Godrej to focus on home, personal care products
Mumbai: Godrej Consumer Products (GCPL) has identified home and personal care as segments that will drive the company's future business growth.

Godrej is also planning to relaunch brands like Godrej shaving cream, Cinthol talcum powder and deodorants and fairness soap, Fairglow in the near future.The company is adopting the super-stockist and sub-stockist format to expand its reach.

During 2002-03, toilet soaps accounted for 54 percent of the company's total sales and 58 percent of its branded sales. The company's soap brands grew 11 percent by volume and 9 percent by value in 2002-03. Personal care products contributed 38 percent to its total sales and 42 percent to its branded sales. Hair colour accounted for 25 percent of the company's total sales and 27 percent of branded sales.
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LML to launch new mobike models
New Delhi: Encouraged by the success of its 110cc motorcycle Freedom, LML now plans to launch four new motorcycles this year involving an investment of about Rs 200-250 crore, which will be met through a mix of internal accruals and market borrowings say company officials.

The first to be launched will be a 150cc model that will hit the market as early as August 2003 followed by a 125cc volume model in two variants. The company is also said to be working on one platform each in the 100cc, 125cc 150cc and 180cc category that are scheduled to hit the market by March next year.

LML, earlier a loss making entity has now broken even, with sales of the Freedom model crossing the level of 15,000 units per month required for a cash break-even. Freedom sold around 17,000 units in June '03.

Institutional sources said LML is now all set to report first quarter profits in the region of Rs 10-15 crore from a net loss figure of Rs 25.2 crore in the corresponding period last year.
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Spectramind topline up 22 percent in Q1
Bangalore: The business process outsourcing (BPO) arm of Wipro, Wipro Spectramind, has declared exceptional results for the first quarter of 2003-04 with a top line growth of 22 per cent and an operating margin of 23 per cent.

Wipro Spectramind now operates out of six centres in India and is looking at other Asian locations.

Wipro Spectramind, which is now right on top of the BPO heap vis-à-vis data in the public domain, has achieved a realisation of $13 per hour, a bare 9 cents below the realisation of the previous quarter and around the top of its league — large BPO operations.

In an industry which is racked by intense price competition Wipro Spectramind has managed to protect margins by running more than one shift.

It is able to do this by having customers around the globe - in Australia, New Zealand, India and the UK, as well the US and Canada in the western hemisphere. Nightime in the western hemisphere means daytime in Asia Pacific.
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Bachchan to relaunch ABCL
New Delhi: In an interview with leading journalist Shekhar Gupta on NDTV's 24x7 Amitabh Bachchan, Bollywood superstar said he planned to relaunch his film production unit Amitabh Bachchan Corporation Limited (ABCL). He has designated two directors to work on various ventures.

On of the directors is Rakesh Mehra who will be directing a film focused on adventure starring Abhishek Bachchan actress Preity Zinta and Amitabh Bachchan.

ABCL was earlier referred to the Board for industrial and financial reconstruction following financial troubles.
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Quipo sets up hub in Gurgaon
New Delhi: Subrata Paul, promoter and chief executive officer, Quipo, an infrastructure equipment bank, said that the bank is setting up hubs in Gurgaon, Hyderabad and Mumbai in its first phase of expansion.

Quipo functions as medium for depositing and renting out of infrastructure building and construction machinery.

Owners of equipments can register with Quipo, which will take on the work of hiring out their equipment to project developers and contractors and avoid long periods of idle time of the equipments.

Officials in Quipo say this will result in a win-win situation for all parties. Owners will receive an income from hitherto idle equipment, contractors lower their costs by not having to purchase top line equipment outright nor have to worry about their maintenance.

Quipo is setting up strategically located hubs to streamline the entire process of equipment availability, renting and their servicing. These hubs will be a centre for display, demonstration, training, servicing and maintenance, say officials.
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Dairy MNCs eye Indian market; look at M&As
New Delhi: Dairy multinationals like Dean, Dairy Farmers of America, Schreiber, and Land O'Lakes pf the US and Arla, Parmalaat, Lactalis, and Campina of Europe are looking out for acquisitions and joint ventures in India.

A market size of $2.5bn for curd and curd-based products, and $375m for paneer alone is making these MNCs eye the market in anticipation. A few aggressive Indian players have been given a mandate to merchant bankers here to find them a foreign investor.

Merchant bankers say, "Indian companies looking for a joint venture with these MNCs are mainly smaller players who want to expand their reach and product lines across the country. Right now MNCs too are not be looking for a majority stake, so joint ventures could be beneficial to both parties."

The mid size dairy players in India include Heritage, Hatsun Agro, Creamline Dairy, Chitale Dairy, and Metro.

The big four — Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation, Nestle, Mother Dairy, and Britannia Fonterra — may not be part of the current M&A activity.

Multinational dairy majors already present in India include Nestle, Fonterra, Danone, Kraft, and Bongrain.
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Sify to introduce new price for I-Way surfers
Hyderabad: Sify Ltd, having a chain of over 1,000 cyber cafes across 25 cities, is introducing new pricing at its I-Way chain of cyber cafes in Hyderabad. The company's new pricing will offer greater value for money, making Internet more affordable for browsers.

As a part of this initiative, Sify has introduced a trial pack of Rs 25 to enable people to experience the power of broadband connectivity on the Internet alongside the facility of happy hours in I-Ways wherein at around 25 per cent lower than normal charges one can surf, as an added incentive.

Sify said that with this initiative, which is being progressively introduced across the country, surfing at Sify's over 1,000 I-Ways, will be more enjoyable. Sify has one of the largest cyber café chains in the country.
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RIL's Krishna-Godavari project could have oil MNCs, FIIs stake participation
New Delhi: International oil majors like Shell, Exxon, Petrobras and financial investors like CVC Capital and Citibank Private Equity are considering equity participation in the Reliance Industries gas property in Krishna-Godavari basin.

The concept of farming in of equity to finance the commercial exploitation of gas is being used. RIL is also said to be evaluating the option of financing the investment on its own balance sheet at the same time. RIL spokesperson offered no comments.

RIL is currently examining three options. These include farming out a part of the stake (RIL owns 90 percent of this property) to a strategic partner or to a financial partner as also to organise a non-recourse financing, based on off-take agreements of the gas.

Investment bankers Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and Morgan Stanley are learnt to be involved in these discussions between strategic and financial investors and the Reliance group. Sources say valuation exercises put the value of the KG-D6 discovery close to $4bn, roughly Rs 19,000 crore. Sources say RIL may consider a 10 percent equity dilution, which would fetch the company Rs 2,000 crore, to help finance the development of this property while continuing to retain 80 percent equity and management control.

Another option for the company is finance the development on its own balance sheet and with its `AAA' ratings and strong cash flow position RIL may be able to manage a competitive rates from lenders to finance KG-D6 development.

In 2002, RIL found the largest reserves in the world for natural gas in Krishna Godavari's D6 basin on the Andhra coast. The oil reserves are estimated to be 14trn cubic feet (TCF). This will lead to a production of 16m cubic metres a day over 15 to 20 years, as compared to the total consumption of 65m cubic metres a day. The refinancing at current gas price will be minimum Rs 10,000 crore a year.
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Tax payers can ask for stay on advance payment on tax
Mumbai: The Income tax appellate tribunal has ruled that tax assessees can now file a stay order application against demands for advance payment of tax by the income-tax (IT) authorities, where tax demanded is double or more than what the assessee has declared in the returns filed.

Lawyers say large-sized demands have been raised by IT authorities following high-pitched assessments made by assessing officers. Coercive action is then used for the recovery of demands. This leads to assessees liquidating assets to meet the tax demands raised by the authorities. This is despite a circular issued way back in 1969 by the Central board of direct taxes (CBDT) allowing assessees to file a stay application till the issue is resolved.

Lawyers say that in most cases, tax demands raised do not survive but due to the long drawn out legislation process the assessee usually has paid out more than 50 per cent of the tax demanded till justice is done.
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India Inc increasing dividends
Mumbai: In what is good news for shareholders, 48 per cent of all dividend-paying companies increased their dividend payouts for 2002-03, while another 27 per cent proposed to maintain them at the previous year's levels.

Of the 503 dividend-paying companies, 241, accounting for 48 per cent of the sample, hiked their dividend rates. About 50 companies returned to the dividend list after skipping dividend in the previous year, while 132 firms maintained their dividend rates. Only 72 companies pruned their payouts while 8 proposed skipping dividends for the year.

Hero Honda, Hindustan Lever, Infosys Technologies, Atlas Copco, ONGC, Indian Oil Corp Cummins India, Godrej Consumer, Indo National and HPCL have proposed a dividend payout of Rs 19,947 crore for 2002-03, considerably more than the Rs 13,037 crore paid in 2001-02. The payouts were higher by 53 per cent, but the payout ratio — dividends as a percentage of net profits — was marginally higher at 30.8 per cent (29.3 per cent).

28 public sector undertakings (PSUs) were the biggest dividend-paying companies, having stepped up payouts by a healthy 82.2 per cent. These PSUs accounted for 55 per cent of total dividend paid during the year. The private sector increased its dividend payout by 27.7 per cent, accounting for 45 per cent of the total.
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BSNL getting customer savvy
New Delhi: Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) has hired research agency International Data Corporation (IDC) India to keep track of customer's expectations and to measure the customer satisfaction level.

Apart from this BSNL has also put the Indian Market Research Bureau (IMRB) and IDC India on its panel as research agencies for future references.

IDC India will continuously monitor BSNL's quality of service (QoS) and track customer response for a period of one year during which it will give four reports on a quarterly basis. The study has been commissioned for BSNL's fixed line services across all circles, according to sources.

Based on the feedback that it gets, BSNL will be framing its plans as well as policies. BSNL will also take corrective actions to strengthen its market leadership.

BSNL's fixed line subscriber base has taken a hit over the past few years.
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India Cements to offer VRS
Mumbai: In order to reduce its workforce by around 1,000, or 25 per cent of its total staff strength India Cements is launching a voluntary retirement scheme (VRS) for its employees.

A senior India Cements executive said the staff reduction process would see a cash outflow of around Rs 50 crore.

The Chennai-based company currently has over 4,000 employees on its payrolls. The VRS is expected to result in an annual saving of Rs 10 crore, sources said.

The company has been ailing, primarily on account of a high debt burden of around Rs 2,000 crore. The debt pile-up is a result of the aggressive acquisition strategy that India Cements embarked upon 4-5 years back.
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Polaris, NEC deploy GBS at Japanese bank
Chennai: Chennai-based Polaris Software Lab and Japan's NEC have announced the successful deployment of NEC's global banking system (GBS) product for Yachiyo Bank in Japan.

NEC officials said the company would continue its association with Polaris for the next two to three years and would be deploying the GBS for eight more banks in Japan.

NEC holds around 30 per cent share in Japan's open architecture banking system (OABS) market for large scale banks and around 10 per cent market share in the OABS among regional banks.

NEC said the value of annual outsourcing from India was close to $34 million and that Polaris held the largest share among the top five vendors from India.

NEC's vendors in India for the development of OABS include Wipro, HCL and Covansys.

NEC is one of Polaris premium clients that has generated business worth $5 million annually over the last four years.
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