Bharat Hotels to bid for Kanishka, Kovallam Ashok
New Delhi: The Lalit Suri-promoted Bharat Hotels will bid for two ITDC hotels, Kanishka and Kovallam Ashok Beach Resort.

Government had earlier invited initial bids for sale of latest tranche of India Tourism Development Corporation hotels, including Hotel Kanishka and Hotel Ranjit, while fixing the minimum net worth criteria for bidders of the two Delhi hotels at Rs 35 crore.

Suri has already acquired two ITDC hotels, Ashok Hotel in Bangalore and Luxmi Vilas Palace in Udaipur.
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New chimney range from Faber Heatkraft
New Delhi: Faber Heatkraft Industries Ltd, a joint venture between Faber SpA of Italy and Heatkraft of Pune, has introduced five new chimney models to cater to Indian oil-based cooking methods.

Faber-India's new range of kitchen chimneys come with features such as suction power, remote control, noise reduction, and metal filters that are capable of trapping more than 90 per cent of grease particles.

The remote-controlled model is aimed at the top-end of the market, with prices ranging between Rs 15,990 and Rs 23,490, while the Jet Vortex model is aimed at the lower-end with prices beginning at Rs 9,000.
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Siemens Q2 net up 11%
Mumbai: Siemens has reported a 11% rise in net profit to Rs 25.15 crore for the second quarter ended 31 March 2002 when compared with Rs 22.72 crore in the corresponding quarter last fiscal.

Net sales rose 12% to Rs 350.9 crore from Rs 312.63 crore.

The board has declared an interim dividend of 30% (Rs 3 per share).
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Castrol Q1 net up 32%
Mumbai: Castrol India has reported a 32% increase in net profit to Rs 32.83 crore for the first quarter ended 31 March 2002 when compared with Rs 24.93 crore in the corresponding quarter last fiscal. The total income (net of excise) fell 4% to Rs 242.92 crore from Rs 254.71 crore.

The company said volatility of crude prices could adversely affect margins over the coming quarters.
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ACC FY02 net zooms 128%
Mumbai: Associated Cement Companies (ACC) has reported a 128% increase in net profit to Rs 130.43 crore for the fiscal 2002 when compared with Rs 57.17 crore in 2001.

The total income (net of excise) has increased 9% to Rs 2,893.16 crore from Rs 2,649.1 crore.

The board has recommended a dividend of Rs 3 per share for the year year ended 31 March 2002.

The company, according to a release issued to the BSE, has said the future growth for the cement industry is expected to be around 8-10% due to strong growth in areas like housing and infrastructure.

This scenario is expected to result in better prices in the current fiscal.
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RIL Q4 net down 11%
Mumbai: Reliance Industries has reported a 11% decline in net profit to Rs 672 crore for the fourth quarter ended 31 March 2002 when compared with Rs 759 crore in the corresponding quarter last fiscal. The total income (net of excise) rose 4% to Rs 6,319 crore from Rs 6,078 crore.

The company has posted a 6% increase in net profit to Rs 2,814 crore for FY02 as againt Rs 2,646 crore in FY01. The total income (net of excise) fell 9% to Rs 23,447 crore from Rs 25,812 crore.

During the year ended 31 March 2002, Reliance earned an extraordinary income of Rs 358 crore from the divestment of shares in Larsen & Toubro.

As per the consolidated results, it has posted a net profit of Rs 883 crore in the fourth quarter. The net sales (net of excise) is Rs 6,179 crore.

The company has posted a net profit of Rs 3,678 crore in FY02. The net sales (net of excise) totalled Rs 22,133 crore.
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ITC buys Minto brand from Candico
New Delhi: ITC Ltd has bought the Minto brand from Delhi-based Candico. Though ITC will now own the brand, the manufacturing rights will remain with Candico.

Minto is the second largest player in the mint confectionery category after Nestle's Polo. It is one of the top brands of Candico, a company promoted by Sanjiv Kumar.

Candico is the erstwhile confectionery division of Bakeman's Ltd. It was spun off as a separate company some time back.
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Jenson promoter stake dips 6.4%
Kolkata: The promoters' holding in Jenson Nicholson (India) Ltd (J&N) has come down by 6.38 per cent to 38.46 per cent in the last 6 months.

Simultaneously, institutional holding in the company increased by 11.13 per cent. The dilution in promoter holding was due to conversion of optionally convertible debentures.

Jenson had earlier planned to raise Rs 40 crore through optionally convertible debentures on a private placement basis but managed to mop up only Rs 20 crore.

Insta Colour, the company's tinting project has been valued at Rs 132 crore. Insta Colour has eight products-special sheen, super acrylic emulsion, super enamel, quartz exterior finish, acrylic exterior finish, pearl lustre finish, acrylic washable distemper and insta colour matching cement primer.
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Menezes seeks to market Old Spice
Mumbai: Menezes Cosmetics, which manufactures and distributes the Xm range of body sprays and perfumes, and the original distributors of Old Spice in India, has staked a claim for selling Old Spice owned by Procter & Gamble in India.

The company has submitted a proposal to P&G to work out a new marketing strategy for Old Spice. However, P&G already has a distributorship arrangement with Marico Industries.

The Old Spice brand was first introduced in India by the Menezes family. This Goa-based family then held the brand license to manufacture and market the range of products including Old Spice aftershave lotion and shaving cream from the UK-based Shulton Inc.

In 1993, Procter & Gamble Company, USA, took over the business of Shulton along with the Old Spice brand.
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Playwin Infravest plans Rs 350-crore expansion
Mumbai: Playwin Infravest has chalked out a Rs 350-crore expansion plan for its online lottery business.

The company plans to install 15,000 terminals across the country over the next few months.

The company has already spent around Rs 350 crore in the first round and is planning a further investment of Rs 350 crore to put in place a countrywide network.
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Citigroup stake values new Infy unit at $100 mn
Mumbai: Citigroup will get a 20 per cent stake for investing $20 million in Infosys Technologies Ltd's new back-office unit Progeon.

That values at $100 million the unit which Infosys announced last Wednesday it planned to set up with $5 million of its own cash and $20 million from Citigroup.

It did not say at the time what sized stake Citigroup would get for its money.

The other 80 per cent will be held by Infosys with a market value of $5.2 billion and sales of $532 million in the past year to March.
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Siemens H1 net up 18%
New Delhi: Siemens India reported a 18 per cent growth in net profit at Rs 45.6 crore during the first half ended March 2002, compared to Rs 38.6 crore during the year-ago period.

The company's sales increased by 16 per cent to Rs 611.2 crore during first October-March compared to Rs 527.2 crore in the year-ago period.

Siemens board of directors approved an interim dividend of 30 per cent.

The company also bought back a little over 2.35 million equity at Rs 197.49 a share by March for Rs 46.52 crore.
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ACC net profit up 128%
Mumbai: Associated Cement Companies has reported that its net profit for the year ended 31 March 2002 rose 128 per cent from a year earlier, on a 9.5 per cent rise in sales.

The company posted a net profit of 1.30 billion rupees or 7.63 rupees per share, compared with 571.7 million rupees or 3.35 a share a year earlier. Net sales rose to 32.40 billion rupees from 29.59 billion a year ago.
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Tata, VSNL to cut telecom costs
Bangalore: Tata Teleservices and VSNL will work closely to address customers and cut costs.

A Tata group committee is working out the terms of co-ordination.

The efforts in sharing infrastructure and customer access would essentially cover domestic telephony and Internet services.
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LIC's investment pegged at Rs 62,000 cr
Mumbai: Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) has planned an investment outlay of Rs 62,000 crore for 2002-03 with 50 per cent funds earmarked for exposure to the government securities.

The investible funds for the current fiscal would be 24 per cent more over Rs 50,000 crore in 2001-02 and according to regulatory norms LIC will have to invest atleast half of the corpus in government securities, managing director A Ramamurthy told reporters here.

The total funds available for investments in the corporate sector were close to Rs 11,340 crore and half of this would be dedicated to equity, he said adding last year LIC had invested Rs 4,400 crore in equities.
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TCS goes for an image makeover
New Delhi: Tata Consultancy Services is all set for a makeover from a shy software services company to an aggressive and market savvy IT behemoth.

The blueprint for the focus shift includes effecting a sharp increase in recruitment of management students for creating a strong front end.

TCS new business strategy will also include giving more emphasis on product development and setting up more partnership ventures to market its various patented products and packages internationally.

The plan to recruit large number of management students is in line with its shift in focus to product developments which require employees with more marketing skills.
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Coca-Cola to set up tea, coffee plant in UP
Lucknow: Coca-Cola is planning to set up a composite plant to make "ready-to-drink" tea and coffee in Uttar Pradesh.

The companys India chief, Sanjiv Gupta, visited the state capital to explore the possibility of setting up a plant in the countrys most populous state.

Buoyed by the success of Sunfill sachet, Coca-Cola India is currently working out the modalities of introducing ready-to-drink tea and coffee.
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IOC rejects Essar stake offer
Mumbai: Indian Oil Corporation has rejected Essar Oil's offer for a stake in the latter's refinery project.

IOC has indicated to Essar Oil that it is not interested in equity participation in the Gujarat-based refinery as the country is surplus in oil products.

Essar Oil had revived the proposal two months ago. The last offer by Essar Oil to IOC was around 2 years ago.

Essar Oil had also sought a marketing tie-up with IOC for selling its products after its refinery was completed.
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Coca-Cola to up capacity of powder units
Kolkata: Coca-Cola India is planning to expand production capacity at its five concentrate powder plants.

The company targets about 200 million consumers for its newly launched soft drinks concentrate.

The company is also planning to set up new plants for its SDC at Guwahati and Bhubaneswar.
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Pepsi may go into fruit farming
Mumbai: PepsiCo may venture into contract farming of Indian fruits for its juice drink Slice on similar lines of its potato farming business in Punjab.

The company is looking at the possibility of applying its experience of contract farming to fruits as well giving a better yield to farmers.

The company, which is India's second largest fruit pulp exporter, has entered into long term contracts with manufacturers in various states for supply of fruit pulps to be then converted into juice drink.
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Nine bidders chosen for HNL selloff
Kolkata: Nine bidders have shown interest in the disinvestment of Hindustan Newsprint, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the public sector Hindustan Paper.

The nine shortlisted bidders are currently carrying out due diligence in HNL and the divestment exercise, including price bids, is expected to be completed over the next few months.

In 2001-02, HNL produced over one lakh tonne of newsprint, operating at over 100 per cent capacity. However, sales in volume terms at 96,105 tonne dipped 7.5 per cent compared to previous year.

Income for the year at Rs 233 crore, was 8 per cent lower than previous fiscal and net profit at Rs 3 crore was down sharply from Rs 30 crore in the previous year.
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ThyssenKrupp to absorb Indian arm
Mumbai: Thyssenkrupp Stahl, the worlds largest stainless steel (flat) and fourth-largest carbon steel company, will bring five of its companies four in Europe and one in India under one holding company.

In electrical steel, the group has two plants in Germany and one each in France, Italy and India.

The Indian company in Nashik is operated by EBG India, a joint venture between EBG and Raymond. EBG is a subsidiary of ThyssenKrupp Stahl.
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Reliance Petroleum Q4 net rises 5.5%
Mumbai: Reliance Petroleum has reported that its net profit rose 5.5 per cent in January-March from a year earlier.

Reliance Petroleum, which is in the process of merging with sister company Reliance Industries, posted a net profit of Rs 4.05 billion or Rs 0.78 a diluted share, up from Rs 3.84 billion or Rs 0.74 per diluted share a year earlier.

Sales rose 1.5 per cent to Rs 76.20 billion from Rs 75.06 billion.
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Tata Tele to launch basic services
Bangalore: Tata Teleservices will be launching basic services in the state in the third quarter of 2002.

The plan is to launch initially in Bangalore, Mangalore, Hubli, Mysore, Mandya and Hassan. By August 2003, the operations are proposed to be extended to over 30 cities and towns. The entire geographical area of Karnataka is expected to be covered in a structured manner over the next seven years.

The Tata group company proposes to invest around Rs 1,000 crore over the next six years to set up necessary infrastructure.
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Shalimar Paints to expand dealer network
Coimbatore: Shalimar Paints Ltd (SPL) plans to increase its dealer network in the south by around 50 per cent during the current financial year.

By the end of this fiscal the company plans to have around 1500 dealers in the four states. Shalimar has a market share of just around 7 per cent in the south. Asian Paints controls over half of the market.
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GRL profit declines 25%
Mumbai:  Zydus Cadila-controlled German Remedies has registered a 24.58 per cent decline in net profit to Rs 24.91 crore for the year ended 31 March 2002 as compared to Rs 33.03 crore for the previous year. Total income (net of excise) has decreased to Rs 200.54 crore from Rs 204.81 crore last year.

The decline in profit was attributed to the agreement for the Agiolax plant, stipulating progressively reducing rates of recovery. The board has recommended 80 per cent dividend for the year 2001-02.
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