Government may rope in Reliance to lobby in Iran
New Delhi: The Indian government is expected to rope in petrochemicals giant, Reliance Industries, to push its case for the two large LNG contracts in Iran, being set up by the National Iran Oil Company.

The entry of the state-owned Gas Authority of India into the project is apparently being objected to by British Petroleum, the third partner in the project with Reliance Industrires and the National Iran Oil Company.

It is understood that the recent trip to Iran by the Indian prime minister, will focus on gas deals with that country. This would include the proposed Iran-India gas pipeline for which the Indian government wants the Iranians to adopt a sub-sea strategy rather than a land route, which will pass through Pakistan.

Reliance and British Petroleum each have a 25 per cent stake in the Iranian venture, with the Iranian oil company having 40 per cent. The balance 10 per cent has been reserved for the fourth partner the venture is trying to attract. It is for this stake that the Indian gas major, GAIL, has been seeking participation.

Officials in the petroleum ministry are hopeful that RIL will push its case with the Iranian government, as it would need GAIL to market its natural gas in India. The possibility of an Indian entry in this project is, however, suspect as it is not known if the Iranians have already sewed up full equity participation in the project.
Back to News Review index page  

Bharti may scale down stake in Televentures
Kolkata: The Bharti group is understood to be offloading a substantial portion of its 65 per cent stake in apex holding company Bharti Televentures, which is currently held by group company, Bharti Enterprises.

This may come through a spate of private placements to mop up a large chunk of its total Rs 5,000-crore funds requirement in the coming months.

Other key international partners in Bharti Televentures are Singapore Telecom and EM Warburg Pincus who hold 14 per cent and 13 per cent stakes, respectively, with the balance 8 per cent held by a clutch of minority stakeholders, comprising US insurer New York Life, Asia Infrastructure Fund and International Finance Corporation.

While company sources say that no decision has been taken on the private placements yet, the promoters are understood to be open to diluting their stake in Bharti Televentures from the present 65 per cent level to 51 per cent.

It is also well known that BT is keen to minimise its equity exposure in Asia. But it remains to be seen whether BT initially opts to swap its 49 per cent stake in Bharti Cellular for a holding in the unlisted Bharti Televentures.
Back to News Review index page  

Satyam decides to drop e-biz institute
Hyderabad: The ambitious Satyam Institute of E-Business, being planned by software major, Satyam, is understood to have been shelved due to the slowdown in the IT sector.

Considered to be a pet project of Satyam chairman B Ramalinga Raju, the Institute was slated to come up at Bahadurpally next to the state-of-the-art Satyam Technology Centre.

According to reports, the decision to defer the project by at least six months was taken at a meeting held here on late last week. It is understood that for the time being Satyam has terminated the services of Bovis India, the Bangalore-based project management consultants for the institute and subsidiary of the Bovis UK.

SIEB was to come up on a 100-acre land with high class infrastructure and faculty competing with the best institutes of the world. The inability of Satyam to fund the institute has been one of the major reasons for the delay.

SIEB had recruited two professors — Prof K Ramachandran from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, and Prof Raghunath from IIM-Bangalore — with a mandate to design strategic courses on e-business.
Back to News Review index page  

Pentamedia deals run into trouble
Mumbai: Entertainment software major, Pentamedia Graphics, which announced its intention to acquire the Canada-based Studio 345 in December last, is said to be renegotiating its acquisition.

Also under renegotiations is another acquisition, Film Roman, which has run into trouble as it has been delisted from the US Nasdaq. Pentamedia had announced the acquisition of Film Roman last year in December.

Initially the company had singed an agreement for acquiring 51 per cent stake for $15 million in Film Roman. After the delisting of Film Roman, Pentamedia is understood to have renegotiated the acquisition of acquiring a 60 per cent stake, instead o 51 per cent, at $15 million.

Pentamedia chief operating officer and director K Sreenivasan confirmed the developments and said that the stock markets crash since the acquisition have prompted this move.

Film Roman is a producer of television animation serials. It has already rejected any restructuring of the acquisition proposal further. Film Roman has already communicated to its shareholders that the Pentamedia deal may not go through on the original terms.
Back to News Review index page  

ESPN-Star bags big deals in telecast rights
New Delhi: The ESPN STAR Sports combine is understood to have acquired multi-year Asian broadcasting rights, including India, for all big-ticket sports.

In a multi million dollar contract, the combine has bagged the cable and satellite rights for beaming ICC Knockouts and Cricket World Cup till 2007, telecasting rights of all foreign tours by the Indian Cricket team till 2004, C&S and syndication rights to leading tennis grand slams, Wimbledon & US Open till 2004 and C&S telecasting rights to FIA Formula One World Championships till 2005.

According to the chief executive of the combine, the multi-year sports package reinforces the combine’s commitment towards maximum live and exclusive sports coverage for the Asian and more so the Indian viewers.

In Asia, ESPN STAR sports already has 250 million viewers spread across 25 countries and India alone accounts for 23 million of it’s viewers.
Back to News Review index page  

Cisco launches storage networking product
Palm Desert: The world’s largest networking equipment manufacturer, Cisco Systems, launched a new, $27,000 storage router in the market. This product, the company claims, will cut costs for large companies and make information on the internet faster and easier to access.

The SN 5420 Storage Router is based on a standard developed with International Business Machines and using the Internet Protocol, or language for the internet and is the first such router from Cisco.

Cisco, which considers the networking storage market as core to its business, plans to capture 30 to 50 per cent of a new market.

The storage networking market is projected by some analysts to hit $4 to $5 billion in 2003 as companies and individuals exponentially expand their storage needs.
Back to News Review index page  

RPL-IOC joint venture may run IBP
Kolkota: In the event that either of Reliance Petroleum or Indian Oil Corporation is successful in acquiring the 26 per cent stake in IBP, the two companies will form a joint venture marketing company to run IBP. A formal clearance from the government for this purpose is expected any day.

The proposed joint venture marketing company will allow IOC to market Reliance’s entire product range, excepting the captive consumption of 7 million tonnes by Reliance.

If successful, the venture will catapult IOC to an unassailable position in retail market share of petroleum products and overtake the other two public sector oil majors, Hindustan Petroleum Corporation and Bharat Petroluem Corporation Ltd .

As a strategy IOC is slowly buying out land owned by dealers to convert some of its dealer owned dealer operated retail outlets into company owned and dealer operated outlets.
Back to News Review index page  

AV Birla group to set up Rs 200-cr hospital
Mumbai: The AV Birla group has planned to set up a a 400-bed super speciality hospital at Chinchwadi near Pune at an estimated cost of Rs 200 crore.

The group is understood to have already acquired more than 15 acres and the construction of the hospital is due to commence shortly. The hospital, to be named Aditya Birla Memorial Hospital, is being undertaken by the Aditya Birla Foundation. The project is expected to be completed in year and a half.

The group is planning to integrate the project with its insurance business, Birla Sunlife, at a later stage.

The hospital is likely to focus on cardiology, neurology, orthopaedics and paediatric, endocrinology, cosmetic surgery and behavioural health.
Back to News Review index page  

Mangalore Chem may foray into urea trade
Bangalore: With the market conditions being dull, the UB-group promoted, Mangalore Chemicals and Refineries has decided to enter related areas of business like trading in chemicals and even urea if it is open for imports.

The company, according to its managing director, Mr. Darius Mehta, could also consider putting up a chemical manufacturing plant catering to the agri and pharma industry right next to its fertiliser unit.

Despite the fact that it might have a "zero" growth rate for this financial year, the company has set itself an aggressive revenue target of Rs 1,000 crore by March 2003. It hopes to achieve this through the ongoing cost cutting and efficiency enhancement programme, apart from its foray into new related activities leveraging its existing business strengths like trained manpower, ample knowledge of the processes.
Back to News Review index page  

Tata Coffee plans new flagship brand
Mumbai: As part of its plans to shift from being a bulk exporter of coffee to a value-added brand player, Tata Coffee is planning to launch a new flagship coffee brand for the domestic market.

According to Mr. Harish Bijoor, vice-president (marketing) of Tata Coffee, the brand may not be pitted directly against the exiting market leaders. Mr. Bijoor refused to divulge the brand name for the product and just stated that the Tata name would be part of the brand name. The product will hit the market by September.

The company plans to increase the contribution to revenue from domestic operations, to about 40 per cent in the next 2-3 years. Currently exports contribute nearly 80 per cent of the revenues.

The company had hitherto restricted its presence mainly in the southern markets, through its brand portfolio which included Tata Cafe, Tata Kapi, Tata Coorg Double Roast and Tata Coorg Coffee. Tata Coffee has a market share of 21.2 per cent.
Back to News Review index page  

McDonald’s to go south
New Delhi: After five years of operation in the country, American fast food chain McDonald’s has finally decided to get a taste of the south with its first southern outlet being planned for an opening in Bangalore by the end of this year.

The company has sought approval of the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) to invest in real estate which will be used to house its restaurants. According to sources, McDonald’s India is yet to decide on the company structure for the southern operations. It is said to be toying with the idea of a ‘developer-licensee model’, wherein it will franchise its business to restaurant owners. If the company goes for this kind of an operation, it will be an unique experiment in India.

McDonald’s currently operates 27 restaurants in the country and plans to open another 15 outlets by the end of this year.
Back to News Review index page  

Schenectady raises stake in Dr Beck
New Delhi: By acquiring the shareholding of the Mahindra Group in the company, Schenectady International (SIL) has increased its shareholding in Dr Beck India Ltd from the existing 58.37 per cent to 80.66 per cent. The acquisition is said to be valued at Rs 13.19 crore.

According to the company, the Mahindra Group has decided to sell their entire shareholding to enable them to concentrate and apply business resources in areas of their core competency.

In October 1998, the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) had permitted the company to acquire 51 per cent and 20 per cent shareholding of Dr Beck India Ltd from Dr Beck AG and BASF AG through public offer under the takeover code.
Back to News Review index page