Emerson to acquire Tata stake in Tata Liebert
Mumbai--The US-based, $16-billion Emerson Electric is acquiring the Tata Group's stake in joint venture company Tata Liebert. At present Emerson holds a 50 per cent stake in the company through its wholly owned subsidiary Liebert.

Emerson has submitted a proposal for raising its stake in the Indian joint venture to the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB). The proposal is expected to come up for approval this week. FIPB has not met for the past couple of weeks. Tata Liebert is a market-leader in uninterrupted power supply systems and precision air conditioning systems.

The company has a manufacturing unit in Thane near Mumbai and has been recording steady growth for the last few years.

It recorded a sales turnover of Rs 175 crore for the financial year ended March 31, 2001.

Tata Liebert is the only manufacturer of precision air conditioning equipment in India and has more than a 33 per cent market share in this segment of the market.

Emerson specialises in design, manufacture and sale of a broad range of electrical, electromechanical and electronic products and systems.

Emerson's business segments are organised into divisions based on the nature of the products and services provided. They are process control, industrial automation, electronics and telecommunications, heating, ventilating and airconditioning and appliance and tools.

Emerson has a presence in more than 150 countries with manufacturing presence in several countries. With headquarters in St. Louis, Emerson employs 123,000 people worldwide.
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Otis Mauritius picks up more stake in Indian arm
Mumbai--Otis Mauritius has picked up another 10 per cent equity stake in Otis Elevator (India) through an open offer, raising the parent's stake in Otis Elevator (India) to 79.69 per cent. The open closed on Tuesday.

Otis Mauritius had made an open offer to acquire 31.1 per cent stake in Otis Elevator at Rs 280 per share to raise its stake to 100 per cent. Prior to the offer the parent held 68.9 per cent shares in the Indian company.

Since the company was not successful in hiking its stake to 90 per cent, it will not be able to delist the scrip from the local stock exchanges. Under the circumstances, Otis may have to wait for the right opportunity to come out with a fresh open offer.

Sources also said, the institutions were divided on the matter of tendering their equity under the offer while merchant bankers said that some institutions had offered their shares.

Institutions like HDFC, LIC, UTI and GIC subsidiaries hold 7 per cent stake in the company and a substantial stake is held by the employees of Otis.

Some institutional and employee shareholders did not offer their shares because they felt that the price offered to them was much lower then that paid to the Mahindras to acquire their stake.

Otis Elevator of USA had paid Rs 375 a share to acquire 23.8 per cent stake of its Indian partner Mahindras in 1999.

The second offer will remain open for six months.
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Intel Capital goes on investing spree in India
Mumbai--Intel's investment arm -- Intel Capital -- said it planned to make up to 20 investments in Indian technology start-ups this year. Intel Capital has already made seven investments during the first six months of 2001 and its investments in India total $100 million till date.

Intel Capital started investing in Indian technology start-ups as early as 1998 and has also exited from two companies till date -- Rediff and Bharti. The company maintains an upper limit of 20 per cent stake in each investment .

Intel's financial year ends in December. Intel Capital's investment plans for India this year were emphasised last week by its president and CEO Craig Barret on a visit to the company's development facilities in Bangalore.

Barret said Intel Capital would not only continue to make investments in India, regardless of the meltdown in the technology sector, but would also be actively looking for acquisitions, particularly in the network and communications space. Investments made by the company during the first half of the current fiscal include R Systems, Evector, Indra Networks and Pramati Technologies. Investments made during year 2000 include Consign Technology, a specialist application service provider of on-line content solutions for the financial services sector, Pune-based Persistent Systems, which is setting up the Konark Porting and Competency centre for Intel's Itanium processor family, and financial services portal Indiainfoline.
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Enron offers Dabhol stake at cost
New Delhi--Enron has offered to sell to the government the foreign equity stake in the Dabhol power project at cost, without any profit or return.

In addition, it is willing to accept part-payment in cash, and the rest in staggered instalments over a period.

However, this offer falls short of what the government seeks from Enron.

Enron Indias managing director K Wade Cline said Enron had made the offer the chairman of Enron said that the company wanted to pull out of the Indian project. Enron owns 65 per cent of the Dabhol Power Companys equity investment of about $1 billion (Rs 4,700 crore), while General Electric and Bechtel hold another 10 per cent each. The Maharashtra State Electricity Board, which is contracted to buy Dabhol power, owns the remaining 15 per cent. Cline said as an alternative to selling out to the government or its nominee, Dabhol was ready to drop the tariff on the power sold by Dabhol to Rs 3.50 per unit which was about 10 per cent below what the cost would be if the second phase of the project is completed and the power utility switches to gas as fuel.

He added that Rs 3.50 per unit was lower than any other new generating plant in the country, and said that the power cost could drop further, to the region of Rs 3.15, if oil prices fall to around $21 per barrel.
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Though HCL Tech income doubles, gloomy forecast prevail
New Delhi--Despite a doubling of its net income for the fiscal year ending June 2001, HCL Technologies has disappointed the markets with a gloomy forecast (growth ahead of 25 per cent in net profit and revenue) for this fiscal year.
HCL's net income soared 106 per cent to Rs 488.2 crore in 2000-01 from Rs 243.3 crore last year while gross revenue jumped 51.7 per cent to Rs 1405.1 crore this year from Rs 925.6 crore last year.

Net income in the April-June fourth quarter (Q4) rose 43 per cent to Rs 132 crore. Shiv Nadar chairman, HCL Technologies, while replying to queries as to why revenues were flat on a sequential-quarter basis, said,

"Our strategy is not based on sequential quarter growth. If you plot our profits for the past 12 quarters you will see many such blips."

Fourth quarter net income rose three per cent and gross revenues rose two per cent over last quarter.

HCL plans to focus on high up-front investments in building a strong marketing network while laying emphasis on offshore centric revenues and focus on annuity contracts for long term visibility.

The emphasis would also be on moving up the value chain and forging strategic alliances, including joint ventures to add new customers and technology competence.
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Grasim cuts staff, trims wage bill by Rs 45cr
Mumbai--Grasim Industries, the Aditya Vikram Birla group flagship, is set to prune its wage bill by around Rs 45 crore in the current financial year.

Having already reduced its workforce strength by around 2,300 after the closure of its pulp and fibre unit at Mavoor in Kerala, Grasim Industries is again targeting a total manpower reduction of almost to 3,500 employees by the third quarter of fiscal 2001-02. Besides the fibre unit, the company is rationalising staff in its cement, chemicals and viscose staple fibre businesses. During 2000-2001, Grasims payments on salaries and bonus aggregated to Rs 246.6 crore, while contributions to provident fund and other welfare expenses added up to another Rs 66.7 crore. The total wage bill during the year stood at Rs 313.3 crore, as against Rs 298.9 crore a year ago.

"Manpower restructuring has been an ongoing affair at Grasim Industries with sizeable reductions at the textiles and fibre divisions last year. The focus this year would be the cement division which would see a reduction of over 1,000 employees by the third quarter," the company official said.
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Microsoft says Supreme Court should takeover antitrust case
Washington--Microsoft Corp has asked the Supreme Court to overturn rulings that it violated antitrust laws. It said that the trial judge should have been thrown off the case because of his derogatory comments about the company.
Microsoft petitioned the United States' highest court two days before an appeals court was due to send the case to a new judge to decide what penalty the Redmond, Washington, company should face.
The company is set to release the newest version of its Windows operating system this fall - a product that several state attorneys general and other critics fear will extend Microsoft's monopoly in the software market.
The Justice Department and the states that brought the original antitrust charges against Microsoft must decide whether to attempt to block the release of Windows XP even as the two sides explore possible settlements in the current case.
However the Justice Department said the issues raised by Microsoft's latest appeal were old.
Some legal experts questioned whether Microsoft's petition to the high court was designed to buy the company time until its new operating system gets to the market. Windows XP is scheduled to be delivered to computer manufacturers at the end of this month and to be on store shelves in October.
Congress and several state attorneys general have asked Microsoft to change Windows XP, saying that it would repeat many of the same business practices already found to be illegal and would force consumers to use more Microsoft products.
The federal appeals court earlier this summer threw out Jackson's ruling breaking Microsoft into two companies, removed the judge from the case and harshly criticised his comments to news media in which he compared Gates to Napoleon and the company to a drug-dealing street gang. Through a spokeswoman, Jackson declined comment on Tuesday.
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Illinois Tool to make open offer for ITW Signode
HyderabadUS-based Illinois Tool Works Inc is coming out with an open offer to acquire the entire 49 per cent public shareholding of ITW Signode India Ltd at Rs 80 per share.

The offer price is 61 per cent higher than yesterdays closing price of Rs 49.70 and also commands 41.59 per cent premium at todays closing price of ITW Signodes stock on the National Stock Exchange.

The offer is subject to a minimum level of acceptance of 66.34 lakh equity shares of ITW Signode, representing 29 per cent share capital of the Indian subsidiary. The 49 per cent public shareholding of ITW Signode translates into 1.12 crore equity shares.

Illinois Tool Works currently holds 51 per cent stake in the Rs 22.88 crore paid-up capital of the ITW Signode.

ICICI Securities is acting as the manager to the offer. As per the tentative schedule, the offer is slated to open on October 30 and closes on November 29.

Illinois Tool Works is a manufacturer of engineered and specialty products with operations in 43 countries. It had a net profit of $958 million on a turnover of $9.984 billion for the year-ended December 31, 2000.
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Tatas not to use all LoIs for basic services
Mumbai--The Tatas do not plan to use all the 15 letters of intent (LoIs) for basic telephony operations that the group has received from the government.

This means that Tata Teleservicesthe company spearheading the groups foray into basic telephony (though it currently operates only in Andhra Pradesh)will utilise seven or eight LoIs.

However, there will be no major changes in its earlier announced investment plan of Rs 8,000 crore for the groups telecom business.

The Tatas have received LoIs for Haryana, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Delhi and Punjab.

The company will not launch services in West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh (East), Uttar Pradesh (West), Kerala, Rajasthan and Bihar though it has received LoIs for these circles as well.

The groups main objective is to start basic services in circles where no telecom firms are present.

Tata Teleservices has also initiated talks with domestic FIs and Tata group firms to part-fund its Rs 8,000-crore basic telephony project. The project will have a debt-equity ratio of 1:1.

Tata Teleservices, which became the first telecom operator in India to offer limited mobility services, currently operates in Hyderabad, Visakhapatnam, Guntur and Vijayawada and commands a subscriber-base of more than 70,000 in the state.
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McKinsey to recast SBI again after 5 years
Mumbai-- McKinsey & Co, the global consultancy firm, after a gap of five years has again been hired by the State Bank of India (SBI), the country's largest commercial bank.

SBI sources say that the agency would help reposition the bank at a crucial juncture when the interest spread has become wafer-thin and competition is hot.

Earlier in 1995-96, McKinsey drafted the restructuring of SBI at the instance of the then chairman, Dipankar Basu. The consultancy firm focussed on faster decision-making by delayering the process and created new business units.

The situation is different now and SBI is losing market share every year with increasing competition. There have been changes in the product lines of the financial intermediaries also. The bank needs another restructuring," said an inside source.
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HM to export Lancer with Mitsubishi's approval
BangaloreMitsubishi has given Hindustan Motors the go-ahead to export Lancer, earlier ranked as the `best premium midsize car on Indian roads by JD Power Asia Pacific 2000, from its Chennai plant to Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bangladesh.

This paves the way for Indian-made Lancers to hit international roads for the first time since the two carmakers entered into collaboration five years ago. Till now Japan was supplying the cars to the international markets and the Lancer units in Japan, Taiwan, Thailand and Philippines handled Asia as a whole.

HM-Mitsubishi Motors general manager for sales and service S Vasudevan said HM had sold about 3900 Lancers between January and July this year, just over the half way mark over last years sale of 7,635 cars.

During the current calendar year, the company is planning to sell about 8200 cars or marginally less because of the slowdown. The company also expects to retain its marketshare of 42 per cent in the mid-premium segment of cars where it has competition from Honda City 1.5, Opel Astra and Maruti Baleno.
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Tata Engg arms also in trouble
Mumbai--Tata Engineering's dismal performance in 2000-01 appears to have rubbed off on its various subsidiaries as well.

Two of its three sub-assemblies, last year spun off into separate subsidiaries, posted combined losses of over Rs 36 crore, while its construction equipment arm Telcon registered a 13 per cent decline in profit for the year ended March 31, 2001.

Even its wholly owned IT services arm, Tata Technologies, recorded a 12 per cent drop in revenues in the last fiscal, though bottomline improved to Rs 4.5 crore during the period.

Of the two sub-assemblies, while HV Axles posted losses of Rs 14.14 crore on a turnover of Rs 267.86 crore, HV Transmissions' losses amounted to Rs 22.03 crore on sales of Rs 139.24 crore.

Tata Engineering has been on the lookout for global strategic partners for offloading stakes in these three subsidiaries, but has yet to identify any partner yet.
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Nabard to enter retail banking
Mumbai-- The apex bank for agriculture sector refinance, the National Bank of Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard), plans to enter into retail banking following the entry of corporates such as Tatas and Hindustan Lever into contract farming, which has opened up new vistas for rural credit financing.

Retail banking is an area from which we cannot keep away for long said Yogesh C Nanda, chairman of Nabard.

Nabard has yet to identify the means of venturing into retail banking, though and according to Nanda has three options.

These include picking up a stake in existing banks, setting up new infrastructure altogether or establish a strong relationship through MoUs with banks in rural areas.

Ever since the Nabard Act, 1981, was amended in February this year, it has been formulating plans to move away from solely refinancing the rural activities of regional rural banks, cooperative banks and commercial banks.

Nabard has already made known its plans to foray into the life insurance sector but has not yet received approval of the board and the Central government.

Here too, Nabard is looking at establishing agency tie-ups with select cooperative, regional rural and commercial banks.

In the beginning of the year, Nabard started refinancing rural housing and Nanda said the organisation is also looking at entering into housing finance.

The bank's plans to foray into insurance and banking are yet to receive approval of the board and the Central government.
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Motorola takes BPL Cellular to court
New DelhiMotorola has approached Chennai High Court for recovering $23-million dues from BPL Cellular, which had bought infrastructure equipment from Motorola for its network in Maharashtra and Kerala.

Pramod Saxena country head of Motorola said Motorola had filed a petition to find a solution to this problem.

However, BPL claims that the amount in question is under dispute as there was a deal on the part of Motorola in shipping the equipment. He declined to comment further as the matter was under dispute.

Motorola supplied equipment for the network and backbone to BPL for setting up infrastructure in Maharashtra and Kerala and BPL bought equipment on supplier's credit.

Sources said BPL informed Motorola that it would pay the dues once the financial closure is achieved. However, the company is nowhere near financial closure.

Ever since BPL announced its intention to merge with Batata, Motorola is worried about the recovery of its dues.

Last month, Motorola started the process of collection of its dues from BPL. It sent a winding up notice on BPL Cellular. However, BPL did not pay the dues. Now, BPL is disputing the whole amount.
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