Oracle first quarter earnings higher than estimated
Palo Alto-Oracle, the software giant, posted first-quarter earnings above last year's results, and were higher than previous estimates.

Oracle said it earned $510.65 million or 9 cents per share for the quarter ended August 31, against $500.68 million, or 8 cents, in the year-earlier period. Earlier Oracle had forecast that per-share earnings would be flat.

Total revenue slipped to $2.24 billion from $2.26 billion a year earlier. Software license revenues fell to $731.43 million from $807.24 million, down 9 per cent, a bit better than the company's August warning that those sales could be as much as 10 per cent lower.
Back to News Review index page  

Hughes Software modifies financial forecast
New Delhi--Hughes Software Systems (HSS), the Indian software subsidiary of the General Motors-owned Hughes Electronic Corp, has issued a profit warning and says it has modified its financial forecast for the year ending March 2002 downwards to 25 to 35 per cent from the earlier estimate of 60 per cent.

The company also forecast that the profit after tax was expected to be over 20 per cent for the financial year ending March 31, 2002. A company statement attributes this to the global economic slowdown.

A company spokesman says that in the last 30 to 60 days the overall economic environment all over the world has deteriorated. The US, Japan and Europe, which are big markets for the Indian software industry, have released data which indicate that the slowdown in their economies is getting worse. Communications companies have continued to announce downsizing and are constantly revising their business forecasts downwards. These factors have affected HSS' business in the last two months and caused it revise its forecast.

HSS had reported a 66.8 per cent rise in net profit for the last financial year.
Back to News Review index page  

Propack acquisition helps Essel increase global mkt share
New Delhi-Essels acquisition of Swiss firm Propack, has helped the company to increase its global market share by 10 per cent according to Cyrus Bagwadia, managing director, Essel Propack.

Essels global turnover for the first quarter of this fiscal increased by 70 per cent over the corresponding quarter in the last fiscal.

The company posted a turnover of Rs 99.45 crore in the first quarter of this fiscal compared to Rs 58.21 crore in the corresponding quarter last fiscal.

Essel recently acquired Propack for a cash component of $ 11 million with Propack having a 22 per cent stake in Essel Propack. The company is now present in 10 countries namely Philippines, Indonesia, Venezuela, Columbia, China, Mexico, Germany, Egypt, Nepal, Mauri-tius.

The company has also entered into a JV with Germanys Bericap to manufacture caps and closures for toothpaste and carbonated soft drinks.
Back to News Review index page  

Essar Steel to recast business, cut losses
Mumbai-Essar Steel is initiating a business-restructuring programme to review all aspects of its operations. Management consultant KPMG has been chosen to undertake this exercise.

KPMG's mandate will be to suggest ways of strengthening operations and reducing Essar's losses, which touched Rs 213 crore in the first quarter ended June 30, '01, compared to a net profit of Rs 4.8 crore in the same period last year. The company attributed the loss to sharp fall in realisation, over capacity and closure of US markets.

Essar currently produces less of hot rolled coils and more of value-added API (American Petroleum Institute) grade. The review would look at how to improve this product mix.
The review has already started with the increase in capacity of its hot briquetted iron to 2.2 m tonnes in June, from 1.7 mt to re-duce production cost. Logistics is another focus area. Essar had earlier announced at saving expenses from logistics, which constitutes 15 per cent of the total cost.
Back to News Review index page  

P&G cuts prices to compete with HLL
Mumbai--Procter & Gamble US-based consumer goods company, has been forced to revise its premium pricing policy in the Indian market to shore up volumes. In a recent move, Procter & Gamble slashed the price of its global detergent brand, Tide, by Rs 35 a kg to Rs 85 per kg, in a bid to increase volumes

It also had to reduce the price of its feminine hygene brand Whisper from Rs 80 to Rs 65 which was apparently not selling because it was perceived as too expensive by consumers.

Procter & Gamble's strategy clearly appears to focus on the value-for-money consumer.
Back to News Review index page  

Sun Micro plans major investments in India
New Delhi-US IT major Sun Microsystems plans to invest 20 million dollar in the current financial year in India for ongoing activities including setting up of hi-tech planning centres in Delhi and Mumbai.
Highly placed company sources said that the total investment in opening such offices would be $3.5 million. The companys last bulk investment in India was $100 million.
Back to News Review index page  

Sails capacity utilisation drops
Kolkata-A glut of flat steel products has led to 7 per cent drop in Steel Authority of India's capacity utilisation of saleable steel in April-August 2001 over the corresponding period last year.

Sail's two flat product plants - Bokaro Steel Plant and Rourkela Steel Plant-- are operating at around 75 per cent capacity utilisation. Bokaro and Rourkela averaged around 82 per cent of sale-able steel capacity utilisation in the April-August, 2000-01.
The capacity utilisation is expected to improve by the year-end by when the market for flat products may improve.

Sail has been able to maintain the capacity utilisation at its two long products plants - Bhilai Steel Plant and Durgapur Steel Plant at a level of 100 per cent for the past two years.

Bokaro Steel Plant averaged a 88 per cent capacity utilisation for the full year completed March 2001.

However, Rourkela operated at a higher capacity utilisation in the first five months against its current utilisation level of 75 per cent. Rourkela's average capacity utilisation for the full year was around 77 per cent.

While Rourkela and Durgapur were highly loss making at net losses of around Rs 445 crore and Rs 236 crore last year, both the plants are expected to reduce losses with Durgapur striving to achieve cash break-even situation.

For the current year SAIL is projected to end with a net loss of around Rs 300 crore.
Back to News Review index page  

Indian Oil increases market share in April-Aug
Mumbai-Domestic PSU Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) has inched its market share to 53.7 per cent in the five month period of April-August 2001 even as the Indian petroleum industry continues to reel under recession.

This means that IOC has been eating into the shares of the other state-owned companies.
The companys total sales, however, were down to 19.8 million tonne as against 36.8 million tonne in the same period last year, he said.

Other state-owned PSU companies like Bharat Petroleum suffered a negative growth of 0.3 per cent, Hindustan Petroleum 0.2 per cent and IBP Ltd at 0.1 per cent.
Back to News Review index page  

Grasim launches Uncrushables
New Delhi--Grasim Suitings of Grasim Industries Ltd, an Aditya Birla Group company, has launched a new fabric, Uncrushables, to cater to the young corporate executives.
Uncrushables is the anti wrinkle version in suitings. The target audience is corporate executives who cant change clothes due to busy schedules.

The company has set aside Rs 7 crore as the total marketing expenditure for the zero crush polywool suiting and the launch is being accompanied by a new television commercial.
Back to News Review index page  

Coca Cola Diet Cola runs out of fizz
Mumbai--Diet Coke, Coca-Cola's sugar-free cola brand for those who are conscious of their waistlines, is running out of fizz in India.

Diet Coke has become popular in the metros but elsewhere it has not achieved any real success. As a result, the local management of the US multinational has now decided to change tack and go slow on the brand.

Company sources say that the brand is not economically viable to aggressively push since it caters to a niche (health conscious) segment of the market and it generates low volumes to the total turnover.

Diet Coke was launched in mid-1999 with great fanfare, the company agrees that even after two years of the launch, the diet-cola market in India has not even touched 1 per cent of the carbonated beverage market.
Back to News Review index page  

RIL not interested in Enron's DPC stake
Mumbai-Reliance Industries has again repeated that it has no interest in picking up US energy major Enron's equity in the Dabhol Power Company, up for sale at a price of $1 billion.

This comes as Indian financial institutions' are scouting for a possible partner in order to save the $3-billion project.

Last week, the FIs had announced that few domestic companies had evinced in Enron's power project, but refused to divulge details.

Financial institutions would meet finance secretary in two weeks with a proposal to bail out Enron from the present crisis which has seen shutdown of 74-mw phase-I of Dabhol project and stoppage of construction work on the 1,444-mw phase
Back to News Review index page  

Divestment of SAIL's Salem plant to start in Nov
Mumbai--The due diligence at Steel Authority of India's (SAIL) stainless steel unit at Salem, put on hold for a year due to political uncertainty following assembly elections in Tamil Nadu, is expected to begin in November.

The two combines shortlisted for the Salem steel plant are Tata Steel-Usinor and Jindal-ALZ, and both have signed the confidentiality agreement, following which they were sent the detailed information memorandum on the plant. SAIL is working towards creating the right climate for a smooth divestment of Salem unit since the support of employees as well as political support is essential for any successful divestment, the official said.

If the Tata Steel-Usinor combine bags the deal, it will mark the Tatas' maiden foray into stainless steel business.
Back to News Review index page  

L&T opens third VRS for 4,300 unionised staff
Mumbai--Larsen & Toubro Ltd (L&T) has launched its third voluntary retirement scheme (VRS) for unionised employees, specifically those below the managerial level.
L&Ts unionised staff, under the banner of the Bharitiya Kamgar Sena, number around 4,300.

Company Sources said the scheme, which opened on September 7, will continue till October 3.

The VRS is applicable to those with 10 years of service and above 40 years of age. Employees opting for the scheme will be entitled to payments of up to Rs 6 lakh, along with bonus and ex-gratia.

The scheme is applicable to the permanent employees in the daily-rated and monthly-rated technical and clerical staff categories working in the electrical business group (EBG), packaging business group, earth-moving machinery services, Powai general manager group, head office in the L&T establishment at Powai and Mudh works and city offices.

Earlier, the company had introduced two VRS schemes - one in August 1999 and the other in August 2000 - for those below the managerial level. In August 1999, the company had introduced a VRPS ( voluntary retirement pension scheme), where, around 500 employees opted for it and in the second round, approximately 150 employees opted for it.
Back to News Review index page  

MSEB starts load shedding
Mumbai--The Maharashtra State Electricity Board (MSEB) has launched a daily load-shedding quota of 1,820 mw comprising 1,520 MW in rural and 300 MW in urban areas in view of a rise in the power demand of 1,500 MW.

MSEB sources say load- shedding has to be of this magnitude because of low frequency of 48.5 Hz. Though the state has an installed capacity of 12,070, it is not fully available.

Apart from loss of capacity, 500 MW is lost at Uran due to non-availability of gas from Bombay High. The hydro capacity at Koyana (1,920 MW) is restricted to 1,000 MW during peak hours by 67.5 thousand million cubic westward division of waters.

Moreover, of the central sector share of 2,356 MW only 1,500 MW was available at present.
Back to News Review index page  

Duncans go for relaunch of brands
Ahmedabad-With the tea market in doldrums, tea companies are looking for new planks to push up sagging sales. Duncans Industries, for instance, has undertaken a major programme of re-launching its existing brands, backed by an extensive promotional campaign.

The company is also expanding its distribution network nation-wide. The company is spending around Rs 15 crore on these re-launches. Sources say that some time ago the company had re-launched its flagship brand - Double Diamond - by improving the blend and introduced contemporary packaging as well.

The company is launching a special tailor made blend of Double Diamond tea in Gujarat, one of the largest markets of tea in the country.

The brand, in new avatar, would be introduced in Gujarat during this month. Besides, the company has also recently launched Double diamond in tea bags, one of the few segments which is still growing.

The company has also re-launched its Sargam brand. It now comes in a dark green pack for the leafy variety and a bright red pack for the dust variant and there is again a special blend for the Gujarat market.

Besides these, the company is planning to re-launch its premium or Darjeeling segment brand Rungli Rungliot.

Duncans hopes to increase its sales by 25 to 30 per cent as a result of the re-launches. The companys (packet tea division) sales last year was Rs 300 crore.

Also, Duncans is expanding its distribution network by 25 per cent and will add one lakh more outlets throughout the country sources in the company said.
Back to News Review index page  

Pegasus Solutions to close domestic operations
New Delhi-- US-based Pegasus Solutions, which owns Utell International, is shutting its Indian operations.

Pegasus is a leading provider of transaction processing and e-commerce solutions to the hotel industry worldwide, and has embarked upon a restructuring plan, which includes the elimination of approximately 300 positions globally.

The company has decided to prune its current staff strength of 2,000 by 15 per cent and decided to shut down its New Delhi office from October 1.

It has been decided that the regional office at Singapore will also cater to the needs of the Indian market, a company source said, adding that the impact of job cuts will be intense in the Asia Pacific region.

In addition to its corporate headquarters in Dallas, Pegasus has 29 offices in 20 countries, including regional hubs in Phoenix, London and Singapore.
The company expects annual cost savings of approximately $9-11 million, through the restructuring exercise. The company has decided to reorganise its operations into distinct functional areas, rather than its current business unit structure, the letter said.
Back to News Review index page