Mysore, July 12
Infosys Ltd, India’s second largest IT bellwether, is back on hiring spree and plans to increase its headcount by a whopping 45,000 during this fiscal (2011-12), a top company official said here Tuesday.

“We will be hiring about 45,000 engineers worldwide in this fiscal (FY 2012), which will be 13,000 more than we projected (32,000) in April to meet the growing demand and increase the bench strength,” Infosys chief executive S Gopalakrishnan told reporters here.

Stepping up hiring was evident in the first quarter (April-June) when the global software major recruited 9,900 persons as against the projected target of 6,500. “We will be hiring about 12,000 persons, including freshers and laterals in the second quarter (July-Sept) to train and mentor them to leverage the emerging outsourcing opportunities,” the company’s co-chairman designate said.

With 7,160 engineers leaving the company and its subsidiaries during the quarter under review (Q1), the net addition was 2,740, taking the total number of employees to 1,33,560 as against 130,820 quarter ago and 114,822 a year ago.

Return to double-digit growth after recovering from the global tech meltdown, the company hired about 43,120 persons last fiscal (FY 2011), including 20,000 freshers against the estimated 25,000. The attrition rate declined sequentially to 15.8 per cent from 17 per cent and remained flat during the last 12 months. — IANS

BANGALORE: Results announced by Infosys on Tuesday for the quarter ending on June 30, 2011, showed it as having made a net profit of Rs 1,722 crore during the period. The profit registered an increase of 16 per cent over the corresponding quarter a year ago, but dipped by over five per cent sequentially (profit made the company in the last quarter was Rs 1818 crore). Its total revenue during the quarter of Rs 7,485 crore was better than the revenue forecast of Rs 7,382 crore made by the company in April. — TNS

Mumbai, July 12
Eyeing the growing ultra rich segment, the country’s second largest private lender HDFC Bank today launched an exclusive credit card ‘Infinia’, with no pre-set limit on spends.

“The card is positioned directly against American Express and we believe it is a better product,” the bank’s Managing Director Aditya Puri told reporters after launching the card, pointing to the entrenched competitor serving the high-net category.

To start with, the bank will issue 5,000 of the credit cards, which come with a slew of privileges through partnerships to its wealth management customers on the basis of their networth and financial dealings history.

The bank management, however, declined to give details like the networth cut-off which will make a customer eligible.

The card’s annual fee will be Rs 30,000, while the bank will charge an interest of 1.99 per cent per month and levy a 2 per cent foreign currency fee.

“We have the largest network of merchant terminals across the country acquired by ourselves. The unique difference from others serving the segment is that Infinia will get accepted anywhere,”the bank's country head for retail assets and credit cards, Pralay Mondal, said.

A senior bank official said American Express has around 1.5 lakh cardholders in India.

Puri said HDFC Bank would not offer concierge services to its cardholders, something which American Express is famous for. Instead, it will give facilities like an air accident cover of Rs 3 crore, emergency hospitalisation cover of Rs 50 lakh, loyalty rewards and has also tied-up with Taj Hotels and Singapore Airlines, he said.

The ultra rich may comprise 1 per cent of the card holding population but they spend 10 per cent which is a big opportunity, its executive vice-president Parag Rao said.

The number of ultra rich in the country stands at 62,000 presently, which is expected to grow to 2,19,000 by 2016, he said, adding that 22 per cent of the wealth for this category of customers goes into consumption.

HDFC Bank has a credit card base of 53 lakh, issues 80,000 cards a month and holds a 26 per cent market share going by spends. — PTI 

New Delhi, July 12
A day after asking ministries and departments to cut foreign tours and refrain from hosting conferences in five-star hotels, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee today said austerity measures were aimed at reducing wasteful expenditure and containing fiscal deficit.

“I sent a note (on austerity in government departments) and the Prime Minister has approved in certain areas where I considered that wasteful expenditure should be avoided and that money should be deployed for developmental work,” he told reporters here.

He said while there was no concern over the revenue collection front, the subsidy Bill of the government on crude oil might go up if prices continue to remain high.

Besides, the government may also have to shell out more to meet the subsidies on food and fertiliser.

“(So) I shall have to keep the target of the fiscal deficit ... but surely I am interested to have some austerity measures to avoid the wasteful expenditures, but not productive expenditure,” he said.

The government yesterday asked ministries and departments to restrict foreign travel, refrain from holding meetings in five-star hotels, not to buy new vehicles and create posts, with a view to reducing public expenditure.

The government proposes to keep the fiscal deficit at 4.6% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2011-12, down from 4.7% in the previous fiscal. The government spends about Rs 73,637 crore a year on fuel and fertiliser subsidies. It is likely to spend about Rs 82,000 crore on food subsidy this fiscal and the bill may go up to Rs 95,000 crore once the National Food Security Act comes into play. — PTI 

New Delhi, July 12
A meeting of the Empowered Group of Ministers (EGoM) headed by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee to consider limiting supply of subsidised domestic LPG cylinders to 4-6 per household in a year, has been deferred.

The meeting was slated for today but had to be deferred due to the Cabinet reshuffle, official sources said.

The panel was to consider recommendation of the Task Force on Direct Transfer of Subsidies on Kerosene, LPG and Fertiliser.

Sources said if approved, every household would get only 4-6 LPG cylinders at subsidised price of Rs 395.35 in Delhi and they would have to pay market price of about Rs 710 per bottle for any requirement beyond that.

The limited supply of subsidised LPG would be for those who own a car, two-wheeler, house or figure in the income-tax list.

In the second phase, the difference between the current retail price and the actual market price will be paid directly to BPL cardholders. This would be delivered through the unique identification number, Aadhar, as it is commonly known.

For kerosene, the Task Force has suggested direct subsidy transfer to the poor and market prices for others.

Sources said the EGoM was to approve launch of pilot projects to test direct transfer of cash subsidy to the targeted populations in few states. — PTI 

New Delhi, July 12
Reliance Industries as well as the Oil Ministry and sector regulator DGH today gave detailed point-by-point reply to observations top auditor CAG had made in its draft report on the nation’s largest gas field, KG-D6.

Besides Reliance, Cairn India and UK’s BG Group too replied to audit observations on Rajasthan oilfields and Panna/Mukta and Tapti fields respectively at the Exit Conference called by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) before finalising its report, sources privy to meetings said.

Directorate General of Hydrocarbons (DGH) Director General S K Srivastava in a separate session with CAG said the Production Sharing Contract (PSC) allowed companies to revise costs and plans for developing oil and gas finds.

This is by incorporating new inputs like the one done by Reliance for its KG-D6 fields where cost went up from $2.4 billion initially proposed to $8.8 billion in two phases ($5.2 billion in Phase-1 and $3.6 billion in phase-II). The initial cost produced in 2004 was for producing a maximum of 40 million standard cubic meters per day but in the revised plans, Reliance doubled output to 80 mmscmd.

“Financial estimates were best estimates at that point of time for the broad work programme considered in development plan and were used for techno economic evaluation only,” DGH said.

CAG in the draft report had accused oil ministry and DGH of turning a blind eye to the cost increase which would lower government's profit take from the field.

Sources said DGH disagreed with CAG assumption of adverse impact on government's financial take from the project saying "cost for the purpose of computation of government take is determined based on actual expenditure incurred and duly validated by audit, and is not based on development plan estimates".

“Any expenditure qualified by audit will be disallowed as contract cost," it said adding Reliance's actual expenditure on Phase-1 of KG-D6 gas field development is USD 5.6 billion till March 2011. Second phase of drilling is scheduled to commence shortly. — PTI 

New Delhi, July 12
The Commerce Ministry has favoured patent protection to low-cost innovations like onion seed transplanter and clay refrigerator (mitticool).

Commenting on the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion's (DIPP) discussion paper on patenting products made out of ‘jugaad’ technology, the Commerce Department said: “It supports the need for introduction of Utility Model in Intellectual Property lexicon”.

Utility model is a kind of patent protection given to homegrown products, but for a lesser term of 6-15 years and has less stringent requirements as against 20 years in the case of regular patents which are given under the Indian Patent Act.

However, the Commerce Department suggested to DIPP to hold further discussions with intellectual property and technology experts to widen the understanding on the proposed model.

The discussion paper, floated in May, had raised questions like does India need a Utility Model Law?; what should be the scope of protection under such a law?; should it be restricted to mechanical devices and what should be the nature of linkages between this law and the existing Patents Act? This model is prevalent in 55 countries, including China, Japan, France and Germany.

Supporting the concept, industry body Ficci said that the move would "surely benefit the small and medium sector immensely especially the sectors as diverse as electronics, robotics, engineering and mechanical." However, the chamber said that innovations from the pharmaceutical sector should be kept out from this purview. — PTI