Maruti launches Alto Xfun
New Delhi: Maruti Udyog has launched a limited edition new variant of the Alto model that will be costlier by about Rs8,000 from the existing model. A company official said the `Alto Xfun' would come in two variants LX and LXi, priced at Rs2.77 lakh and Rs2.95 lakh (ex-showroom Delhi) respectively.

The new Alto comes with added features like two-tone interiors, new body graphics, body coloured wheel cap and bumpers. The launch of the new limited edition of Alto Xfun is to celebrate the model's sales of five lakh units in a span of six years.
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Texmaco gets Rs145-cr order from Concor
New Delhi: KK Birla group company Texmaco has received an order to supply 900 flat wagons to Container Corporation of India Ltd (Concor). The value for these wagons is at Rs145 crore, including duties and taxes. The company would supply 20 rakes comprising 900 bogie container flat wagons (BLC) valued around Rs145 crore including duties and taxes, according to the company. However, this excludes the value of wheels, which Concor will provide to Texmaco as free-supply items. The wheels would cost about Rs 56 crore, the release added. With this order, Texmaco has orders for 44 rakes (2,000 BLC wagons) and the company's current order book stands at Rs1,500 crore including value of free-supply items.
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Ranbaxy wins US appeals court case over Simvastatin
New Delhi: A US Court of Appeal has upheld a district court's ruling granting Ranbaxy a 180-day exclusivity on the 80 mg strength of the anti-cholesterol drug, Simvastatin (the generic form of Merck's blockbuster drug, Zocor).

The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit reaffirmed an earlier order by a District Court on Simvastatin, which had directed the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to allow Ranbaxy to launch the generic versions of Zocor in June and retain an exclusivity period of 180 days along with Israel's Teva Pharmaceuticals, as both companies had first-to-file status with the FDA across dosage forms.

Zocor's sales had diminished after the expiry. However, because Merck had delisted the patents before the expiry, the FDA had prohibited any company from obtaining a six-month exclusivity period generic Zocor.

Teva and Ranbaxy took the FDA to federal court and in April had won a ruling for a 180-day period of exclusivity. FDA made an appeal against the ruling, resulting in Tuesday's ruling where the US Court of Appeals upheld the district court's verdict.
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Global Motors to begin manufacturing two-wheelers in Bengal
New Delhi: Gobal Motors, a joint venture between China-based Xenitus Group and Guangzhou Motors company, will soon begin manufacturing two-wheelers in West Bengal, with a capacity of 20,000 pieces of two wheelers each month. The plant capacity would be increased depending upon the demand.

Global Motors plans to enter the two-wheeler market with the launch of four variants of its motorbikes, Xoom, in 100cc, 125cc, 150cc and 180cc, sizes in keeping with the requirements of the Indian market.

Guangzhou Motors will provide the joint venture company with technical support to set up the assembly line, production process, service network, product strategy control, marketing and selling. Besides motorbikes, the company also has plans of launching gearless scooters in India soon.
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Carraro to invest Rs200-cr more in India
Pune: Carraro SpA of Italy plans to invest Rs200 crore more in India which includes a Rs120 crore all-cash buyout of Escort's 49 per cent stake in Carraro India, making it a wholly owned subsidiary of the Italian group.

Mario Carraro, chairman of the Carraro group has also announced setting up of the group's global design centre for technical and engineering design in Pune, the first such centre for the group in Asia and the sixth in the world.

The centre will employ about 75 engineers in the mechanical and electronics space over the next year and will conduct value-added engineering work including virtual assembly testing and virtual prototyping among others.

The Italian group, meanwhile, is betting big on the India growth story and is all set to manufacture new product lines in the country to develop it into a strategic export hub.

The group has invested Rs310 crore in India in less than two years and is on the verge of ramping up operations significantly.

The Carraro group is all set to manufacture industrial transmissions in the country and is setting up a plant for this. The plant is expected to go into production by October 2007. The company's existing mechanical transmissions business in India is also being ramped up from 20,000 units to 30,000 units.

The group companies, Carraro India and Turbo Gears, are expected to achieve total sales of Rs266 crore by end-2006 and double that to reach an estimated Rs570 crore by 2009.

Carraro India's operations are based in Ranjangaon, Pune. The company specialises in the manufacture of transmissions, axles and power trains for tractors for the domestic and export markets.
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TVS Motor to launch four-stroke scooters
Bangalore: TVS Motor is planning to launch a 100cc plus four-stroke scooter to take on Honda Activa and Kinetic 4S.

It also plans to launch a new motorcycle in the 125cc executive segment to grow its sales. This is the second time the company is entering this category. TVS was forced to exit the segment after its product failed to notch up good numbers.

According to senior officials the main reason for launching a 100cc plus scooter was because the 90cc TVS Scooty was associated with women and hence was not able to rope in male customers. The entry into the segment could happen sooner than expected. The scooter segment forms 10 per cent of the two-wheeler market whose size in volume terms is between 5 lakh units and 6 lakh units per month.

TVS sells between 22,000 units and 25,000 units of Scooty every month. The company says the growth in this segment has stagnated and it is the right time to launch a new product, which could shake up the market.

The company has launched TVS Assurance, a five-year warranty scheme for its motorcycle, TVS StaR, and an engine oil brand, TVS TRU4. The five-year warranty is transferable even if the motorcycle is sold to another customer. The scheme is open to both new and existing customers.
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Genpact is largest employer in BPO sector
New Delhi: Genpact, with employee strength of 19,700, is listed by Dun & Bradstreet (D&B) as the largest employer among Indian ITES and BPO companies. Accenture Services followed at second place with 19,000 employees while Wipro BPO with about 12,900 stood at third place. IBM Daksh was fourth with 10,000 employees.

The listing has been done on the basis of employee size, number of delivery centres and verticals across which the company operates.

D&B's list of the companies has increased to 193 from 155 last year. This has been attributed to growth of the IT sector resulting in more companies matching their listing criteria.

The report estimates banking and insurance verticals constitute about 75 per cent of ITES and BPO exports, followed by healthcare at 46 per cent and telecom services at 40 per cent. Further, the report reckons 18 per cent delivery centres in Bangalore, followed by Mumbai and Chennai at 17 and 16 per cent respectively. The remaining 17 per cent is concentrated at tier two cities such as Pune, Ahmedabad and Chandigarh.
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Polaris launches banking product in US
Chennai: Chennai-based IT company Polaris Software Lab has launched its Intellect Front Office in the US. The product, which offers banks a 360-degree view of their customers, integrates 20 relationship-driven applications and brings it to a single desktop.

For instance, a bank's Teller is enabled with a single window operation that provides the capability to service divergent needs of the customer, faster and better. The product was unveiled in Las Vegas at the BAI Retail Delivery Conference & Expo, says a company press release.
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MSN Hotmail offers 1GB storage limit
Chennai: Microsoft Corp has announced a global storage upgrade for MSN Hotmail accounts by increasing the storage limit from 250 MB to 1 GB. It has also increased the expiration period for inactive accounts from 30 days to 60 days for accounts that are more than two years old.

The first major player to move into the 1 GB storage limit league was Google's Gmail (in April 2004), and then raised it to 2 GB in April 2005. Yahoo! initially extended its email storage to 100 MB and then to 1 GB. Rediff extended its storage to 1 GB as well. Earlier, Hotmail had increased its storage limit to 25 MB and then to 250 MB.

Windows Live Mail, the next generation of Web mail from Microsoft, is currently in Beta. It has been built from the ground up to be faster, safer and simpler. Windows Live Mail will feature 2 GB storage space, 120 days expiration period, anti-phishing features, address autocomplete, and drag-and-drop functionality making it easier to read, send, and organise email messages.

The storage upgrade, which began rolling out in Asia on November 7, will affect Hotmail users in ten markets in the region including Australia, China, India, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Taiwan, Thailand and Singapore. There are more than 260 million active MSN Hotmail accounts worldwide.
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Satyam starts third centre in China
Hyderabad: Satyam Computer Services has opened 100-seater development centre in the Guangzhou Software Park, China, which has the potential to scale up to 1,000 employees by 2008-end.

The new centre strengthens Satyam's presence in China, which includes operations in Shanghai, Beijing and Dalian. About 400 associates of which 97 per cent are Chinese work across technologies. Guangzhou is perceived as ideal nearshore location for our Hong Kong and Japanese clients who have invested in southern China. Satyam plans to further grow the team size to 1,000 by the end of 2008. The company indicated that the growth plan envisages increasing headcount to 3,000 associates and setting up of two more nearshore centres in Dalian and Beijing.
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Reliance Comm ties up with laptop cos for wireless cards
New Delhi: Reliance Communications is tying-up with laptop manufacturers Hewlett Packard, Lenovo and HCL to bundle its wireless data card. Reliance has five lakh Internet subscribers and is targeting to double its user base by fiscal end.

The company claims to be the largest Wireless Internet Service provider in the country.

The data cards branded "R Connect" has seen an uptake of 12,000 to 14,000 units a months over the last four months. According to industry estimates, HP, Lenevo and HCL have combined sales of close to 60,000 laptop units every month. Through the alliance, Reliance expects the "R Connect" monthly sales to double from the current sales numbers.

The company plans to promote Internet access on mobile phones. Reliance has close to eight million mobile users who have phones with Internet capabilities. Plans are afoot to promote handsets with in-built modems that can be used to access Internet.

Wireless Internet is seen to be the next big thing in telecom with technologies such as Wi-Max, 3G and CDMA 1X. Internet penetration in India is mainly concentrated in the top 10 cities, which account for 70 per cent of the total users. Reliance is therefore targeting Category B and C circles where the Internet penetration is low and the traditional dial-up wire line speeds are poor.
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Taj plans five-star hotel in Gurgaon
Gurgaon: The Taj Group of Hotels is considering building a 200-room five-star hotel in Gurgaon. The company is said to have inked a land deal for around 7 acres on Gurgaon's Golf road, for roughly Rs50 crore.

The overall investment in the entire project may cost the company well in the excess of Rs150 crore. According to sources in the Haryana Urban Development Authority (HUDA), the initial blueprint is already complete and the company is likely to start construction work in the next 6-9 months. In fact, sources say the land that the Taj group has bought was initially auctioned by HUDA six months ago.

Industry experts say that the land is strategically located for a hospitality project. Given the fact that the area is a corporate hub, particularly for MNCs, it has only two five-star hotels — Bristol and Trident Hilton. As such, room rents in the two hotels are significantly higher than the hotels in Delhi.

The Taj group seems to taking advantage of the demand-supply gap in Gurgaon. Some other international chains, including the Intercontinental, are set to have a presence in Gurgaon.
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Companies may have to keep spares alive after model withdrawal
New Delhi: According to a new law suggested in the 10-year automotive mission plan which is also being finalised by the government automobile manufacturers may have to provide maintenance and spare parts for vehicles for five years after they withdraw the model or shut shop.

In the past Daewoo Motors Ltd (which sold the Matiz and the Cielo), Premier Automobiles (Premier Padmini and 118NE), Hero Puch Ltd (mopeds) and scooter manufacturer LML have either closed shop or gone under.

The Federation of Automobile Dealers' Associations has been receiving complaints from Matiz and Hero Puch owners on spares and service and has been referring them to different government agencies. To govern the obligation among manufacturers, dealers and customers, the federation has been pushing for such a law.

Binod Agarwal, president of the federation said automobile manufacturers will also have to improve their service and expand dealership networks to meet customer expectations.

If an automobile company closes or discontinues its service operations, the supply chain of dealers-vendors-retailers will ensure services to customers.

Taking a cue from similar laws in the US and the UK, manufacturers will ensure service and spare supplies for a stipulated period and abrupt closure of automobile companies could invite hefty fines and seizure of assets by the government.
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