B U S I N E S S

Trade deficit with China
India asks Chinese firms to set up manufacturing units
New Delhi, November 26
To reduce the trade deficit, India has asked Chinese companies to invest here and set up manufacturing facilities. Amitabh Kant, Secretary, Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP), told an audience of Chinese companies that at present, India faces a trade deficit which is an unsustainable situation and cannot continue for long.

India is fastest growing smartphone market: IDC 
New Delhi, November 26
India continues to be the fastest growing smartphone market in the Asia-Pacific region, with about 82% growth in the July-September quarter of 2014 over the same period last year, research firm IDC said today.

IT industry largest creator of jobs: Murthy
Bangalore, November 26
Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy today said the IT industry in India was a “shining example of all the good that came off after liberalisation” in the country. “The software industry has given new confidence to Indians”, he said.

Nokia India MD Ajey Mehta (L) with chairman of Microsoft India Bhaskar Pramanik at the launch of Microsoft Lumia 535 smartphone in New Delhi on Wednesday. It is priced at Rs 9,199. Tribune photo: Manas Ranjan Bhui

Alibaba to invest more in India, help start-ups
New Delhi, November 26
Alibaba founder Jack Ma, China’s wealthiest man, today said he is keen to invest more funds in India and will work with Indian technology entrepreneurs as he believes internet can transform the country’s future.

FTIL shares up over 4.5% 
Mumbai, November 26
Shares of Financial Technologies India (FTIL) ended over 4.5% higher after the company inked a pact with ace investor Rakesh Jhunjhunwala and others to sell its entire 5% stake in MCX-SX for Rs 88.41 crore.

Nippon to raise stake in Rel MF
New Delhi, November 26
Japanese financial services giant Nippon will hike its stake in India’s top fund house Reliance Mutual Fund from 26% to 49%, while investing Rs 657 crore for the first tranche of 9%.

Trade deficit with China
India asks Chinese firms to set up manufacturing units
Tribune News Service

New Delhi, November 26
To reduce the trade deficit, India has asked Chinese companies to invest here and set up manufacturing facilities. Amitabh Kant, Secretary, Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP), told an audience of Chinese companies that at present, India faces a trade deficit which is an unsustainable situation and cannot continue for long.

With an open up business environment, Chinese companies should invest and set up businesses in India to bridge the trade deficit.

Expressing concern over the ballooning trade deficit of $36 billion with China, Kant said huge scope is available in India for Chinese firms to relocate their manufacturing units.

“It is important that Chinese companies come to invest in India because the trade imbalance is unsustainable in the long run. It will be difficult to continue this business unless and until Chinese companies relocate and manufacture in India and from India penetrate the global market,” Kant said while speaking at the India-China (Zhejiang) Business Cooperation Conference, organized by FICCI.

Sidharth Birla, president, FICCI, said, “We are happy that China has acknowledged that trade deficit is a matter of concern to us; our five-year trade and economic cooperation pact is geared to addressing this. Market access issues faced by our firms in sectors such as pharmaceuticals, IT and agricultural products should get resolved with renewed effort from China to import value-added products from India.”

Jack Ma, executive chairman, Alibaba while addressing the business conference said that Indo-China business cooperation had a lot of potential and he was hopeful of closer business ties between Indian and China and more Indian vendors selling products to Chinese users via Alibaba.

He said that it is a wonderful time for India and China to do business, particularly after the visit Chinese President to India.

The event saw MoUs worth over $2.4 billion signed at the conference. Among the MoUs signed today, the biggest is between Kunlun Chuangyuan Investment (Zhejiang) and Kiri Infrastructure for the project India International Trade Center in Gujarat worth $1,500 million.

Kant said there is a need for a closer economic relationship between the countries to promote regional trade and development, he said, adding trade and economic relationship has seen a lack of progress in the last few years.

“This adverse trade is not sustainable in the long run. China is the factory of the world and India is the back office of the world. If China and India work together, we will be able to facilitate global markets,” he said.

India is fastest growing smartphone market: IDC 

Shipments up 82% y-o-y

• The shipments grew 82% y-o-y to 23.3m units in the Q3
• This is the second consecutive quarter of more than 80% y-o-y growth
• The share of smartphone market in the overall mobile phone market stood at 32% in the Q3
• Samsung continues to lead the market with 24% share, followed by Micromax (20%), Lava and Karbonn (8% each) and Motorola (5%)

IT industry largest creator of jobs: Murthy
Shubhadeep Choudhury
Tribune News Service

Bangalore, November 26
Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy today said the IT industry in India was a “shining example of all the good that came off after liberalisation” in the country. “The software industry has given new confidence to Indians”, he said.

He said the Indian IT industry came out with two innovations that were adopted globally. The innovations — 24-hour work day and global delivery model — were developed by the Indian IT companies to primarily service their clients in the USA. He claimed that no other Indian industry had ever come up with innovation which was adopted by industries in the developed countries.

Murthy was addressing the audience at the ongoing Commonwealth Science Conference here in a session themed “Entrepreneurship and Innovation in India”.

He said IT industry had already replaced the public sector as the biggest employer in India. The IT industry had also generated downstream employment that was three times more than the number of people directly employed in various IT companies, Murthy said.

“The software industry in India employs about 3.2 million professionals and adds about 2,00,000 jobs every year,” he said.

Murthy said the huge foreign exchanges earned by the IT industry and said the foreign exchanges had a stabilising effect on the Indian economy which would have otherwise gone out of control owing to the skyrocketing global oil prices.

Alibaba to invest more in India, help start-ups

FTIL shares up over 4.5% 

Nippon to raise stake in Rel MF