Volkswagen may review India plans
Pune: German auto giant Volkswagen AG is reviewing its India plans and has deferred the on-site ceremony at Chakan scheduled for April 4 and also cancelled a supplier meet slated for mid-May.

According to sources, a team from a German event management company, which was in Pune to plan for and organise the May event, received instruction over the weekend that the service would not be required as the programme stood cancelled. It did not offer any fresh dates. The earlier plan was also to fly in a dozen or so of Volkswagen's top management team, including members of the board and their wives, for a high profile launch on April 4 morning at the site of the proposed plant followed by a grand banquet at a city hotel later that night for around 150 invitees. The new chief executive officer of the company, Dr Martin Winterkorn, is said to be re-examining all plans for the company made by his predecessor, Bernd Pischetsrieder, to bring out models suited to the Indian market.

Volkswagen was to set up a facility to manufacture 1,10,000 cars annually at Chakan, and make an investment of Rs2,400 crore.
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Steel cos may raise prices
New Delhi: Steel companies may raise steel prices due to a supply-demand mismatch that has developed in select steel products during the past few weeks. Steel makers had increased the prices immediately after the Budget and had later rolled them back following the intervention of the Finance Minister, Mr P. Chidambaram.

Primary steel manufacturing industry sources said there were shortages ranging between 10 and 15 per cent in heavy plates that are 16 cm thick or more, there is almost a 15 per cent short supply in the northern region. And given the weight, their imports are also expensive said officials in steel companies.

These heavy plates are mostly used in the manufacture of heavy machineries such as dredgers, excavators, mining machineries, army tanks and power equipment. They are also extensively used in the Metro railway construction, company officials said.

Current supplies are also also 10 to 15 per cent lower than demand in hot-rolled coils of width 2mm and less. The third group of steel products where a large number of small players are involved is reinforced bars used in construction. Industry officials said that the supply was lower by around 10-15 per cent across the northern region, which is seeing a construction boom.
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Glenmark acquiring Czech co Medicamenta
Mumbai: Glenmark Pharmaceuticals will acquire more than 90 per cent stake in Czech company Medicamenta, for an undisclosed amount. The agreement for the deal was concluded through Glenmark Holdings SA, the wholly-owned Swiss subsidiary of Glenmark Pharmaceuticals.

Under the Czech law, a holding of over 90 per cent shares in a company will trigger a mandatory takeover bid for the remaining shares, a Glenmark company release said on Monday.

Medicamenta, which has sales and marketing operations in the Czech Republic and Slovakia, would give Glenmark a strategic entry point to two of the fastest growing and attractive markets of Europe, said the statement. Glenmark will use Medicamenta's plant in Vysoke Myto to provide additional manufacturing, packaging and warehousing for its European business.
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Kirloskar Oil Engines to set up greenfield project for diesel engines
Mumbai: Kirloskar Oil Engines, part of the Rs4,500-crore Kirloskar Group, plans to set up a Rs550 crore greenfield project to manufacture diesel generator sets and engines, at Kagal near Kolhapur in Maharashtra.

Atul Kirloskar, chairman and managing director of Kirloskar Oil, said production of generator sets would commence in the export unit by September and production of engines will start by April 2008. The export-oriented diesel generator sets would manufacture 12,000 diesel sets per annum.

The unit is expected to achieve a turnover of Rs300 crore in the first year of operation and would be funded up to Rs350 crore by debt and Rs200 crore by internal accruals. The company is looking at Africa and West Asian markets for exports.
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Avaya Globalconnect ties up with Microsoft
Hyderabad: Avaya Globalconnect (AGL), a communication solutions provider, has entered into a tie-up with Microsoft for customer relationship management (CRM) solutions. With the growing demand for CRM in BPOs, KPO and other enterprises, Microsoft is looking at positioning its latest offering, Microsoft Dynamics CRM, in India.

AGL and Microsoft Dynamics would help create personalied customer interactions across an organisation. The information is delivered in real time across any communication channel to achieve proven and measurable business success.
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Hyundai to launch CNG Santro
Chennai: Hyundai Motor India has announced plans to roll out a CNG version of its bread-and-butter hatchback model Santro by this year-end or early 2008.

The car would have a factory fitted CNG kit and also the option of a second fuel (petrol) and would be manufactured at the company's existing plant here.

The CNG version of Santro would be a bi-fuel car. The company also plans to launch another small car in the last quarter of this year.

On export of Getz Prime, he said this is the third car after Santro (Atoz Prime) and Accent to be exported from India to the European market. Getz Prime, 4,000 units of which were shipped to Germany today, would soon be launched in India too, he added.

HMIL expects to ship 40,000 units of the car in the current fiscal and increase the export of the 'Made in India' Getz to 1,00,000 units by 2008. He also said Hyundai would invest an additional Rs4,000 crore in India by 2010. The current level of investment of the Korean car major was about Rs3,500 crore, a company official said. The company would export 1,35,000 units of the Getz Prime this year, against 1,13,000 units shipped last year.
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Ashok Leyland to set up unit in UAE
New Delhi: Hinduja Group plan to invest Rs1,200 crore in property development business in the UAE, while the group's flagship company Ashok Leyland intends to set up a commercial vehicle manufacturing unit in Dubai.

Hinduja Group (India) chairman Ashok P Hinduja said the details of the new manufacturing project were being worked out.
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Reliance sees fuel sales fall 10 per cent in January
New Delhi: Reliance Industries (RIL) saw a 10 per cent drop in fuel sales in January to 1.256 million tonnes as against 1.399 million tonnes a year ago while the public sector firms recorded robust growth.

In April-January, RIL saw a 5.4 per cent dip in sales to 11.22 million tonnes as diesel sales dropped 41.9 per cent to 1.62 million tonnes. State-run Indian Oil Corp (IOC), Bharat Petroleum and Hindustan Petroleum are entitled to compensation from the Government in the form of oil bonds for selling fuel below their cost of production. Private retailers such as Reliance are not party to the c ompensation mechanism.

IOC posted a 10.9 per cent rise in sales to 4.46 million tonnes in January and 4.4 per cent to 41.43 million tonnes in April-January. The company saw a 15 per cent growth in diesel sales to 1.68 million tonnes while petrol sales rose 9.3 per cent to 265, 100 tonnes. BPCL also registered an impressive 9.7 per cent sales growth in January to 2.07 million tonnes and by 7.3 per cent in April-January to 19.2 million tonnes. HPCL recorded 8.5 per cent sales growth in January to 1.71 million tonnes and 7 per cent in April- January to 16.26 million tonnes.
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Nagarjuna Construction gets orders worth Rs302 crore
Mumbai: Nagarjuna Construction Co. has secured three orders worth Rs302 crore, which includes a water supply project order worth Rs246 crore.
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Godrej enters into JV with Sweden's SCA Hygiene
Mumbai: Godrej Consumer Products has formed an equal joint venture with Sweden's SCA Hygiene Products AB to make sanitary napkins and diapers. The JV named, Godrej SCA Hygiene Ltd., will have an equity investment of Rs20 crore ($4.6 million) equally shared by the two firms, a statement from the company said. SCA will bring in its diaper brands Libero and Up&Go and female hygiene product brands such as Libresse and Nana into India.
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Videocon to set up manufacturing unit in Dubai
New Delhi: Videocon Group is considering setting up a new manufacturing unit for consumer durables in Dubai. The company said it had been invited by the Prime Minister Of UAE and ruler of Dubai H H Shaikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Makhtoum to set up a unit in Dubai.

The company already has a unit in Oman.
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Coke, Pepsi directed to file replies on pesticide issue
New Delhi: The Supreme Court has directed soft drink makers Pepsico and Coca Cola to file their replies within six weeks of the N K Ganguly Committee report that concluded cola drinks contained pesticide residues.

This was in reply to a public interest litigation filed by a civil society group - Centre for Public Interest. The NGO has also been directed to file its reply. The petitioner had contended that cola drinks were harmful for human consumption.

The Ganguly committee had early this month filed an affidavit in the Supreme Court, admitting that pesticide residues were found in cola drinks.
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RComm ties up with Intrex for rail ticket booking
New Delhi: Reliance Communications has tied up with Essel Group compamy Intrex India to offer a service that will enable users to book railway tickets through mobile phones with the use of ItzCash cards.

ItzCash is a multi-purpose pre-paid card from Essel Group and is available through a pan-India distribution network, a company press release said here.

The company already has a tie up with Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation for booking railway tickets through mobile phones with credit cards.
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BT expands services in India
New Delhi: Global communications solutions and services provider British Telecom plans to enhance its services for corporate customers in India and abroad. BT was awarded an ILD and NLD licence last month and said it has activated a new node in Chennai establishing its Internet Protocol backbone in India to expand services.

BT also activated a multi-protocol label switching (MPLS) node in Chennai and as part of its 21st Century Network (21CN) programme, the new node establishes BT's IP backbone in India and expands services, a company press release said.

An additional node in Bangalore and a new node in Hyderabad are also scheduled to go live this month, with other nodes due for launch this year in Mumbai, Pune and Kolkata.

These nodes will provide greater access to and from the Indian facilities of these companies, connecting them to markets across the world.
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Posco hurdles under clearance: Orissa govt
New Delhi: The Orissa government has said it would clear hurdles to South Korean steel giant Posco's Rs52,000 crore plant in the within the next three months, amid a possible review of investment by the steel-maker.

The government said the steel giant has already been given 1,100 acres of land for its proposed 12 million tonne integrated steel plant in Jagatsinghpur district.

He reasoned that misgivings among the people on the project site were being addressed, and hoped that Posco would commence work on its project in due course.

Posco was, last week, reported to be reviewing its India investment plans owing to problems on the ground. The company is believed to have told the Centre and the Orissa government that "if matters were not sorted out within the next two-three months, then it could re-consider its investment plans in the country."
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DLF, Al Nakheel to set up townships in Mumbai, Delhi
New Delhi: DLF and a large property developer from the UAE, Nakheel, have signed a 50:50 joint venture for two integrated townships spread across 40,000 acres in India with an initial investment of $10 billion.

Nakheel is run as a private commercial enterprise under the Dubai government and is controlled by Dubai World. Nakheel is currently developing 17 major projects worth more than $30 billion, and will make its foray into India with DLF. Its portfolio includes several land reclamation projects in Dubai such as The Palms and the Dubai Waterfront.

A source close to the development had earlier said that the joint venture would develop 20,000 acres each in Gurgaon (beyond Manesar and in conformity with the draft Master Plan) and in Maharashtra between Mumbai and Pune. Construction of the projects is expected to begin this year and the first phase of the development is targeted to finish in three years.

The cost of the land would comprise nearly 40 pc of the $10 billion investment. Roughly 70 pc of the land has been acquired by DLF.
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Hindujas tie up with Dubai World for $1bn health biz
New Delhi: The Hinduja Group has entered into a deal with Dubai World, the holding company that manages and supervises the portfolio of businesses and projects for the Dubai government, for massive infrastructrure development projects in Dubai and India.

Dubai World will partner Hindujas in their attempt to set up a chain of hospitals across India. The initial investment in the healthcare project is Rs4,400 crore ($1 billion) that is to be equally contributed by the partners.

On the healthcare plans, Hinduja said that the 51:49 JV with Limitless LLC (another Dubai World subsidiary) will initially set up hospitals in cities like Delhi, Hyderabad, Mumbai and Bangalore. The Hinduja hospital chain is to have its presence in all major cities of the country. The healthcare investments of the group will come through it's listed entity in India i.e, Hinduja TMT. The initial investment will aim at having facilities with a cumulative capacity of 2,000 beds in two-three years, he added.
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