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| Govt hikes FDI cap in civil aviation to 49 pc NEW DELHI, Oct 20: In a major reform measure, the Government today hiked Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) cap in the......more Dipping
profits pinch AHMEDABAD, Oct 20: The glitter of small mirrors matched with bright colours and intricate craftwork on chaniya.....more Govt hikes
FDI cap in NEW DELHI, Oct 20: Government today hiked Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) cap for domestic airlines from 40 to 49.....more Global
offshore NEW DELHI, Oct 20: The worldwide market for offshore it services will see a compound annual growth of 20 per cent........more |
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Panacea ties up with UK firm to make cocktail vaccine NEW DELHI, Oct 20: Domestic pharma firm panacea biotec has collaborated with British firm Cambridge Biostability........more Venture
capital flowing NEW YORK, Oct 20: The number of American venture capitalists going to India is growing and most of them are Non-Resident......more Oil prices
slide NEW YORK, Oct 20: World oil prices skidded as funds skimmed off profits from a record-breaking streak amid fears of......more Cabinet to
raise NEW DELHI, Oct 20: The Union Cabinet meeting today will approve the proposal of hiking Foreign Direct Investment..........more |
Govt hikes FDI cap in civil aviation to 49 pc NEW DELHI, Oct 20: In a major reform measure, the Government today hiked Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) cap in the civil aviation sector from 40 to 49 per cent. Announcing the cabinet decision, Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel told reporters "today’s meeting has cleared the proposal to hike FDI cap in civil aviation sector to 49 per cent." However, the proposal to allow foreign airlines to pick up equity in the domestic carriers is understood to have been dropped. According to a note submitted by the Civil Aviation Ministry, the hike in FDI limit was part of the proposals made by Finance Minister P Chidambaram in his annual budget for 2004-05, the sources said. While pegging the plan outlay for the sector at about Rs 1,621 crore, a hike of about Rs 135 crore from the revised estimate for the last fiscal, the Government had said there was an "urgent need" for infusing huge amounts of capital in this sector, they said. The proposal to hike the FDI cap had seen protests from the Left parties, extending crucial outside support to the UPA Government. (PTI) |
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Dipping profits pinch ‘chaniya choli’ sellers AHMEDABAD, Oct 20: The glitter of small mirrors matched with bright colours and intricate craftwork on chaniya cholis, a traditional garba attire, worn during Navratri, has been attracting women for the past three decades but the dipping profits is a cause of worry for several sellers of the dress in the city. Despite rapid changes in the fashion trends, the ‘chaniya cholis’ were worn by scores of people across the country and even abroad and have, in a way, set the clothing trends for ‘Navratri’. Despite stiff competition from ‘imitators’ and dipping profit margins, the vendors at ‘law garden’ in the city continue to supply chania choli’s and accompanying jewellery and accessories required to be a garba reveller at prices ranging from Rs 20 to Rs 2000. "Sale is good for two months (September-October) and the flow of people has not decreased but profit margins have dipped and the remuneration is not the same as it used to be", Pravin Gowai, whose family has been selling the traditional garba attires for 35 years from the same spot, told PTI. "It is impossible for a passerby at law garden area to ignore the glittering stuff and not visit one of the shops. But people do not pay as much as they used to for a `ghagra’ or a `choli’ even though we have not compromised on the quality at all," Gowai said. Several shopkeepers echo a similar tone about the dip in profits over the years but this has not dampend their spirits or creativity with more varieties flooding the market each year. They attribute the dip in profits to higher bargaining by the clients, sale of similar clothes in other areas and the increasing cost of materials to make the garments. "Some of us do sell cheaper stuff made in the city itself while many take more pains by going to kutch and rajkot districts to get more and new designs, fabric and accessories for each Navratri", Snehaben Gamit, a vendor said. A total of 110 shops selling the same wares are clustered in the law garden area of the city which is dotted with a number of open air eateries and posh garment shops. "There is immense competition and some of them also reduce their rates drastically to make quick money. What we lack is proper understanding and coordination", the shopkeepers said. They feel lack of an association to voice their concerns before the Government and to coordinate the sale. Apart from internal competition they also face the challenge from similar road-side shops selling similar clothes and accessories that are fast mushrooming in other parts of the city. "Several other shops have also emerged along the satellite road area and even though their wares are not half as attractive as ours...A fraction of the sale is diverted. This has to be stopped and the local administration should consider our work and make law garden an exclusive point for selling these items", Ajitbhai, a shopkeeper said. The craftsmen mainly use artwork known as ‘Bharat’, ‘Kutchi Kadhi’ and those influenced by ‘Rabari’, ‘Bharwad’ community (cowherd) on the attires and say that at times an intricately hand-embroidered Ghaghra can take upto one month to be completed. "We know that foreigners also like our work a lot and in the past many have purchased a variety of items. But this time even though we have heard that Navratri is being celebrated on an international level there have not been many foreigners shopping. Some did come with tour guides but there was not much sale", said Kakabhai, a shopkeeper, who has been in the business for the past three decades. But till the garba drums beat loud and the festival of nine nights is celebrated with the same fervour there is no denying that law garden will be the favourite road-side shopping arcade for all revellers. (PTI) |
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Govt hikes FDI cap in civil aviation to 49 pc NEW DELHI, Oct 20: Government today hiked Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) cap for domestic airlines from 40 to 49 per cent through the automatic route but barred foreign airlines from picking up direct or indirect equity. The decision will ensure that FDI investments in the domestic airlines need not go through the foreign investment promotion board, Finance Minister P Chidambaram told reporters after a cabinet meeting. The meeting also approved 100 per cent FDI in domestic airlines by NRIs and overseas corporate bodies through the automatic route. The Government would, however, not allow direct or indirect equity participation by foreign airlines. Earlier the celings on FDI in respect of air transport services (domestic airlines) stood at 40 per cent with prior Government approval of FIPB. The 100 per cent NRIs/overseas corporate bodies were earlier allowed with prior Government approval. The other conditions remain the same, he said. By raising the FDI cap, the domestic scheduled and non-scheduled airlines will get more equity from foreign investors and this would increase their competitiveness, according to a release issued after the meeting. (PTI) |
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Global offshore outsourcing
revenue to NEW DELHI, Oct 20: The worldwide market for offshore it services will see a compound annual growth of 20 per cent to reach 17 billion dollars in 2008, with India being a leading exporter of it services, research firm IDC has said. The global market for offshore IT services stood at 7 billion dollars in 2003. Spending by US customers on offshore IT services will continue to be heavily concentrated on applications. "Additionally, the countries exporting the most IT services will be India, the Philippines, and China, joined by Central and eastern Europe," IDC said in its study on "worldwide and US offshore IT services, 2004-2008 forecast: Tracking the shift in offshore spending". The study tracks IT services sales won by offshore-based companies such as Wipro technologies and Infosys technologies. It does not include the value of work being placed offshore by American service providers such as IBM and EDS. "The growth is being driven in part by the fact that some IT-related work that has been relatively immune to offshoring is starting to move overseas," IDC senior analyst Barry Mason has said. "We’re starting to see offshore firms move up the value chain. It consulting represents one new market that offshore firms are aggressively pursuing," he said. Customers’ continued need to look to offshore as a resource from which to procure IT services as part of their overall sourcing requirements is growing as a share of the total IT services market, said the study. The market is also expanding from traditional IT services, such as application development and maintenance, to areas traditionally limited to being delivered locally, idc said. As offshore companies expand, they are opening offices in the United States and hiring locally. "There is still a lot of work that requires a presence close to the client," Mr Mason added. (UNI) |
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Panacea ties up with UK firm to make cocktail vaccine NEW DELHI, Oct 20: Domestic pharma firm panacea biotec has collaborated with British firm Cambridge Biostability Ltd (CBL) for a new technology to manufacture a five-in-one childhood vaccine. Panacea biotec will use CBL’s technology to make the cocktail vaccine against measles, rubella, tetanus, whooping cough and diphtheria. British scientists have developed a new way of storing childhood vaccines without refrigeration in a move that could slash costs and increase access to life-savings shots in poor countries. The British Government has already said it would provide 9,50,000 pounds to fund production of the childhood vaccine. Currently, childhood vaccines have to be kept cold to remain potent, which contributes significantly to the 16.7 pounds cost for each child. The new system embeds the vaccines in tiny sugar beads, which allows them to be stored without refrigeration until needed. The technology is based on the same process that allows some plants to remain in a desiccated state for hundreds of years and then return to life. Savings from removing the "cold chain" from vaccine programmes would enable the vaccination of an additional 10 million children worldwide within existing budgets, according to the project’s backers. (UNI) |
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Venture capital flowing into India: Report NEW YORK, Oct 20: The number of American venture capitalists going to India is growing and most of them are Non-Resident Indians (NRIs), according to a news report. "More and more, sand hill road money is moving to India," Indian-American multimillionaire venture capitalist Vinod Dham told the Wall Street journal. "It’s clear that India’s time has come." Sand Hill Road is a key location in California’s Silicon Valley, the center of America’s technology industry and venture capitalists. The news article - with a color photograph of Lord Ganesh (a rarity in the newspaper) and a chart depicting rise in venture capital investment — appeared on the front page of a section titled money and investing. Mr Dham, who worked at intel corp. For 16 years as a Chief Engineer, supervised the creation of a series of chips. Now his company, new path ventures oversees 40 million dollars allotted for the creation of "cross-border" companies in the United States and India. For about 20 years, NRIs have played a key role in silicon valley’s progress. They have occupied important positions at sun microsystems, Juniper networks and Hotmail Corp., which is now part of microsoft corp. They also have been in senior posts in venture capital firms like Kleiner Perkins Caulfield and byers and norwest venture partners. These influential NRIs have focused on their work and businesses for a majority of those years. But in recent years, the situation has changed, the newspaper pointed out. Part of the reason was the lukewarm attitude of the successive Indian Governments toward NRIs. India’s economic liberalisation and the growth of the internet and reduction in telecommunications costs have made things easier for those NRIs interested in investing in India. In Santa Clara, Calif., the Indus entrepreneurs - a 12-year-old global Indian networking group known as tie - meets frequently to assess their investments in India, where it has 13 offices. "Biotech firms in Boston have to have a position in China and India now," Mr Hemang Dave, a Boston investor and tie member who helped organise a trade visit to Bangalore, Mumbai and New Delhi this month for 25 venture capitalists and senior executives. Celerity ventures, Mr Dave’s firm, recently invested in a Mumbai company. The newspaper also cited other examples like Sumir Chadha of Westbridge capital partners Promod Haque of norwest venture partners Vinod Khosla of Kleiner Perkins and Vish Mishra of clearstone venture partners. All of them are doing business in India or set up ventures with domestic partners. The newspaper summed up the trend by quoting Dham, who left intel nine years ago. "It’s payback time for us," he said. (UNI) |
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Oil prices slide as investors skim off profits NEW YORK, Oct 20: World oil prices skidded as funds skimmed off profits from a record-breaking streak amid fears of a cooling in super-heated global demand. New York’s main contract, light sweet crude for delivery in November, fell 38 cents to 53.29 dollars a barrel yesterday. The price has slumped for two days after briefly touching a record 55.33 dollars Monday. Brent north sea crude oil for December delivery slipped 14 cents to 48.77 dollars. "There was some heavy fund profit-taking," said Refco market analyst Marshall Steeves. Investors widely expected a snapshot of US commercial crude oil inventories, due yesterday, to show a weekly gain of two million barrels, Steeves said. "It’s just profit-taking," agreed investec securities analyst Bruce Evers in London. "There are also a few concerns about the high oil price affecting economic growth, though any real impact is yet to be seen," he added, noting two recent reports had also poilted to lower-than-expected oil demand next year. The organization of petroleum exporting countries on Monday pared down its growth projection for 2005 oil demand by 130,000 barrels a day (BPD) to 1.61 millon BPD as high prices deter consumption. And the Paris-based international energy agency forecast last week that global oil demand growth would slow sharply next year to 1.45 million bpd, or 1.8 per cent, from 2.71 million, or 3.4 per cent, this year. Nevertheless, several analysts said prices were expected to rise again soon. (AFP) |
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Cabinet to raise FDI limit in aviation to 49 pc NEW DELHI, Oct 20: The Union Cabinet meeting today will approve the proposal of hiking Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) limit in civil aviation sector from 40 to 49 per cent. The present policy allows 40 per cent foreign investment in airlines but bars foreign airlines from picking up stakes. Government officials said the new FDI norms will come with conditions to ensure that international airlines do not have proxy control of Indian entities. One of the safeguards that the Government wants to put in is preventing international airlines from taking traffic away from India by diverting their hubs. Officials said there is enough expertise — both in private and public sectors — to run the airlines in a professional manner. A recommendatory note circulated recently by the Finance Ministry is understood to have favoured allowing foreign airlines to invest in the Indian domestic aviation sector through the automatic route. (UNI) |
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S Korea C Bank denies it sees ‘05 growth of 4.3 pc SEOUL, Oct 20: South Korea’s central bank denied on Wednesday media reports that it has forecast economic growth would dip to a low as 4.3 percent in 2005 from about 5 percent forecast for this year. The Finance Ministry has said it would do its best to help South Korea’s economy, the third largest in Asia, to achieve about 5 percent growth in 2005 despite threats from high oil price and a two-year slump in domestic consumption. "We have not made or given such forecasts to the Finance Ministry. The reports are groundless," said Kim-Myung-Kee, a deputy Director of the Bank of Korea’s Research Department. The Joongang Ilbo daily and MBN cable television reported the bank has forecast in a report to the Finance Ministry that gross domestic product growth would be 4.6 percent at most in 2005 and could even slow to 4.3 percent if oil traded 10 percent higher. Kim said the bank expected to unveil its first economic growth forecasts for next year after its last monthly monetary policy committee meeting of this year due on Dec 9. The bank unexpectedly cut interest rates by a quarter of a percentage point in August to a record low to boost the economy, but opted to leave rates steady this month despite expectations by economists for another cut. Both the Finance Minister and the Central Bank Governor told Parliament last week firmer oil prices and a delayed recovery in domestic demand could push next year’s economic growth below 5 percent, but gave no specific numbers. Separately, the bank said in a statement its Governor agreed with scholars and researchers at a regular meeting that corporate investment should be boosted by the further removal of red tape and by keeping down wage increases. (AGENCIES) |
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Mumbai paid Rs 2,200-cr service tax last year MUMBAI, Oct 20: Mumbai is always in the good books of the tax authorities as the tax net is widening. Of the total nationwide collection of Rs 9,000-crore of service tax last year, Mumbai alone accounted for Rs 2,200-crore. Speaking at a function organised by Indian Merchants’ Chamber (IMC) here, Chief Commissioner of Central Excise K K Agarwal said that there was 96 per cent growth in the service tax collection in the Mumbai in last year. "This year we expect to acheive at least a further growth of 100 per cent", he said. Meanwhile, Mr Agarwal appealed to the service tax assessees to avail full benefit of the two ongoing ‘tax payer friendly’ schemes for settling their tax liabilities before the expiry of the schemes soon. The first ‘tax payer friendly’ scheme, which would be operative till October 31, would provide instantaneous registration facilities for unregistered units, and accept declarations of self-assessment made by them without any hassles. The second one would be operative till November 30 which will facilitate service tax assessees who were involved in tortuous litigations to come out clean and expeditiously settle their disputes. "We will give a sympathetic hearing to their cases and help settle them by taking a realistic view", Mr Agarwal said. At the same time, IMC vice president Rajesh Kapadia urged the tax department to extend the tenure of the scheme by an additional one or two months for providing facilities to honest tax assessees desiring into action because most tax practitioners at this juncture were preoccupied with filing income-tax returns. "Extension of the schemes’s tenure would also enhance Government revenues", he added. (UNI) |
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Varun shipping mulls acquiring second hand vessels MUMBAI, Oct 20: Excellent second hand vessel market conditions and shipyards running full capacity has prompted leading Indian shipping line Varun shipping to turn towards the option of acquiring the second hand vessels. "There is no alternative for new building as the ship yards are booked upto 2006-07. They are running in full capacity. On the contrary, the second hand vessel market is turning excellent and the sentiments are good", a company official told UNI. Varun shipping has entered into a Memorandum of Agreement for the acquisition of its seventh LPG carrier which will be delivered in the current quarter. Meanwhile, the company has also entered into memorandum of agreements for sale of its older vessels mt Shakti Doot and Mt Vishwa Doot. The officials said,"the company would be acquiring two-three vessels but all would be second hand vessels. We are also exploring the idea of going for the new buildings in future". Interestingly, Varun shipping is currently planning an additional investment of approximately US 70 million to acquire modern vessels in the hydro carbon sector out of their rights issue. The company’s right issue of 36,261,591 equity shares of Rs 10 each for cash at a premium of Rs 8 per share aggregating to Rs 62.57-crore in the ratio of one equity share for every two equity shares held has opened for subscription on October 18, 2004. In addition, Varun shipping is also planning to issue Singapore Depositories Receipts (SDRs) to be listed in the Singapore Stock Exchange. (UNI) LIC bids for NTPC IPO, invests Rs 400 cr NEW DELHI, Oct 20: Life Insurance Corp (LIC) has bid for 7.9 per cent of the NTPC IPO size, investing around Rs 400 crore in the issue offered at Rs 62 per share of Rs 10 face value. "LIC has set aside Rs 8,000 crore for investing in equities during this fiscal," LIC executive director D S Bhargava said here. Part of the proposed outlay has already been invested in the over Rs 5,000 crore TCS mega IPO. LIC bid for 8 per cent of the TCS issue size for about 44 lakh shares, against the offer size of 5.54 crore equity shares. LIC invsted Rs 6377 crore in equities last fiscal, he added. The 100 per cent book building NTPC IPO was oversubscribed by over 12 times when it closed on October 14. (UNI) |
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