India Cements gets Centre’s nod for capacity expansion

The company is setting up a 40 MW power plant at one of its facility in Tamil Nadu at a cost of Rs 810 cr
Chennai: An expert appraisal committee under the ministry of environment has given its nod to India Cements to double its capacity and set up a 40-Mw power plant at one of its facilities in Tamil Nadu. The proposed expansion project will come up at Dalavoi in Ariyalur district. According to a senior official of the company, the capacity addition would cater to Tamil Nadu and Kerala markets. "It will be a significant expansion in the two markets, where not much of the capacity additions expected in the future,” said the official.

It is expected to take about two years to complete the work. Current capacity for clinker production in this facility is 1.24 million tonnes per annum and the company plans to add 1.53 million tonnes taking total clinker production capacity to 2.77 million tonnes per annum. Cement (OPC/PPC) production capacity is 2.16 million tonnes and the company plans to add 2.55 million tonnes taking the total cement production capacity to 4.71 million tonnes.

The proposed expansion will be carried out in an area of 25.09 hectares. The estimated cost of the project is Rs 810 crore, including Rs 39.6 crore and Rs 5.71 crore earmarked for the capital cost and recurring cost per annum towards the environmental pollution control measures. India Cements, country's one of the largest cement manufacturers, currently has a total capacity of 15.5 million tonnes. It has seven plants in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh and one in Rajasthan. The company is also planning to add 2X20 Mw power plant in the facility.

The captive power plant will use coal/pet coke as fuel. The power requirement for the facility would be 41.4 Mw, which will be met from the captive power plant and the Tamil Nadu Electricity Board, according to the company's disclosure to the ministry.

SDF to shift some tractor engine lines from Italy to India

New Delhi: Farm equipment maker Same Deutz Fahr (SDF), which recently unveiled its Lamborghini tractors in India, proposes to shift some engine production lines from Italy to its plant at Ranipet, near Chennai.

The company plans to invest Rs 300 crore over the next one year in expanding the tractor engine production capacity, said Bhanu Sharma, Managing Director and CEO of SDF India Pvt Ltd.

Two new lines
“We are planning to shift production of tractor engines with three and four cylinders, that will have a horse power range of 80-110,” Sharma said. Two new tractor engine production lines will be added at its existing facility in Ranipet.

Shifting of production lines will help the company introduce newer range of tractors with higher horsepower in the Indian market by 2015, where the demand for higher capacity tractors is seen going up, Sharma said.

key factors
The shortage of manpower, rising labour costs and consolidation of land holdings are the key factors that are driving the tractor sales, he added.

Currently, SDF manufactures about 8-9 tractor models in the mid-segment with a horse power range of 40-80 hp, bulk of which are exported to about 54 countries across Asia, Africa, Latin America and Australia.

The company sold about 2,000 Deutz Fahr tractors in the Indian market this year and is planning to double it in 2014.

SDF is eyeing a production to 25,000 tractor engines during 2014, up from the current year’s output of 15,000 engines, Sharma added.

Lamborghini tractors
SDF unveiled its Lamborghini range of tractors in India at an agri-fair in Pune, recently.

The company is in the process of finalising the specifications for the Indian market, based on the customer requirement, and expects to start rolling out Lamborghini tractors in the second half of 2014, he added.

SDF is targeting rich farmers and high profile individuals with farming interests, besides golf courses, cricket stadiums and luxury resorts.

RBI allows foreign retail investments in tax-free rupee bond

Mumbai: The Reserve Bank of India on Tuesday allowed foreign retail investors, including non-resident Indians, to invest in rupee-denominated tax-free non-convertible bonds.

Funds raised through these bonds can be invested in infrastructure projects and in fixed deposits with banks. "It has been decided to permit resident entities, companies in India, authorized by the government of India, to issue taxfree, secured, redeemable, non-convertible bonds in rupees to persons resident outside India to use such borrowed funds for on lending, re-lending to the infrastructure sector and keeping in fixed deposits with banks in India pending utilization by them for permissible end-uses," RBI said in a statement.

It said the move will widen the investor base, help in internationalizing the currency and open another window for foreign investors.

At present, foreign institutional investors are not allowed to invest in tax-free infrastructure bonds issued by companies such as Power Finance Corporation, NAHAI, IIFL and Rural Electrification Corporation. Every year, the government allows some public sector companies to issue tax-free bonds.

Global investors have shown interest in rupee-denominated bonds. Recently, International Finance Corporation, the private finance arm of World Bank, had raised Rs 1,000 crore in the US by issuing rupee-linked bonds to global investors. IFC plans to raise a total of $1 billion. In such currency bond, the foreign investor will get proceeds in rupee.

"This will help in increasing the market base by including small and wide ticket size into Indian debt market," said Ashutosh Khajuria, president (treasury) at Federal Bank. "It is one step towards internationalisation of the currency." Since the bonds are rupee-denominated, volatility in the currency will not have an impact on the issuer. To that extent, external debt will be taken care of.

India Inc raises $9 bn via overseas bonds in 2013

Raises more than double the amount raised last calendar year
Kolkata: India Inc is making a scramble to raise money abroad. Indian private and state-run companies, other than financial institutions, have raised $9.23 billion by selling foreign currency bonds in foreign markets in 2013. This is more than double the money they raised through this route during the last calendar year. In 2012, domestic companies had raised $4.12 billion through foreign currency bonds.

There were 16 foreign bond issuances by private and public sector companies from India in 2013 compared to nine a year earlier. Standard Chartered Bank topped the league table helping corporates raise $1.3 billion this calendar year. It was followed by Deutsche Bank, JPMorgan, Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) and Citi.

"The overseas issuances were largely driven by volume rather than pricing. Indian companies were able to raise large sums of money through foreign currency bonds. It would have been difficult for them to raise this money in India in the current environment," said a senior banker with a large foreign bank in India.

He added investors' confidence in Indian issuers had improved in recent months, which helped domestic companies in raising money abroad. Apart from the dollar, local companies have also raised funds in other foreign currencies like the Euro, Swiss franc and Singapore dollar.

"Many issuers were of the view that interest rates could go up in the future and, hence, we saw a lot of opportunistic fund-raising as well. Overseas bond markets presented a perfect opportunity to raise large amounts and longer tenor liabilities, compared to the bank loan market," Randhir Singh, head of financing at Deutsche Bank in India, said.

Deutsche Bank managed nine of the 16 deals this year and helped its clients raise $1.29 billion from foreign bond markets.

In most cases, companies decided to use the money abroad — either to expand their business or refinance some of their existing foreign currency liabilities.

Bankers remained confident that this trend of raising money through foreign currency bonds will continue in 2014, at least in the first couple of quarters. The deal pipeline for the first quarter of the 2014 calendar year is estimated to be around $2 billion. "The new year should start on a good note, as the first quarter deal pipeline is quite robust," said a senior banker with a mid-sized foreign bank in India.

India Inc raises $9 bn via overseas bonds in 2013

Raises more than double the amount raised last calendar year
Kolkata: India Inc is making a scramble to raise money abroad. Indian private and state-run companies, other than financial institutions, have raised $9.23 billion by selling foreign currency bonds in foreign markets in 2013. This is more than double the money they raised through this route during the last calendar year. In 2012, domestic companies had raised $4.12 billion through foreign currency bonds.

There were 16 foreign bond issuances by private and public sector companies from India in 2013 compared to nine a year earlier. Standard Chartered Bank topped the league table helping corporates raise $1.3 billion this calendar year. It was followed by Deutsche Bank, JPMorgan, Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) and Citi.

"The overseas issuances were largely driven by volume rather than pricing. Indian companies were able to raise large sums of money through foreign currency bonds. It would have been difficult for them to raise this money in India in the current environment," said a senior banker with a large foreign bank in India.

He added investors' confidence in Indian issuers had improved in recent months, which helped domestic companies in raising money abroad. Apart from the dollar, local companies have also raised funds in other foreign currencies like the Euro, Swiss franc and Singapore dollar.

"Many issuers were of the view that interest rates could go up in the future and, hence, we saw a lot of opportunistic fund-raising as well. Overseas bond markets presented a perfect opportunity to raise large amounts and longer tenor liabilities, compared to the bank loan market," Randhir Singh, head of financing at Deutsche Bank in India, said.

Deutsche Bank managed nine of the 16 deals this year and helped its clients raise $1.29 billion from foreign bond markets.

In most cases, companies decided to use the money abroad — either to expand their business or refinance some of their existing foreign currency liabilities.

Bankers remained confident that this trend of raising money through foreign currency bonds will continue in 2014, at least in the first couple of quarters. The deal pipeline for the first quarter of the 2014 calendar year is estimated to be around $2 billion. "The new year should start on a good note, as the first quarter deal pipeline is quite robust," said a senior banker with a mid-sized foreign bank in India.

Jet Air in pact with Turkish Airlines

Mumbai: Jet Airways (India) Ltd has entered into a fresh aircraft leasing arrangement with Turkish Airlines for its Airbus 330-200 wide bodied jets.

The Indian company, which is 24 per cent owned by Etihad Airways, will lease out three of its idle A330s to the Turkish carrier for six years, according to sources.

A Jet spokesperson did not comment on the development, and the financial details could not be ascertained.

At the end of the second quarter, Jet said it had grounded five A330s and had initiated discussions with players for both an outright sale and long-term lease arrangements.

If the company is successful in an outright sale of these aircraft, its debt portfolio will shrink by $200 million, the airline's chief financial officer Ravishankar Gopalakrishnan had said then. Debt at the country’s second largest airline was at $1.9 billion as on September 30, 2013.

Indian companies are keen to lease out their idle aircraft to tide over mounting losses. For Q2, Jet Airways had reported a net loss of Rs 891 crore. Of this, Rs 123 crore in losses were related to aircraft on ground.

Earlier, Jet was close to leasing out all five aircraft to Kuwait Airlines, but the deal fell apart with the Kuwait government suspending the flag carrier’s chairman, Sami Al-Nesif.

Turkish Airlines and Jet Airways have a long history of commercial arrangements. News reports suggest that the two airlines have been leasing partners since 2008. In 2010, Turkish Airlines has inked an agreement with Jet to take three Boeing 777s on lease.

Recently, Air India invited bids from leasing companies to sell its Boeing 787 Dreamliner jets and is set to hire them back on monthly rentals as part of its strategy to raise cash.

Frugal innovations to keep India healthy

Mumbai: From a smart medicine pack that keeps a tab on a person taking tuberculosis medicines to technology that identifies the right blood vessel for an intra-venous procedure, innovations are now coming in small packages.

And research competitions are challenging these “Edisons of tomorrow” — students, scientists and entrepreneurs — by encouraging them to think-up novel solutions in healthcare.

Prototype development
Take the ‘Grand Challenges in Tuberculosis Control’ programme for instance. Winners get $30,000 as a grant for six months to develop a prototype. And those who scale this challenge get $100,000 each to integrate the innovation into India’s healthcare system.

The TB-control challenge, an initiative from IKP Knowledge Park, has the US Agency for International Development and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, as partners.

Big innovations are required and will continue, but the idea here is to open opportunities for effective, high-volume and low-cost solutions, says Gopichand Katragadda, Chairman and Managing Director of GE India Technology Centre (GE-ITC). GE’s Edison Challenge gives the winner a Rs 10-lakh grant, and the runner-up, Rs 5 lakh.

Exposure to market
The challenge gives university research an exposure to market needs, as perceived by the industry, he says, adding that GE would be open to absorbing an innovation that “fits the bill.”

Globally, such initiatives are not unknown. In fact, the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences, collectively founded by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and Google co-founder Sergey Brin, among others, also looks to russel up the excitement around science and research.

One of the 15 recipients of IKP’s first round of funding for TB-control solutions is Bill Thies, a researcher with Microsoft Research India. His team’s innovation helps ensure that a patient takes the TB medicine regularly and without the direct supervision mandated in the Government-run system.

The innovation involves giving numbers, hidden behind the pills in a strip of TB medicines. On taking the medicine, a four-digit code is revealed to the patient, who has to combine it with a six-digit number printed on the pack and give a missed phone call to that number. And this gets captured at the monitoring end.

TB control falters, since patients default on taking their medicines regularly. Thies’ team’s innovation seeks to plug this gap. The grant money goes to Innovators in Health, a non-profit organisation in Bihar that partners and co-evaluates the initiative, says Thies.

In the GE Edison challenge, this year’s winner was a mobile application to diagnose skin cancer and related abnormalities from IIT (Kharagpur). And last year’s runner-up, Vellore Institute of Technology’s VeinLoc (blood-vessel detector), has taken the innovation a step further, by applying for a patent.

The five-year Edison challenge encourages awardees to continue interacting with mentors at GE — a no mean exposure — since GE’s centre at Bangalore is its largest multidisciplinary research, development and engineering centre outside the US.

Intellectual property
Explaining the academia-industry misfit, Katragadda says universities are flush with funds, but are not tied to deliverables and market insight. Besides, there are trust issues between universities and the industry on matters such as intellectual property.

The Edison challenge looks to bridge the gap, by including interactions with technology resource persons and angel investors, to awaken researchers to market-place realities.

Centre approves IOC's LNG project

The capacity of the proposed facility, part of Indian Oil's Rs 56,000-cr investment plan during the 12th Plan, will be five mt a year
Chennai: The expert appraisal committee of the ministry of environment and forests has given its nod to Indian Oil Corporation (IOC)'s Rs 4,320-crore liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal project at Ennore, about 25 km away from Chennai.

The capacity of the proposed facility will be five million tonnes a year. The terminal can be expanded to 10-15 million tonnes a year. This is part of IOC’s Rs 56,000-crore investment plan during the 12th Plan Period (2012-17).

IOC started marketing of re-gasified LNG (RLNG) in 2004. As one of the major off-takers of RLNG from Dahej LNG import terminal of Petronet LNG Limited (PLL- a Joint Venture Company of IOCL, BPCL, GAIL and ONGC). IOC also has a marketing share of 30 per cent of RLNG in the upcoming PLL’s Kochi LNG terminal.

According to the committee, the Ennore port is an all-weather facility. It has all infrastructure facilities in place. The port has already earmarked water front for LNG jetty and land for storage and regasification terminal in their master plan.

After the completion of the project, RLNG would cater to the southern states. RLNG will be supplied to customers such as power plants, fertiliser companies through an extensive pipeline network. LNG would also be supplied by road through cryogenic LNG road tankers.

CCI approves acquisition of cement plants of Jaypee in Gujarat located at Sewagram and Wanakbori by Ultratech

New Delhi: The Competition Commission of India (CCI) has approved the proposed acquisition of cement plants of Jaypee Cement Corporation Limited, comprising an integrated cement unit at Sewagram and grinding unit at Wanakbori in Gujarat by Ultratech Cement Limited (Ultratech). Jaypee Cement Corporation Limited is a wholly owned subsidiary of Jaiprakash Associates Limited (Jaypee).

Both Ultratech and Jaypee are engaged in the manufacture and marketing of different varieties of cement across India. The combined capacity of sewagram and wanakbori plants is 4.8 MTPA.

The Commission vide its order dated 20.12.2013 is of the opinion that the proposed combination is not likely to have an appreciable adverse effect on competition in India and therefore, approved the proposed combination under sub-section (1) of Section 31 of the Act.

2 more investment zones, chilli park for Karnataka

Bengaluru: Union Commerce Ministry has approved the Karnataka Government’s proposal to set up a chilli park at Haveri.

Addressing reporters after a meeting here to review the pending projects, Union Commerce Minister Anand Sharma said, “We have cleared the proposal. The land for setting up the chilli park will be finalised by the State government. Spices Board and the State government will take it forward.”

The Ministry also cleared the Karnataka Government proposal to include pepper under the National Horticultural Mission (NHM).

“Karnataka is the second largest pepper producer. The State will be brought under NHM. For setting up a pepper park, the State will co-ordinate with the Spices Board,” said Sharma.

Export facilitation
To facilitate export from Karnataka, Commerce Ministry has approved few more projects. Prominent among them are to take up construction of a convention centre. An assistance of Rs 20 crore is being given to Karnataka Trade Promotion Organisation (KTPO) to take up construction of the centre.

In order to increase agri-exports from Karnataka, Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (APEDA) will take up construction of cold storage and warehousing facilities at the new airport (BIAL).

“This will increase State’s share of agri-exports and create additional infrastructure facility at the airport,” said Sharma.

Of the seven mega leather clusters proposed in the country, Karnataka will get one.

The regional sub centre of the National Institute of Design (NID) in Bangalore is will be upgraded to a full-fledged campus.

The Indian Institute of Packaging’s proposal to set up a centre in Bangalore has been cleared.“A proposal was approved some time back but it will be taken up with the State government’s help,” Sharma said.