Mittal to invest Rs40,000 crore in Orissa
Bhubaneshwar: Steel tycoon Lakshmi Niwas Mittal has announced an investment of up to Rs40,000 crore in Orissa for setting up a 12-million tonne project in the state.

Mittal Steel had earlier sought a letter of comfort (LoC) from the state government of Jharkhand to identify iron ore mines. Mittal said: "Though the Jharkhand government is cooperating, we are not happy with the progress there."

He announced his investment plans immediately after meeting the State Chief Minister, Naveen Patnaik and said "We are weighing our options in Orissa. We want to move fast," he said.
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Mittal-ONGC to invest $6 billion in Nigeria
New Delhi: Mittal Energy along with state owned gas major ONGC have announced more than $6-billion investment in setting up a refinery, power plant and railway lines in Nigeria.

ONGC Mittal Energy Ltd is finalising the investment proposals for setting up a 15 million tonnes per annum export-oriented refinery, a 2,000 MW power plant and railway lines in the African country, sources said.

The refinery would have an initial capacity of 5-million tonnes and would be expanded to 15 MT, they said.

The investments are part of a mega deal between state-run Oil and Natural Gas Corporation and Nigerian government, wherein OMEL would create the infrastructure and the African country would give them oil blocks.

ONGC Mittal Energy Ltd - the joint venture company of Mittal Steel and ONGC, has recently won two lucrative oil fields in Nigeria. OMEL had won Blocks OPL 209 and OPL 212 in the Nigeria 2006 Mini Bid Round. The recoverable reserves potential estimated from a few clearly delineated prospects in the blocks are expected to be over one billion barrels of oil and oil equivalent gas.

OMEL is registered in Cyprus. ONGC Videsh Ltd, the overseas arm of ONGC, holds 49.98 per cent equity and Mittal Investment Sarl holds 48.02 per cent. The balance 2 per cent is with SBI Caps.
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ITC looks at $2.5-billion revenue from e-choupal by 2010
New Delhi: ITC hopes its rural initiative e-choupal business will generate revenues of $2.5 billion, which is almost equal to the current size of the company, by 2010. The company is also looking to expand to newer states.

The company is currently doing business worth $500 million through the e-choupals and with further expansion as well as diversification, this is going to rise to around $2.5 billion by 2010 said company officials.

The company currently has 5,600 e-choupals in six states covering 35,000 villages catering around 3.5 million farmers and it targets to have 20,000 e-choupal centres by 2010 in 15 states, targeting 1,00,000 villages and 25 million farmers.

Through the e-Choupals, which are information technology-driven initiative, ITC delivers real-time information and customised knowledge to improve the farmer's decision-making ability, thereby better aligning farm output to market demands, securing better quality, productivity and improved price discovery.
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Reliance Comm against 3G-entry fee
New Delhi: Reliance Communications controlled by Anil Ambani has said it does not support the imposition of an entry fee on third generation (3G) mobile services spectrum, and if at all any criteria is to be applied, economic and social benefits of 3G should be the benchmark.

"The authority in its recommendations on May 13, 2005, had very rightly recommended that there should be no one-time spectrum charges for allocation of IMT 2000 spectrum to the existing service providers," the company said.

"The recommendation was based on the consideration that 3G spectrum is viewed as an extension of 2G spectrum and service neutral approach as recommended by TRAI on unified licensing. This recommendation was based on sound logic and should be reiterated, "RCL said in its presentation to the TRAI.

Ratan Tata, Tata group head, had earlier recommended that an entry fee of Rs1,500 crore should be put on 3G spectrum. GSM-based cellular operators have all along been opposing any entry fee on 3G spectrum, fearing escalation of cost.
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ONGC signs gas sales agreement with Gail
New Delhi: ONGC has signed a gas sales agreement (GSA) with state utility Gail India Ltd for sale of Government-regulated natural gas. Under the agreement ONGC will sell 50 mscm, natural gas per day on take or pay agreement. The GSA would be for 15 years and the Government gas pricing order will determine the price of gas.
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ONGC may invest $3 billion in Rosneft
New Delhi: Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) is considering investing $3 billion dollars to take upto 5 per cent equity in Russian state oil firm OAO Rosneft, which is making an initial public ofering (IPO). ONGC Videsh (OVL), the overseas arm of state-owned ONGC, is in talks for participation in the $11.6-billion IPO.
The IPO values Rosneft at between $60 billion and $80 billion.

A 5 per cent stake would mean $3-4 billion investment. OVL is keen that it be given a stake in big-ticket Sakhalin-3, Vankor or Timano-Pechora oil fields in lieu of investing in the Rosneft IPO.
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License fee to be charged only on telecom services
New Delhi: Providing relief to telecom companies, TDSAT has said revenues arising only from telecom services should be included in the gross revenue of a company for the purpose of levying licence fee. It also remanded telecom regulator TRAI only to determine to the extent of various components of adjusted gross revenue bearing in mind the finding of the TDSAT relating to non-licensed activities.

The decision to levy license fee only on the telecom services would enable the operators to offer many more promotional schemes especially bundling of handsets among other schemes.

According to some analysts this could result in a saving of up to Rs 300 crore annually and the same benefit could be passed on to consumers in terms of lowering tariffs.
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Kalindee secures contract from Rail Vikas Nigam
Mumbai: Kalindee Rail Nirman Engineers has informed the BSE that it has secured a high value contract from Rail Vikas Nigam for installing signaling for doubling of railway line between Gooty-Pullampet sect ion in Andhra Pradesh. The contract value is Rs102.7 crore and is awarded to consortium comprising the company and Leighton contractors (India) Pvt Ltd; a subsidiary of Singapore based Leighton Holding Ltd.
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NLC staff resumes work
Chennai: Neyveli Lignite Corporation has informed the BSE that the union of the workers and associates of engineers and officers of the company have withdrawn their strike and have resumed their duty from the 3rd shift on July 06, 2006.
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eBay, Nasscom unveil e-Commerce guide
New Delhi: eBay India and Nasscom have launched eBay eCommerce guide. Kiran Karnik, president of Nasscom and Gautam Thakar, country manager, eBay India Marketplace, launched the guide, which aims to spread awareness and educate Internet users on the various aspects of e-Commerce. The guide spells out the basic business models in e-Commerce, the benefits to users, profiles of sellers and buyers, as well as industry statistics.
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Wipro Q1 results on July 19
Bangalore: Wipro has informed the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) that a meeting of the board of directors of the company would be held on July 18 and 19 to consider and approve the accounts for the quarter ended June 30, 2006. The company said that the board would finally approve the accounts only on July 19.
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Global oil majors bid for stake in Gujarat oil fields
Mumbai: The gas hunt is getting sharper. Oil majors including Exxon Mobil, Royal Dutch Shell, BP Plc. and Total have submitted bids to buy up to 30 per cent in the Krishna Godavari (KG) basin, government officials said. These majors are among the dozen companies that have bid to buy a stake and jointly operate Gujarat State Petroleum Corp.'s (GSPC) field in the KG basin, which may have reserves of about 20-trillion cubic feet (tcf).

Gas discoveries in the KG basin, where Reliance Industries found an estimated 35 tcf, have encouraged global oil majors, which have so far refrained from committing large investments in India, to consider upstream projects in the country.

Shares in GSPC's gas transport subsidiary, Gujarat State Petronet Ltd, rose more than 1 per cent to Rs33.95 before settling 1 per cent lower on the day at Rs33.25.
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