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| Friday,
August 3, 2001, Chandigarh, India   
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Indian postman on information highway
Medium term export policy soon: Maran
‘No irregularities in UTI investment’ |
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Secret of a sound business partnership |
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Hero Honda July sales rise 39.8 pc
Bank of Punjab
net rises 20 pc
Are Infosys, Hughes Soft wannabes?
Indian beer wins gold medal
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Indian postman on information highway New Delhi, August 2 The project, launched on a pilot basis in Gujarat, Maharashtra, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh and Goa, involves the physical deliverance of electronic messages sent through the Internet at the doorstep within a few hours. During the first phase, 203 e-Post centres in the five states will be connected to 5,300 inter-networked delivery centres. “Eventually, every citizen will be covered by a generic e-mail id on the PIN Code of the delivery post office. For example, for those served by the Connaught Place (PIN Code 110001), New Delhi, the email id will be : epost110001@indianpostoffice.net. Mails sent to this address would be downloaded at the nearest e-Post office, printed, enveloped and delivered by a delivery staff specially trained for the purpose,” Secretary of Posts, Mr B.N. Som said. Union Minister for Communications Ram Vilas Paswan, who cut the ribbon on the scheme here today, underlined the need for bridging the digital divide which is threatening to assume dangerous proportions. “If technology cannot be spread in rural areas, the digital divide will continue to delay the process of development”, the minister observed. “We are seeking to undo the present divide by drawing from the strengths of e-mail and snail mail,” Mr Som pointed out, adding: “e-Post is coming together of the traditional postal system and the latest in Internet technology to redefine the conventional way of communicating with letters.” Questions, however, have been raised about the affordability of the service. Under the current tariff structure, an user is charged Rs 10 per page, and payments can be made either through credit cards or customised pre-paid cards carrying a minimum denomination of Rs 250. The project is a joint effort of the Department of Posts and a Hyderabad-based technology vendor and Internet service provider, Netlinx Limited. |
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Medium term export policy soon: Maran New Delhi, August 2 “The first draft of the strategy is ready and we are examining it....it will be announced soon,” said the Union Commerce and Industry Minister Murasoli Maran here today. The official export data had put export growth during the April - June at 1.76 per cent as against a healthy 28 per cent in the corresponding period a year ago. Mr Maran said “the dip in exports is mainly due to the international slowdown. Any improvement in export performance will depend on the international market condition.” The silver lining in the cloud was that, he said the downturn in the US economy could compel them to outsource from India. On the concerns expressed to the dumping of Chinese goods in India, he said “anti-dumping” duty is not a permanent remedy and a mere cry of cheap import of China will not help the industry. Mr Maran said the Ministry has commissioned two studies to analyse the potential of Indian exports to China as well as the threat posed by Chinese competition to Indian exports. The results of the study would be available in three months. |
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‘No irregularities in UTI investment’ New Delhi, August 2 In a letter to Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha, the copy of which was released to the Press, RIL said the investment was made at a discount and not at a premium. The clarification came in the wake of Mr Sinha’s statement in the Rajya Sabha yesterday that the UTI had purchased the shares of a Mumbai-based company at a much higher price than prevailing in the market in 1994 when Dr Manmohan Singh was the Finance Minister. RIL said the shares worth Rs 1,073 crore were bought at Rs 385 per share, representing a discount of 6 per cent to the closing market price of Rs 409.6 at the Bombay Stock Exchange on October 21, 1994. The company said UTI’s investment in the private placement of RIL shares in 1994 represented less than 2 per cent of the UTI corpus and less than 5 per cent of the corpus of the US-64 scheme. RIL said the UTI made a profit of Rs 862 crore on its investment of Rs 1,073 crore in RIL shares in 1994. It said the UTI made profits of nearly Rs 3,000 crore in the past 7 years on its aggregate investments in RIL and Reliance Petrochemicals Limited shares.
UNI |
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UTI is United Thieves of India!
New Delhi, August 2 The name was given to the beleaguered Unit Trust of India by Congress member P.R. Dasmunshi while initiating a discussion on the adjournment motion on the UTI muddle in the Lok Sabha. He said nexus between several corporate houses and the UTI resulted in the “scam of the millennium”, which hit hard millions of small investors.
PTI |
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Secret of a sound business partnership London, August 2 So there I was, extolling the virtues of multicoloured gender-mixed cross-cultural communities and staring at a sea of white middle-class men in blue shirts and dark trousers. I thought my talk wasn’t bad; but the longer I spoke, the more uneasy I became. It wasn’t that they were yawning or walking out. They seemed attentive; they even laughed at my jokes. My creeping disquiet stemmed from a sense that I was a diverting floorshow from which they could remain comfortably disengaged. Despite the evidence I presented, the virtues of diversity were an intellectual ideal removed from the realities of their business. Comments in the questions and answers session afterwards confirmed my suspicions. To paraphrase: ‘Everything you say may be true, but we’re making pots of money just as we are. Why would we want to become more diverse?’ They have a point. Success is a poor change agent, especially in tough times when weaker rivals are having to trim furiously compete. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. In so many of life’s situations we face the same dilemma. Consider what happens when people choose a life partner. What do we want? A quiet life of perfect harmony will someone who shares our style, tastes and interests? Or someone who leads us toward novel experiences and counterbalances our weaknesses with their strengths? The idealist in us inclines toward the latter. But in reality we tend to opt for the former — perfect peace isn’t such a bad option. Besides, one needs to look at the downside of these alternatives. With the former, the worst thing that can happen is the relationship becomes boring. With the latter it is much worse — mayhem and conflict. In business, people talk idealistically about synergistic teamwork, corporate diversity and learning cultures, but their actions bespeak a preference for the company of clones and teamwork within monocultural corporate communities. Homogeneous groups are much easier to maintain — in the language of economists they have lower transaction costs. Why go through all the hassle of getting heterogenous parties aligned when you can hit the ground running with like-minded colleagues? The counter-argument is that you can hit higher highs and go further when you get the right burn of disparate elements coming together. It takes longer, it can hurt, and failure is an ever-present risk. But as you build strength through diversity, you become a winner. Many of the greatest and most enduring businesses of our time were built on the complementary assets of partners — soap and candle makers William Procter and James Gamble, garage inventors Bill Hwelett and Dave Packard or the two Steves, Wozniak and Jobs, at Apple. But of course we only remember the success stories. Business history is littered with failed partnerships. The only way to make diversity work is to achieve and sustain what I call the Duke Ellington principle. In a jazz band no one cares whether you’re black or white, old or young, educated or not. Only two things matter: can you play the music and do you love it? This spirit, under intelligent and visionary leadership, brings together disparate styles and talents to make one glorious and unique sound. The Duke Ellington principle flourishes in the best partnerships, project groups and corporate cultures. Every member knows their individual sound gives something special to the ensemble, not as a soloist but as a voice in harmony with others. What is the secret? Business psychology identifies a number of key features: diverse talents bound together by shared values, an egalitarian and informal ethos, people really listening to each other and finding a shared language, taking time to explore options. The best project groups are assembled — more by accident than design — to meet these criteria. They bind people with disparate skills, and a willingness to challenge each other within a framework of shared values.
— By arrangement with The Observer |
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Hero Honda July sales rise 39.8 pc New Delhi, August 2 The July sales were, however, down by 1.8 per cent compared to 1.05 lakh motorcycles sold in June this year. Cumulative sales (April-July 2001-02) stood at 4.10 lakh units, up 30.9 per cent against 3.13 lakh units sold in the year-ago period. Hero Honda’s largest selling motorcycle, the 100cc ‘Splendor’ comprises about 50-60 per cent of its total sales. The company sells about 30,000 and 10,000 units per month of the recently launched ‘Passion’ and ‘Joy’ models respectively. Hero Honda is a 26:26 joint venture between the Hero Group and Honda Motor Company of Japan. The rest of the equity is held by financial institutions and public.
PTI |
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Arvind Johari remanded in CBI custody
Mumbai, August 2 Designated Judge M.S. Keny rejected the oral bail plea of the accused. He was not represented by any lawyer. Considering the serious nature of the case and the crucial stage of investigations, custodial interrogation of Johri was essential, the Judge said. Producing the accused before the Judge, the CBI said he had been confronted with the co-accused, particularly in view of the allegations that he had offered money to a broker to lure top UTI officials to purchase Cyberspace shares at high price. On July 27, former UTI Chairman P.S. Subramanyam, Executive Directors M.M. Kapur and S.K. Basu and stock broker Rakesh Mehta were remanded in police custody till tomorrow by the special court, which had rejected their plea for liberty.
PTI |
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Insurance training Ludhiana, August 2 |
rc
Are Infosys, Hughes Soft wannabes? IT
is a fact that stock markets the world over, with the Indian ones being no exception, discount events in advance and although the traditional forward P/E approximated six months, it does seem that this parameter had multiplied at least three-fold and valuations in India in the recent past typically depicted a discounting based on the earnings of a date eighteen months down the line. Using that parameter, on the assumption of course that no further equity dilution materialised, the P/E multiples of most IT stocks should have dropped by around 35 per cent at least to make them a little less unrealistic. But then, subtleness is an unknown virtue at the Indian bourses, and when the inevitable correction took place it did so with a perverted kind of gusto that saw stock prices halving almost overnight. Yet, it is a fact that there is no way that even such valuations can be wholly justified as notwithstanding the ongoing infotech revolution, growth rates will inevitably slow down and it is then that investors will realise that they themselves killed the goose that laid the golden eggs through unrealistic expectations and valuations based thereon. Take the recent case of Infosys Technologies, whose Q4 results for FY 2000-01 fell short of market expectations notwithstanding an otherwise satisfactory topline and bottomline growth. It is another thing that Infosys has sent the record right in Q1 of FY 2001-02 with a good performance that had most investors smiling again in from the aisles. Of course, the fear factor has ensured that the cheer did not translate into fresh purchases. Historical evidence suggested that euphoria normally precedes a crash in the stock market, and euphoria would have been a relatively mild word to use for the run up in infotech stocks from the first trading day of the new millennium to the day that the Union Budget was announced. What happened thereafter, in many ways reinforces this theory. The two single largest factors that drive investors are fear and greed, though not necessarily in that order. In a bull market of the kind we had been witnessing in recent times, fear goes out of the window and unadulterated greed becomes the dominant force. It is here that investors invariably begin losing. Typically, they would find the price of an Infosys or Hughes Software stock too high for their liking and almost by default go looking for cheaper infotech stocks. Now, seven times out of ten, these companies are ‘wannabes’ rather than fundamentally solid performers, and while it is easy to be a ‘wannabe’ Infy, to even come close to a semblance of its performance is well nigh impossible for most of these companies. Worse still, there were companies that were recent ‘converts’, typically though not necessarily from the finance segment whose USP those days was to re-christen themselves with an infotech tag and hey presto, their dwindling stock soared raising their market capitalisation without any good reason. And here typically, is where the problem lies — indiscriminate investors who cannot or rather, refuse to distinguish between a fundamentally sound infotech company and a bogus one whose life-span at the bourses is limited. Inevitably thus, there was a fallout and the market that was built on hopes began to witness a shakeout of the kind we are continuing to witness today. It is here that the men get separated from the boys and investors begin to realise (most of them, too late) the importance of remaining invested only in fundamentally sound companies. After all, as good old Abe Lincoln once said, “You can fool some of the people all the time, all the people some of the time, but you can never fool all the people all the time”. Amen! |
Indian beer wins gold medal London, August 2 Making the announcement at a function attended by Indian High Commissioner, Nareshwar Dayal, founder and Managing Director of the award winning Cobra Beer, Karan Bilimoria said here yesterday. “It is very gratifying to have Cobra’s quality recognised as a world-class beer by this international body.” Monde is the oldest and most representative body in the field of quality selection worldwide.
PTI
Sony cuts prices on ‘Memory Stick’ San Diego, August 2 Sony’s chewing-gum shaped “Memory Stick” now runs from $ 24.95 for the 8-megabyte stick to $ 149.95 for the 128-megabyte stick. The larger stick had previously sold for as much as $ 240. The sticks can be swapped among other Sony products, including digital cameras, laptop computers and handheld devices and used as a way to share files.
Reuters
Peace through poverty alleviation Sydney, August 2 He said the bank would stay its current course of providing help through structural adjustment programmes despite anti-capitalist protests such as those at the recent Group of Eight summit where one protester was killed. “If you cannot deal with the question of poverty, if you cannot deal with the issue of equity, then you are not dealing with the question of peace,” Wolfensohn told a charity dinner yesterday.
Reuters
IT companies grows 70 pc: Nasscom Bangalore, August 2 “This is a cause for total euphoria”, Nasscom Chairman, Phiroz Vandrewala said, addressing “E-biz India 2001”, Nasscom’s third
annual on e-business, which began here today. PTI |
bb
Sanctioned First licence Arena Animation ISO 9002 BPL Studio 21 Tisco trophy |
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