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Friday,
May 4, 2001, Chandigarh, India  
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Sinha attacks prophets of doom
ICICI’s net drops 55 pc
He eyes success after failure
Cellular & WLL licences can’t be different: Modi |
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‘Give exports top priority’ Markfed to buy paddy
transplanters Zap grows 125 per cent in
region Swiss ice cream in Chandigarh Global meltdown chances
slim Kale Consult hopes for $20 m
business
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Sinha
attacks prophets of doom
New Delhi, May 3 “Others (countries) are confident, the world is confident, but we are not confident’’ Sinha remarked when asked whether India will sustain its growth rate in the face of the slowdown of the US economy. He did not anticipate any serious impact on the Indian economy due to the US slowdown, Sinha told reporters on his return here from the USA after attending the annual Fund-Bank meeting. Noting that the USA’s annualised growth rate had stood at 2 per cent instead of an abysmal 1 per cent forecast, Sinha said this would have “very minimal’’ impact on the Indian economy. It was regrettable, he said, that while people abroad were very buoyant about the Indian economy, the same did not hold good within the country where certain quarters remained pessimistic about the economic outlook for India. Sinha declined to comment on the US decision to put India on the watchlist under Super 301, saying it was for the Commerce Ministry to react. The US government had on Tuesday announced it was placing India, EU, Japan and some other countries on the watchlist of Super 301 and Special 301 provisions of its trade law for imposing “unfair” trade barriers on Amercian products or for violation of intellectual property rights. On the prospects of a new round of negotiations at the WTO, Sinha said India had already stated at Seattle and elswhere that it was opposed to entry into the trade round of any issue which is a non-trade issue and which is going to create new non-tariff barriers. “Nobody in India or abroad be in any doubt about India’s position. We have talked about implementational issues which have to be tackled before we go into the new round. All that is India’s stated position”, Sinha said on the sidelines of a FICCI meeting here. “The trend that I got in meetings in Washington and New York was that the developed countries are losing sympathy, and there is already a clear division among their ranks on the various issues,” he said. For instance, he said, some issues that might be of very great importance to the US may not find support from the European Union. Similarly, the issue that could be of great importance to the EU may not find support in the USA or those of importance to Japan may not find backing from the USA and the European Union. “This is clearly perceptible that they (developed nations) will not be able to talk in one voice and therefore if developing countries put their act together and talk in one voice they have a great chance if and when the next round is held”. “If a new round of (WTO negotiations) is in the interest of India and other developing countries, we are not opposed to it”, Sinha said adding that “there is no point in having a new round which is going to fail like in Seattle. That is going to be very, very bad for international trade”. Sinha also did not comment on the lifting of the remaining sanctions by the USA and merely said Washington has to move into action, and that it calls for legislative action. The Finance Minister also refused to hazard a guess on the timeframe for such an action. On interest rate cut, Sinha said it was for the Reserve Bank of India to decide.
PTI
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ICICI’s net drops 55 pc
Mumbai, May 3 Unveiling the financial performance at a press conference here this evening, ICICI Managing Director and CED KV Kamath has attributed the drop in net profit to the higher provisioning in wake of new RBI guidelines and the depressed capital markets as well as volatility in interest rates and foreign exchange markets which hampered the growth of ICICI during the year as well as the fourth quarter of the current
FY. ICICI’s net also declined by 35 per cent in the fourth quarter during the FYended March 31, 2001. ICICI has reported a net profit of Rs 257 crore during the quarter ended March 31, 2001 as against Rs 395
crore, reported in the corresponding period a year ago. ICICI’s scrip closed lower at Rs 81.90 at the Bombay Stock Exchange
(BSE) registering a drop of Rs 1.45. PTI
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Singapore, May 3 “In this part of the world, there’s so much emphasis on success. Nobody talks about failure,” Michael Lum, author of the self-help guide told Reuters on Thursday. “My book is to promote the fact that there’s no failure, only feedback. Success comes in a time-delayed capsule.” Penned and published by the 47-year-old management consultant, “I Once Wore Diapers — How to Manage Failure Successfully” is filled with poems, cartoons, inspirational stories and exercises. Lum also hopes to raise awareness and recruit members for a local support group called “No Failure Circle” modelled after Alcoholics Anonymous. The stigma of failure in school, business or life is very real in tiny Singapore after it transformed itself from a backwater into an affluent financial hub in less than 40 years. Lum said the 132-page book, launched a week ago with a print run of 5,000 copies, draws on his own experiences. He failed in his university entrance exams, his undergraduate degree in accountancy and a masters programme in commerce. Three businesses flopped. He was unlucky in love too, but has since been married for 16 years and has two children. Lum’s inspiration came from diverse areas. Infants who pick themselves up as they learn to walk, former U.S. President Bill Clinton who bounced back from the Monica Lewinsky sex scandal and Jews who suffered the holocaust are among his icons. Lum, who failed English in his teens, is already working on his next book. “Theory K” takes a look at how Singapore’s “kia su” culture, with its accompanying survival of the fittest mentality, can be applied to business. The oft-heard Chinese term literally means “afraid to lose”. But the true success of “I Once Wore Diapers” lies in finding a literary agent to take it to the United States. “If we succeed in America, the rest of the world will follow,” Lum said. “If I fail, it’s OK because my book is about failure.”
Reuters
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Cellular & WLL licences can’t be different: Modi New Delhi, May 3 The GoT-IT report has made a clear distinction that the WLL mobile servies are cellular services. They have based their finding on the basis of the handset and not on technology, said Dr Bhupendra Kumar Modi, Chairman of ModiCorp. Spice Telecom, which operates in Punjab, is a wholly owned subsidiary of ModiCorp. Mr Modi said: “the report has recommended equal interconnect revenue share ratio for both cellular mobile services and WLL based mobile services, which in essense acknowledges WLL mobile services and cellular mobile services as similar.” Welcoming the GoT-IT report, he said the licensing process for cellular and WLL operators cannot be any different. “Any future players in these two services must come through the same process such as bidding, which has been followed in the past and is to be followed for the fourth cellular license as already announced by the DoT,” he said. Mr Modi said the letter of intent issued to some of the players under the limited mobility guidelines must be withdrawn and a fresh review for limited mobility terms must be done. The DOT has issued LOIs to six players. The ModiCorp chairman said the TRAI will come out with a clear cut policy guidelines on the basis of the GoT-IT report and would look into the issue of transparency of the licensing system that is fair, equitable and non-discriminatory. On the reported differences within the cellular operators association of India (COAI), he said the body represents the views of the cellular operators only and those with interest in basic, WLL or both should speak in one voice when they address the issue from the COAI forum. Asked why the COAI has not welcomed the report, he said the report is a vindication of the association’s stand that handset and not technology should be the yardstick for distinguishing whether it is a cellular or basic service. “It could be wireless or any other technology. If the handset is mobile, it should be part of the cellular service and should be given licence as other mobile services,” he said.
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‘Give exports top priority’ This was stated by Mr Ashok Khanna, Past President and Chairman, Northern Regional Development Council, PHDCCI, here today. He was speaking during the inaugural session of the three day training programme on ‘Exports Documentation and Procedures’. which is being organised by the PHDCCI in joint co-operation with Konard Adenuaer Foundation of Germany. Mr D.S. Guru, Director Industries and Special Secretary Industries , Punjab, inaugurated the programme. While emphasising that top priority should be given to the exports, he said that there is a need for greater synergy of efforts between the government and industry towards placing India and especially the northern region in the higher echelons of global business. In the wake of liberalisation, the state governments need to bring about a major shift in thinking, operations and hence making continuous efforts in facilitating the industrial development. Outlining the course contents of the programme, Mr C.M. Krishna, Adviser, PHDCCI apprised that the course would cover export strategy and operations, export finance, Exim policy, export documentation framework and other issues of special interest to both the exporters as well as the importers. |
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Markfed to buy paddy
transplanters Chandigarh, May 3 It will also distribute certified seed paddy through its retail outlets in the 8 km vicinity of the rice mills, said an official release here today. Paddy sown with the mechanised transplanter will be purchased by the Markfed rice mills at the support price. Paddy will be purchased the day it is harvested and payment released the next day. The transplanter can control the depth and distance of seedlings, save labour and time, and helps avoid skin infections. For paddy transplantation farmers depend on migratory labour which , if not available in time, can delay paddy sowing , affecting the yield. Early sowing results in early arrival of paddy when rain can hit the quality of paddy leading to a high percentage of broken rice. To tackle these problems, Markfed has decided to purchase paddy transplanters of Escorts-Yanmar RR-6 based on Japanese technology. Each transplanter costs Rs 6 lakh. Markfed purchases about 16-17 lakh MTs of paddy and about 19-20 lakh MTs of wheat
annually. It bought combine harvesters in 1970-71 which had brought a see change in harvesting and contributed to the Green Revolution.
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Zap grows 125 per cent in
region Chandigarh, May 3 Sun
Infoways has recorded a turnover of Rs 133.33 crore and with the net
profit of Rs 44.38 crore in the year 2000-2001. Zap started its
operations in the Chandigarh region with 8 centres on August 3, 2000. In
nine months the number of centres has grown to 15 and five more are
scheduled to be launched on May 15. Mr G.S. Bhatti, Regional Head,
said Zap had introduced Digital design Academy in 1997, e-commerce in
1998, and WAP in 2000. Recently ZAP launched EWT (embedded web
technology) first time in Asia and is the first to be offered the centre
of excellence by Microsoft in 2000. “Zap currently has a presence in
the USA, the UK, Europe, South East Asian-region, Australia and is
eyeing telecom software services as well as technology and marketing
companies. The opening of education business models in China,
Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia, West Asia and Bangladesh is on the
cards”, he added.
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Swiss ice
cream in Chandigarh Chandigarh, May 3 The Movenpick ice creams will be available in Chandigarh through a string of retail outlets. Plans are in the offing to create a network of outlets in Punjab and Haryana that can be serviced out of Chandigarh. Movenpick has already provisioned for a cold room at Chandigarh to provide the distribution support to the region. Also on the anvil is the Movenpick ice cream boutique. |
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Global meltdown chances slim Why is the US economy so important to us? Well, it’s not just the world’s largest economy, it’s also our largest trading partner. What’s more, it has also been the world’s locomotive, pulling the global train along nicely with a huge surge of productivity growth, when Euroland and Japan remained mired in their problems. First, if a US recession reduced import of goods and services and raised exports direct demand for the rest of the world’s output would be reduced. Second, if the US slows down, the fear is that the fund flows that finance the whopping US current account deficit would slow, or even reverse. Should that happen, interest rates would rise, Wall Street would panic, debt-ridden consumers would stop spending and the US economy could be exposed to a deep recession. This is doomsday. Third, advocates of a hard landing for the US economy say that rate cuts by the Federal Reserve will not help, for the same reason that they didn’t help in 1930-31 and in present-day Japan. The collapse of an asset price bubble, say these bears, goes on for a long time. Yes, of course we, along with the rest of the world, would be affected by a US slowdown. But that doesn’t mean we have to accept the doomsday scenario. To start with, the other economies of the world aren’t doing too well either, and there’s no question of foreign, especially Japanese, money, deserting the US just because interest rates are lower. And if as Alan Greenspan seems to think there’s been a drastic improvement in US productivity brought about by technology, then there’s no reason to believe that gain in productivity is going to disappear. In short, the chances of a global meltdown are slim indeed, despite what the bears may say. Good policy-making can easily prevent it. Don’t believe it? Well, read the concluding remarks in next week’s diary. Reverting to the corporate front, I remember having referred a month or so ago to call I received from Vinod Ramnani, the MD of Opto Circuits (India) who was in Mumbai then to brief analysts & the press about the post-IPO progress of his company. I had remarked then that the proof of the pudding would lie in the financials. It seems that Vinod took my words very seriously, which is why his office promptly faxed me a copy of his financial results press release. It said that Opto Circuits reported a net profit of Rs 6.26 crore during the fiscal year ended March 31, 2001, an 80 per cent increase over the previous year and that the company’s turnover went up to Rs 28.57 crore in 2000-01 as compared to Rs 18.41 crore during 1999-2000. The Board also recommended a payment of dividend of 30 per cent which made its shares a fair play on yield at the current depressed price level. Perhaps that is why I marked the copy of this fax to Garima, my better half for further dissection.
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Indian business team to visit Pak Compaq expects higher growth WAP phones a flop for Asians Korea’s Hyundai Q1 net rises 28 pc PepsiCo names new Chairman |
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SBP meet New IOC ED Edutech Haryana loan Seat belts |
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Chandigarh, May 3