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Saturday,
October 12, 2002, Chandigarh, India  
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CORPORATE NEWS
JCT
expects Rs 35 cr profit Build up
consensus on VAT: CII |
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6 pc GDP
not sustainable: IEG Narayanamurthy
Ernst & Young entrepreneur Chambal
Fert to enter procurement business
BoP
launches ‘Mobile wallet’
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CORPORATE NEWS
New Delhi, October 11 During the period the company’s net sales were pegged at Rs 52.1 crore as against Rs 53.6 crore during July-September, 2001. Talking about the company’s future outlook, Mr Arun Kumar, Managing Director of Hughes Software, said: “We have already implemented several measures to diversify revenue and have cost structure more commensurate with revenue. Our strategy to grow existing relationship in the original equipment manufacturers and telecom service provider segments are showing progress”. He expected that the company’s strategy of diversifying into new verticals would show the desired results in medium to long term. “The broadened offering will help the company derisk its business and reduce dependence on telecom verticals,” he said. Hughes Software’s net profit for the first half April- September, 2002, is Rs 12.7 crore as against Rs 25 crore in the same period last year reflecting a drop of 49 per cent. Ballarpur Ind
Ballarpur Industries Ltd has posted marginal increase in sales at Rs 386.3 crore in the first quarter ending September 30 while net profit soared 56 per cent to 21.19 crore. Also, the board of directors yesterday approved the scheme of amalgamation between Bilt Graphic Paper Ltd and Bilt after the successful completion of the rights issue in June this year for the acquisition of BGPL. The appointed date for this amalgamation is July 1, 2002. In terms of the valuation made by independent valuers, Bilt will issue equity shares of Rs 10 each fully paid up to the shareholders of BGPL in the ratio of one equity share of Bilt for every 17 shares held by them in BGPL.
Hindustan Diamond
State-owned Hindustan Diamond Company Limited has maintained 20 per cent dividend to its shareholders despite doubling of the share capital to Rs 5.60 crore following the bonus issue made last year. Company Chairman and Managing Director Virendra Singh presented the dividend cheque of Rs 56 lakh to Commerce Secretary Dipak Chatterjee here today.
NBCC
State owned National Buildings Construction Limited (NBCC) has posted a net profit of Rs.3.70 crore in 2001-02, representing a growth of about 50 per cent over the previous year. NBCC’s turnover has also gone up by 30 per cent this year, its Chairman-cum-Managing-Director Arup Roy Choudhury said.
Agencies
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JCT expects Rs 35 cr profit New Delhi, October 11 Top company officials said a major restructuring exercise involving exiting from the unprofitable business areas and injecting young blood in the senior management cadre were instrumental in engineering the turnaround of the group, which, at one point of time, was nearly written off by experts after it had slipped into a severe tailspin in 1994. "The going was great till 1994 after which the polyester business started accruing huge losses ", Vice Chairman and Managing Director of JCT Samir Thapar told The Tribune. The company had decided to invest heavily in capacity upgradation in 1994 and raised $50 million from a GDR issue. "The decision to invest was premised upon bullish projections of the international polyester market. The market was expected to grow and therefore we invested heavily on modernisation of all plants", Mr Thapar said. "However, in 1994, the year in which our investments were made, China, the biggest buyer of polyester in the international market, pulled out due to domestic
reasons. This hit our polyester business while the textile business was not growing as anticipated", Mr Thapar explained. From a cash profit of Rs 52 crore in 1993-94, it dipped into cash losses of more than Rs 30 crore till around 2001. The debt liability of the company had hit a whopping figure of Rs 1,100 crore and interest liabilities accounted for Rs 170 crore alone. "We took some hard decisions and exiting from the polyester business was a major element of the restructuring exercise", Mr Thapar said. After more than one-and-a-half years of hard negotiations, the polyester plant was eventually sold off to Reliance Industries for about Rs 500 crore. "Reliance was looking for acquiring a foothold in the North and was on an acquisition spree. The sale of the plant in March, 2001, which was set up in 1989, was a major decision which was arrived at after hard negotiations", he said. At the same time, the company put together a new management team with young blood. "The old generation exited. And young people, in early 40s, were thrust upon the responsibility of heading independent profit centres", Mr Thapar, who himself is in the late 30s, said. The moves appear to have paid off. The overall debt situation is now comfortably placed at Rs 160 crore ( a major improvement from the Rs 1, 100 crore) and the interest liability has reduced to Rs 24 crore. The company is anticipating cash profit of Rs 35 crore during this fiscal. "We have plans for diversification and are looking at entering the garment business in about a year's time", he said.
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Build up consensus on VAT: CII Chandigarh, October 11 These views were expressed by industrial representatives in a conference on ‘VAT— Ensuring a Smooth Transition in Northern Region States’ held here today. The conference was organised by the CII, Northern Region. Addressing the delegates, Prof Sampat Singh, Minister of Finance, Haryana, claimed that the state government was fully geared up to implement the VAT. He said: “The state government has taken various steps to smoothen the transition phase. As per the recommendations of the Atre Committee report, the state government would implement the law.” Mr Sachin Menon, Member, National VAT Core Committee, said: “The state governments would have to prepare for a low tax regime, as the imports are set to become cheap with the decrease in import duty to 20 per cent in the next few years under WTO provisions besides appreciation of rupee value. In the short time, they may face marginal fall in tax collections, but in the long term the state and industry would benefit from the new tax system, already implemented by more than 100 countries.” On this occasion, Mr Suresh Kumar, Excise and Taxation Commissioner, Punjab, said, “Punjab Government is ready to do away with the purchase tax on foodgrains worth Rs 800 crore and duty on petrol worth Rs 900 crore provided the Centre and the other states were ready to work out a formula to compensate the state. The State is also ready to do away with the CST if other states also agree.”
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6 pc GDP not sustainable: IEG
New Delhi, October 11 “The good news from the GDP figures for the first quarter of the current fiscal may not be sustainable,” the think-tank said in its latest ‘Monthly Monitor’. GDP had shown a growth rate of 6 per cent in the first quarter of this fiscal as compared to 3.5 per cent in the same period last year, with the manufacturing and services sectors clocking 3.8 per cent and 9.7 per cent growth, the IEG noted. “But this trend may not continue given the demand constraints and the existing drought situation, which is expected to reduce the kharif output by 10 per cent in this year,” the report reasoned. Expressing concern over the rising combined fiscal deficit of the Centre and states, which led to the downgrading by Standard and Poor, the IEG said though the downgrading might not have any “significant” impact because of many favourable factors, “policy makers should neither ignore this warning nor get into any panic reaction” by coming out with one more forex borrowing scheme. The favourable factors were comfortable foreign exchange reserves and food stock, low inflation, the declining interest rates and reasonably good GDP growth. The IEG, however, cautioned the oil prices having further increased from October 1, it was expected to cast a “spin-off” effect, and inflation was likely to rise to over 4 per cent in the coming months. On the industrial sector, the IEG said, “increase in the price of fuel, decline in the growth rate of exports, increase in imports, decline in the core sector growth to 6.9 per cent in August and gloomy market sentiments may, to some extent, depress the industry from its current high growth of 6.4 per cent.”
PTI
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Narayanamurthy Ernst & Young entrepreneur
Bangalore, October 11 Mr Narayanamurthy, who received the award on the day his company released encouraging second-quarter results and improved its guidance, would participate in the E&Y World Entrepreneur of the Year 2003, to be held at Monte Carlo. MRF Limited founder Mammen Mappillai received the Lifetime Achievement Award for taking the firm to the number one spot in the face of stiff competition from international companies. Mr Ratul Puri of Moser Baer India won the award in the Manufacturing category. Dr Naresh Trehan of Escorts Heart Institute for Services, Mr Rajesh Hukku of i-flex solutions for IT, communication and Entertainment and Biocon India’s Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw for healthcare and life sciences also won the awards. Mr Sanjeev Agarwal of Daksh Services was named the Start-up Entrepreneur of the Year while Mr Pramod Bhasin of GE Capital India won the Manager Entrepreneur award. The awards for 2002 were decided by a jury comprising Bajaj Auto Chairman Rahul Bajaj, SBI Chairman Janki Ballabh, CII Chief Economist Omkar Goswami, RBI Deputy Governor Rakesh Mohan, Bharti Enterprises Chairman and group Managing Director Sunil Bharti Mittal and Sanmar group Chairman N Sankar. The jury chose the eight winners from among a shortlist of 19 finalists.
UNI
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Chambal Fert to enter procurement business Chandigarh, October 11 “We will make these purchases from tribal areas of Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh for other private operators to follow suit for promoting crop diversification,” company’s Vice President Marketing S.K. Patra told a press conference here today. With the agriculture becoming uncertain like the share market and farmer being worried to choose which crop to grow to get the best deal globally, the company was also planning the crop demand and supply forecasting along with the possible price it can fetch internationally, he said. The company has chalked out a big plan to integrate its Rs 4000 crore main business of urea into social responsibility (monetary gain expected) by raising Uttam Customer Loyalty Clubs to provide the member farmer one-stop-shop solution for increasing his income. The company has also decided to market bio-fertilizer from the best of sources globally and has imported 350 metric tonnes of fodder seed from Egypt considering the shortfall in rain. Despite being a chemical fertilizer producer, the company has decided to help the farmer in organic farming which can bring better returns on crops. By making the best the quality of seed available, bio-fertilizer, consultancy, providing veterinary medical support, food processing, soil testing, setting up farm information kiosks virtually at all 30,000 outlets in the country and grain storage and cold storage, it wants to create a niche in the Rs. 2,00,000 commodity market business along with serving a social purpose. The company has also decided to grow table potatoes used by multinational companies in Baddi and this quality of seed would be made available to an Australian company Technico Australia for marketing globally. The company is already bringing out ‘’Chambal ki Chithi” newsletter to consult farmers on agriculture, has created Uttam-Krishi.com for providing value added services and opened laboratories in Ganganagar and Agra for soil, water and nutrient tests. It has also created Hello Uttam Krishi clinics to provide solutions to the problems of farmers online and onsite free of cost.
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PNB scheme Bajaj Elect Satyam chief ABN Amro Bank BSES |
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New Delhi, October 11
