HFCL, Kerry Packer e-com venture over
Mumbai--Kerry Packer and Himachal Futuristic Communications Ltd (HFCL) have cancelled their agreement for their e-commerce joint venture, Exel Netcommerce.
While HFCL had a majority stake of 51 per cent in the company, Packer had 31 per cent stake. The remaining equity was to be split between a strategic investor, with 10 per cent, and the staff. However, with the crumbling global software market, the joint venture failed to rope in a strategic investor.

The group now feels that e-commerce ventures have lost confidence of investors across the globe.

Exel Netcommerce was to cater an entire gamut of e-commerce services including business-to-business services, Internet security, net verification, etc.

In December 2000, the board of HFCL had approved an equity capital of Rs 100 crore in Exel Netcommerce.
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Royal Enfield restructures
Bangalore--Royal Enfield Motors, part of Eicher Ltd, makers of Bullet motorcycles, is restructuring operations as part of a turnaround strategy.

The division of Eicher Ltd has also decided to launch new variants every six months and invest around Rs 40 crore over the next two years, chief executive of Royal Enfield Motors, Siddhartha Lal, said.

The restructuring exercise is being carried out in two parts. The first part consists of rationalisation of manufacturing process to reduce variable costs. It also carried out reduction in employee cost.

A sizeable cut in executive manpower was also initiated and the workmen were offered VRS. The non-permanent manpower was also reduced.

The second part consists of weeding out underperforming dealers who will be replaced with new ones. There are around 227 exclusive dealers for Royal Enfield bikes and more will be added soon.

Siddhartha Lal said the production of motorcycles will be increased to 2,600 per month from 2,000.

Royal Enfield plans to increase the total number of units to around 26,000 from 22,000 units that were sold during 2000-01. In 1999-2000, around 25,000 units were sold.
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Samsung plans to take products beyond metros
Bangalore-Samsung is now reaching out to consumers beyond the metros. The company has launched a major marketing initiative to strengthen its brand equity and awareness in mini metros and smaller towns, where the company is seeking to increase its penetration this year. Samsung also plans to increase its total dealer strength to around 5,000 this year from 3,700 at present.

In order to increase awareness of the brand Samsung is carrying out Samsung Dream Home roadshows in 12 cities this year. In the first half of this year, Samsung carried out Samsung V live shows in places like Ahmedabad , Chandigarh, Hyderabad, Cochin among other centres. Along with these events, the first roadshow was organised in Mangalore and then in Trivandrum and Hubli.

Now the company will hold the event in nine more cities, including Mysore, Madurai and Trichi. The roadshow will showcase Samsung's latest high tech digital products like plasma television, high definition colour television, DVD players, 'Sync Master' series of colour monitors with TFT LCD display and DynaFlat technology, WAP-enabled mobile phones and Samsung's lightweight mobile phone with built in MP3 player.
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EID Parry to consolidate core businesses
Chennai-- Parry (India), part of the Murugappa Group, is seeking to consolidate its position in core businesses like sugar, fertilisers and ceramics. The group intends to prune interest and operational cost before looking at further acquisitions.

In sugar the group has four factories and a combined crushing capacity of 14,000 tonnes a day. It is one of the largest players in the industry. In fertiliser, along with associate company, Coromandel Fertiliser, it is close to the number one position. In ceramics, Parryware holds the number one and two positions.

Last year, borrowing as well as the interest cost had increased mainly due to higher sugar stock and merger of Pettavatittalai Sugars and Johnson Pedder. It is looking at various options to reduce interest cost.

This year, it had budgeted a capital expenditure of only Rs 20 crore with a focus on reducing manufacturing cost. A Vellayan, vice-chairman of the company said, the company wants to bring down debt:equity ration to 1: 0.8 from the current 1:1.
For this, it is looking at selling some non-performing assets and issuing preference shares.
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TCS chief advocates niche software development
Chennai--Indian Information technology companies should develop software products in niche areas where they have domain expertise like software engineering tools, FC Kohli, chairman of Tata Consultancy Services said.

Stressing the need for increased domestic computerisation, Kohli said there was a huge need for extensive computerisation, adding that domestic IT companies could generate business opportunity by realising this demand.

He said that in future, the domestic demand for software would exceed exports. At present, exports contribute around three-fourth of the $8.7 billion total IT business generated from India.

He said that his company had initiated a project in Coimbatore by installing servers and other IT infrastructure to connect and provide connectivity and accessibility between 10,000 and 15,000 small and medium units.
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GM India plans Corsa sports variant for Rs 7 lakh
Bangalore-General Motors, the worlds biggest car company, is introducing a sporty variant of its popular mid-size car Corsa here with some catchy features.

Sources said GM is pricing the limited edition Opel Corsa Sport at about Rs 40,000 more than its Corsa 1.4 GLS version. The Corsa Sport with a 1.4 litre petrol engine will cost just over Rs 7 lakh on road in Bangalore.

The new variant will be available in three colours, vermello beta red, passion yellow and black. While the first two colours are available in the station wagon variant of the Corsa called Opel Swing, the black shade is only sported by Corsa Royale, the hi-end 1.6 litre special edition.

Additional features in the Corsa Sport include rear spoiler, mag-alloy wheels with chromium finish, power side-mirrors, and glitzy side stickers.

Corsa is already available in five variants, namely the 1.4 GLS, 1.6 GSI, 1.6 Royale, 1.4 Swing and 1.6 Swing, and are powering the GM sales -about 60 per cent share - in India.

GM, with its three product base, has recorded over six per cent growth in sales during the April-August period compared to the corresponding months last year. During these five months, it has sold about 3,366 cars up from 3,165 cars last year.

The sales in the month of August compared to July this year and last fiscal have shown a whopping jump. In July this year, GM sold 650 cars and in August it did 950 cars. Last year, the numbers were 620 and 1,020 respectively.

Incidentally, GM recorded a consolidated sale of 8,254 vehicles for the fiscal 2000-2001, including 2,936 Astras and 5,318 Corsas, up by 170 per cent over the figure of 3,052 recorded during the previous fiscal. This year, GM is targeting sales of 10,500 units.
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BPL forms alliance with Toshiba for flat picture tubes
Bangalore-BPL has entered into a strategic alliance with Toshiba Corporation of Japan to manufacture pure flat picture tubes at its manufacturing unit in Sahibabad in Uttar Pradesh.

This will be the first time pure flat tubes will be manufactured in India.
BPL Display Devices Ltd (BDDL), the 80 per cent subsidiary of BPL, will execute this project. Toshibas relationship with BDDL began in 1986 as a technical collaboration for the manufacture of 20 inch colour picture tubes.

BPL will start the production of pure flat picture tubes in early 2002 and the production volume targeted in the first year is 50,000 units per month.

The manufacture of pure flat picture tubes will provide BPL with greater speed and flexibility, as well as aggressive pricing to accelerate its growth and market position in the fast growing flat screen television segment, said Ajit Nambiar, BPL chairman and managing director.
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