Singapore, June 19
Global telecommunications giant Nokia today announced shifting the hub of its global telecom network management services business to India from its home base in Finland.

“The managed services will be led globally from India from July this year. Ashish Chowdhary, currently the head of networks in India, will transition as new global head of managed services from India by the end of this year,” Rajeev Suri, Senior Vice-President, Asia Pacific (Networks) at Nokia said.

“Going forward India will play a pivotal role in Nokia-managed services success, not only as a large target market but also from delivery and direction perspective,” he said.

The current Vice-President for managed services at the company, Henrik Sund, who established the service line, is quitting the company.

The managed services division of Nokia runs the telecom networks of service providers as part of the outsourcing agreement.

Nokia said the move underscores its commitment to tap global services market growth as well as India’s outstanding outsourcing and innovation ecosystem, Suri said.

The company also announced that its first Global Network Solutions Centre in Chennai has begun operations in May and will serve as hub for other Nokia operations centres all over the world.

Meanwhile, Nokia today announced a five-year deal with mobile phone services provider Hutchison Essar for managing its telecom infrastructure in 10 new circles.

“With today’s announcement the number of circles in which Nokia is managing network for Hutch would go up to 19,” Chowdhary said.

He, however, did not disclose the size of the deal in dollar terms, citing confidentiality agreement with Hutch.

Nokia had signed a similar deal with Hutch in January for nine of its existing circles. It will now run Hutchs network in 19 of its 23 circles.

The deal for 10 circles announced today includes three existing circles of Maharashtra, Kerala and Tamil Nadu and seven Greenfield circles in Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Orissa, Assam and Northeast.

In the Greenfield circles, Nokia will build and run from scratch the infrastructure for Hutch.

Of the 19 circles, nine have already been taken over by Nokia while three, which came to Huch with the acquisition of BPL Mobile Cellular, are in transition.

The rollout in the Greenfield circles would start around third quarter when Hutch gets spectrum, Chowdhary said.

As part of the deal, Nokia will also take on another 200 employees of Hutch taking the total to 800, the number of employees it has absorbed, he added.

Nokia would run Hutch’s network from solutions centre in Chennai.

Nokia has a similar agreement with the countrys top GSM mobile phone service provider Bharti Airtel and has won contracts worth $400 million from it for eight circles.

The contracts have the capacity to cover more than 4500 villages and towns. Nokia has also taken on 200 employees of Bharti.

Till date Nokia has 39 managed services contracts in 30 countries and it expects this figure to grow in coming years. — PTI 

Karachi, June 19
The proposed gas pipeline from Iran to India through Pakistan was in the greater interest of the region and “no one” should have any reservations on it, Pakistan Prime Minister has said, dismissing the view that the US was a “hurdle” in its execution.

The US had publicly expressed its opposition to the Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline over Iran’s suspected nuclear weapons ambitions.

But speaking to journalists here yesterday, Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz said, “I disagree with those who term the US a hurdle in this regard.”

“The construction of a gas pipeline from Iran to India through Pakistan is in the greater interest of the region and no one should have any reservations on that,” he told a SAFMA meeting.

“We have to meet our future energy requirements and if three countries are clear about their interests, then there will be no hurdle in its execution. If a fourth country had a different view on the project, it could be convinced because this project makes sense to the people of this region.” — PTI 

New Delhi, June 19
Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Murli Deora has conveyed New Delhi’s commitment to the India-Pakistan-Iran (IPI) gas pipeline project to Teheran during the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Conference at Shanghai, China.

According to an official press note issued here today, Mr Deora called on Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinajad and reiterated India’s commitment to the IPI gas pipeline project.

Mr Deora said the discussions by the three participating countries on the project structure, route, gas pricing, framework agreement, etc were progressing on fast-track. 

New Delhi, June 19
India and France have joined hands to jointly set up the Indo-French Centre of Arbitration and Conciliation to provide a low-cost platform to companies in both countries to resolve their disputes.

It is considered the first major initiative by both the countries that would help companies in both the countries to resolve disputes amicably, without involving International Chamber of Commerce, Paris, an international body to settle disputes among the corporate world.

“An agreement has been signed in this regard between Ficci Arbitration and Conciliation Tribunal (FACT) of India and the Centre Interprofessionel de Mediation et d’Arbitrage (CIMA) of France in France last week during Finance Minister P. Chidambaram’s visit to France,” said Arun Chawla, Director, FICCI who signed the agreement on India’s behalf.

Talking to The Tribune today, he disclosed that once formed the Centre would be administrated by a board, with equal representation by both parties, which will be responsible for the operation and promotion of the Centre. It will have offices in India and France as well.

France and China already have a joint set-up to resolve corporate disputes.

He said, if succeeded, it would pave a way for setting such bodies with other countries as well. “There is already a proposal to set up inter-regional Arbitration body in the SAARC region to promote trade and settle corporate disputes in an amicable and cost-effective manner,” he said.

At present, there are over 300 French companies operating in India, mainly in the field of cement, chemicals, oil refinery, food products, telecommunication and banking services. The major companies include Lafarge, Alstom, L’Oreal, Aventis, Reynolds and Schneider.

The bilateral trade between the two countries has increased, he said, from $ 1415 million in 1996-97 to $ 3467 million by 2004-05, and the target is to double it by 2009-10.

Out of total foreign direct investment (FDI) amounting $ 30.4 billion in India between 1991-2005, the French companies have invested $ 0.77 billion, about 2.5 per cent of total FDI.

Both the countries are targeting FDI from France to India to $ 1 billion every year, and such joint structures are likely to give a boost to bilateral trade between the two countries.

The major IT and pharmaceutical Indian companies like Tata Consultancy Services, Wipro, NIIT, Larsen and Toubro, Ranbaxy and Zydus Cadila have make heavy investments in France.

These companies would benefit from this centre. “They would be able to resolve the dispute at a fractional cost of the costs that they would have to incur through ICC, Paris,” added Mr Chawla.

New Delhi, June 19
Amid the debate over security issues in the telecom sector, the Department of Telecommunication is understood to have favoured parity in security clearance treatment for FDI below 49 per cent and between 49 to 74 per cent in the sector.

While DoT feels the policy should have “no differential security conditions” for FDI up to 74 per cent, the National Security Adviser and the Defence Ministry is believed to have favoured routing investment in this category through Foreign Investment Promotion Board so as to give due consideration to security related issues.

The issue had assumed importance in the wake of NSA asking the views of the ministry and department concerned on a communication it received from Essar on its foreign partner Hutchison selling stake to Egypt’s Orascom, which has a majority shareholding in Pakistan’s mobile telecom market.

Communication and IT Minister Dayanidhi Maran met Prime Minister last week and submitted that any attempt to discriminate between 49 and 74 per cent FDI would not only invite allegations in the area of national treatment, but would create clash within the class.

It would be seen as a move that is discriminatory, but more importantly as a specific barrier only to discourage foreign investors from competing with Indian majority owned companies, DoT said.

National Security Council under the PMO wants all security issues to be handled by it separately and is pressing for dual norms for FDI.

NSC’s contention is that 74 per cent FDI hike was allowed only after it was decided that stringent security norms would be followed for those with foreign equity between 49-74 per cent. — PTI 

Mumbai, June 19
As it seeks to double its Latin American revenues to $100 million this fiscal, Tata Consultancy Services today announced clinching contracts worth over $30 million (Rs 135 crore) from two Chile-based companies.

The company would manage the BPO and IT operations for Transantiago, the modernised integrated public transportation system planned for Chile’s capital, Santiago, TCS said.

“The Transantiago initiative will bring a truly world class public transportation system to Chile... TCS will bring the very best global experience, personnel and quality methodologies to ensure the project’s success” TCS Latin America BPO business CEO Henry Manzano said.

It has also bagged a five-year contract from a leading Spanish banking and financial group to manage the entire set of back office operations for the bank’s loan and credit business in Chile.

In November 2005, TCS had acquired Comicrom, the largest BPO firm in Chile in a bid to jumpstart its BPO business in the region.

Over the next three years, TCS would lead a consortium of four other service providers to build and manage customer care, communications, operational support and information systems for Transantiago. — PTI

New Delhi, June 19
Sharp volatility and erosion of about 2,000 points in the Sensex on global cues have not demolished India's growth story which remains rock solid on back of sound fundamentals like GDP growth, driven by continuous rise in industrial production and robust growth in services, an Assocham Business Barometer (ABB) survey of top CEOs and CMDs has indicated.

As many as 78 per cent of the CEOs and CMDs polled by ABB said they expected the Index for Industrial Production (IIP) to grow by 8.5 per cent in 2006-07, improving upon the level of 8 per cent in 2005-06.

All these corporate heads said the robust demand across various sectors — consumers spending as also the industrial intermediate — will not be significantly impacted by the moderate price rise which is unavoidable.

Besides IIP, the service sector is likely to give a repeat performance of 10 per cent growth of 2005-06 again in 2006-07. As many as 87 per cent of the ABB respondents felt this way stating that the services like IT and ITES, tourism, finance, telecom, transportation, would continue to perform well in the current fiscal, no matter what happens in the stock market.

Erosion in the stock market in May and earlier this month may be steeper in the beginning of this fiscal as compared to the previous years, but it was largely because of shuffling of portfolios by the foreign institutional investors (FIIs) which generally lie low in the first quarter of the Indian financial year.

Investment pattern for the past few years has shown that the FIIs lie low in the first two quarters of the Indian financial year and they pick up from the third quarter.

They deploy the maximum funds in the fourth quarter; the "Santa Claus'' rally is witnessed in December, thanks to festive mood and Christmas bonuses. Besides, to offset their capital gains, they seek to create bigger portfolios.

With Federal Reserve chief Ben Bernanke downplaying inflationary worries, the markets all around the world witnessed a sharp pullback in the past two days of the week ended June 16.

Roller coaster in the market cannot be ruled out and the investors, as also the industry, have to get used to the phenomenon of sharp volatility.

"With India well integrated into the global economy, event-specific market gyrations could become quite common. But that should not mean the fundamentals disappear overnight. They remain intact and will reflect in real numbers'', Assocham President Anil K Agarwal said.

However, 20 per cent of the CEOs polled said a severe jolt in the market could impact the investment climate. Forty per cent of the ABB respondents said the market crash would hit the primary market, which in turn could disrupt the capital mobiliation efforts of the corporates. 

New Delhi, June 19
The Madhya Pradesh Government is holding a sick industry trade fair in the first week of July at Gwalior to recover dues from about 1,500 industrial units which lying closed for years.

Madhya Pradesh Industry Minister Babulal Gaur said on his return from his trip to Japan that the objective of organising the fair was to either recover the dues from the sick units or to extend assistance for their revival.