Hindustan Lever to hive-off tea estates
New Delhi: FMCG giant Hindustan Lever Ltd. has said it is considering hiving off its tea plantation business in Assam and Tamil Nadu into a separate wholly-owned subsidiary.

In a communique to the National Stock Exchange, the company said the proposal to transfer its plantation business by way of sale was considered and approved in-principle by its board of directors. It would now seek shareholders' nod by way of a postal ballot.

HLL's tea plantation business in Assam is commonly known as the Doom Dooma Division while in Tamil Nadu it is referred as Tea Estates Division.

The company said duly completed postal ballot form should reach the scrutinizer on or before May 12 and the results of the ballot would be announced on May 16.
Back to News Review index page  

Air Deccan to operate on North-east routes
Bangalore: Air Deccan has announced its operations on the Delhi-Baghdogra route from April 11 to increase its presence in the north-eastern region.

The low cost carrier would be adding Delhi-Baghdogra, Baghdorga-Guwahati and Guwahati-Delhi routes to its network with daily flights except for Sundays.

Air Deccan would also station an ATR-42-500 aircraft at Kolkata for daily flights to Dibrugarh via Guwahati from April 11. The route would be Kolkata-Guwahati, Guwahati-Dibrugarh, Dirbugarh-Guwahati, Guwahati-Kolkata.

"We are looking at a much larger presence in the northeast. While an airbus A320 will cover the Baghdogra route, we will be deploying an ATR-42-500 in Kolkata to cover Guwahati and Dibrugarh," said Captain Gopinath, Managing Director, Air Deccan.

He further stated that the company would soon be expanding its network to Aizwal and Agartala from Kolkata.
Back to News Review index page  

Kingfisher Airlines to launch first flight in May
New Delhi: UB group's flag carrier Kingfisher Airlines will launch its first commercial flight on May 9.

The airline has ordered a total of 30 brand new A320 and three A319 aircraft from Airbus at a cost of $1.93 billion (Rs8,492 crore). The first eight 'Funliners' will be delivered this year with eight more in 2006.

Kingfisher has also leased four brand new A320-200 aircraft from Debis Air Finance, a company of Daimler Chrysler, which will be delivered directly from the Airbus factory in Toulouse later this month. Debis is also a significant investor in Kingfisher Airlines with over $200 million assets placed.

By 2008 it will have a total of 37 aircraft in its fleet.
Back to News Review index page  

Huawei Tech to expand R&D base in India
Shenzhen: Chinese telecom major, Huawei Technologies will further expand its operations in the country, including establishing its largest foreign software research and development (R&D) centre at Bangalore.

The company has said as the largest overseas R&D centre of Huawei Technologies, the Bangalore centre has become an indispensable part of its total R&D force. The company has also announced its plans to introduce some of its main products.

Huawei India is set to become a CMMI Level 5 organisation in 2005, and will play a key role in the pioneering R&D efforts of Huawei Technologies.

The state-of-the-art Bangalore R&D centre of Huawei, set up in 1999 currently employs some 800 professionals, more than 90 per cent of them Indians.
Back to News Review index page  

HCL Tech bags BDA project
New Delhi: HCL Technologies Ltd will design integrated management information system for Bangalore Development Authority (BDA), a project worth Rs20 crore.

The company has said it has been selected by the BDA to design, develop, implement and support the system to automate business processes in its various departments. This is expected to reduce the current paper work by 80 per cent, it informed the BSE.
Back to News Review index page  

LPG stocks pile up at Reliance refinery
New Delhi: Reliance Industries is facing a problem stockpiling LPG at its Jamnagar oil refinery and has asked the Government for permission to export the fuel.

The situation has so developed following state-run Indian Oil Corp's (IOC) refusal to lift petroleum products from Jamnagar, unless the private sector refiner, which does not have a LPG retail chain of its own, offered discounts.

The company has asked for permission to export 2,00,000 tonnes of LPG immediately and 2.25 lakh tons per month till August. IOC wants Reliance to share at least one-third of the Rs82 per cylinder loss the company is making on LPG sales due to Government freeze on raising retail prices, despite surge in cost of raw material (crude oil).

Reliance has the facility to store 25,000 tonnes of LPG at its refinery complex in Gujarat. This storage is adequate for stocking only four days of LPG production.
Back to News Review index page  

IOC to charter ships directly for imports
New Delhi: The Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) has been given the clearance by the govt. to directly charter ships for oil imports instead of going through the Ministry of Shipping's agency Transchart.

The Cabinet approved the decision after the Committee of Secretaries recommended the amendment in the existing policy on charter of ships for imports by PSUs.

The Information & Broadcasting Minister Jaipal Reddy however said that other oil PSUs like HPCL, BPCL and MRPL will continue to depend on Transchart and Shipping Corporation of India for meeting their charter requirements for the time being.
"Their cases for hiring charter ships would be reviewed after one year, based on the experience of IOC," he said.

The proposed amendment in the existing policy is in line with the deregulation of petroleum sector and would enable level playing field for private and public sector oil companies, he added.
Back to News Review index page  

NTPC to bid for coal mining blocks
New Delhi: The country's largest consumer of coal, National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) has said that it will enter the coal mining business and has applied for such ventures in 17 mining blocks in the country.

NTPC said that this year the company had procured 98.97 million tonnes compared to last year's 92 million tonnes. As a short-term measure, NTPC will import 2.1 million tonne while the long-term plan is to enter the mining business, officials said.

NTPC has already been awarded a coal-mining block for captive consumption. The company operates 13 coal-fired and seven gas-fired power stations.

The ongoing coal shortage had disturbed the power generation schedule in several of its thermal plants — NTPC's Talcher, Farakka and Kahalgaon super thermal power stations are among the worst hit.

The Ministry has already identified over 20 thermal stations that are in a 'critical' stage, with less than a week's stock of coal. The situation in about 15 of the stations has been designated as 'super-critical', with coal stocks expected to deplete.
Back to News Review index page