Enron gets Rs 412 crore penalty notice from Maharashtra
New Delhi: The ongoing tussle between the energy giant, Enron, and the Maharashtra government is all set to get murkier. The government has slapped a Rs. 412 crore penalty claim on Enron.

The penalty notice has been sent in according to one of the clauses on availability, under which the power company would have to make itself available to its full capacity, i.e. 90 per cent within three hours after they are directed to be available. Such an act is not possible technically for a plant of this nature.

The government has noticed that in the last quarter of calendar year 2000, Enron failed in its availability commitments leading as a result of which the penalty has been raised.

According to sources in the review committee, technically the state government’s claims are justified and Enron may have to be prepared to fork out the penalty.
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Sony may join VSNL's DTH platform
Mumbai: In a recent announcement made by Mr Kunal Dasgupta, chief executive of Sony Television, the company is said to be planning to join the VSNL-promoted DTH platform.

The company will use the VSNL platform to offer a bouquet of around 20 specialised channels, including interactive gaming, music, home shopping, video-on-demand, pay-per-view and internet.

Mr. Dasgupta said Sony was expected to invest up to Rs 150 crore in devising programmes and channels specific to the DTH platform. He expected a subscriber base of around 3 million subscribers for DTH services.

The channel plans to digitalise its content and make it available across every platform – DTH, broadband, internet and television. The company would be investing around Rs 70 crore to digitalise its content.

VSNL had earlier announced the launch of its DTH service platform by October this year. To start with, the platform will offering over 70 channels, including two internet channels.
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Siemens subsidiary enters training business
Mumbai: Siemens Information Systems, the subsidiary of engineering giant, Siemens India, is all set to enter the IT training business with a targeted revenue of Rs. 10 crore in the first year.

Targeted primarily at professionals seeking to enhance their knowledge base and keep abreast with the developments in the industry, the company hopes to enrol at least 5,000 students in the first year.

The company plans to impart this education through a network of 30 centres by the end of year one, most of which will be franchisee driven.

Apart from basic training for professionals in courses that will be three-weeks long, the company will also offer classroom training at these 30 centres. As a differentiating factor from other training companies, it will offer IT project management courses to companies and individual professionals.

Participants in these courses will get certificates from the company through its tie-up with Wave Technologies, UK, which is the world's largest organization for administering vendor certification examinations in the area of IT learning.

The training division is also working with Wave on offering training in vernacular languages like Tamil, Bengali, Hindi and Marathi. It also plans to do foreign languages like Russian, Chinese and Japanese.
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Lupin finally exits Ceph International
Mumbai: In what is likely to be a setback to the company’s plan to enter the US off-patent market, Lupin Laboratories has finally exited from its 50:50 joint venture Ceph International. The joint venture was with Puerto-Rican drug firm Mova Pharmaceuticals Corporation.

The company is also facing some delay in exporting the anti-infective bulk drug cefotaxime to its US ally American Pharmaceutical Partners and will now do so in April instead of March this year.

The company has recovered the entire $5 million invested in the overseas company that was set up to tap the US off-patent drugs market.

Ceph was to import bulk drugs from Lupin’s unit in India, make finished dosage forms locally, and sell it in the US market. Instead, Lupin will now manufacture finished dosage forms in a local facility that is coming up at Mandideep, at an investment of Rs 12 crore.

The break-up had occurred because of differences over the core businesses of each company. Mova, a contract manufacturer, was in favour of basing Ceph’s business model on contract manufacturing.

Lupin’s intention, while forging the venture, was to use it as a vehicle to become a major player in its own right by cornering a portion of the generics market through a combination of research and marketing. The two objectives didn’t quite mesh.
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Maruti to launch 7-seater Vitara
New Delhi: Maruti Udyog is said to be contemplating the import in fully-built form of the Suzuki Vitara. According to Mr. Jagdish Khattar, managing director of the company, they were evaluating the proposal and a final decision to this effect was likely to be taken in a few weeks.

Although the pricing of the model has not been decided yet, it will be in the fast-emerging Rs 13-15 lakh ‘D’ segment.

Cumulative sales of the Alto, WagonR and the Zen models rose from 74,758 last year to 91,393 units this year. However Zen volumes fell from 70,829 last year (minus Zen diesel) to 52,402 this year.
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Indian Rayon may license brands to global firms
Mumbai: In a bid to effectively build its brands in overseas countries, the AV Birla Group company Indian Rayon is said to be weighing the option of licensing its major brands -- Louis Philippe, Allen Solly, Peter England and San Frisco -- in certain overseas markets.

The company is said to be looking at countries like Australia, Philippines and Malaysia where it does not have any presence and is understood to have commenced feasibility studies for the brand-building strategy.

Indian Rayon’s overseas subsidiary Aditya Vikram Global Trading House had acquired the global rights for Louis Philippe, Allen Solly and Peter England from the UK-based Coats Viyella for Rs 9.4 crore early this year.

The company holds the rights for the above brands in almost all parts of the world. Though licensing of brands is common globally, Indian Rayon will be the first Indian company to take this route.
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German Remedies sell off date extended
Mumbai: German chemicals major, Degussa-Huls, which is selling its holding in Indian pharmaceutical company, German Remedies, has extended the deadline for submission of final bids. The shortlisted firms, which were initially asked to make their bids this week, have been given till the end of next week to do so.

A clutch of bidders have been shortlisted including American drug majors Pharmacia & Upjohn and BristolMyers Squibb and local firm Nicholas Piramal India.

The extension of time has been given on the grounds that certain logistical issues involved in coordinating with companies that are spread across different parts of the world have resulted in delays.

The cut-off date has been pushed back to finalise details on product licensing conditions from the German partners which is crucial to the bidding process, sources said.
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Pillsbury increases stake in joint venture
New Delhi: The US-based food company, NY Pillsbury, has decided to hike its stake in Godrej Pillsbury, its joint venture with the Godrej Group, to 56.50 per cent from its existing level of 51 per cent.

This increase is being brought about through a preferential issue. Under the agreement between the two partners, Selvic Netherlands, an associate company of Pillsbury, will be issued 56,10,000 shares with Rs 10 face value through a preferential issue which will result in the US major’s stake going up by 5.5 per cent.

Apart from the Pillsbury atta, Godrej Pillsbury used to distribute the Godrej Food brands like Cooklite sunflower oil and Jumpin brand of fruit juices.
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Sun Pharma board approves merger with research arm
Mumbai: The Sun Pharma Advanced Research Centre will finally be merged with its parent, Sun Pharmaceutical Industries. This merger was cleared by the latter’s board of directors recently. The decision is subject to the approval of shareholders and the Gujarat High Court.

SPARC, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sun Pharmaceuticals, had an income of Rs 2.28 crore with a net profit of Rs 97 lakh in 1999-00. The move to merge SPARCL is in line with the company's decision to consolidate its various activities into itself, the company said.
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Shaw Wallace begins McKinsey recommended restructuring
New Delhi: Liquor major, Shaw Wallace, has begun its ambitious restructuring exercise based on the recommendations made by consulting major, McKinsey & Company. Accordingly an internal task force comprising of a cross-functional team of senior managers has been set up. This task force will identify areas which can help improve the profitability and productivity of the company.

McKinsey & Company is expected to provide its expertise as an outside agency to the task force, which would work towards bringing in a complete mind-set change within the company for adopting global practices.

The task force will work in three phases: Identify areas where cost reduction can be effected; taking into account the relevant data and analyse the same; and, implement the results and suggestions down the line with the help of the divisional heads.
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Ciba sells polymer unit for Rs 40 crore
Mumbai: Ciba Specialty Chemicals, in keeping with Swiss parent’s decision to exit from the polymer business worldwide and shift focus to the specialty business, has sold its performance polymer business to Vantico Performance Polymers for a consideration of Rs 40 crore.

The company has also sold its 76 per cent stake in its basic liquid resins joint venture company Petro Araldite Pvt Ltd (PAPL) to Vantico International SA of Switzerland.

PAPL was a 76:24 joint venture between Ciba India, the wholly owned subsidiary of CSCIL and Tamilnadu Petro Products, for the manufacture of basic liquid resins.

Vantico is one of the leading companies in the field of innovative thermosetting polymers and has a presence in more than 30 countries. The electronic polymer division of Vantico represents 23 per cent of its sales. It supplies ready-to-sue polymer insulating systems which are used in the electrical and electronics industries.
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M&M agrees to wage hike at Nashik plant
Mumbai: Automobile and tractor major, Mahindra & Mahindra, has settled the strike at its Nashik plant after agreeing to a 20 per cent wage hike for the employees there.

Workers at the company's Nashik plant, which is also the company's largest automotive plant, had gone on a strike earlier this month, demanding a wage hike of around 30 per cent.

The automotive manufacturing plant at Nashik, which manufactures the M&M. Mahindra Bolero, the company's latest offering in the utility vehicle segment, in addition to the Armada Grand, Marshal and some other vehicles meant for military purposes, is strategically very important.

The Maharashtra labour ministry had also intervened and had initiated tripartite talks, bringing the management and the unions to the negotiation table and resuming production at the plant.

The other reason why the management is happy with the settlement is that fact that the highly-secretive project Scorpio, on which on which it has so far spent over Rs 650 crore and two years of R&D work, is also being worked on at the Nashik plant.
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Eicher Motors will manufacture 16-tonne HCV locally
Kolkata: Moving away from its past, Eicher Motors has decided to go it alone to produce a 16-tonne heavy commercial vehicle (HCV), with a 6.5-litre engine. Code named 20.16, the HCV will undergo field trials in April this year.

The company had, in the past, a technical collaboration with Mitsubishi Motors and used the Japanese manufacturer's technology to produce its four, six and seven tonne medium commercial vehicles (MCV) under the Canter brand name.

The new vehicle is set to be launched in September this year after much study in the marketplace. The new vehicle will have 95 per cent indigenous components. Vital gear components and a few engine parts will come from the overseas market.

Eicher does not see Volvo as a threat to its HCV because it is yet to cater to the segment that demands a twin axle, power-steered model. It recently launched its school bus in the city, which has been manufactured keeping in mind the Supreme Court directive on safety regulations to be followed for school buses.
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VDO launches speed limiter
New Delhi: The Indian subsidiary of Mannesmann, VDO India, today launched its 'road speed limiter', a product which has been made mandatory for all CNG buses plying on Delhi roads from April 1, 2001 and does not allow the bus driver to cross the speed of 40 km per hour. VDO India is currently importing the speed limiter from Germany.

The decision to install delimiters in the buses follows directive from the Delhi High Court, which has directed the State Transport Authority and the Delhi government on February 22 to equip all CNG buses plying on Delhi roads from April 1 with an electronic speed governor.

Currently costing Rs. 20,000, the company feels that if the government withdraws the customs duty, the price of this equipment will get reduced by around Rs 5,000-6,000.
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BSES directed to pay Tata Power
Mumbai: The two warring parties over the payment of standby charges, BSES and Tata Power Company, have agreed to refer the matter of their dispute, currently before the high court, back to the Maharashtra Electricity Regulatory Commission (MERC). The row centres around a payment of Rs. 363 crore as standby charges by BSES to Tata Power.

While referring the matter back to the MERC, the Bombay High Court has asked BSES to deposit Rs 52 crore with TPC. The court on March 20 referred the case to MERC with May 15 as deadline and in an interim arrangement also asked BSES to deposit 50 per cent of the aforesaid amount (Rs 26 crore) before March 28 in a special account with the State Bank of India.
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