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Satyam to offer ADS issue
Mumbai/New Delhi: Satyam Computer Services has
planned an American Depository Share offering of 12.5 million ADS, accounting for 25
million equity shares. The company has filed the statement in the US Securities Exchange
Commission, and will make the public offering soon.
It expects to list on the New
York Stock Exchange under the symbol, SAY.
The underwriters for the offering are Merrill Lynch & Co., Deutsche Banc. Alex Brown,
Banc of America Securities LLC, Salomon Smith Barney and CLSA Emerging Markets.
The issue size is expected to be in the
region of around 115 million dollars, with a greenshoe option of 15 per cent.
The proceeds will go for debt retirement and
expansions, as well as for mergers and acquisitions. Satyam Computers is one of the few
infotech companies in the country that carries debt on its books. The company recorded an
interest outgo of Rs 34.51 crore for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2001.
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Commerce One to make India its content base
New Delhi: Commerce One Inc, the 400 million dollar
e-marketplace company is planning to relocate its US based content factory and global
helpdesk to India. The relocation will reduce the cost to one third, according to the
company.
The content factory, now in Silicon Valley,
is a 500 people facility, while the global helpdesk will be a 500-1000 seat facility.
Commerce One has already invested 6 million dollar in the country, and plans to bring in
another four million this year.
The company has signed up clients like DCM
Shriram Consolidated, Hindalco and Tata International, has partnerships with ICICI,
Crisil, Satyam Infoway and SGSonSite and has current revenues of Rs 3 crores. It aims at
reaching 40 per cent of the marketshare within a year.
Commerce One is also planning 11 new
verticals in the auto, consumer, chemicals, computing, energy, engineering, FMCG, metals,
paper, IT services and petroleum/textile sectors.
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New Sony entity
for Bollywood business
Mumbai: Sony group companies, comprising
Sony Music, Sony Entertainment Television and Sony Pictures are planning to form a joint
venture to enter the Hindi film business. The scope of this company would be wide-ranging,
to include marketing and distribution of soundtrack including film music, production and
distribution of films. Even prior to the formation of such a company, the Sony entities
have begun to adopt an integrated approach to the Hindi film business, where if one
company pitches for distribution rights of a particular banner, the other company tries to
get the soundtrack rights, the idea being, to pitch together as one entity for all the
rights, TV, overseas rights, domestic theatrical distribution and music rights.
Hollywood majors like Warner Brothers,
Universal and 20th Century Fox too have tried to bring in a similar strategy in
the Indian film industry, but have not made much progress. The music arms of these
studios, however, are making better progress at Hindi film music, where Sony Music too is
muscling in. It has aces like the Aamir Khan starrer 'Lagaan' , Shah Rukh Khan starrer
'Asoka' and the Amitabh Bachchan-Hrithik Roshan starrer 'Kabhi Khushi, Kabhi Gam', up its
sleeve.
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Agrani
dispute brings 58 million dollar to Chandra
New Delhi: The London Court of
International Arbitration has ordered Hughes Space & Communication to make a 58
million dollar (about Rs 272 crores) compensation pay out to Subhash Chandra owned company
Afro-Asian Satellite Communications.
The order pertains to a dispute between
ASC and Hughes Space, a satellite manufacturing arm of Hughes Electronics Corporation over
the cancellation of a satellite project in the Rs 1,150 crore Agrani satellite project.
While Hughes pleaded absence of finance, ASC argued that the project was stopped because
of greater interest in the Asia-Pacific Mobile Telecommunications consortium of Singapore.
The London court found this reason plausible, while giving its verdict.
As the Agrani project is now being revived,
the compensation will come in handy. The promoters were committed to bring in Rs 460
crores against a loan component of Rs 690 crores. But for this windfall, they would have
had to divest their equity in Zee Telefilms and Essel Packaging, to bring in their share.
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Microsoft
to change licensing charges
Seattle: Microsoft is expected to bring in
licensing changes in its software sales, switching from one time payments to continued
subscriptions.
This approach is being adopted in order
to de-link its sales from the sales of personal computers, which has flagging in recent
times, and extract more revenue from existing users.
Although Microsoft has not confirmed it,
analysts say the corporation is doing away with 'perpetual use' clauses that allows
customers to use a version of the software for as long as he chooses. Under the new
licensing norms, customers will be required to make continuing subscriptions for using
software like Windows operating system and Office. Microsoft is said to have already
entered into such contracts with some of the larger enterprises in Europe.
The changes will not affect customers who
actively upgrade software, but will see a rise in costs for those who buy software and use
it for many years.
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A V
Birla group appoints Hay for HR direction
Mumbai: As part of its human resources
initiatives, the A V Birla group has appointed Hay Management Consultants, a US-based
management consultancy, to help the group analyse the relative worth of different
positions within the group.
Beginning with its carbon black and cement businesses, the Hay's group will work across
all the group's businesses to list the responsibilities associated with each position in
order to rationalise job designations. It has been felt that now designations are not
fully related to the responsibilities.
The mandate for Hay's is to complete the
task in 18 months across all companies, except Mangalore Refineries and Petroleum (a joint
venture with Hindustan Petroleum) and Birla Tata-AT&T joint venture for cellular
services.
The A V Birla group has earlier initiated
other HR initiatives, such as retirement at age 65, and preference for internal candidates
for posts.
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Cipla
to offer combination AIDS tablet
Mumbai: Cipla plans to add another
combination pill, into its kitty of low priced anti-AIDS drugs. The new pill will be a
combination of three AIDS drugs, stavudine, nevirapine and lamivudine, in one tablet,
which will bring the prices down further.
Cipla had earlier jolted the global drug
industry with an offer to supply the three AIDS drugs to the charity organisation,
Medecins Sans Frontieres for 350 dollars per patient per year, or under one dollar a day,
which is about 3 per cent of the price in the US. Now the new combination pill will be
offered to MSF and other bodies for free supply.
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Wockhardt,
Eisai join to launch nerve drug
Mumbai: In an exclusive alliance with
Japan based Eisai Company, pharma major Wockhardt will make and sell the nerve disorder
drug, 'methycobal', in India, under technical assistance from Eisai. The move is part of
Wockhardt's strategy to focus on new product introductions in diabetes and neurology.
Methycobal, which is one of the largest
of Eisai products, with worldwide sales of 400 million dollars in 25 countries, is said to
promote the regeneration of nerve cells and thereby the conduction of nerve impulses
through nerve cell bodies.
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Reliance
gets letter of intent for long-distance telephony
New Delhi: The stage is set for a Reliance
- Bharti battle on long distance telephony, with Reliance given the first letter of intent
in the country for long distance telephony, and Bharti due to shortly receive it.
The licence will be issued in 90 days,
subject to the company paying a one-time entry fee of Rs 100 crores and furnishing four
performance-related bank guarantees of Rs 100 crores each.
Although the applications had been filed in
February by Reliance, and March by Bharti, and the letters of intent were still in the
pipeline, both have embarked on extensive laying of optical fibre cables across the
country.
Voice services, which make up 90 per cent of
the Rs 12,600 crore domestic long distance market, are expected to grow at an annual rate
of 14 per cent over the next five years.
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Cemex
not in L&T cement race
Mumbai: Cemex is said to have pulled out of the race to
become a strategic partner in Larsen & Toubro’s cement division, clearing the
path for Lafarge and Holder Bank. A statement was made to this effect by the chairman of
Cemex who told shareholders that Cemex was not likely to make acquisitions in India or
Portugal this year after its recent buying into US cement concern Southdown.
L&T had initially offered a 26 per cent stake to the strategic partner which would
reach a level of equal shareholding with L&T in three years time, when the division is
demerged into a separate entity, Larsen & Toubro Cement Ltd (LTCL).
A decision on Lafarge and Holder Bank is expected soon, since due diligence is believed to
be over. Lafarge has a strong presence in eastern India, Holder Bank has a presence as a
strategic investor in Kalyanpur Cement.
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Dr
Reddy’s GDS terminated
Hyderabad: Dr. Reddy's Laboratories has
terminated its GDS facility, and the shares equivalent to each GDS can now be freely sold
without restriction.
The company's GDS. Listed on the
Luxembourg Stock Exchange which were subject to regulations under Securities Act are now
free of such restrictions. The shares under the GDS will now be deposited in Dr
Reddy’s American Depository Share (ADS) facility with Morgan Guaranty Trust Company
of New York as depository, unless the holders wish to hold their share directly.
Dr Reddy’s ADSs are listed on the New
York Stock Exchange and began trading on April 11, 2001.
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Mahindra's
Bijlee set for launch
Mumbai: Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd
(M&M) is all set to launch its electric three wheeler ‘Mahindra Bijlee’
within a month. Priced at around Rs 3.1 lakh, the company plans to sell 1500-2000 units
this year.
An improved version with better
aesthetics and performance, and a better range of about 100 km will be developed for the
export market, from the current range of 88 km.
A new company, Mahindra Eco Mobiles Ltd is to be floated for a separate dealership network
for these electric vehicles
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HDFC
exits Countrywide, to exit Maruti Countrywide
Mumbai: Housing Development and Finance
Corporation (HDFC) has exited Countrywide Consumer Finance Services Ltd (CCFSL) selling
off its 25 per cent stake to the majority partner GE Caps.
The shares were sold at par. Once the
deal is cleared by the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB), CCFSL will become a
wholly-owned subsidiary of GE Caps.
This is the first transaction where a foreign
multinational will have a 100 per cent NBFC arm in the country after the latest Union
Budget announced hiking the limit of foreign direct investment in the NBFC sector to 100
per cent from the earlier 75 per cent.
HDFC is also in the process of selling its
entire stake in another finance joint venture, Maruti Countrywide Auto Financial Services
which is a car financing outfit. Maruti Countrywide is a three-way venture where the
housing finance major and GE each hold 37 per cent stake while Maruti holds 26 per cent.
HDFC is understood to be in talks with GE as well as Maruti for selling the stake.
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Blow
Plast hives off furniture unit
Mumbai: Blow Plast, the Dilip Piramal
group flagship, has hived off its Rs 80 crore office furniture systems business into a
standalone wholly owned subsidiary called Blow Plast Ergonomics. This was done for Blow
Plast to stay more focussed in its luggage business.
The focus of Blow Plast Ergonomics will
be, apart from product sales, on value-added services such as designing, consultancy,
installation and product promotion.
Blow Plast Ergonomics will also now take care
of its own marketing as well as manufacturing processes.
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