Richard Branson came close to buying BA
London: Executives at British Airways will this week be asked to draw up plans for a dramatic bid for Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Atlantic after it emerged that Virgin had come within a whisker of trying to buy BA. Branson was close to making a full-blown offer to BA shareholders earlier this year -having started tentative talks with BMI British Midland, the airline chaired by Sir Michael Bishop.

Branson enlisted the support of Texas Pacific Group, the American private-equity firm founded by David Bonderman, one of the world’s most successful airline investors. He was advised on the BA plan - codenamed Project Balloon -by Credit Suisse First Boston. Sources close to Branson said that after three weeks’ study, he and his advisers decided instead to pursue talks with BMI. The merger discussions became public last week.
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Coca-Cola to launch flavoured milk drinks in US
Atlanta: Got milk? Coca-Cola has. The Coca-Cola Co said that it was planning to introduce a new dairy drink in the United States this summer in a bid to boost its share of the growing nutritional beverage market. A spokesman for the world’s No. 1 soft drink maker acknowledged the new product after Beverage Digest, a leading industry newsletter, published details of the company’s roll-out plans. The new drink, which will be called Swerve, will come in chocolate, vanilla-banana and blueberry flavors and contain more than 50 per cent dairy products, allowing it to carry the “Real” seal of the American Dairy Association. The first 12-ounce cans will appear in stores and drink machines in July or August, shortly before millions of US children return to school. Unlike many milk products, they will not require refrigeration before opening.
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4 American states may ban outsourcing
London: Four US states are considering legislation to ban outsourcing of state data processing contracts to developing nations even as dozens of household names, spanning insurance, banking, technology and telecoms, are transferring part of their white collar administrative and customer-service work to Asia, particularly to India to cut costs. The US states considering the measure to curb flight of jobs are New Jersey, Maryland, Connecticut and Washington, the Sunday Telegraph reported on Sunday. The report also expressed concern about the future of UK call centres, a major industry employing about 500,000 people across 6,000 sites. According to it, Mitial Research, a specialist consultancy, has predicted that one third of Britain’s larger call centres could shut down by 2005 with the loss of 90,000 jobs.
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BMW sees brighter 2nd half despite German gloom
Cagliari: A gloomy home market continues to weigh on German luxury carmaker BMW but it still sees an upswing in the second half of the year, its chief financial officer said. "In Germany there is simply no confidence at the moment," chief financial officer Stefan Krause said in remarks embargoed for release on Sunday. A weak economy in Germany, BMW's key market, has led to a decline in the country's flagship car industry since the middle of 1999. "It's logical that people are not making big investment decisions right now," he said at a press conference to showcase its new 5-series car which is due to be launched in Europe in July. Following the end of war in Iraq, the economic climate had taken a turn for the better he said, adding the firm still expected further improvement in the second half of the year, helped by the 5-series.
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Door to euro open, says UK
London: The British government has agreed that it should not rule out joining the euro in the foreseeable future, a minister said on Sunday, as newspapers said the government would keep open the option of holding a national referendum on joining before the next general election. Pro-euro Welsh secretary Peter Hain, who discussed the euro issue with Prime Minister Tony Blair and Chancellor of the Exchequer (finance minister) Gordon Brown last week, said it would be “disastrous” for Britain to rule out adopting the euro. Hain said his talks with Blair and Brown, one of a series of meetings they held with cabinet ministers on the euro, were very amicable. “I think what we are all agreed is what we must never do is rule out joining the euro in the foreseeable future, that would be disastrous for Britain,” Hain said.
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