Tapti gas field shut down as GAIL cuts purchases
Mumbai: The ONGC-Reliance-British Gas consortium have shut down wells at the Tapti gas field for the first time in eight years, after GAIL (India), its largest gas buyer, cut purchases to one-third.

The Tapti field, which supplies roughly one-fifth of the total 34 million metric standard cubic metres per day (mmscmpd) gas to customers along the Hazira-Bijaipur-Jagdishpur (HBJ) pipeline, has shut wells for the last ten days, an official with the consortium said.

Production has come down from 10.8 mmscmpd to 6.8 mmscmpd after GAIL cut purchases to 1.5-2 mmscmpd instead of the contracted 6 mmscmpd.

Industry observers believe this is an extension of the dispute between GAIL and the consortium over supply and pricing of Tapti gas. GAIL, which was the sole gas buyer, had opposed an increase in the gas price scheduled from February 2005, although its gas purchase contract said so.

The price was to become market-linked, increasing prices to $4.90 per mmscmpd from $3.11 per mmscmpd, with a ceiling of $ 5.55 per mmscmpd. The Petroleum Ministry intervened and in February, allowed the consortium to sell 4.8 mmscmpd gas directly to other customers. They were asked to sell the remaining 6 mmscmpd to GAIL, as supplies to fertiliser and power customers along the HBJ pipeline.

Meantime, GAIL was asked to make alternative supply arrangements. A revised higher price was agreed upon at a March 29, 2005 meeting with the Petroleum Secretary, S.C. Tripathi. GAIL is, however, yet to sign the contract and so is not contractually bound to lift supplies.

As a result, the consortium has once again written to Petroleum Ministry asking for permission to sell the gas directly to other customers to avoid production losses. GAIL officials say the reason for the fall in purchases was because the Oswal and Indo-Gulf fertiliser units have gone in for shutdowns.

According to one of GAIL's customers, the company has been pushing liquefied natural gas received at Petronet LNG Ltd's recently commissioned 2.5 million-tonne Dahej LNG terminal, to customers along HBJ. GAIL owns 12.5 per cent stake in PLL.
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ONGC lowers turnover and profit estimates for 2004-05
New Delhi: Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Ltd has revised downwards its estimated turnover for 2004-05 to Rs46,025 crore and estimated net profit to Rs12,175 crore following instructions from Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas to continue the practice of sharing of under-recoveries on PDS kerosene and LPG for the fourth quarter of the fiscal.

The corporation has said in a statement that compliance of these instructions would lead to a reduction in turnover by 1,000 crore and reduction in net profit by Rs500 crore, from what it had previously estimated.

It had earlier estimated a turnover of Rs47,025 crore and a net profit of Rs12,725 crore for 2004-05. These figures were after excluding transfer of Rs3,114 crore profit to IOC, BPCL and HPCL for April-December 2004.
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NIIT Tech and Holcim group scale up ties
New Delhi: NIIT Technologies Ltd has announced that it is scaling up its ongoing IT engagement with the global cement major, Holcim group.

"The global cement major, Holcim group, has decided to consolidate its data centre operations for the entire Asia- Pacific region with the company. Till recently NIIT Technologies was operating a dedicated data centre for Holcim's business critical IT applications in Thailand," a company press release said here.

As part of this engagement, NIIT Technologies will use its data centre and disaster recovery centre in Bangkok to help Holcim group companies in Asia-Pacific access SAP applications and services round the clock.

In the year 2000, NIIT was selected to design and set up a data centre for SAP services for Siam City Cement, the Holcim's Thailand group company. In the new scenario, NIIT Technologies would be providing complete end-to-end SAP services to enable Holcim to maintain focus on running of its core businesses for all of the Group's Asia-Pacific operations.
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Wipro merges BPO arms
Bangalore: Wipro Ltd has decided to amalgamate its business process outsourcing (BPO) subsidiaries under one entity, Wipro BPO Solutions Ltd is the new division created after renaming WiproSpectramind Services Ltd.

The companies to be amalgamated into Wipro BPO Solutions Ltd include Spectramind Ltd, Bermuda and Spectramind Ltd Mauritius. Raman Roy, President, Wipro BPO, said nearly 38 per cent of the total BPO revenues came from the existing IT clients of Wipro. Customers had been demanding for a single invoice for their business, he said.

The BPO operations contributed to some 11 per cent of total IT revenues during the fourth quarter.

Revenues for Wipro BPO stayed flat during the quarter registering a three per cent sequential growth, while on a year-on-year basis the growth rate was 56 per cent.

Wipro also saw a marginal decline of 2.8 per cent in the attrition rates for its BPO business at 22.8 per cent in Q4 as compared to 25.4 per cent in Q3. The BPO operation is focused on increasing its non-voice component and seeing good traction. Wipro has added some 6,373 people to its BPO operations on a net-basis during FY05 taking its overall headcount to 15,673 people.

The Chairman of Wipro, Azim Premji, said the process of strategic transformation in the BPO business would continue and a key aspect of this transformation apart from changing the revenue profile was tighter integration with the company's vertical businesses.
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IPCL board accepts Anil Ambani's resignation
New Delhi: Anil Ambani's name has been taken off the IPCL website - the first sign that his resignation was accepted by the company. Reliance said later in the day that the IPCL board met on March 30 to allow Anil Ambani to step down as Vice Chairman.

IPCL shares are actively traded in the stock markets with its trading volume touching eight lakh shares, which is 45 per cent higher than average. Reliance Industries holds 46 per cent equity in IPCL. The second largest chunk, over 20 per cent, is with the retail investors.

IPCL, like other Reliance companies, has been the centre of the tussle between the two Ambani brothers.

In his resignation letter, Anil Ambani had charged Anand Jain, a close friend of Mukesh Ambani and a board member of IPCL, of irregular business practices. On January 3, Anil Ambani had resigned after making charges against Anand Jain.

Later on January 21, the IPCL board had requested Anil to reconsider his resignation.
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Shangri La group sets up Traders Hotel in Chennai
Chennai: The Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts, one of the leading luxury hotel groups in the Asia Pacific region, has entered the Indian market with Traders Hotel in Chennai.

Symon Bridle, Vice-President, Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts, said that the group planned to rollout both its brands, Shangri-La and Traders Hotels, in all the four metros in India.

Shangri-La properties are primarily deluxe city centre and resort hotels with over 300 rooms, he said. The name Shangri-La was inspired by the legendary land featured in James Hilton's "The Lost Horizon."

Traders Hotels are premium business hotels. The group's premium end offering, Shangri-La New Delhi will be ready by the end of summer, he said.

The company plans to launch three new projects - Shangri-La, Traders and City Resort - in Bangalore by August 2007. The Group has signed management contracts with the Adarsh Group to operate the new hotels in Bangalore.

Traders Hotels will also come up in Mumbai, Gurgaon, Hyderabad and Pune. He said that there would be eight to ten Traders Hotels in India, in four to five years time.
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Mukand Ltd. bags orders worth Rs.140 crore
Mumbai: Mukand Ltd has received orders for supply of EOT cranes, caster equipment and mill equipment from Bhushan Ltd, worth about Rs140 crore, for its 1.5-million-tonne steel plant being set up in Orissa.

The specialised four-girder cranes, designed to handle liquid metal to be supplied under the order, will have capacities ranging from 20-250 tonnes. The caster and mill equipment will be custom-built, the company said in a news release.

All these equipment will be manufactured at Mukand's machine building division at Kalwe, near Thane.

Supplies are expected to be completed within 18 months.
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Airtel to invest Rs.120 crore in Maharashtra and Goa
Pune: Mobile service provider Airtel has announced that it will invest Rs120 crore in the Maharashtra and Goa circles where it plans to rapidly roll out its network, add capacity and infrastructure to grab market share.

The company said it has almost doubled its market shares over last year to reach the level of 23.8 per cent in fiscal 04-05. The company has firmed up plans to add an additional 100 new towns in its network, taking the total to 330 out of the total 650 towns that the State has.

The year just ended also saw the mobile service provider notching up a 6.5-lakh subscriber base, officials said. The company is also working towards providing seamless connectivity on the maximum number of highways with a view to increase the quality of service to its subscribers.

For the current fiscal the company will be also rapidly adding cell sites, which are expected to go up from 750 to an estimated 1200, officials said.
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Quarterly Results: WIPRO, Wipro Consumer Care, Gujarat Gas
Wipro Q4 net rises marginally
Bangalore: IT services major Wipro has posted a net profit of Rs433 crore in Q4 of FY05, up marginally over a per cent from Rs428.8 crore in the corresponding quarter of the previous fiscal.

On a QoQ basis, the revenues are up 9.57 per cent at Rs2312 crore. The technology major has declared a dividend of Rs5 per share. The global software revenues are up at Rs1604 crore. The EPS for the quarter ended March 31, 2005 is at Rs6.35, up from Rs4.68.

The company added 41 new clients and 2,520 employees in this quarter. It added 1333 employees for its BPO business, Wipro Spectramind.

For FY05, it has posted a net profit of Rs1628.05 crore, a jump of 58 per cent over Rs1031.05 crore recorded in the previous fiscal. The Bangalore-based company posted revenues of Rs8,169.80 crore, an increase of 39 per cent over Rs5881.20 crore in 2003-04.

The Board of Directors also recommended issue of one bonus share for every share held by the shareholder.

Wipro Consumer Care revenues up 20 per cent
Bangalore: Wipro Consumer Care and Lighting (WCCL) recorded revenues of Rs472 crore, a 29 per cent rise year-on-year, and contributed six per cent to Wipro Ltd's revenues of Rs8,170 crore for 2004-05. Quarter-on-quarter, the business grew 20 per cent registering revenues of Rs122.7 crore in Q4 of 2004-05.

Sequentially, the revenues actually fell five per cent from Rs128.9 crore in the third quarter of the year.

As regarding its investment plans, Wipro has said that they are on an expansion spree and have added a second soap-making line and are getting into `noodle'-making as well. WCCL's Santoor brand has grown during the year and the company is planning a re-launch of its Chandrika brand of hand-made soaps, officials said.

WCCL has also forayed into the modular office furniture business in 2004-05. The Wipro Chairman, Mr Azim Premji, said its 98 per cent-owned subsidiary, Wipro Fluid Power, had delivered robust results during fiscal 2004-05.

The company makes hydraulic cylinders for construction equipment and has rising exports to Japan and other markets, officials said.

Gujarat Gas Q1 net zooms
New Delhi: Gujarat Gas Company has posted 72.25 percent rise in net profit at Rs27.32 crore for the first quarter ended March 31, 2005 as compared to Rs15.86 crore in the corresponding quarter in 2003-04.

Total income has gone up 14.91 percent to Rs160.06 crore for the first quarter from Rs139.29 crore in the year-ago period, the company has informed the Bombay Stock Exchange.

Consolidated profit of the group is Rs33.45 crore for the quarter ended March 31, 2005 as compared to Rs17.73 crore for same quarter in previous fiscal.

Total income has increased to Rs194.64 crore for the first quarter from Rs171.28 crore in same quarter in 2003-04, it said.
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