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HCL to create 600 more jobs in UK
New Delhi: The British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, currently visiting India, has announced that IT company HCL would create 600 jobs in a major expansion of its Armagh and Belfast contact centre operations in the UK.

Tony Blair made this announcement during the launch of the 2006 UK Trade and Investment India Business Awards at New Delhi, in the presence of Shiv Nadar, CEO and chairman of HCL Technologies.

Referring to a number of positive developments involving economic links between India and the UK, Blair highlighted the strategic importance of the UK for Asian companies seeking a springboard for developing business within the enlarged European Union.

Commenting on the development, the secretary of state in Northern Ireland, UK, Peter Hain said, "It is a credit to the quality of our workforce that Northern Ireland continues to be an attractive location for outsourced services, in the face of stiff competition from lower waged economies. This expansion, supported by Invest Northern Ireland, will create at least 400 new jobs in Armagh with the balance at either of the two locations depending on operational requirements."

HCL Technologies currently employs about 2,350 employees in the UK (2,000 of which are UK nationals), making it the largest Indian IT employer of local staff and is among the top 10 private sector employers in Northern Ireland.

With the latest expansion plans in place, HCL's manpower strength would touch 3,000 in the next one-year.

"While India is an integral part of the solution we offer our clients, far from taking jobs out of the UK, we are actually creating hundreds of new positions while investing in the UK economy. It is a model that is unique in our industry.

"But it is one, I believe, that others will have to try to replicate sooner rather than later if they are to make the most of the global opportunities that now exist in offshore business process outsourcing and the IT-led services business," Nadar said in a statement.
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BSNL to float Rs.20,000 crore tender for 40-60 million lines
Kolkata: PSU telecom major, BSNL, will be floating a tender valued at Rs20,000 crore for 40-60 million lines, out of which 3G lines alone would account for 30-40 per cent of the total.

Speaking on the sidelines of a national convention on e-governance, organised by Grameen Sanchar Society (Grasso), A K Sinha, chairman and managing director of BSNL, said the tender would be floated sometime over the next one month. He added, the cost would work out to around Rs3,800-Rs4,000 per line.

At present, the GSM subscriber base of BSNL was at 1.13 crore and the telecom major would add another two crore lines over the next four months. Sinha said, while 3G would be rolled out by March, Enhanced Data for GSM Evolution (Edge) would be launched by the end of the month.

Addressing the seminar, Union IT and communication minister, Dayanidhi Maran said, the BSNL's GSM subscriber base would grow to 32 million in four months' time. The expansion programme of BSNL would ensure on-demand mobile phones for consumers.

When asked about the BSNL-MTNL merger, Sinha said, financial consultants had submitted the report and it was now pending with the Department of Telecommunications (DoT).
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ONGC-MRPL combine win nomination for Rajasthan crude oil purchase
New Delhi: ONGC and its subsidiary Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd (MRPL) have been nominated by the ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas to get crude from Rajasthan oil fields.

Subsequent to the oil discoveries made by the Cairn Energy consortium in Barmer district of Rajasthan, one of the bidders, ONGC, through its subsidiary MRPL, had shown interest in setting up a refinery with a capacity of 7.5 million tonnes per annum. The other two bidders Indian Oil Corporation Ltd (IOC) and HPCL had also shown interest in setting up a wellhead refinery in Rajasthan.

The Ministry had asked the players to submit their proposals by June 30. Any investment plan for a refinery can be firmed up only after the Government designated its nominee.

The Cairn Energy consortium hopes to begin production from mid-2006, sources said. One of the largest onshore oil discoveries in the last 25 years, the operator of the block RJ-ON-90/1 is the Scottish exploring company, Cairn Energy. According to ONGC, this development augurs well for it. The company is optimistic that a favourable decision will soon be taken on the 7.5 mt wellhead refinery to be set up at Barmer to process this crude, jointly by ONGC and Cairn.

Cairn Energy has made twelve oil discoveries in block RJ-ON-90/1 in Rajasthan. The total in-place reserve estimates for the four oil discoveries declared commercial are about 1.2 billion barrels. The remaining eight discoveries were under evaluation. The operator has indicated a potential of 2.5 billion barrels from these discoveries.
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Country's mobile user base crosses 63mn mark in August
New Delhi: The country's mobile subscriber base has shot up by a record 2.74 million during August 2005, taking the total subscriber base in the country to 63.10 million. Also, telecom operators offering GSM-based services roped in an unprecedented 2.04 million customers during the month, a growth of 4.6 per cent over July 2005.

With this, the number of customers using GSM mobile services in the country has reached 48.914 million, showed the figures released by Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) today.

The rival Association of Unified Services Providers of India (AUSPI), representing operators offering services based on code division multiple access (CDMA) technology, reported addition of seven lakh customers last month. The number of CDMA mobile users now stands at 13.04 million. The growth in August 2005 has been 5.37 per cent as compared to 4.9 per cent during July, AUSPI said.

COAI, representing the nine GSM operators, said 75 per cent of all new mobile subscribers chose GSM during August 2005. Bharti, the country's largest private telco, added 624,209 GSM wireless users, taking its customer base to 13.413 million. It has a market share of 27.42 per cent.

Second biggest GSM firm Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) added 595,130 subscribers in August. Its mobile user base now stands at 11.319 million and the public sector giant has a market share of 23.14 per cent. Hutchison Essar Telecom added 451,236 mobile users, taking the user base to 9.296 million customers and market share to 19.01 per cent.

Among CDMA firms, Anil Ambani's Reliance Infocomm roped in 487,911 users, increasing its mobile subscriber base to 11.134 million.
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Tata Steel and Jharkhand signs MoUs for Rs.55.000 crore greenfield projects
Jamshedpur: Tata Steel and the Jharkhand government, signed four separate MoUs on Thursday, including one that will see an investment of around Rs42,000 crore in a 12 million tonne (mt) greenfield integrated steel plant at either Manoharpur or Chandil.

Another Rs11,000 crore is expected to be invested in expansion of existing projects from 5mt to 10mt, taking the total investment in the state to Rs53,000 crore.

While Manoharpur, in the heart of West Singhbhum's iron ore deposits is around 80 km by rail from Jamshedpur (East Singhbhum), Chandil, in adjacent Seraikela-Kharswan district, is about 50 km from here.

Jharkhand chief secretary PP Sharma and Tata Steel managing director B Muthuraman, in the presence of Tata group chairman Ratan Tata and a number of Cabinet ministers, signed the MoUs. Two MoUs concern cooperation in the opening of polytechnics and industrial training institutes.

The greenfield plant is to come up in two phases, the first of 6 mt per annum to be set up in 36-54 months after obtaining statutory clearances. The project includes development of iron ore mines and sources of other raw materials including coal, as also logistic linkages for the plant.
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Foreign investors to pick up equity in Spicejet
Mumbai: Indian airline Spicejet, said on Thursday that Singapore-based equity investor Temasek Holdings' subsidiary and a United Arab Emirates (UAE)-based company have agreed to invest US$20mn in the company.

Spicejet, which launched its services in the crowded Indian aviation market few months ago, will seek the required permissions for accepting fresh foreign investments, said a company statement issued to the Bombay Stock Exchange. The company will also seek shareholders' approval for allotment of equity shares on a preferential basis.

MacRitchie Investments, a wholly owned subsidiary of Temasek Holdings, and private equity firm Istithmar will make investments as per the pricing formula laid down by the Indian capital market watchdog, added the statement.

Spicejet said it had also received a "very positive response" for its proposed foreign convertible currency bond issue.
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Ashok Leyland April-Aug sales up 18 per cent
Chennai: Ashok Leyland sold 4,737 vehicles in August compared with 4,023 vehicles in the same month last year, a company press release says.

In the first five months of the year, Ashok Leyland sold 22,340 vehicles, 18 per cent more than 18,963 it sold in the same period last year, the release says.

Exports, however, fell 35 per cent to 1,691 vehicles, compared with 2,618 in the first five months of last year.
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Bharti and IBM to offer managed services
New Delhi: Bharti Tele-Ventures Ltd and IBM Global India on Thursday have announced the launch of managed services under their `Joint Go-To-Market' programme that the companies signed a year back.

The two companies will jointly develop and market telecom and IT solution to the enterprise market in India. The initial offering portfolio will include managed hosting services and business resiliency and continuity services.

Under the agreement, IBM will make available to clients, IBM India's Level III+ command centre services (including remote monitoring of servers, security operations and network operations), data centre services (including server hosting, server management and storage management), and IT help desk services. Bharti will provide end-to-end connectivity and cater to all telecom and communication requirements of clients.

The marketing of the integrated solutions and services will be front-ended by Bharti.
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