IA out of the red
New Delhi: Indian Airlines has reported a net profit of Rs44.17 crore during 2003-04 against a net loss of Rs196.56 crore during 2002-03. At a press conference shortly after the annual results were cleared by the IA board, the IA Chairman and Managing Director, Sunil Arora, said it was after three years of continuous losses that the State-owned carrier was reporting a profit.

IA earned an operating profit of Rs125.10 crore during 2003-04 compared with an operating loss of Rs134.72 crore during the previous year. There was a 13.37 per cent increase in operating revenue at Rs4,649.80 crore (Rs4,101.50 crore).

The Chairman said IA achieved the turnaround mainly because of strict cost-control measures, improved physical performance and increased aircraft utilisation, among others.

"The estimated saving from the various cost control and economy measures amounted to Rs190 crore during the year on account of reduction in staff and voluntary retirement scheme, fuel tankering, streamlining of stores and inventory management, among others," Arora said. The improved financial performance was achieved despite the increase in average domestic prices of aviation turbine fuel.
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Re-routing calls: SC tells Reliance Info to pay up
New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday referred the dispute between Reliance Infocomm and Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd to the Delhi High Court even as it directed the former to pay the full amount of Rs182.7 crore as demanded by BSNL for illegally routing international long distance calls as local calls. Since Reliance has already paid Rs98 crore to BSNL, the balance Rs84.7 crore has to be paid within four weeks.

The payment will be an interim measure until the Delhi High Court takes a decision on the appeal filed by Reliance Infocomm.

A Bench, comprising Justice N. Santosh Hegde and Justice S.B. Sinha, further asked the High Court to dispose of Reliance's appeal against BSNL's claim of Rs182.7 crore by January 31.

The Department of Telecom is also looking at imposing a penalty of Rs150 crore on Reliance separately for licence violation.

The Supreme Court Bench has asked Reliance to comply with its undertaking before the High Court to correct the Caller Line Identification for ILD calls. Reliance has agreed.

The Bench issued the directions based on a Special Leave Petition (SLP) filed by BSNL against the Delhi High Court order which had asked the public sector undertaking to maintain status quo on the dispute.
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Shell returns to fuel retailing after 30 year gap
New Delhi: Anglo-Dutch oil major Shell has returned to auto fuel retailing in India after a gap of nearly three decades, opening its first petrol pump in Bangalore last week.

``We have commissioned the first of our retail outlets at Bangalore last week," Vikram Singh Mehta, Chairman, Shell Group of Companies in India, told reporters on the sidelines of an oil and gas conference here on Friday. Royal Dutch/Shell had to wind up its India operations in 1976 after its petrol pump network and refinery at Mumbai were nationalised and renamed Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL).

Shell will be the first multinational oil firm to start fuel retailing in India after the Government opened up the sector to private players in April 2002. Recently, domestic private entities such as Reliance Industries Ltd and Essar Oil have opened a few petrol outlets.

Shell, which has a licence to open up to 2,000 petrol pumps in the country, will invest Rs250 crore in phase-I of its retail plan that focuses on setting up petrol pumps in the South.

Shell, which secured the retail licence on investing more than Rs2,000 crore in setting up an LNG import facility at Hazira in Gujarat, is sourcing petrol and diesel for its retail foray from Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd, a subsidiary of state-run Oil and Natural Gas Corporation, he added.
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IMAX Corp plans twenty five theatres in India
Hyderabad: IMAX Corporation, the entertainment technology company that produces giant size movies, plans to have a footprint of 1,000 theatres in the next 10 years.

While 300 of them would come up in the US, the rest would cover elsewhere. India will have at least 25, according to Richard L. Gelfond, Co-Chairman and Co-Chief Executive Officer of the company based out of Toronto (Canada). In India, there were three screens which show films in the IMAX format, with seven more coming up by 2008 end. Gelfond said IMAX theatres would come up in Delhi and Kolkata among other top cities.

For the smaller cities, the company was working on MPX technology that involved lesser investments and operating costs.
He said the spurt in shopping malls provided a good opportunity for the company to expand. "It is estimated that about 600 malls are coming up by 2009," he said.

The Canadian company also saw India as a good place to source its conversion jobs thanks to lower costs out here. While conversion of a film cost $4 million in the US, it might just cost $2.5 million if done in India.
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VSNL gets $26 m from New Skies sale
Mumbai: Videsh Sanchar Nigam Ltd. has announced that it has received approximately $26 million (around Rs114 crore) from the sale proceeds of New Skies Satellite, in which it was a shareholder.

This amount, which was received on Thursday, is the first installment of the proceeds from the sale of VSNL's shares in New Skies and represents approximately 95 per cent of the proceeds, according to a notice sent to the stock exchanges by VSNL. The remaining proceeds are expected to be received after two months, as per the applicable US laws, said VSNL.

VSNL also expects income from sale of its investment in Intelsat to the tune of Rs800 crore, according to a senior company official. The proceeds from these sales will keep VSNL's reserves at more or less the same levels, even after its proposed acquisition of Tyco's international global communications network. Tyco's network is proposed to be acquired by VSNL for $130 million (around Rs600 crore) through an all-cash transaction, to be funded from internal accruals.

VSNL's current reserves are around Rs1,600 crore.
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Asian Paints to exit Mauritius
Mumbai: Asian Paints (India) Ltd. has announced that it plans to exit Mauritius as the paint market in that country has been stagnant over the last five years.

Asian Paints will be divesting its shareholding in the Mauritius subsidiary, Asian Paints (Mauritius) Ltd (APML). Asian Paints holds 89.6 per cent equity in APML. "The divestment/transfer of shares will be done to a Mauritius-based company, subject to necessary approvals and due diligence,'' the company said in a news release.

According to Asian Paints, the Mauritius paint market has not been growing for the past five years. Its subsidiary has been making losses for several years. Besides, the subsidiary's contribution to the overall group sales is insignificant, the paint major said.

Following the exit from Mauritius, Asian Paints will have manufacturing facilities in 22 countries with 28 manufacturing facilities spread across the Caribbean, West Asia, South East Asia, South Asia and the South Pacific Region.

The company has also announced the setting up a dedicated plant for the manufacture of industrial liquid paint at Taloja, Maharashtra. The first phase of the project with a capacity of 8,000 KL would involve a capital expenditure of Rs14.88 crore.
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Rs.351 crore Afghanistan order for WAPCOS
New Delhi: Water & Power Consultancy Services (India) Ltd has won a Rs351-crore order for reconstruction and completion of Salma Dam project in Afghanistan's Herat Province. The contract has been awarded by the Ministry of External Affairs, India, under Technical and Economic Cooperation, an official release said here.

As part of the agreement, WAPCOS, which is an ISO 9001:2000 International Consultancy Organisation under the Ministry of Water Resources, would provide engineering consultancy services, including construction of infrastructure facilities, pre-construction survey, review of basic design, tender engineering and model studies, it said.

The project is scheduled for completion in four years, the release added.
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ONGC bids for Ecuadorean oilfields
New Delhi: State-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corporation has bid for acquiring Canadian firm EnCana's stake in a cluster of oilfields in Ecuador.

ONGC has also unveiled plans to hike capacity at its subsidiary, Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd (MRPL), to 15 million tonnes by 2007 at an investment of Rs2,000 crore, apart from seeking permission to market LPG and kerosene.

ONGC Videsh Ltd (OVL), the company's overseas arm, has bid for the assets, which include the Canadian firm's stake in Amazon blocks 14, 17 and Tarapoa, having a combined output of 66,891 barrels of oil per day (bpd). OVL is competing with PetroChina for the EnCana assets and is understood to have made a better offer than the Chinese company. EnCana's assets are estimated to be worth $1.5 billion and OVL is believed to have bid slightly more than the stated amount.

EnCana owns a 36.26-per cent stake in a new 4,50,000-bpd heavy crude pipeline from the Amazon oil blocks to the Pacific coast, and has reserved space to ship more than 1,08,000 bpd. EnCana also owns a 40-per cent stake in oil block 15, operated by Occidental Petroleum Corp.

In the meanwhile the feasibility report for the MRPL expansion involving additional units such as FCC, Coker and Indalin (naphtha to LPG plant) will be available in a month. The refinery capacity will first be raised to 12 million tonnes through minor revamps at an investment of Rs200 crore - Rs 300 crore.
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Asahi to invest Rs.600 crore for plant at Roorkee
New Delhi: Asahi India Glass (AIS) has announced it plans to set up its single largest integrated glass plant at Roorkee in Uttaranchal at a cost of Rs600 crore. The funds for the project are to be generated through a mix of internal accruals and debt.

The plant, to be completed by the end of 2006, would be an integrated, composite unit with manufacturing facilities for value-added glass and glass products. This would include reflective glass, mirror, automotive safety glass and float glass. Incidentally, the company's float glass unit at Taloja in Maharashtra is running at a capacity of 113 per cent. The new float glass unit at Roorkee will have a capacity of 700 tonnes per day.

Currently, AIS derives about 55 per cent of its revenue from the automotive glass segment and 43 per cent from float glass.

AIS is targeting to grow at more than 20 per cent over the next five years and expects to generate revenues of over Rs700 crore in the current fiscal. The company, currently, has a market share of over 85 per cent in the automotive glass segment and 21 per cent in the glass business.

AIS is a joint venture between the Labroo family, Asahi Glass (Japan) and Maruti Udyog Ltd which hold a stake of 22 per cent, 22 per cent and 11 per cent, respectively.
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Volvo plans more workshops in N-E
Kolkata: Volvo India, which recently upgraded its workshop in Kolkata, is now planning to set up more satellite workshops in the eastern and north-eastern States to meet the needs of increasing customer base for trucks in the eastern region. The eastern and north eastern region has some of Volvo's largest fleet owners.

According to a press release issued by Volvo India, the upgraded service and parts centre in Kolkata supported by a network of 10 service centres now caters West Bengal, Jharkhand, Orissa, Bihar in the East and the entire North East.

Having a capacity to service 150 service-jobs on the trucks a month, the Kolkata workshop is equipped to carry out major repairs and includes electronic diagnostic equipment, special oil dispenser machines and others. The workshop is manned by 50 technicians and support staff.

During last six years Volvo has increased its service network to over 50 support points in the country.
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i-flex opens Moscow office
Mumbai: i-FLEX Solutions has said that it has set up an office in Moscow. "The Moscow office is an important milestone in i-flex's plan to grow its customer engagements in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) region, currently comprising 12 countries including the Russian Federation, Ukraine and Belarus," said the release.

i-flex recently acquired a new customer in the region following an agreement with International Moscow Bank, Russia, for the deployment of Flexcube, its flagship product. i-flex said it has a historic relationship with Russia, having sold its earlier banking solution, MicroBanker in the early nineties to Russian banks.
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