April-May passenger car sales up 10.8 per cent
New Delhi: Domestic sales of passenger cars rose 10.84 per cent in April-May to 181,144 units from 163,428 units in the same period a year ago according to the industry body Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers.

Sales of commercial vehicles — trucks and buses — stood at 64,116 units in April-May, up 3.61 per cent, from 61,881 units in the same period a year earlier.
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DLF to set up hotels in Kolkata
Kolkata: Just before launching its mega IPO real estate giant DLF has announced plans to open hotels in Kolkata with an investment of Rs3,000 crore.

The company has said it would develop a luxury hotel, a budget hotel and a service apartment in the Eastern city.

The budget hotel would have 320 rooms while the luxury one would have 250 rooms.

Both the hotels will be set up under the Hilton brand as DLF had last year entered into a joint venture with the US-based hospitality major Hilton to foray into hotel business.

The entire complex would be next to ITC Sonar Bangla and would be ready in the next three years and land is being obtained by the company.

DLF has received approval for setting up a textile SEZ in Dankuni and is diversifying into the areas of life insurance and wind energy.
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IBM develops technology to predict pandemics
Mumbai: IBM has announced it has developed an advanced software technology that can help predict the transmission of diseases across countries and around the globe to the open source community.

The tool will aid scientists and public health officials in understanding and planning more efficient responses to health crises, ultimately providing new tools for protecting population health.

The software, known as Spatio-Temporal Epidemiological Modeler (STEM), is now available for use through the Eclipse Open Healthcare Framework Project (OHF), hosted at the Eclipse Foundation, the non-profit foundation that guides the Eclipse open source community.

It is one of the key technologies being utilised in the Global Pandemic Initiative, a collaborative effort formed by IBM and over 20 major worldwide public health institutions to help prevent the spread of infectious diseases.
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Webel forms solar cell JV with European firm
Mumbai: Webel-Sl Energy Systems, which produces solar photovoltaic (PV) cells and modules in India, has formed a joint venture with a leading PV-cell manufacturing company in Europe to set up a production unit in West Bengal for solar cells and wafers.

Kolkata-based Webel started production about a decade ago by manufacturing 5-inch wafers with an installed capacity of 1 MW (megawatt) in technical collaboration with a European manufacturer. Now the company has 5 MW capacity and produces different types of PV cells and modules.

The MoU is based on the semi-conductor policy recently announced by the central government, according to which the parties intend to study and assess the feasibility of setting up a production unit of wafers and solar cells with an installed capacity of 100 MWp, that could be expanded up to 200 MWp.

Wafers are thin semiconducting materials on which microcircuits are built. The company did not disclose the name of the new joint venture partner and the investment going into the proposed project.
A year ago, Webel had divested 49 per cent stake in a Singapore-based joint venture company, Solar Energy Power for about Rs 2.16 crore.
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i-Flex ties up with US firm to offer secure solutions
Mumbai: i-Flex, which provides banking industry solutions plans to collaborate with US-based security solutions provider Bharosa to offer banking customers advanced security solutions for combating threats of consumer identity theft and Internet fraud.

The company said its collaboration with Bharosa would help it to add real-time fraud detection and multiple forms of authentication security to its Flexcube retail banking product. It will safeguard consumers' online identity and transactions against the latest forms of online threats, including phishing, spyware, and computer bots.

As part of its security strategy, i-flex would offer fraud detection and authentication capabilities from Bharosa to provide an enhanced security offering for its growing customer base as well as for customers of its outsourced offering through Financial Services Inc (FSI), it added.
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Daimler not to manufacture trucks in India
Mumbai: Refuting newspaper reports DaimlerChrysler said it has no plans for the company to begin manufacture trucks in India. The company said it would begin assembling trucks in the country in early 2008.

According to recent reports in the Mint news paper DaimlerChrysler, which imports Actros trucks, would begin assembling models from imported kits next year. The news report quoted people familiar with the plans.

The company said, "We import Actros trucks and nothing has been decided on manufacturing them in India."
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Radio Mirchi, Radio Mantra tie up for ad sales
Mumbai: Entertainment Network (India) Ltd (ENIL) has signed up with Dainik Jagran-promoted Shri Puran Multimedia Ltd (SPML) to provide sales and support across eight cities. ENIL, which owns and operates Radio Mirchi, will exclusively assist SPML to secure national advertisers for its radio stations, at a mutually agreed rate.

The agreement excludes local ad sales for Radio Mantra which will be handled independently by SPML.

The deal will allow ENIL to expand in the north while SPML will be able to go national and tap national advertisers at higher rates. ENIL will sell Radio Mantra's air time across its stations in Agra, Varanasi, Bareily, Jalandhar, Gorakhpur, Ranchi, Karnal and Hissar, through its own sales team.
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