The Aditya Birla group's wireless telephony firm Idea Cellular has agreed to buy Spice Communications in a three-stage deal in which minority shareholders of Spice would be given an option either to swap their shares for the Birla group firm or sell them in an open offer.
On the sidelines of crude oil price rise, Indian oil majors including Reliance Industries, Oil and Natural Gas Corporation and Essar Oil are eyeing exploration opportunities at the oil-rich sand beds of Alberta in Canada. The firms are believed to be drawing up plans in consultation with the central government and considering tie-ups with international firms for sand-oil exploration.
South African major to make open offer to RCom shareholders. The deal would create a telecom colossus with 115 million subscribers in 25 countries.
Reliance Industries has signed agreements with nine fertiliser and power companies for gas sales from its field in the Krishna-Godavari basin over the past three months. India's largest private sector company has signed memorandums of understanding with Nagarjuna Fertilisers, GVK Industries, Konaseema Power (all in Andhra Pradesh), Kribhco, Chambal Fertilisers, Iffco, Torrent Power (all in Gujarat), Tata Power and Rashtriya Chemicals & Fertilisers in Maharashtra.
Idea Cellular's bid to acquire a controlling stake in the B K Modi-promoted Spice Communications has hit a pricing roadblock. Investment banking sources said that B K Modi had asked for Rs 70 a share for his 40.8 per cent stake in Spice, valuing the company at Rs 4,829.47 crore, but Idea is reluctant to pay that much."Any price valuing Spice Communications beyond Rs 4,200 crore would be expensive for Idea Cellular," said an analyst with a domestic brokerage.
Anil Ambani has won Lebanon-based M1 Chief Executive Officer Azmi Mikati's approval for a possible merger of Reliance Communications and South Africa's MTN Group following a meeting between the two.
Global Steel owns 70 per cent stakes in iron ore mine in Brazil and two coal mines in Columbia and Mozambique. The company is setting up three special purpose vehicles for isolating financial and regulatory risks. Ispat will purchase the stakes in these SPVs, which are held by Global Steel. The iron ore mine has an estimated reserve of 500 million tonne while the coal mines hold reserves of 120 million tonne.
Spice Communications, owned by billionaire B K Modi, may consider buying out Telekom Malaysia, its partner in the phone company, if the latter fails to come up with a stake-raising plan by June, a top company official said. Telekom Malaysia, South Asia's second largest telecommunications company, owns 39.2 per cent in the Indian company and was keen to increase it to 74 per cent, the upper limit for foreign direct investments in the Indian telecom sector.
Vijay Mallya has ensured that his brands do not fall out of Indian Premier League (IPL) viewership, though his team Royal Challengers Bangalore bowed out of the tournament. After RC's series of defeats, the UB Group chairman decided to cash in on his smaller investments in rival teams such as Rajasthan Royals, Delhi Daredevils, Chennai Superkings and Mumbai Indians.
"The factories need consolidation and control as they operate independently with different human resource (HR) and logistic policies. The segmented operations cannot have power and focus on quality," K R Kim, vice-chairman and CEO (global operations), Videocon, who steered LG to market leadership in his earlier stint, told Business Standard.
The Singapore government-controlled Temasek Holdings, which controls over 90 per cent of power generation and distribution in Singapore, will soon call for bids to privatise the two companies. The Indian companies are exploring various options to bid for these assets, said sources familar with the developments. Spokespersons of both Reliance Power and GMR Infrastructure declined to comment.
Videcocon Industries plans a major consumer electronics retail foray across West Asia, Europe, Africa and Latin America under the brand name "VC" to raise global revenue shares from the current 2 per cent to 50 per cent by 2011.
Indian firms, including Tata Steel, in the past have formed SPVs to acquire foreign companies to protect local operations and also to avoid legal hindrances. The SPV may be registered in a tax-haven country, like Mauritius or Bahamas, the sources said. The move to float an SPV will help Bharti Airtel to continue being listed on Indian stock exchanges, while MTN's promoters will be given a stake in the SPV.
To up stakes in 'globally active' firms by 3 to 4% this year.
Reliance Industries Ltd, India's biggest firm by market capitalisation, is drawing up plans to convert its fuel retail outlets, which were recently closed owing to unviable operations, into malls and multiplexes.
Bharti Airtel Chairman Sunil Mittal's bid for telecom major MTN Group has to contend with some tough negotiations with Lebanon's former prime minister Najib Mikati, one of the wealthiest men in his country, as well as stiff black economic empowerment policies in South Africa that provide for a major share in the management of companies located in the country to blacks.
Tata Steel, the world's sixth-largest steel maker, is looking to acquire Brazilian iron ore assets of the United Kingdom-based London Mining, which will help ensure raw material supply for its Anglo-Dutch subsidiary, Corus. The valuation of the asset is yet to be completed, but analysts said that it would be in the range of $2 billion.
Engineering giant Larsen and Toubro and Aditya Birla group firm Grasim Industries are set to settle their long-standing dispute over the sale of cross-holdings out of court. Both the companies are believed to be in consultation with Chennai-based chartered accountant S Gurumurthy to act as arbitrator.
A global value-added services (VAS) player, Buongiorno, has researched on the habits of browsers who surf the Internet on their cell phones. In India, analysts estimate that 20-25 per cent of mobile handsets can be used for Internet surfing. Embracers, for instance, are hooked on to the technology on mobile phones and battery power is their only limitation when it comes to being online. On the other hand, Pragmatists use mobile phones as tools to make their life easier.
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.
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