Tata Finance to expand into insurance and credit card business
New Delhi: Tata Finance Ltd, a non-banking finance company (NBFC) of the Tata group in which the latter holds about 50 per cent stake, is set to diversify its range of financial related services with new offerings. The company is now set to distribute insurance products for Tata AIG insurance ventures, Mr. Subodh K Shah, president of Tata Finance has said. Tata Finance will distribute products for both life and non-life insurance companies, through its own offices and also through that of its subsidiary companies.

As part of its expansion drive, Tata Finance has also decided to foray into the credit card business and will launch a co-branded international credit card with American Express in next

This is for the first time that American Express will be tying up with an Indian company to launch an international credit card. A debit card will also be later added to its portfolio of services.

Tata Finance has an asset base of about Rs 3,500 crore and had a turnover of Rs 611 crore at the end of the 1999-2000 financial year. Along with its subsidiaries - like the one for home finance the company's asset base stands is about Rs 4,500 crore and the turnover is in the region of Rs 800 crore.

The company has presence in a variety of businesses that include housing loans, securities trading and is also a primary dealer for government securities.
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Reliance strikes key swap deals with oil majors
Mumbai: The Reliance group has reportedly entered into struck a swap deal with leading international oil majors, under which it will sell them naphtha and, in return, buy petrochemicals-grade naphtha. The deal, reportedly signed last month, involves Japanese oil majors Mitsubishi, Marubeni, Itochu, Idemitsu and Anglo-Dutch major Shell.

Under the deal, 50,000 mt of naphtha from Reliance Petroleum’s Jamnagar refinery is likely to be exported to the Japanese companies and Shell, in the next six months. In turn, the Reliance group will import 50,000 tonnes of petrochemicals-grade naphtha.

The RPL refinery in Jamnagar is the world's largest grassroots refinery, with a capacity of 27 million tonnes per annum. It is also the world’s seventh largest operating refinery.
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Sahara Airlines to expand it fleet
Mumbai: Sahara Airlines has announced that it will procure 13 new aircraft on dry lease. With the new acquisitions, the airline will almost triple its fleet to 20 from the present size of seven aircraft. The airline’s operations have been dogged due to a lack of adequate fleet among other problems. The airline has set aside $15 million for the acquisition of 13 Boeing 737s over the next one year.

After strengthening its fleet, the airline plans to consolidate its presence on important routes such as Delhi-Mumbai and Delhi-Calcutta, by increasing the flight frequency, to be followed by the introduction of flights on newer routes. Sahara Airlines, presently operates just five aircraft while two other aircraft are out of operation for past few months.

Sahara Airlines claims a 12 per cent share in the domestic aviation market, with market leaders Indian Airlines and Jet Airways, the largest private aviation service, clearly in the lead. The Indian Airlines has a fleet of 54 aircraft and claims 53 per cent market share. Jet has 30 aircraft with a 38 per cent share
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AV Birla to acquire global brand rights from Coats Viyella
Mumbai: The AV Birla group is set to acquiring the global brand rights from Coats Viyella, a year after it bought the Indian arm of the UK-based company and brand rights for the Middle East and Saarc regions. Brands to be acquired include Louis Philippe, Van Heusen, Allen Solly, San Frisco and Byford.

Aditya Vikram Global Trading House, the overseas trading arm of the group is acquiring the global rights and a formal announcement is expected in three weeks.

AV Global Trading House had earlier acquired the exclusive brand rights and technology for various countries in Saarc and the Middle East for Rs 47 crore. The price bid for acquiring global rights is not known. The structure of the deal has however, been finalised. The group is buying out the world rights for Louis Philippe. It will obtain the global rights for Peter England, except for the UK and Ireland. The group is buying out the rights for Allen Solly in all other countries, except America. The arrangement for other brands such as Van Heusen, Byford and San Frisco is not yet known.
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Funskool to launch electronic toys
Chennai: Funskool, a toys manufacturing company is shortly planning to introduce a wide range of electronic toys, designed to suit typical Indian conditions, in a bid to capture this emerging lucrative market segment, presently dominated by imported varieties from China.

The company hopes to hit the market with range of indigenous electronic toys for the Indian kids at the earliest, Mr. Rapheal Kuriyan, chief executive, Funskool has said. Imported electronic toys had the disadvantage of not having been designed and developed for the typical Indian climatic conditions, whereas the Funskool range would be specially designed for such conditions Mr. Kuriyan has assured.

To begin with, the company was planning to introduce handheld electronic games, with the full range of Funskool electronic toys to be unveiled within next two years. Funskool has technical collaboration with the world leader Hasbro and enjoys a major market share, followed by competitors Mettle India and Lego.

The Rs 250-crore toy market in the country is growing at the rate of 15 per cent annually. However as much as 80 per cent of the market demand is met by the unorganised sector.
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TTK Prestige to acquire 26 per cent stake in Softel 4
Ahemedabad: TTK Prestige is acquiring a 26 per cent stake in Ahmedabad-based Softel Machines, through a preferential share allotment. The deal will drive the Rs 150-crore Bangalore-based company into the electrical kitchen appliances segment, where it currently has no presence.

TTK will initially source mixer-grinders and hand-held blenders from Softel’s plant in Gandhidham, Kutch, and market it under its own brand name. The Rs 22 crore turnover Softel will in the bargain gain access to TTK’s wide distribution network for its full product range, which it will continue to market under Softel brand name.

Promoted by first generation entrepreneur Anil Jain, Softel is a closely held company, whose main strength has been in innovative product design.
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Lanbit spreads wings to UK
Mumbai: Lanbit India Pvt Ltd. and Health & Home Shopping (HHS) have announced the setting up of their joint venture - Tulsient Systems Plc in Manchester, UK. Lanbit holds 51 per cent in the venture, with HSS holding the remaining 49 per cent.

The UK-based Tulsient is a systems development and integration company, which has announced the launch of a comprehensive ERP package for the mail order business, Mail Order Manager (M-OM). Priced at 1,50,000, the package covers a range of services from concept fulfillment to physical catalogue management and distribution, the release said.

The new company expects to achieve revenue of 2 million in the first year from M-OM and related services. It is also in the process of launching two more ERP products, Television Sales Order Manager (TS-OM) and Website Order Manager (WS-OM).
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Phelps Dodge, Metdist to jointly bid for HCL
New Delhi: Phelps Dodge, an international copper giant along with global metals trading firm Metdist is bidding for a majority stake in the state-owned Hindustan Copper Ltd. slated for disinvestment by the end of this fiscal. The two companies have reportedly filed a joint expression of interest for acquiring 51 per cent stake in the company.

Phelps Dodge of the United States is one of the largest copper producers in the world and operates a range of mining operations across the globe. Metdist is a metal trading promoted by a London-based Indian businessman Lord Raj Bagri, who is also the chairman of the London Metals Exchange (LME).

Both the mining majors already enjoy a presence in the country through their subsidiaries Phelps Dodge Exploration India Pvt Ltd. set up in 1997 for the purpose of exploration of base metals and setting up of a copper, zinc and nickle smelter. Metdist has set up a subsidiary called Metdist Industries, which is involved in setting up a copper smelter and refinery in Gujarat.

Three other Indian bidders for HCL include Birla Copper, Sterlite and the Binani group.
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GE Caps Equity to invest in telecom, media and retail space
New Delhi: GE Capital Services’ Equity Group is looking at investing in the telecom, media and retail space in India, Mr. Puneet Bhatia, chief executive, equity group, GE Capital Services India has stated. The company is presently talking to couple of media companies, in the content and broadcasting space, Mr. Bhatia has said.

The size of the fund’s portfolio globally placed at $5 billion. In India, it has enhanced its portfolio to $50 million and by this year-end this will go up to $85 million. By the end of this year, GE Capital will have 14 companies in its portfolio and every year it will add 20 more companies to this portfolio, Mr.Bhatia has said.

The fund will primarily looking at Indian companies that cater to the rest of the world and companies that have potential to grow in the domestic market. The fund’s strategy has also been to structure equity with companies that are vendors to GE and those which could be showcased to GE and the rest of the world to create businesses for these companies.
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