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Infy net up 37 per cent, stock falls
Bangalore: Infosys Technologies despite raising the outlook for the full financial year has announced first quarter earnings that fell short of expectations.

Infosys reported a net profit of Rs532.07 crore (Rs513.48 crore last year same period) on revenues of Rs2,071.59 crore (Rs1987.82 crore) for the quarter ended June 30 - a growth of 37 per cent and 36.5 per cent respectively.

Sequentially, the growth in core net profit and revenues was put at
3.62 per cent and 4.24 per cent respectively.

Post the result the Infosys stock fell 4.12 per cent to close at Rs2,219.95 on the Bombay Stock Exchange on Tuesday.

For fiscal 2006, Infosys has set its income expectations between Rs8,947 crore and Rs9,051 crore - a growth of 25-26 per cent. The earnings per share before exceptional items is expected to be between Rs84.7 and Rs86 - a growth of 23-25 per cent.

For the September quarter, Infosys expects income between Rs2,202 crore and Rs2,215 crore, a year-on-year growth of 26 per cent. EPS for Q2 is expected to be between Rs19.80 and Rs20.30.
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MphasiS-BFL net profit down 4.5 per cent in Q1
Bangalore: MphasiS-BFL group has declared a 4.5 per cent fall in its consolidated net profit for the first quarter ended June 30,2005, to Rs33.7 crore against Rs35.3 crore a year ago.

However, the company's revenue rose to Rs219.7 crore against Rs175.8 crore indicating a year-on-year growth of 25 per cent. On a sequential basis though, consolidated revenue rose by 7.1 per cent while net profit was up 8.8 per cent to Rs33.7 crore (Rs 31 crore).

The company has attributed the fall in net profit to a fall in foreign
exchange income and other income.
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GM to launch 4 new models in India
Chennai: General Motors India (GMI) plans to introduce at least four new models in India in the next one-and-a-half years. This includes the widely expected mini-car.

The company is also keen to introduce the 'Hummer' and the 'Cadilac' range of cars over the next two or three years.

Now the company plans to focus on capacity expansion, and achieve a 10 per cent market share by 2010.

As for the capacity, the company has already increased it to 60,000 units per annum, from the earlier 40,000 units at Halol, Gujarat and is in the midst of increasing it further to 80,000 units.
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Aurobindo Pharma gets tentative US FDA approval for generic AIDS drug
Hyderabad: Aurobindo Pharma has been given a tentative approval for the abbreviated new drug application (ANDA) on lamivudine and zidovudine tablets, 150 mg/300 mg with combination.

According to a company press release this is another significant
achievement for the company in terms of formulation technology.

The drug is the first generic version of GlaxoSmithKline Plc's combination AIDS drug Combivir. The drugs, one of the largest sellers in the ARV (anti-retroviral) segment, are in the class of drugs called nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors, which help keep the AIDS virus from reproducing.

This fixed-dose combination anti-retroviral drug is intended for use
with other anti-retroviral agents for the treatment of HIV-1 infection, the release said.

The company said the US FDA approval would enable it to participate in President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief programme.
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Videocon appliances sales down: A C Nielsen
Mumbai: Sales of Videocon's colour televisions saw an 8.6 per cent drop in value terms in January-May this year, even though volumes grew by 6 per cent according to market research agency A C Nielsen.

Apart from this sales Videocon refrigerators declined 20.2 per cent in volume and 21 per cent in value.

In washing machines also, Videocon saw a sales decline of 3.4 per cent in volume and 3.7 in value.

According to the company the figures are not factual since the bulk of its sales comes from rural India and the AC Nielsen survey does not cover the region. The AC Nielsen survey covers the metros and other big cities only.
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Sami Labs plans IPO
Thiruvananthapuram: Sami Labs, based in Bangalore, is looking at coming out with an initial public offering (IPO) by the end of 2006.

The company is looking at making acquisitions in Europe and South America with an investment of Rs100 crore, and has commissioned Ernst and Young to identify possible targets for acquisition. The acquisitions will be funded through internal accruals.

Encouraged by its performance over the past year, the company is also in the process of expanding its manufacturing capacity. While two new plants in Karnataka will start production by the end of the year, another new plant near Hyderabad is scheduled to start operations by August, he said.
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BSNL to offer video conferencing services
New Delhi: State-owned Bharat Sanchar Nigam will start offering video conferencing services in a few weeks and is spending Rs6 to Rs7 crore for the project in the first phase.

The services would be rolled out in five big cities to start with and
later expanded to other cities.

Polycom, provider of solutions to enable video conferencing, is also talking with another state-owned telecom company for deployment of its technologies.
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GA European Investments buys stake in NDTV
New Delhi: Cyprus-based VC fund GA European Investments has acquired a 7.9 per cent stake in New Delhi Television (NDTV) Ltd for over Rs125 crore.

The company has informed the National Stock Exchange (NSE) that GA Europeon had purchased 48.36 lakh shares, representing a 7.9 per cent stake, from Shyam Cellular Infrastructure Project, an entity of the Shyam Telecom group.

This is the second sale by the entity. Last month, Shyam Basic
Infrastructure Project had picked up 45.43 lakh shares of NDTV,
representing a 7.47 per cent stake and on July 7, the entity sold 7
per cent of the stake in the open market.

There has been hectic activity on the NDTV over the past few weeks.

ICICI Equity Fund recently exited from the company by selling its
14.93 per cent stake in phases. The last sale of 6,077,528 shares,
representing a 10 per cent stake, took place on June 28.
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Arvind raises $37m via GDR issue
Ahmedabad: Arvind Mills has raised $37.19 million through the issue of 13.5 million global depositary receipts (GDR) constituting up to seven per cent of the expanded equity base of the company.

A further 50,000 GDRs have been allocated as a greenshoe option. Each GDR represents one underlying share and would be listed on the Luxembourg Stock Exchange, the company informed the Bombay Stock Exchange.

The GDR was priced at $2.75 (Rs120) per GDR against a closing price of Rs126.75 per share on the BSE, on July 11, 2005, it said.

A substantial amount of the funds is expected to be used to acquire
ICICI Venture's stake in Arvind Brands for Rs106 crore while the rest of the funds will be used to scale up shirting and denim capacities. The company would also invest in retail initiatives in branded apparels.

Arvind will focus on branded apparel retailing and plans to take its
brands to countries like Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, African and European countries apart from the US market.

The company had earlier decided to buy a 53.4 per cent equity holding of ICICI Venture Fund Management Ltd in Arvind Brands for Rs106 crore, while the company already holds 48.5 per cent of the company.

Through the acquisition of Arvind Brands, Arvind Mills plans to open an exclusive company owned retail outlets for the brands like New Port, Flying Machine, Ruf and Tuf amongst others. The company is also the Indian licensee for international brands like Arrow, Lee, Wrangler and Tommy Hilfiger directly and through its subsidiaries.
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IA marketshare dives
New Delhi: Domestic airline Indian Airlines market share has been eroded by almost 50 per cent due to stiff competition from low-cost carriers and other private airlines. The government in a presentation to a parliamentary consultative committee stated this.

Indian Airlines enjoyed a market share of 65.9 per cent about seven years ago — it slid to 38.2 per cent in 2004-05.

Its passenger-capacity share fell from 65.2 per cent in 1997-98 to
41.7 in 2004-05.

However the airline said that various cost-control measures had
resulted in savings of Rs 148 crore in the year 2004.
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