Apollo Tyres to invest Rs 230 crore in Kerala
Kochi: Apollo Tyres is reported to be planing to invest Rs 230 crore in Perambra plant in Kerala. The proposed investment include Rs 150 crore for the manufacture of radial tyres and another Rs 80 crore as part of its expansion drive in revamping Premier Tyres Ltd. which it acquired in 1995.

With this investment, the radial truck tyre manufacturing capacity at Perambra plant located in Thrissur district will go up to 150 tonnes per day from the existing 132 tonnes. The expansion work at the unit is likely to take two years to reach completion. The Rs 80-crore investment in Premier Tyres Ltd would raise the capacity of the plant from the present 60 tonnes daily to 100 tonnes.
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Ajanta Pharma to spend Rs.50 crore on brand acquisitions
Mumbai: Ajanta Pharma has announced that it would be acquire new brands to widen its portfolio of offerings and improve company's market share. The company has set aside Rs 50 crore for the purpose and as a part of the exercise, appointed merchant banker I-Sec to scout for fresh brand acquisitions within six months.

The company, with 35 to 40 products in the pipeline to be launched in the ethical segments, in cardiovascular, nutraceuticals, pain management, premium antibiotics and ophthalmics segments, has recently applied for 15 patent drugs, four up from earlier tally of 11 patents, by filing four more applications in the New Drug Delivery Systems (NDDS).

Mr. Purushottam Agrawal, managing director of Ajanta Pharma has said that as a part of efforts to augment its distribution reach, Ajanta Pharma will be enhancing its sales force to 600 representatives in the next six months covering all states. The exercise will be carried with an investment of Rs 15 crore. The company has already added 250 representatives in the year 2000, taking its overall sales force tally to 350 representatives.
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Tisco reports lower net profits
Mumbai: Tata Steel has reported a 12 per cent fall in its net profit for the quarter ended December 31, 2000, to Rs 127.7 crore. However, Tisco's sales grew up to 10 per cent supported by a 4 per cent rise in product realisation, in contrast to other players in the domestic steel industry, signaling steel giant's movement up the value chain. With prices of steel falling sharply, realisation in the domestic sector has come down sharply by 11 per cent.
Tata Steel's realisation has been improving mainly due to a gradual change in its product mix. While 63 per cent of its production consists of flat products 37 per cent is of long products (including semis). Tata Steel sales were at Rs 1,868.1 crore compared to Rs 1,698.9 crore for the same quarter last year. The company's production also rose to 838,376 tonnes for the third quarter from 784,900 tonnes last year.
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Shaw Wallace to launch new brands
Kolkata: Shaw Wallace is set to launch a number of new liquor brands in both the premium as well as lower end segment in a bid to increase its market share. Mr. A K M A Shamsuddin, executive vice-president (liquor) of Shaw Wallace has said that new brands would be launched this year.

Mr Shamsuddin said that company's newly launched premium brandy R C Gold was doing extremely well, while the market share of company's premium range product 'Royal Challenge' had increased significantly to 70 per cent throughout the country. He also said that while market rivals had resorted to drastic price cuts in the premium segment to increase market share, their attempts proved to be futile as consumers 'totally rejected their game plan'.
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L&T plans contract manufacturing of medical equipment
Mumbai: Larsen & Toubro is planning a major thrust on exports of medical equipment and is initiating the contract manufacturing route for entry into the European markets. The new strategy, which has been drawn up based on recommendations of Boston Consultancy Group, seeks to completely transform its Rs 60 crore medical equipment and systems business division into a Rs 240 crore entity in the next five years.

The company plans to initially tap the export potential for Singapore, Middle East and a few European countries and eventually enter the US market over the next 15-18 months.
Mr. RN Mukhija, L&T senior vice president (operations) announcing the strategic move said that company's growth will now essentially be driven by exports, which would contribute around 50 per cent of the total revenue in medical equipment business over the next five years. The domestic market for medical equipment is currently pegged at around Rs 1,000 crore and the market segment in which L&T operates, which includes - display monitors, ultrasound machines and surgical diathermies - is about Rs 200 crore. The overall growth of the medical equipment market is placed at around 30 per cent.
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Ambassador car to be relaunched with new looks
Kochi: Hindustan Motors is set to make major improvements on its flagship brand - Ambassador - in a bid to reposition itself in the automobile market. The company plans to embark on a major modernisation drive involving an investment of Rs 75 crore over the next 18 months.

The car would soon be made available with PU seats in bench type and bucket style, factory-fitted air conditioner, power windows and power steering. More features would be incorporated within the next 2-3 months. The company has decided to focus on modernisation of the manufacturing process and the improving product quality, while retaining the model's core benefits. Major improvements undertaken included body shop, paint booth and improved engines.
As part of the drive, the company is also planning to expand its network in the country, particularly in the North and in the West, where it has a low presence. Currently, the company is manufacturing around 24,000 Ambassador cars a year and with the expansion drive, this could be increased to 30,000 within the next two years.
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Indian Hotels offered stake in Tata Travel
New Delhi: Tata Finance has proposed to Indian Hotels to pick up stake Tata Travel, its proposed subsidiary, while it would retain 51 per cent stake. Mr. Dilip Pendse, managing director of Tata Finance Ltd. has stated that negotiations were also on with other international and domestic travel majors for joint venture participation. Mr Pendse has however, made it clear that majority stake would be retained by Tata, in line with group's overall corporate strategy.

All travel-related businesses of the Tata Group are to be brought under the umbrella of the proposed subsidiary -Tata Travel, The restructuring exercise is aimed at synergising group's disparate interests in travel-related businesses in order to face global competition. Tata Travel will be created by merging three existing group companies Forvol International, Stalion Travel Services and Taj Services.
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New L&T arm set up for embedded software
Mumbai: Larsen & Toubro Ltd. has formed a separate company L&T EMSYS (L&T Embedded Systems) for taking up embedded software development. L&T had so far been using embedded systems, as part of its electrical business activity, with the software development being mainly looked after by Larsen & Toubro Information Technology Ltd. (LTITL), L&T's information technology subsidiary.
The company however, has more skills in this area such as design and development of medical systems and manufacture of electronic motors and drives. According to Mr. Y.M Deosthalee, L&T senior vice-president, the proposed new entity - L&T EMSYS - will specifically be leveraging these skills in the area of embedded software development. LTITL will continue to look after telecom software development.
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