IOC ends mktg pact with Reliance
New Delhi: Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) has terminated its marketing agreement with Reliance Petroleum (RPL) following insistance by the latter that IOC lift 100 per cent of Jamnagar refinery output on take-or-pay basis.

As per the original agreement, IOC committed to marketing 52 per cent throughput of RPL on take-or-pay basis till 2008 while the remaining was to be marketed by a joint venture company of IOC and RPL.

IOC was also upset with RPL's plans to sell its products on its own from next fiscal as it ran against the spirit of the marketing agreement.

RPL wants to enter direct marketing since the Jamnagar refinery was likely to produce 2 million tonnes additional products beyond the tied-up output of 15 million tonnes.
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PNB, Vijaya make fresh bid of insurance foray
Mumbai: Punjab National Bank (PNB) and Vijaya Bank are scouting for a partner for their insurance venture with Swiss insurer Zurich.

The move comes after the New Delhi-based Hero group pulled out of the venture at the last minute. The group was supposed to hold 51% while Zurich would have been holding 26%. The remaining stake was to be split between PNB (15%) and Vijaya Bank (8%).
While SBI is the only PSU bank to get the central bank nod, Vysya Bank and Jammu & Kashmir Bank are the private sector banks to get RBI okay for their insurance plans.
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Chandra sells 1.5% to pay debts
Mumbai: The promoters of Zee Telefilms Ltd have sold 60 lakh shares of the media company for a consideration of around Rs 70 crore at Rs 115 per share.

The block deal was done to four equity funds, including domestic funds like Templeton and Alliance Mutual. The proceeds will be used to repay liabilities of Rs 220 crore, which the promoters of the Zee Group owe to Zee Telefilms.

Subhash Chandra holds 59 per cent equity in ZTL. He is believed to be interested in bringing his holding down to 50 per cent.
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ONGC to invest Rs 100cr in gas exploration
New Delhi: The Oil and Natural Gas Corporation will invest close to Rs 100 crore in exploration of coal bed methane (CBM) over the next five years.

The ONGC-Indian Oil Corporation combine had secured two blocks - Bokaro and North Karanpura in Jharkhand - in the first round of competitive bidding for CBM blocks under the new exploration licensing policy.

ONGC-IOC combine would put Rs 70 crore in Bokaro and Rs 39 crore in North Karanpura block during the five years.
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IPCL gets US patent
New Delhi: Indian Petrochemicals Corporation has been awarded a US patent for novel way of producing high purity ethylene and propylene jointly with Korea Institute of Energy Research.

The technique eliminates the use of conventional technology which separates ethyelene and propylene by deploying highly energy intensive cryogenic processes.
The invention, patented in the US, assumes significance in the wake of the growing interests in ethylene and propylene separations worldwide.

In India the ethyelene production is expected to grow to 2.6 million tonnes annually by 2005.
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L&T to take medical equipment to China
New Delhi: Larsen & Toubro is planning for an aggressive debut in the Chinese market with its range of electrical and medical equipment.

The company's electrical and electronics division has decided to venture into China in a bid to achieve its target of trebling the exports turnover every year
The company will focus on exporting top-end circuit breakers, switchgears and medical equipment.
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HDFC MF declares 7% dividend
Mumbai: HDFC Mutual Fund has declared a tax-free annualised seven per cent dividend on its liquid fund under weekly dividend option.

The dividend for the liquid fund under the reinvestment plan would work out to Rs 0.01342 per unit for the week ended 31 December 2001, a HDFC Mutual Fund release said.

The fund-- launched in October, 2000-- manages Rs 1,308.12 crore worth assets and the objective was to enhance investors' income consistently with a high level of liquidity through a mix of money market and debt instruments.

The mutual fund has eight schemes including Liquid Fund, Growth Fund, Balanced Fund, Income Fund, Tax Plan Fund, Gilt Fund, Fixed Investment Fund and Children's Gift Fund.
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Ispat develops power saving technology
Mumbai: Ispat Industries has developed a new process technology that reduces power consumption in the steel manufacturing process.

The process will help Ispat reduce its cost of production by around 20 per cent.

Steel manufacturing under this technology will involve utilisation of 100 per cent hot metal in the electric arch furnace.

The hot metal is produced from the blast furnace and charged into the electric arc furnace as a raw material for further processing. As the iron is in molten hot form, it avoids use of electricity in the arc furnace.

The newly developed production process will help to reduce costs by around Rs 2,000 per tonne of hot-rolled coils produced.
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Tata pickups to have more power
Mumbai: Tata Engineering is planning to fit its pick-up vehicle-- Tata 207 -- with a more powerful 3-litre engine, which is used in the 407 model. The company will display three new variants of the 207, fitted with the powerful 407 engine, at the coming Auto Expo 2002 at New Delhi.
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Visa Airways to take off in March
Mumbai: Visa Airways is preparing to take off by March-end. The airline has received government approval to import three dry-leased Dash 8 Series 100 aircraft.

Visa will initially offer six weekly flights each on Mumbai-Surat and Mumbai-Nashik sectors.

It is planning to connect smaller cities and towns to the major cities, thus feeding the bigger domestic airlines with more traffic from hitherto unconnected places.

Visa Airways is controlled by Captain Vivek Sane, a former Indian Airlines pilot. A small group of non-resident Indians own a minority stake in the airline.

The Dash series aircraft can accommodate 36 passengers in nine rows of 2-by-2 seats.
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Voltas to close down Thane unit
Pune: The state government has permitted Voltas Ltd to close down its cooling appliances business division at its Thane plant.

The companys contention is that there was no work for the workmen with capacity utilisation at present being zero. During the last 12 months there was no production activity as no orders were booked between April 2001 and September 2001.
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Maya Entertainment to go for IPO
Mumbai: Ketan Mehta-promoted Maya Entertainment plans to raise Rs 50 crore through an initial public offering (IPO).

The company is converting Chacha Chaudhuri comics into a television series for Sahara. It will be launched in March and have 200 episodes. The serial will air thrice a week.
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Moser Baer India betters profit
New Delhi: Moser Baer India Ltd, the worlds fifth-largest optical compact disc maker, saw a jump in earnings and revenue for the year to March 2002.
The companys earnings rose to Rs 2.0-2.2 billion from Rs 1.38 billion a year ago and revenue jumped to Rs 6.0-6.5 billion from Rs 3.34 billion a year ago.
About 85 per cent of Moser Baers revenue comes from exports, while domestic sales account for the remaining 15 per cent.
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Heritage Foods proposes buyback
Hyderabad: Heritage Foods (India) Ltd proposes to buy back its shares from the open market at a price not exceeding Rs 30 per share. The overall buyback size is Rs 3 crore. The company is engaged in the production of processed milk and milk products.

The current paid-up equity share capital of the company stands at Rs 10.8 crore. It has reserves and surplus funds of Rs 19.97 crore.

The company currently has 9,284 small shareholders who were holding 13.29 lakh shares in aggregate but less than 500 shares each.

The buyback proposal was basically meant for providing an exit route to these small shareholders at a reasonably good price.

The promoters of HFIL, including Bhuvaneswari Devi, wife of Andhra Pradesh chief minister N. Chandrababu Naidu, currently hold 30 per cent equity stake in the company.
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Aurobindo to opt for pvt placement
Hyderabad: Aurobindo Pharma Ltd (APL), the Rs 1,000-crore pharma major, plans to raise Rs 125 crore through the private placement route to meet investment expenses.

The company has convened an EGM on 15 January 15 to authorise the board to take appropriate decisions regarding the type of instruments to be offered, including global depository receipts (GDRs) for an aggregate value not exceeding Rs 125 crore.
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ECIL sets up satellite station in Mauritius
Hyderabad: Electronics Corporation of India Ltd (ECIL), a Central public sector undertaking under the Department of Atomic Energy, has commissinoed a satellite communication earth station antenna in Mauritius. The antenna is said to have improved the quality of relay and reception of Doordarshan programmes.

ECIL possesses a three-decade track record of supplying antennas of various types for use by the ministries of defence, space, information & broadcasting and telecommunications.

The range of antennas developed by the corporation included line of sight antennas for microwave communications, earth station antennas for satellite communications, TVRO antennas for Doordarshan applications and doubly-curved antennas for special purpose defence applications.
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Volvo IT, MindTree join hands
Bangalore: Volvo, through its subsidiary Volvo IT, has signed an agreement with Bangalore-based MindTree Consulting for outsourcing software development and services for its global operations.

As part of the agreement, MindTree will be working with Volvo for a wide range of enterprise software development such as mainframe applications enhancement and maintenance, ERP applications and a host of eBusiness applications such as content management and applications using Microsoft and Java technologies.
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STCL launches spices
Bangalore: The Spices Trading Corporation Ltd (STCL) has entered the domestic retail market by launching packaged whole spices and spice powders under the brand name Royal Spice.

The Royal Spice range of products are also planned to be exported in the global retail market.
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Herbal lipstick developed
Hyderabad: The Lucknow-based National Botanical Research Institute has developed Luvstic, a herbal lipstick, which can be used even by men.

Men too can use it as it provides transparent composition containing essential oil and aroma isolates.

The institute has developed lipsticks with different colour shades for women and without colour for men. The aroma serves as an anti-depressant, anti-stress and anxiety-reducing agent. Luvstick is stated to be safe and eco-friendly.
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Tatas to offer WLL services
Mumbai: The Tata group has decided to offer limited mobility services in all its new basic telecom circles. The company is planning to start basic operations in all its four circles of Delhi, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka.

The group will offer CDMA-based limited mobility services in all basic circles including Delhi and Gujarat.

After the completion of the merger between BPL Communications and Birla-Tata-AT&T, the group will have to compete with the cellular services in Tamil Nadu, where BPL Cellular, a part of BPL Communications, offers services.

Tata Teleservices, which has received letters of intent for 15 basic telephony circles of which they surrendered seven and converted four into licences, will invest around Rs 3,555 crore in the next five years to develop the four circles.
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Good Knight to go global
Mumbai: Sara Lee is planning to take Good Knight, the flagship insecticide brand of its Indian subsidiary Godrej Sara Lee, global. Sara Lee will pay a three per cent royalty on sales to the Godrej group for using the brand rights.

The company plans to introduce Good Knight in Indonesia, Philippines, China and other Asian countries. Good Knight, with an annual turnover of around Rs 250 crore, is available in coils, mats, liquidators and lotion forms.
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