The premier Indian Institutes of Management will have to draw on all their management skills to solve the current financial imbroglio they are in. On the one hand, the fee hike by IIM Ahmedabad and IIM Bangalore has caused heartburn not only among students and the Union Human Resource Development Ministry but also among the other IIMs who say they were not consulted despite an existing agreement to do so. IIM-A and IIM-B have said that a fee hike is a prerogative of their own
Struggling US telecom giant Motorola is exploring the possibility of shifting part of the manufacturing facility it is closing in Singapore to India. China and Thailand are also on the radar. Top sources said India is high on the list since Motorola already has a plant in Chennai and a large domestic mobile phone base of over 120 million phones annually.
International digital marketing company Digitas has partnered with Solutions to enter the digital marketing sector in India. Digitas is owned by global advertising major Publicis Groupe. The new entity will be called Solutions Digitas. Digital marketing was not just online marketing and India is an upcoming market for digital marketing. Digitas will also introduce Prodigious digital production that manages the technology end of digital marketing for clients such as GM & P&G.
GMR Hyderabad International Airport Ltd, the consortium operating the new Hyderabad airport, has offered to halve ground-handling charges even as the civil aviation ministry allowed the domestic carriers to undertake their ground-handling till January 1, 2009. This will give the two sides enough time to resolve the contentious issue, which almost jeopardised the opening of the new airport and forced a postponement once.
Aviation experts say the existing airports cannot be viable.
Canadian communications major Research In Motion (RIM), owners of the BlackBerry brand of mobile phones, has assured the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) that it would sort out the BlackBerry tangle by initiating discussions between security agencies of Canada and India. The move comes in response to a government notice directing BlackBerry service providers to stop services by December 31, 2007.
Star Plus has signed up telecom major Airtel as the presenting sponsor for the Shah Rukh Khan-anchored Kya Aap Panchvi Pass Se Tez Hai. According to sources, the deal has been struck at Rs 40 crore. The Airtel deal follows on the heels of its competitor Vodafone signing up as the presenting sponsor for the Indian Premier League on Sony TV.
With the Bangalore airport announcing stiff user developmental fee on domestic passengers, low-cost carriers -- JetLite, SpiceJet and Simplifly Deccan (formerly Air Deccan) -- have decided to drastically cut their flight schedules to the city and other new airports like Hyderabad.
Regional airlines that have received approval include MDLR, Jagson Airlines, Star Aviation and Zav Air. Others like Mega Airways and Premier Airlines are still awaiting approval.
Bangalore's new airport will be ready on March 7 to receive the first commercial test flights. It plans to start commercial operations on March 28 or 30, soon after Hyderabad's new airport does so on 16 March.
The income earned from such activities is crucial for the domestic airline industry, which had accumulated losses of over Rs 2,200 crore in 2007. These losses are expected to rise to Rs 2,800 crore in 2008.
For executives who quit their cushy jobs to do a one-year post-graduate programme in management at reputed management schools, it could be a problem of plenty, with placement offers pouring in two months before their course comes to an end.
Realty FII norms, which were recently put outside the purview of Press Note 2 (2005), are vague about pre-IPO investments.
The move follows the near Rs 60 crore (Rs 600 million) redemptions every month from the US-64 and ARS bonds in the last couple of years.
Indian television company NDTV is in advanced stages of negotiations with NBC Universal, a subsidiary of New York Stock Exchange-listed General Electric to sell between 25 and 30 per cent in its UK-based subsidiary NDTV Networks Plc.
If press freedom is not to be treated as sacrosanct when the press is critical of the government, and if the only freedom available is to be a cheer-leader, that is not press freedom at all.
If India's Australia tour gets cancelled, advertisers will ask the broadcasters for a refund.
Power sector stocks have recently emerged as market favourites, evoking memories of the information technology and pharmaceutical booms of a few years ago and the real estate sector more recently.
While few doubt stocks here are quoting at price-earnings ratios which are higher than those in peer countries, India's growth prospects are the key differentiator.
In November and December, FIIs pulled out $5 billion from the market, yet the Sensex settled back above the 20,000-mark.
