiced concern over the proposal and wanted the current mechanism of crude sale to continue. Under the current system, the Ministry apportions 16 million tonnes of the Mumbai High crude to the refiners on a nomination basis, without allowing free market pricing.
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Cobra Beer looks at acquisition, greenfield brewery
New Delhi: UK-based Cobra Beer is looking for acquisition of breweries and setting up a greenfield plant in India with an investment of up to $10 million which includes promoting the brand and distribution network in India in the next couple of years.

The premium beer maker is also looking to increase sales to one million cases by early next year in the market dominated by Kingfisher, which has sells nearly 36 million cases annually.

The company says if it plans fructify it was looking at selling five million cases of beer annually.

The company has recently signed a licensing agreement with a Goa-based brewer in addition to one in Rajasthan.
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