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M&M sets up jv with US auto major
Honda to pump Rs 700 cr into Indian arm
Promoting free zone business model
Saif Zone woos Indian investors
Skoda unveils Laura model
Renault’s Logan may cost around Rs 3.3 lakh |
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Car sales down by 2.31 pc
Dilip Chhabria’s designs a big hit at Dubai motor show
Assocham for 49 pc FDI in SSIs
Gold plunges by Rs 270
PHDCCI favours early FTA
A-I to promote Malaysia, Singapore sector
HLL decision
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M&M sets up jv with US auto major
New York, December 13 The new venture will be known as Mahindra International, the companies said in a statement here yesterday. Mahindra and Mahindra will have 51 per cent ownership in the joint venture with Navistar accounting for 49 per cent and the combined investments of the two companies will be more than $ 80 million over a two-to-three year period, it said. Mr Daniel C. Ustian, Navistar Chairman, CEO and President, said the joint venture gave the company “the opportunity to participate in the economic growth of India and the surrounding region, working with a partner of proven capabilities and reputation.” Mahindra International is expected to start production of commercial trucks and buses in 2007 in an updated Mahindra facility, the statement said. Mr Anand G. Mahindra, Vice-Chairman and Managing Director of Mahindra and Mahindra, said: “This jv will help us strengthen our competence across our core areas of product development, engineering and manufacturing.” The state-of-the-art Mahindra factory will include cab assembly, vehicle assembly and a paint shop. The vehicles will have 90 per cent local content from the start due to strong availability of quality parts and materials from Indian suppliers, the statement said. Besides marketing the vehicles in India, the venture is also expected to export vehicles to many other parts of the world through its own distribution channel, as well as Navistar and M&M’s overseas networks. Navistar International is a leading manufacturer of truck, school bus and mid-range diesel engines in North America.
— PTI
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Honda to pump Rs 700 cr into Indian arm
New Delhi, December 13 The company, which has invested close to Rs 150 crore for ramping up capacity to 50,000 units per annum from 30,000 units, plans to double the output to 1,00,000 units by 2010. Honda Siel Cars India (HSCI) President and CEO Masahiro Takedagawa told reporters at the company’s manufacturing facility at Greater Noida in UP. Honda holds a 99 per cent stake in HSCI while local partner Siel India has the remaining 1 per cent. Mr Takedagawa said the new investments would be met through internal accruals with the company making profits in India. The company has so far invested close to Rs 800 crore in India. The company CEO said Civic would be the new model that would hit the Indian roads in 2006. Asked whether the company was looking to make an entry into the small car segment, which dominates car sales in India, he said it was on their radar.
— PTI
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Promoting free zone business model
Chandigarh, December 13 This is essentially what free zones are all about, and the Sharjah Airport International Free Zone
(Saif Zone), one of an estimated 3000 such free zones around the world, has around 1000 Indian companies operating from there. And they are looking for more. “Indian companies today are going global. Many are in the process of creating a global brand name. We are offering our free zone as a great facilitator,” says Sheikh Saqer
R.H. Al Qassemi, Deputy Director- General of the Saif Zone Authority. Like in most free zones, 100 per cent foreign ownership is permitted, and capital and profits can be freely repatriated. “We have put in place excellent infrastructure, numerous airports, ports, and a superb road network. Indian companies can take advantage of this, and our own economy will grow as well,” the Sheikh said. Around 40 per cent of Saif Zone’s companies are into trading, where the zone essentially functions as a logistics and warehousing hub for the movement of goods. “Increasingly, we are also seeing services companies, which form another 30 per cent. Industries take up the remaining 30 per cent, he said.” Interestingly, the clustering model does not work well in free zones, noted Sheikh
Qassemi. In a cluster, companies offering similar services or manufacture of similar components cluster together to serve a demand generated by the market, or by a major manufacturer - an automobile company catered to by a base of ancillaries/parts makers for example.
Companies like Infosys and ICICI Infotech are among the IT service companies operating from the zone. Zee Telefilms is another major Indian name. “India is a growing economy, the largest in the region. We want to facilitate this growth and be part of it,” he said.
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Saif Zone woos Indian investors
Chandigarh, December 13 The Sheikh, who is on a whirlwind tour of India, met investors from Chandigarh and Punjab at a meet organised by the CII Northern Region last night. He said the Saif Zone, spread over an area of 15 million square feet, already had 2,000 companies. Saif was established in 1995 with just 55 companies, but because of the strategic location of Saif and accessibility to over 2 billion consumers in the world market from here, has resulted in maintaining annual growth rate of 35 per cent. Since Punjab has primarily an agrarian economy, there is a lot of scope for attracting investors to Saif. The Deputy Director-General, while introducing the Saif Zone to local investors, said besides a 100 per cent ownership provided to investors in the free zone, the investors were exempted from taxes, import and export duties. He added that the complete repatriation of capital is also allowed with no currency restriction. "The tax holiday to investors would continue for the next 25 years," he added. Sheikh Saqer R.H. Al Qassemi said during the past three years, India has seen a boom in economy, and foreigners are now wooing investors here. "We have seven international airports, nine sea ports, and Sharjah is also one of the top 20 cargo hubs in the world. The Sheikh said the banking systems were not much different from India. "There are 60 banks in the UAE, and 40 of these are international banks, including some Indian banks. The 20 local banks, too, are going global," he said. He pointed out that of the 2,000 companies already established in the Saif Zone, about 50 per cent of the companies were Indian. He added he would be meeting investors in Delhi, Hyderabad, Indore.
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Skoda unveils Laura model
New Delhi, December 13 “The prices of 12 models of cars from SkodaAuto India will go up between Rs 15,000 and Rs 30,000,” Managing Director Imran Hassen told reporters here at the launch of its latest model Laura. He, however, said the hike in prices would not be applicable to the newly launched ‘Laura’, which comes at a tag of Rs 16,81,081 (ex-showroom Delhi). He said the company planned to launch two new versions of its Octavia range in January and March. Based on the A5 platform, the latest model comes with six-speed transmission powered by a 1896 cc diesel pumpe duse engine.
— PTI
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Renault’s Logan may cost around Rs 3.3 lakh
Kolkata, December 12 Mr Jean Leviol, French head of the Economic Missions for India and South Asia, at an interaction with the Indian Chamber of Commerce here, said that the Renault Logan could cost 6,000 Euros. The budget car, which is expected in 2007, will be produced by a joint venture company of France’s Renault and Indian partner Mahindra and Mahindra. M&M will hold 51 per cent in the JV company which has already invested about Rs 600 crore into a facility at Nasik.
— PTI
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Car sales down by 2.31 pc
New Delhi, December 13 Motor cycle sales in the domestic market, however, managed to hold ground increasing by just 0.97 per cent at 4,83,884 units in November as against 4,79,212 units in the same month last year. Commercial vehicle sales improved by 5.52 per cent to 28,010 units in November as against 26,544 units in the same month a year ago. With customers postponing new buys for the next year, Korean carmaker Hyundai suffered a decline of 11.89 per cent in domestic sales at 13,950 units in November as against 15,834 units in the same month a year ago. Market leader Maruti Udyog, however, maintained its upward growth with a 7.42 per cent increase at 37,853 units
during the month as against 35,237 units in the corresponding month a year ago. Another leading player Tata Motors managed to hold its November sales figure in the positive terrain with a 2.28 per cent increase at 10,687 units as against 10,448 units in the same month last year. Cumulative domestic car sales during the April-November period, however, increased by 5.22 per cent at 5,57,813 units this year as against 5,30,117 units in the corresponding period last year. In the motor cycles segment, market leader Hero Honda managed a growth of 5.95 per cent, clocking 2,43,885 units in November as against 2,30,182 units in the same month last year. South-based TVS Motor Co also managed to increase its sales in November by 3.38 per cent at 63,635 units as against 61,551 units in the same month last year. However, the second biggest player in the segment, Bajaj Auto’s sales declined by 2.74 per cent at 1,41,083 units in November as against 1,45,058 units in the same month last year. Nevertheless, the cumulative bike sales in the April-Nov period jumped by 18.83 per cent at 38,11,736 units as against 32,07,816 units in the corresponding period last year. Scooter and scooterettes sales in during the period, however, declined by 4.59 per cent at 6,10,367 units as against 6,39,756 units in the same
period last year. The commercial vehicles category managed to grow 8.47 per cent at 2,10,216 units in the April-November period, as compared to 1,93,794 units in the corresponding period last year.
— PTI
Maruti tops
New Delhi, December 13
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Dilip Chhabria’s designs a big hit at Dubai motor show
Dubai, December 13 Having established its presence in the very special custom-built car market in India, Chhabria’s DC Design feels that it is only logical to move to a market, which has the highest car-per-person ratio in the world and where customer spending on lifestyle products is high. “We have joined hands with EximStar, a leading automotive trading company, to market our vehicles in this part of the world,” Mr Chhabria told PTI here at the inaugural yesterday. The JV, the finer details of which are still being worked out, is confident of selling at least 150 re-designed vehicles in 2006. The DC Design stall, which showcased two of Chhabria’s creations — a Mercedes S-500 Stretch and a DC Star XS (the first two-door SUV on the Porsche Cayenne platform) — evoked considerable excitement among car enthusiasts. But Chhabria said DC Star, as the JV would be called, was not here to per se sell the concept vehicles, but to gauge the market. Based on the success, DC Star would set up a manufacturing facility for tailor-made cars here, said EximStar’s Saleem Ansari, who said the JV’s offering would be high on quality and soft on the pocket. Mr Chhabria said EximStar had put a price tag of 400,000 euros on the Mercedes S-500 and 300,000 euros on the Porsche Cayenne. While re-designed vehicles are high on looks, Mr Chhabria said they were also superior in performance and safety.
— PTI
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Assocham for 49 pc FDI in SSIs
New Delhi, December 13 The chamber also stressed the need for a unified law for small & medium enterprises (SME) and called for setting up of a technology bank for provision of new technologies. "The flow of credit to the SMEs and SSIs under the present dispensation is limited and full of hassles as these two face constraints to finance their working capital requirement as also suffer credit speech to finance their plant and machinery requirements," Assocham president Anil Agarwal said. Once the new law is enforced, the chamber believes that the investment limit in plant and machinery for the SSIs will be raised to Rs 5 crore from the present level of Rs 1 crore.
— PTI
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Gold plunges by Rs 270
New Delhi, December 13 An ongoing seven-day-long rally was snapped as market participants felt a rise in the gold price, which touched an high of Rs 8,150 yesterday. The yellow metal fell in Asian trading as some investors sold bullion betting a rally to a 24-year high may have been overdone, and lost $ 6.60 to $ 521.40 an ounce. A similar dampening trend was noticed in the white metal as silver ready fell by Rs 150 at Rs 13,500 per kg and weekly-based delivery by Rs 600 at Rs 13,100 per kg. Silver coins were
equally affected and lost Rs 400 at Rs 17,000 for buying and Rs 17,200 for selling of 100 pieces. Standard gold and ornaments plunged by Rs 270 each at Rs 7,880 and Rs 7,730 per 10 gram, respectively. Sovereign also fell by Rs 100 at Rs 6,000 per piece of eight gram.
— PTI
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PHDCCI favours early FTA
New Delhi, December 13 India’s efforts to proactively engage the economies of the South-East Asian region under its “Look East” policy have already begun to pay rich dividends as India’s trade with ASEAN reached the Rs 39,831 crore mark, registering a 14 per cent increase during April-September over that in the same period last fiscal, said Mr K.N. Memani, President, PHDCCI. “It would be mutually beneficial for both India and ASEAN if FTA between the two is implemented by next year itself,” Mr Memani underlined. The 24 per cent increase in India’s exports to the group during this period is a clear indication of the inherent potential and the need for furthering the economic relations between the two. These are the findings of a PHDCCI analysis to measure and access the performance of India’s trade relations’ vis-à-vis major trading blocks in the world.
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A-I to promote Malaysia, Singapore sector
New Delhi, December 13 In a written reply to a question in the Rajya Sabha, the minister said many tangible and intangible benefits would accrue from this alliance to the aviation, travel and tourism industry which cannot be quantified. Regarding norms for overseas air services, the minister replied that under the existing guidelines, Indian scheduled carriers having experience of continuous operations of five years in the domestic sector and having a minimum fleet size of 20 aircraft are permitted to operate on international routes. To another question on disruption in schedule of Alliance Air in view of a number of pilots leaving it for new private carriers, Mr Patel said some curtailments/adjustments have been made in the schedule within existing resources.
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HLL decision
Mumbai, December 13
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Setco Clutch buys Lipe brand Telecom licence Zensar buyout |
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