document.writeln("

Ravi Kant takes over as MD at Tata Motors
Mumbai: Ravi Kant, in-charge of the commercial vehicle business unit of Tata Motors since 1999, will take control of the day-to-day affairs of the automobile company, as its managing director with immediate effect.

The appointment comes at a time when the fifth-largest commercial vehicles maker in the world with a sizeable interest in passenger cars has announced plans to go global.

The board approved Kant's appointment and it is believed chairman Ratan Tata broke the news personally to him.

As CEO Ratan Tata has steered the company out of a Rs500-crore loss a few years back. It has since bounced back to profit after a painful restructuring and with the help of the Indica.

Tata Motors is poised to make an impact as a global player and much of the action has so far centred around the commercial vehicles unit, the sector that Ravi Kant heads. Tata Motors is also developing a small car that will be priced close to Rs 1 lakh.

Kant has helped integrate Daewoo Commercial Vehicles, a South Korean company that Tata Motors acquired a couple of years ago.

The company beat analysts forecasts on Friday with a 22 per cent rise in quarterly net profit as strong sales of buses and trucks offset high raw material costs.

The company, with more than a 60 per cent share of India's truck and bus market, said net profit rose to Rs272.67 crore in the first quarter to June from Rs223.36 crore a year earlier.
Back to News Review index page  

Alfa Laval MD quits — Nish Patel is new MD
Pune: Swedish multinational Alfa Laval India's Managing Director of eight years, Satish Tandon, has resigned.

The Alfa Laval UK Managing Director, Nish Patel, has been appointed Managing Director of the company with effect from October 17, a company statement said here on Friday.

Tandon has been with the company for over 38 years. He will continue with the company till December when his contract ends and thereafter continue as a non-executive director on the board.

Tandon was President of the company's Separation and Thermal division when he was appointed Managing Director.
Back to News Review index page  

Widrig is new Chief Commercial Officer at BIAL
Bangalore: Bangalore International Airport Ltd, the company which is executing the new airport at Devanahalli, has now seen its second crucial appointment within the month, with the posting of its Chief Commercial Officer, Stephan Widrig.

Widrig is the second top-ranking executive to be named nearly three years after the company was set up. Widrig, like the CEO, Albert Brunner, comes from Unique Zurich Airport, one of the promoters.

As per the OMSA (operations & maintenance services agreement) it has signed with BIAL, Unique Zurich makes all the top level and other recruitments for the company. The chief operational officer would also be recruited in a few months, company officials said.

According to the OMSA, Unique is entrusted with the building up of the future organisation, operations of the airport in the initial phase as well as the future operations. Thus, it has the right to nominate the CEO, CCO/CFO and the COO. "The rest we would recruit from the local market."

However, expatriates would initially hold the three top posts. Unique Zurich holds 17 per cent equity in the Siemens-Unique Zurich-L&T consortium. The combine, which won the 1999 bid to build the public-private venture, is the 74 per cent majority partner in the project which also has AAI and the state-owned KSIIDC as minority co-promoters.

BIAL plans to raise its staff size from the current 10-12 to around 40 by the end of this year, touch 80-100 by the second year, mainly for the marketing/financial and operational posts.

Starting this year-end, Bangalore is to have flights of Air France, British Airways and also the KLM/Northwest Airline partnership.
Back to News Review index page