Aegis to hire 9,000 next fiscal

Mumbai: Aegis, part of the $39-billion Essar Group, will hire up to 9,000 people in fiscal 2015 to cater to increasing demand for back-office services from developed markets and India.
Of this, about 4,500 employees would be added to its operations in India, Mumbai: while the remaining would be deployed at Aegis’ centres globally, Sandip Sen, Global CEO of Aegis, told Business Line . Currently, the company has centres in 13 countries.

“The demand pipeline is looking good across geographies. Thanks to our size, we have a seat at the table when it comes to most outsourcing conversations,” Sen said on the sidelines of the Nasscom summit.

Emerging destination
The company would also be hiring in the Philippines and Malaysia. Sen sees Malaysia as an emerging alternative to Philippines, a country which has become a strong destination for voice-based business process outsourcing and management.

Most of the hiring at Aegis would be for new business and not to make up for attrition, Sen said.

The backfilling of positions is a continuous process at the 55,000 employee-strong BPO company, thanks to the over 40 per cent attrition rate. Sen says that attrition need not be a negative factor.

“Most BPO contracts are for three years and we generally do not get price escalations every year. However, my people costs keep going up with annual salary hikes. So we do not mind if some experience hands have to be replaced with entry level staffers as we are confident of our internal training abilities,” he said.

Essar commissions 6 mtpa pellet plant in Odisha

Mumbai: Essar Steel commissioned a six million tonnes per annum (mtpa) pellet-making facility at Paradip in Odisha on Monday.

This is the first phase of the 12 mtpa pellet plant to be commissioned by 2013.

The company is also setting up 12 mtpa iron ore beneficiation plant at Dabuna and a 253 km slurry pipeline connecting Dabuna and Paradip.

The beneficiation plant will enhance the iron content in the ore to 63 per cent from 54 per cent.

Essar Steel plans to invest Rs 4,200 crore to set up the integrated facility in Odisha.

The pellet plant in Paradip, along with the eight mtpa facility at Visakhapatnam, in Andhra Pradesh, will fully secure the iron ore requirements of the company's Hazira plant.

Mr Dilip Oommen, Managing Director and CEO, said the company will beneficiate the low-grade iron ore available at Dabuna and transport it through a slurry pipe to the pellet plant at Paradip.

The pellets will then be transported from the company's dedicated berth at Paradip port to Hazira.

“The entire process will bring down our production cost to $750 a tonne against the industry average of $1,000 to $1,350 a tonne,” he said.

Mr Shashi Ruia, Chairman, Essar Group, said Odisha is fast emerging as a favoured investment destination and Essar is committed to be part of this growth story.

Largest Producer
“This pellet plant in Odisha is crucial in our quest to achieve complete vertical integration,” he said.

Essar has emerged as the largest pellet producer in India with a capacity of 14 mtpa.

This will increase to 20 mtpa after completion of the second phase in Odisha. JSW Steel has 9.2 mtpa capacity followed by JSPL, at 4.5 mtpa.

Essar Steel requires about 15 mtpa pellets to produce 10 mtpa of steel at Hazira. It intends to either export or offload the surplus pellets when the entire capacity is commissioned.

The company has signed a 10-year supply contract for iron ore in Odisha and has a long-term contract with NMDC for its requirement at Visakhapatnam.

It has applied for allotment of iron ore mines in Odisha.

Steel Production
The company has set a production target of 7.4 mtpa for this fiscal against 4.35 mtpa achieved in FY'12.

“We intend to ramp up production at all our facilities and aim to produce more value-added products, such as outer panels for the auto sector and the white goods industry, besides targeting import substitution. The realisation from value-added products is higher by $70-80 a tonne,” said Mr Ruia.

The company's turnover will touch Rs 40,000 crore once it produces 10 mtpa of steel, said Mr Oommen. It has a debt of Rs 20,000 crore.

Vodafone pays $1.9 billion for buying Essar stake in JV

NEW DELHI: UK-based Vodafone today paid USD 1.9 billion to Essar as first tranche for buying 22 per cent stake, held by offshore entities belonging to Ruias in their telecom joint venture Vodafone-Essar.

The 22.03 per cent stake, held in the JV by offshore entities of the Ruias-led Essar, is valued at USD 3.8 billion.

"We have made the first tranche of payment to Essar," a Vodafone spokesperson said.

Of Essar's 33 per cent stake in the JV, 22.03 per cent is owned by the company's overseas entities, while the remaining 10.97 per cent is held by the group's Indian firms and is valued at USD 1.2 billion.

According to sources, Vodafone has now paid USD 1.9 billion to Essar and the remaining USD 1.9 billion would be paid in November.

To sell the remaining 10.97 per cent in the telecom joint venture, Essar has approached the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) for approval.

When contacted, Essar spokesperson declined to comment.