ONGC to hire consultant for global desk on crude trading
Mumbai: Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) is scouting for a consultant to help the company set up an international desk for trading crude, in Delhi. The exploration major has invited interest from consultants who would help the company trade in crude from overseas oil and gas producing fields. Sources said that the company has, meanwhile, decided to continue the services of London-based Trafigura Beheer BV for trading in the crude received from Sudan. ONGC has a 25 per cent stake in the oil and gas field in Sudan and the first consigment of 80,000 barrels of crude from Sudan has already arrived at Mangalore. Company officials said that the trading desk would also help the company in risk management and hedging crude as the public sector oil companies have been permitted to hedge crude. The official added that the crude received from Sudan at present would be processed at Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemcials Ltd (MRPL). However, since ONGC would be receiving about three million tonne crude annually from the project, it would also be sold in the open market. ONGC has been bullish about overseas exploration for the last couple of years. OVL has acquired upstream equity in Iraq, Russia and Vietnam to supplement domestically-produced oil and gas. ONGC produced 26 million tonne of crude in 2002-03. By acquiring a 25 per cent stake in Sudan, it will add another three million tonne of crude per year.
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SABMiller stake in Shaw Wallace to usher in heightened competition
Mumbai: The recent acquisition of 50 per cent stake in Shaw Wallace Breweries by Mysore Breweries, part of the world’s second largest beer manufacturer SABMiller, is likely to usher in a major change in the competitive equation in the estimated 81 million cases Indian beer industry. While Shaw Wallace has been the market leader in the strong beer segment with 15 million cases, Haywards 5000 alone accounted for over 30 per cent of the strong beer segment, its rival United Breweries with its 18 million cases brand - Kingfisher has been the traditional leader in the mild beer segment. According to industry analysts, “The tie-ups like United Breweries with Scottish & Newcastle or Shaw Wallace with SABMiller can be termed as a major move towards the consolidation of the Indian beer business.” SABMiller was already in the process of consolidating its position in the Indian market by launching its brands like Castle & Knock-Out in the mild segment.
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Iffco, Kerala Co-operatives spin strategy for FACT bid
Thiruvananthapuram: Fertilisers and Chemicals Travancore (FACT) is on the road to meet its ‘strategic partner’ with deep pockets in the co-operative sector. Indian Farmers Fertilsers Co-operative Ltd (Iffco) has tied up with a clutch of Kerala Co-operatives to pitch for 51 per cent equity in the fertiliser major on the disinvestment ministry’s chopping block. This time Kerala chief minister AK Antony has stepped in to reinforce the bid from the country’s biggest fertiliser co-operative. Earlier, the Rs 4,500-crore Iffco had been shying from making the FACT bid move on its own steam. “What we see in FACT is its ready jetty advantage which would reduce the transportation headache of 6.5 lakh tonne of urea from Iffco’s Oman manufacturing facility (Om-Iffco),” BS Vishwanathan, director, Iffco said. Advantage two is the manufacturing presence in South, which would translate to having more cost-efficient transporting in the South Indian fertiliser market. So far, only private players like Birla and Dharani groups were reportedly scouting the bidding terrain. Disinvestment ministry has been sitting pretty on all the options.
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Morepen Labs files process patent for anti-asthama drug
Mumbai: Morepen Labs Ltd has filed an international process patent application for “Montelukast Sodium”, a high value block buster anti-asthamatic drug. “Montelukast Sodium” has an US market size of $1.24 billion growing at the rate of approximately 24 per cent, the company said Tuesday. Morepen has developed and filed a process patent application on a novel process for the preparation of exceptionally pure Montelukast acid converted to a superior quality of Montelukast sodium, it said. This would give the company an opportunity to find a foothold in the regulated markets, it said. Morepen would soon file a drug master file (DMF) for Montelukast Sodium, it said .
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L&T to build cement plant in Bangladesh
Mumbai: Larsen & Toubro Ltd (L&T) has bagged a major order from Lafarge Surma Cement Ltd, to build a cement plant valued at $103.35 million near Sylhet town in Bangladesh. The plant is expected to go on stream by October 2005. The cement plant with a capacity of 1.2 million tonne per annum is likely to be set up at Chhatak near Sylhet town on a turn-key basis, a company release said. Limestone for the plant would be supplied from Meghalaya. The construction and erection work for the plant would be done by company’s ECC division while FL Smidth of Denmark will provide technology for the unit.
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New Honda accord to cost Rs 15.7 lakh
New Delhi: Honda Siel Cars India announced the launch of its new-look Accord priced between Rs 14.7-15.7 lakh, which is pitched against premium D segment cars — Toyota Camry, Ford Mondeo and Hyundai Sonata. The company is planning to launch a model in the C segment in four to five months, a senior official said, adding that it may be a new-look City. Honda Siel Cars hopes to achieve around 48 per cent increase in turnover this year with sales of over 20,000 units, from 13,500 units sold last fiscal. “This year our target is to wipe out the accumulated losses of Rs 75 crore and also make a net profit. During 2002-03, we sold 13,300 cars and this year, we are targeting to sell 7,000 more units,” Honda Siel Cars president and CEO H Yamada said. The company made a net profit of Rs 45 crore in the year ended March 2003. It has invested Rs 200 crore over a period of three years (from 2001) on upgrading its existing models, including the new mid-size car Honda City which is likely to be launched this year. The investments are being made from internal accruals and debt. The company’s equity stands at Rs 360 crore.
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Honda Siel to raise employee strength by 50 per cent
New Delhi: The Rs 1,000-crore Honda Siel Cars India Ltd (Honda India) will increase its current employee strength by 50 per cent by the last quarter of the year ending March 2004. This is in preparation for the company’s plan to gradually enhance operations from the current one-shift a day to three-shifts a day level in the next couple of years. Says Honda India vice president and director (administration and personnel) NK Goila: “Our current employee strength is 850 (excluding 250 contractual staff in security, sanitation and horticulture). To meet the enhanced production requirement we will be raising our headcount by 50 per cent by the last quarter of this fiscal. Going further, we will induct additional 500 workers when we commence operations on a 3-shift basis in the next couple of years.” Adds Goila: “Our target is to sell close to our installed capacity of 30,000 cars a year (on three-shift basis) in the next couple of years. This fiscal we plan to sell over 20,000 cars (up from 13,500 cars in 2002-03) and as such we will commence second-shift by October 2003.” Honda India is said to be mulling the launch of a small car but not before it starts selling close to its installed capacity of 30,000 units a year.
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Hyundai to build two VLCCs for SCI
Mumbai: Shipping Corporation of India Ltd (SCI) has signed contracts with Hyundai Heavy Industries Company Ltd of South Korea for building and delivering two very large crude carriers (VLCCs). The VLCCs, to be built at HHI’s ship-building yard at Ulsan in South Korea, would have a deadweight of about 3,00,000 tonne at the design draft of 21.6 meters, a SCI release said. The acquisition of these crude carriers will augment SCI’s tanker tonnage and strengthen its position in transportation of the country’s crude oil requirement, particularly in view of the increasing requirement of larger tankers by the Indian oil industry. These vessels would join SCI’s fleet by the end of February 2005 and mid-October 2005 respectively, the release said.
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Kinetic puts off DC-designed scooter launch
Bangalore: Two-wheeler maker Kinetic Engineering has decided to put the launch of limited edition Dilip Chhabria-designed Kinetic scooters on the backburner because of technical hitches. A company spokesperson told that the decision to put off the launch of Kinetic scooters was taken after conducting a survey of the market. "It would have been difficult for us to service the scooters," the spokesperson said. Last year, Kinetic in association with India's leading auto designer, Dilip Chhabria, decided to produce a limited edition of 2,500 scooters named `DC edition Kinetic''. While Dilip Chhabria's design studio developed a new design for the vehicle, Kinetic was planning to sell them through its large dealership network.
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Maharaja Appliances' Jammu unit to go on stream soon
New Delhi: The Rs 110-crore small appliances major, Maharaja Appliances Ltd (MAL), is all set to commission its recently acquired plant in Jammu. The company, which is targeting a turnover of Rs 150 crore, is also taking steps to undergo a complete brand revamp while expanding its product portfolio. The company is proposing to relocate its unit from Delhi, Harish Kumar, managing director, MAL, said. "At present we have three units in and around Delhi," he said. The unit will be manufacturing all the appliances under the company's brand portfolio, he said. Elaborating further, he said that the investments involved for the Jammu plant was not much as it is a leased factory. The company has made an initial investment of about , Rs 1 crore, Kumar said.
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Voltas gets Rs 26-crore Gujarat contract
Mumbai: Voltas Ltd has bagged an order from the Gujarat Government encompassing three pumping projects, with a total value of Rs 26.25 crore to be completed by the end of the year. The order is a follow through of some of Voltas' earlier projects with the Surat Municipal Corporation, Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation and Gujarat Water Supply and Sewerage Board.
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SRF plans to delist securities from 3 SEs
New Delhi: Nylon tyre cord fabric (NTCF) manufacturer, SRF Ltd, would seek shareholders' nod at the forthcoming annual general meeting (AGM) of the company for delisting its securities from the stock exchanges at Delhi, Madras and Ahmedabad. The proposal to delist the securities from these three exchanges had been approved by the board of directors at their meeting held on May 31. SRF informed the Mumbai stock exchange that the decision to delist its securities from these three stock exchanges came in the wake of "NIL" transactions at these stock exchanges during the last 1-2 years. For the year ended March 31, 2002, SRF Ltd reported a net profit of Rs 31.89 crore on net sales of Rs 720.90 crore.
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VSP production hit by tripping
Viskhapatnam: The production activity at the Visakhapatnam Steel Plant (VSP) suffered partial disruption on Tuesday, following glitches on the transmission lines. The Simhadri power station, Lanco, Kondapalli and the GVK stations were taken off the bars, following tripping of key feeders to the Vijayawada Thermal Power Station (VTPS) and the Kothagudem Thermal Power Station (KTPS). Consequently, the power transmission to the VSP from the NTPC's Simhadri unit was affected, resulting in the impact on production. The problems were rectified after a couple of hours. According to the chairman and managing director of the VSP, .K. Panda, transmission problems from the Simhadri unit in the past few months had resulted in setback to production and the estimated loss due to it was of the order of Rs 20-25 crore.
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Lyka to seek nod for jt venture counter guarantee
Mumbai: THE Gujarat-based Lyka Labs is to seek shareholders' approval to provide security, guarantee and counter guarantee to its joint venture company, Lyka Hetero Healthcare Ltd. In a notification to the stock exchanges, the company said the approval through postal ballot. The security would be provided from time to time for amounts not exceeding Rs 9.8 crore for loans and inter corporate deposits obtained by Lyka Hetero Healthcare from Rabo India Finance Pvt Ltd and any renewal thereof by way of pledging of investment of the company in equity shares of Lyka Hetero Healthcare.
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Tractor sales tied to monsoon, says Crisil
Mumbai: Tractor players in India, which includes Mahindra & Mahindra, Punjab Tractors and Eicher, are going to have it tough going ahead. Tractor manufacturers are closely following the monsoon’s progress this year. The Credit Rating and Information Services of India (Crisil) believes that this is because a normal monsoon has become extremely crucial to their performance this year as they seek to reduce the high receivables that have been built up over the last five years. According to an analysis done by Crisil, the year-end receivables (as days of wholesale volumes during a year) of the five domestic tractor majors — M&M, Escorts Ltd, Punjab Tractors Ltd, Tractors and Farm Equipment Ltd and Eicher Ltd — have risen from less than a month’s sales in 1996-97 to over five months’ sales in 2002-03. The analysis shows that the receivables were around 65,000 tractors as at March 31, 2003, which is equivalent to almost half their annual wholesale volumes in ’02-03. This is in spite of the fact that tractor manufacturers sharply cut down wholesale volumes in 2002-03 (to around 160,000 units from around 216,000 in ’01-02) in response to weak demand conditions.
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Broadcasters seek more time from govt
New Delhi: Government gave more time to broadcasters to announce prices for individual channels “to facilitate decision making for them too,” I&B secretary Pawan Chopra told reporters after a two-and-half hour meeting with broadcasters. ”We have agreed to give them more time and asked them to get back to us quickly after discussing among themselves. The idea is to facilitate decision-making for them too. Everyone has their own business compulsions and wish to test their own market,” he said.
Asked it this would not make a mockery of the June 15 date set by the government, he said that the idea was to let everyone co-operate. “This is not an issue where we should resort to threats, quote deadlines and force compliance.” Pay broadcasters including CNBC, ESPN, Star, Sony and Zee attended the meeting. They are likely to meet again soon and may give a more clear picture to the government either on June 14 or on June 16 —June 15 being a Sunday. Though fingers could be pointed at the government for its flexibility on the issue, it was obvious today that the broadcasters have accepted the inevitability of CAS. As one of the channel representatives commented sarcastically, “We smaller ones have decided our strategy, but the bigger ones who accepted the policy belatedly are yet to complete their homework.” Meanwhile consumers —the other important stakeholder —are unable to swallow the CAS pill it seems. A delegation under the Consumer Coordination Council banner on Tuesday met the minister for information and broadcasting, Ravi Shankar Prasad and demanded a regulatory mechanism be put in place.
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Wipro plans facilities in SE Asia, Europe
Bangalore: Wipro, which wants to make every new client account earn over $1 million in annual revenues within twelve months, plans to set up new software development facilities in Southeast Asia and Europe. The company which has such facilities in six countries around the world, majority of them being in India, has not yet made substantial contractual commitments to establish these facilities and its proposed expansion plans may be significantly altered, depending on market situation. Wipro is one of the few Indian IT services companies which hasn’t yet announced a `China plan.’ The company has what it calls `nearshore development centres’ which are dedicated development centres close to its clients’ business locations. These centres — at Reading (UK), Windsor (Canada), Kiel (Germany), and Helsinki (Finland) have employees with specialised functional skills and provide on-call support to customers.
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