Ashok Leyland launches medium duty cargo carrier
Hyderabad: Ashok Leyland, the flagship company of Hinduja Group in India, has launched the Comet 1611, the first-ever medium duty vehicle in the Indian market, featuring a factory-built cab. The company claims that the vehicle offers 10 pc saving on fuel costs.

Fitted with a four-cylinder engine, the truck with fully built body options is designed to meet the growing demand in rated payload segments such as containers, parcel, courier, white goods and tankers suitable for the emerging hub-and-spoke scenario in goods transport across the country.

Vinod K Dasari, COO of Ashok Leyland, said the launch of Comet fits the changing needs of the market. With Andhra Pradesh being the biggest market, the company has launched its new range in the state.

The company is investing about Rs500 crore for capacity expansion in the existing manufacturing plant it is proposing to set up new green field plants each with an investment of about Rs1,500 crore.
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Hutch questioned on push-to-talk service
New Delhi: The government has asked Hutchison-Essar to reveal the the licence under which the company offered its push-to-talk service that was halted after objections were raised in early 2005, to ascertain whether there was any violation of licence.

Last year, telecom regulator TRAI had said Hutch's push-to-talk services were in violation of licence and had recommended the DoT take appropriate action against the company.

DoT has also imposed a penalty of Rs50 crore on Tata Teleservices, which had started the service about two years ago but had to stop after objections were raised with regard to service s viability in terms of numbering plan and payment of Access Deficit Charge (ADC), a levy paid for using other operators' networks.
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Pharma PSUs foray to make anti-AIDS drugs
New Delhi: Two pharma PSUs - Rajasthan Drugs and Pharmaceuticals (RDPL) and Hindustan Antibiotics (HAL) - are entering the fast-growing segment of anti-retroviral (ARV) drugs, used in the treatment of AIDS.

The PSUs intend to price their drugs 20 pc cheaper than the prevailing market rates which will bring down the prices of ARV drugs. The ARV market estimated at Rs3,000 crore a year.

There is already a downward pressure on the prices of ARVs as a result of Gilead Sciences, the US-based multi-national, entering into as many as seven licensing agreements with Indian companies to make and market its ARV, tenofovir.

There are four pharma PSUs in the country and all of them are sick. Apart fronm RDPL and HAL the other two are Indian Drug & Pharmaceuticals and Bengal Chemicals & Pharmaceuticals. It is also likely that these will also join the ARV fray.
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HMSI casual workers call off strike
New Delhi: The six-day long strike by contract workers of Honda Motorcycle and Scooter India (HMSI) demanding regularisation of their jobs has been called off after an agreement was reached between the labourers and the contractor early this morning. The agreement follows an order by a civil court in Gurgaon, which ordered the local administration, including police, to evict striking contract workers from the company premises at Manesar.

Officials said the details of the agreement were awaited as it was reached between the contractors and the casual workers and the management was not a party to it.

The contract workers went on strike on Tuesday demanding regularisation of employment, a few days after the HMSI management signed a three settlement with the regular employees.
The company management says that the demand of the contract workers was illegal.

Officials said, "Under the law, any contract labourer who has 240 days of continuous employment in preceding 12 months is entitled to permanent employment. In case of HMSI's striking contract workers, many had completed just about 100 days. The company also says it does not hire workers more than 180 days in a year.

HMSI is a leader in the scooter market and has also forayed into the bike market. The company has a daily production of around 1,800 scooters and 700 bikes.
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Sun Pharma to demerge I&D division into separate company
Channei: Pharma major Sun Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd plans to demerge its 'Innovation and Development' wing and make it into a separate company.

The company is awaiting a green signal from the Centre and shareholders. Shareholders of parent company will be given the same amount of shares in the new company. The decision to demerge I and D had been taken in view of the special attention needed for the wing.

Sun Pharma is looking for acquisition of more companies in United States to increase its presence there. The company has set apart Rs2,000 crore for this.

Sun Pharma has sought FDA approval for introducing 30 of its formulations in the US and four or five more would be added to the list before end of this fiscal.
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Microsoft launches Xbox 360 in India
New Delhi: Microsoft has launched its much awaited gaming console 'Xbox 360' in India priced in the range of about Rs19,990-Rs23,990. The product would be available across Microsoft's 1200 strong retail network across top 7 cities in the country, which includes Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Kolkata and Pune.

Company officials said the Xbox system would have 25 titles at the launch and 7-10 titles would be added to it every month.

Microsoft has already sold about 5 million units of Xbox 360 till June, 2006, and is expecting to sell about 10 million units worldwide by end of the year.

The worldwide Xbox 360 launch has met with great success and fanfare grossing more than the Harry Potter books or the Lord of the Rings movies.

Micosoft also announced a cricket focused gaming title 'Yuvraj Singh International Cricket 2007', which would be launched here early next year.
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Zee ties up with Motorola for mobile radio technology gaming
Mumbai: Zee Group has tied up with Motorola to launch public mobile radio trunking services in Bangalore. The proposed deal includes using Motorola's iDEN technology for this venture.

Zee TV has requested the DoT's intervention for allocation of 1 MHz of spectrum at the earliest to commence the operations.

As per the guidelines, 3MHz of spectrum has been earmarked for digital PMRT services, out of which 1 MHz shall be allocated to any applicant on a first-com first-serve basis.

The Motorola devices could useful to enterprise customers that have long depended on the reliability and range of the walkie-talkie-like push-to-talk (PTT) service on the iDEN network.

Zee plans to provide services using the Motorola-iDEN technology enabling private conversation in a closed group, which will not be charged.

The device will run voice and data services over the network while keeping the PTT VOIP service on the iDEN network.
Motorola's iDEN technology has been in use for the last 20 years across several networks in 22 countries. The US-based Nextel is the largest and most successful service provider using the technology.
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Reliance finds more gas in KG basin
Mumbai: Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) has informed the Directorate General of Hydrocarbon about another gas discovery in the Krishna-Godavari basin in the eastern coasts.

RIL has notified DHG about discovery of gas in KG-OSN-2001/1 (NELP3 block) in KG basin of eastern cost. Discovery has been named Dhirubhai 28.

The potential commercial interest of the said discovery is yet to be established.
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Coal India to invest Rs12,000-cr to increase production
Kolkata: Coal India (CIL) plans to invest about Rs12,000 crore to increase production to meet the enhanced demand of coal in the country.

The company says the demand for coal is projected to rise to 620 million tonne by 2011 giving rise to a shortage of just 40 million tonne (mt) when CIL would produce about 530 million tonne.

About 40 mt of coal is expected to come from captive mines, while the remaining production would come from Singereni Collieries. The company has taken steps to increase its production and that every year Coal India was investing around Rs2,800 to Rs3,000 crore to enhance production.
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Godrej Agrovet, Malaysian co enter into JV
Mumbai: Godrej Agrovet (GAVL) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with IJM Plantations Berhad of Malaysia on Saturday to float a new joint venture company that will initially make an investment of Rs200 crore in the Indian oil palm sector.

The joint venture would be a subsidiary of Godrej Agovet, a subsidiary of Godrej Industries Ltd. The new company is expected to invest a couple of crores to begin with.

The MoU provides the framework and establishes the areas of collaboration, that include procuring oil palm planting materials, raising nurseries, supply of seedlings and provision of agronomic assistance to oil palm farmers in India and in processing of oil-palm crop.

GAVL has about 10,000 hectares of oil palm in Andhra Pradesh, Goa and Karnataka and oil palm plantation activities have also been taken up in Gujarat, Orissa and Mizoram.
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Hyundai to invest Rs4,191-cr in India by 2008
New Delhi: South Korean auto company Hyundai has announced an investment of Rs4,191 crore in India for setting up new car and engine and transmission plants as well as a research and development centre.

Recently Hyundai's chairman and CEO, Chung Mong Koo, called on the President Dr A P J Abdul Kalam and the Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh, and shared Hyundai's investment plans for India.

Hyundai has so far invested Rs3,372 crore in India.
The company, which has made India the hub for manufacture of small car to cater to various geographies, currently has a production capacity of 3 lakh units which it will double with the addition of the second plant that is likely to be operational by the end of 2007 and involve an investment of Rs2,429 crore.
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Air Deccan to raise $100mn from overseas markets
Bangalore: Budget airline Air Deccan has signed a 'Term Sheet' to raise an additional USD 100 million from a consortium of bankers in Europe. "

A company official the money raised would be used to fund the working capital.

He said part of the money will go for aircraft funding and the rest for market development. The airline reported a loss of Rs3.40 billion for the 15-month-period from April 2005 to June 30, 2006 and a turnover of Rs13.52 billion.
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AI selects three companies for fuel hedging
Mumbai: Air-India (A-I) has chosen three additional counter parties to hedge jet fuel from the international market for its operations. These are Mitsui & Co, Societe Generale and a subsidiary of Goldman Sachs.

This month the government gave its approval to the carrier to extend its jet fuel-hedging limit from 10 per cent earlier to 25 per cent.

Jet fuel cost constitutes almost 30 per cent of the total operating costs for A-I. The airline currently has a fleet of 44 aircraft.

The airline started hedging in March this year for which Citibank was selected as the counter party.

This has, however, not made a significant difference to the fuel bill of A-I due to fluctuating fuel prices. So far, the carrier has been able to save only about Rs1 crore on its fuel bill.

Established carriers like British Airways and Lufthansa hedge up to 60 per cent of their jet fuel requirements.
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