Andhranews

Chennai, Sept. 10: Union finance minister P. Chidambaram on Sunday said the government’s hardware policy would be announced soon. “We will offer some fiscal incentives in the policy,” he said. Launching SPEL Semiconductor Ltd’s leadless molded packages and unveiling its $250-million expansion plans in Chennai, Mr Chidambaram said the government had promised to announce a package for the computer hardware industry in its Budget session.

After a detailed discussion with the industry, the government is ready with the package and it will be announced soon, he added. Stating that the government was determined to make India a hardware manufacturing hub, he said, it took 15 years for the country to become a software powerhouse. But he hoped that India would not take such a long period to reach such a position in hardware manufacturing.

The finance minister said semiconductor fab manufacturing facilities were essential for developing the hardware industry. He said the fab facility has to come up in the country in the next two-three years. “We have to migrate from the intermediary manufacturer to a complete hardware manufacturing hub? From concept to fab to the end products,” he said. Highlighting the need for investing in research and development in various sectors of the economy, Mr Chidambaram said knowledge and technology have to be India’s high priority. “Indians have excelled in the foreign countries. Why can’t we do it here?” he asked. India, he said, should create an ecosystem to attract these talents.

Pointing out the importance of a knowledge economy, Mr Chidambaram said, “We must make India a knowledge society. Nobody will give their knowledge free of cost.” On India’s economic growth, he said, “It’s my intention to maintain and continue the growth momentum. It is possible to grow more than 8 per cent. That requires investment, good HR practices, good process and manufacturing practices, strong R&D and healthy competitive environment.”

Giving the example of high employment opportunities arising in the IT sector, he said, the top four Indian IT companies are adding one lakh, 1.30 lakh and 1.75 lakh engineers in the next three years respectively. “This is a matter of pride, but it’s a matter of concern too. All these engineers are becoming IT professionals.

New Delhi, Sept. 10: German carmaker Volkswagen AG said it will start rolling out small cars first in the country and a final decision on the plant location was expected within “weeks”. “We have done a research of the Indian market and we would be rolling out small cars first here though we have a complete range of vehicles available,” Volkswagen Group Research Director (Powertrain) Wolfgang Steiger said here.

He, however, declined to comment on the exact time when the car was expected to hit the Indian market but said modifications in the vehicle was “inevitable” considering the Indian road conditions were far more different from that in Europe. When asked where the company has decided to set up its manufacturing unit in India, Mr Steiger said, “A decision would be taken in weeks time and announced.” The company has been reported to be in talks with various State governments, including Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Punjab, after the problems it had undergone while trying to set up in Andhra Pradesh.

Panaji, Sept. 10: An expression of interest (EoI) invited for a Rs 300-crore international convention centre in Goa has received what officials claim is a “landmark response”. Some 43 national and international firms have shown interest in the project to be set up at Panaji’s Don-a-Paula premonitory. Interest in the International Convention Centre is linked to Goa’s growing importance as a destination for conferences, conventions, exhibitions, a development that is backed by an array of hotel accommodation from premium super deluxes to modest budget accommodation.

Authorities have identified 25 acres near the Goa University for the 2,000-seater centre. Plans include a 1,200-capacity ballroom, meeting and exhibition halls, besides a 350-room ho-tel, entertainment zone and commercial shopping malls spread over 1.2 lakh square feet.

Beijing, Sept. 10: Export-led growth was the biggest challenge China was facing, while the Indian economy was driven by huge domestic consumption, science and technology minister Kapil Sibal said on Sunday as he foresaw greater trade and economic cooperation between the two Asian giants.“Today, the Chinese economy is driven by exports. Ideally, it should be led by domestic consumption levels. I think that is the biggest challenge the Chinese economy is facing,” said Mr Sibal, a panelist at the ongoing China Business Summit 2006 organised by the World Economic Forum (WEF) here.

“We, fortunately do not face that challenge and most of our growth is driven by huge consumption,” he said on the topic, ‘Globalist or mercantilist: China’s future role in the world economy’, attended by an august gathering of eminent economists and entrepreneurs. “The more players you have within a market, the more units of production you have, who contribute to the economy, the greater benefit it will have to the world economy. It is a challenge to the world economy how do you get more people get involved in economic development. This is also a challenge to the Chinese from within,” he said.

“As far as India is concerned,” Mr Sibal said, “we are a far more egalitarian and far more open society. We have played by the rules of the game, we have lowered our tariffs, we have allowed world trade to flourish and have a system through hich most of the trade is really conducted by private enterprises. That is the real difference between India and China,” the minister said.

New Delhi, Sept. 10: After a year’s probe into auto-routing of international calls as local ones, the CBI has registered a case against four senior officials of Reliance Infocomm, before the split between Ambani brothers, and some unknown officials of the Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited.

The Reliance Infocomm officials have been alleged by the CBI of entering into a criminal conspiracy with certain officials of the BSNL and “masking” international calls as local ones through a specially designed software. The CBI named Manoj Modi, the then director of Reliance Infocomm, Akhil Gupta, the then CEO, A. Shankar, the then head of the company’s corporate affairs, Pankaj Panwar, the then head regulator of the company and other unnamed officials of Reliance and BSNL in its case, the CBI sources said.

During the probe, the CBI ascertained the ramifications of the auto-routing of international calls vis-a-vis threat to the national security as pointed out by the the Telecom Dispute Settlement Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT), while imposing a penalty of Rs 150 crores on Reliance Infocomm for allegedly breaching the license conditions.

According to CBI, any call generated from foreign country used to land at three gateways in Chennai, Kolkata and Mumbai from where collected calls were “masked” with the help of the software and sent as local ones to the Public System Telephone Network (PSTN). The alleged re-routing of calls were done with a view to avoid payment of Access Deficit Charge, which private telecom operators are supposed to pay to BSNL to offset their unremunerative services in rural areas.

During the preliminary probe, the CBI quizzed Reliance Infocomm and BSNL’s chief technical officers in connection with the alleged masquerading of calls by the private telecom giant to avoid payment of a fee, which initial estimates suggest costed the exchequer Rs 50 crore. After registering the preliminary enquiry on September 15 last year, CBI had secured all files related to the case from DoT. It has so far estimated a loss of Rs 50 crore to the exchequer and the figure could go beyond it, they said.

New Delhi, Sept. 10: When it comes to investments overseas, the US is the country where India Inc. is most interested. A recent report by industry chamber Ficci and global consultancy major Ernst & Young points out that the US is the country that has received the highest amount of RBI-approved investments worth $225 million between April 2005 and January 2006.

Not only this, the US has been the favourite investment destination for long now. The report says that in the decade up to 2005, the US attracted the highest share of Indian direct investments approvals ($2,159 million) followed by Russia ($1,763 million), Mauritius ($1,038 million) and Sudan ($964 million). The report observes that outbound investments and acquisitions in the US by Indian companies are likely to witness a further increase. \

The new found confidence in the Indian buyers, supported by strong economic fundamentals, is expected to foster this growth trend, says the report. Stating that American companies have emerged as the largest business partners for India Inc., the report on direct investments in the US by Indian enterprises notes that the software/BPO sector accounted for the largest share at 58 per cent.

Have you ever felt that you just weren’t connecting with a colleague whose support you needed? Ever tried to work with a team that offered resistance and foot dragging instead of cooperation? Has your feedback had the opposite effect that you intended — or has it gotten no response at all?

The fact is, leadership and management aren’t quite as simple as they used to be. Companies are becoming flatter and less hierarchical; we’re “commanding” less and collaborating more. When direct or prescriptive methods of communication and management don’t work, you may have better luck with a more subtle, indirect approach.

In her book The Power of Indirect Influence (Amacom, 2001), Judith Tingley explains that “indirect influence attempts are planned as intentional by the leader, but viewed as unintentional by the target person.” Here are four alternatives to the direct approach.

BEAT AROUND THE BUSH

Although Western cultures tend toward direct methods of communication, other cultures take a very different approach in their business dealings — in fact, the business itself often seems to be an afterthought. Tingley tells of an American man working in Saudi Arabia who learned that getting something done requires an indirect approach.

When he needs information from a government office, he drops by and hangs around for an hour or two, drinking tea and chatting. He knows that eventually one of the workers will ask if he needs help with anything. At that point, he’ll act surprised, as if he’s just remembered, and then state his need, which is promptly and graciously taken care of. We all know people who seem to succeed at getting others to do things for them without having to ask directly. We usually chalk it up to “charm.” But often, it’s just a matter of letting go of the agenda and taking the time to be pleasant.

TALK LESS, LISTEN MORE

When trying to win people over to our way of thinking, we often spend too much time explaining and convincing, and not enough time asking questions, listening and understanding other points of view. People are less apt to put up resistance when they feel that you’ve taken the time to listen to and understand their concerns. In his best-selling book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People (Fireside, 1990), Stephen Covey says that the greatest need of human beings — after physical survival — is to be understood, affirmed and appreciated.

MAKE ‘EM LIKE YOU

Studies consistently show that we’d rather say yes to someone we like — even a stranger — than to someone we don’t like. So how can you increase your likability? Some factors, like good looks, are beyond our control. But there are other things you can do to increase rapport. Key among these is to play up similarities. We tend to like people who are like us, who share our background, interests, opinions, taste, style of dress and so forth. We also like people who like us. Research shows that human beings are suckers for compliments, even insincere flattery. Another way to heighten feelings of similarity is to copy the communication style, both verbal and nonverbal, of the person you’re trying to influence. Tingley calls this technique “modelling and matching.”

Close on the heels of Stanford University decision to use Sony PlayStation 3’s processing power for a molecular simulation project allows researchers to study various diseases, IBM is planning to use the Cell processor in the PS3 to build a new supercomputer. The new supercomputer, which is expected to break the petaflop barrier by topping speeds of 1,000 trial calculations per second, will have as its base the Cell processor. IBM developed the Cell in association with Sony and Toshiba. Sony will be launching the PS3 in November.

IBM says that the computer, codenamed Roadrunner, will be a joint project with Los Alamos National Laboratory in the US. It will be built in two phases, and will be installed at the laboratory. The first phase is comprised of a base cluster that runs on the Linux operating system and uses IBM System x 3755 servers based on AMD Opteron technology. That phase is slated to be shipped to the national lab next month, according to InformationWeek.

“But the computer’s real speed boost will come in late in 2007 or early in 2008 when the second phase, which doesn’t yet have a price tag, rolls out. At that point, the cluster will be upgraded with the addition of Cell processors, which were originally designed for video game platforms. The hybrid machine will run both types of clusters, boosting peak performance to an expected 1.6 petaflops,” IW says.

“General microprocessors are built to do everything quite well,” IW quotes Addison Snell of IDC as saying. “Specialised calculations that are highly repeated can be offloaded to the game processor.” The initial base cluster for Roadrunner is estimated to cost about $35 million. IBM wasn’t willing to hazard a guess of the cost of the computer once the Cell chips are added. “And if companies can afford that kind of price tag, they have to find room for the approximately 360 racks of servers they’ll have to house, power and cool. IBM expects it will take up 12,000 square feet of room, or about the size of three basketball courts,” it said.

The teraflop speed barrier was broken in 1997. A teraflop is 1 trillion calculations per second. A petaflop is a thousand times that speed, or a quadrillion, which is a one with 15 zeros. At this point, Blue Gene still is the fastest supercomputer on the block. Installed at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California, the machine is based on IBM’s Power chip. It peaks at more than 360 teraflops. But when Roadrunner gets the Cell chip addition, it should be four to eight times faster than Blue Gene is today, IW says.

Despite weak cues from global markets, the Indian market showed great resilience during the week ended to close on a positive note. On the BSE, the Sensex finished with a gain of 140 points at 11,918 and the Nifty on the NSE closed at 3,471. It is interesting to note that while the Sensex and the Nifty are now just 6 per cent away from their May peak, the small-cap and mid-cap indices are still 20 per cent lower from their peak. It’s time to stage a catch up act in the mid-cap universe, feel market players. Market breadth has improved with more sectors participating in the rally and renewed interest shown in mid-cap counters by traders and investors.

Selective build-up of fresh positions reflects the positive sentiment in the market triggered by receding fears of interest rate hike and weakness in crude oil prices. A strong buying interest at lower levels indicates that the markets are poised for a big move in the short-term. The present consolidation looks like a lull before the storm. Barring negative surprises in Q2 results or unexpected negative global developments, the markets are well poised to cross their all time highs in the next few weeks. Strong supports on the downside for the Sensex exist at 11,815 and 11,550 and for the Nifty they are at 3,430 & 3,360. On the upside, some resistance is indicated for the Sensex at 12,090 and 12,250 and for the Nifty at 3,520 and 3,560. Fasten your belts for exciting rally in the coming days.

F&O SEGMENT

Mirroring the creeping optimism in the cash market, open interest in the derivatives segment has gone up steadily in the last few sessions. Sentiment indicators like implied volatility, put/call ratio and open interest indicate a positive outlook. Take straddle position in the Nifty by buying call and put options of 3450 strikes to take advantage of a large breakout in either direction.

Stay invested in Nifty futures with a stop loss at 3,430. Among the active stock futures buy Maruti, IOC, BPCL, HPCL, RIL, Tata Steel, Century Textiles, HLL, ITC, VSNL and M&M with stop loss at Rs 915, Rs 495, Rs 368, Rs 292, Rs 1,085, Rs 500, Rs 485, Rs 230, Rs 175, Rs 414 and Rs 620. Side counters like IVRCL, Escorts, Jindal Stainless, Polaris, SRF, MRPL, Punj Lloyd and KTK Bank are good bets for the short term with a stop loss at Rs 248, Rs 84, Rs 96, Rs 113, Rs 238, Rs 40, Rs 772 and Rs 108. The inclusion of SAIL, Zee Tele, Reliance Communications and L&T into the F&O segment from September 15 may spark sharp swings in the Nifty as the four counters together command nearly 7 per cent weightage in the Nifty.

Stocks from the telecom, media and metal sectors like VSNL, Bharti, NDTV, Sun TV and Tata Steel may feel the ripple effect. With India well on its way of becoming one of the important low-cost small car manufacturer in the world, major auto stocks like Maruti and Tata Motors are being lapped up by funds. Buy on declines for steady long-term returns. Non-ferrous metal counters Hindalco and Nalco are witnessing renewed buying interest. After the recent bout of profit taking, technology stocks look good for buying ahead of Q2 results.

SATTA GUPCHUP

* Consumer durable stocks are back in the shopping list of fund managers. Strong buying interest was seen in Whirlpool India, Timex Watches and Mirc Electronics. Moves by their MNC parents to develop them as export outsourcing hubs has sparked buying in Whirlpool and Timex. Stay invested for further gains. Buy TTK Prestige, Hawkins and Bajaj Electric on declines for strong medium term gains.

* Select mid-cap counters like Balaji Telefilms, Hotel Leelaventure, Punjab Tractors and Exide Inds are attracting strong buying interest. Buy on every decline for steady medium term gains.

C. Kutumba Rao is a Hyderabad-based stock market analyst. The views expressed and the recommendations made are those of the author. Readers are strongly recommended to consult their financial advisors before making any financial investments. This newspaper is not liable for investment decisions made on the basis of recommendations in these columns.

Mumbai, Sept. 10: The GSM industry has witnessed the highest-ever subscriber additions in the month of August 2006, and the industry has set a new record by adding 4.2 million GSM subscribers in August 2006. “This is a strong evidence of the fact that GSM continues to be the predominant technology choice of the masses,” said T.V. Ramachandran, director-general, Cellular Operator Association of India. According to Mr Ramachandran, the GSM subscriber base has touched the 86.6 million by the end of end August 2006 as compared to 82.4 million by the end of July 2006.

“The industry is expected to continuously drive operational excellence, the effect of which will be seen in the coming quarters,” say experts. Among all circles, category B circles witnessed the highest rate of growth at seven per cent, followed by category C circles at 5.6 per cent. Within the category B circles, UP (West) and MP recorded the highest growth at 13 per cent and 10 per cent respectively. Within the category C circles, the highest growth was recorded by the Assam Circle (eight per cent). Category A circles also witnessed a healthy growth of 5 per cent in August 2006, where Karnataka recorded the highest growth at (5.6 per cent).

Arun Jain is chairman and CEO of Polaris Software Lab Ltd., a specialty application services provider for the banking and financial sector. Mr Jain started Polaris in 1993, in Chennai. The company now has offices in 13 countries, and 7,000 employees.

Polaris acquired OrbiTech, a Citigroup subsidiary, in 2003. What’s the level of Polaris’ engagement with Citigroup now?
Citigroup is the single biggest customer. It accounts for more than 50 per cent of our annual revenues, over $100 million. The top five banks financial services firms control almost 80 per cent of the market in developed countries, and each of them have large IT budgets, and the need for technology that will give them the edge in the market. Citigroup has an annual IT budget of $7 billion, while HSBC and UBS have IT budgets of between $ 2 billion and $ 3 billion per annum. Therefore, the Citigroup engagement is very important to us.

Polaris focuses exclusively on developing products and software services for the banking and financial sector. Will your company expand into other verticals as well?
Our strength is in the BFSI space. We have spent the past three years in repositioning Polaris as a specialty applications company in the BFSI space. The BFSI space provides a huge opportunity with an estimated market size of $400 billion.

We are in other verticals as well with Polaris Retail Infotech providing application suite for the retail industry. Emprize, an independent business division of Polaris, develops enterprise solutions, while Optimus is a BPO service provider. It handles back office services in the BFSI sector. But we will be focusing on the financial sector, especially investment banking and wealth management.

Polaris has just launched a “super-specialty centre” in Hyderabad. What will be the centre’s core competence?
Our Mumbai centre focuses on the corporate banking vertical, and we decided when we merged OrbiTech to locate the centre, The Capital, for developing applications services for the investment banking vertical in Hyderabad. Polaris has invested Rs 70 crore in developing The Capital, which has a built-up area of 2,00,000 sq. feet. It can seat 2,000 employees. We currently have 1,250 people. We believe Hyderabad has a large talent pool for developing investment banking and wealth management applications.

Why wealth management?
Retail banking is under pressure, while wealth management is a segment that is showing consistent growth. Most banks and financial services firms have aggressive wealth management divisions, so there will be large requirement for software applications to make wealth management offerings seamless. The BFSI segment contributes more than 30 per cent of India’s software exports.

What do you think is the future of mid-size technology companies like Polaris?
We are a specialist provider of technology, and we believe we have differentiated offerings. i-flex Solutions is strong in retail and corporate banking, and we have strong IP in investment banking. The Hyderabad centre will be key to the development of investment banking and wealth management solutions. The Capital has eight centres of excellence, for securities, money markets, derivatives, foreign exchange, margin lending, fixed income, equities and custody, spanning the spectrum of investment banking.

Given the fact that mid-size technology companies need stronger parents or partners, like i-flex with Oracle Corp, will the promoters of Polaris, including yourself, bring in a stronger partner or sell the company if a good deal comes along?
Sure, Polaris could be a target of acquisition, but I don’t believe the promoters will sell their stakes. We are a differentiated software products and applications company. Polaris is now an integrated solutions provider, and there is room for our specialised services.

Will labour arbitrage be the main reason for financial services firms to get together with Polaris to develop their applications?
We have had a long experience in the BFSI space, and now have the expertise to be seen as partners for our clients’ applications. We have developed domain knowledge in the areas we operate in. Clients are increasingly coming to us to help them in growing their business by developing customised solutions. We have moved towards economics and expertise rather than the economics of mere cost arbitrage.

What’s the break-up of revenue from different geographies?
The United States contributes 40 per cent of our revenues, with Europe and the Asia-Pacific accounting for 30 per cent each. We expect to see stronger performance in the Asia-Pacific region.

What are Polaris’ expansion plans?
As I said, the BFSI vertical has been growing at a robust pace, and we have invested in developing the expertise for this space. We expect to hire between 1,500 and 2,000 software people in 2006-07.

Do you think there will be consolidation among mid-size companies in the BFSI applications space?
Consolidation is definite. More importantly, I think the industry is moving towards a “technology-on-tap” situation, using Service Oriented Architecture. Polaris’ Intellect Suite, a Web-enabled enterprise platform, includes Intellect GeneS, which are highly modular and flexible solutions based on SOA principles. I believe that we have an advantage because we are an integrated solutions provider, and we are exclusively for the largest vertical, BFSI. We hope to be a Tier I player in the BFSI segment in the next three years.

Purwar joins Piramal as real estate fund director:
A.K. Purwar has joined the Piramal Group as director, India REIT Fund Advisors Private Limited, a real estate fund of the Ajay Piramal Group. Mr Purwar takes over after having retired as chairman of the State Bank of India in May, 2006. He joined the bank in 1968 as a probationary officer, and rose to the level of chairman in November 2002. During his long innings at SBI, he worked in almost all sectors of the industry like corporate banking, international banking, commercial banking and operations.

Religare hires merchant banker Kamlesh Gandhi:
Religare Enterprises Limited, a Ranbaxy-promoted group financial services company, has hired Kamlesh Gandhi as its country head to spearhead its investment banking business. Mr Gandhi joins with more than 34 years of experience as a merchant banker and has been instrumental in raising capital for more than 300 companies. He was a director on the board of the Association of Merchant Bankers of India ever since its inception and now he has been re-elected. Prior to the present appointment, Mr Gandhi worked as a executive director at Centrum Financing.

Ghotgalkar is country head of Principal PNBAM:
Principal International, an arm of the Principal Financial Group, appointed Rajan Ghotgalkar as country head and managing director of Principal PNB Asset Management Company, India. Mr Ghotgalkar will be responsible for all the businesses of the company in India. Mr Ghotgalkar started his career in 1982 and has worked for organisations such as ANZ Grindlays Bank, Standard Chartered Bank, National Bank of Dubai and most recently IDBI Bank. During his career, he has experience covering branch management, operations, finance, consumer banking and retail banking. Mr Ghotgalkar is a graduate in Economics and a CA.

Limaye to lead HR team at WNS:
Aniruddha Limaye is the new head of human resources of WNS Global Services, a leading offshore business process outsourcing provider. Mr Limaye joins the company from IBM Business Consulting Services, where he was the leader of the human capital management consulting practice. Mr Limaye has led human resources teams at Daksh e-Services, NetA-cross Online Services, ICICI Limited, CEAT Financial Services, the Taj Group of hotels and the Tata Group. Mr Limaye holds a masters degree in Personnel Management and Industrial Relations from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences and a degree in law from the University of Pune.

Niche speciality chemicals major Gwalior Chemical Industries Ltd (GCIL) is entering the capital market with an initial public offering of equity shares aggregating to Rs 80 crores through a 100 per cent book build process for expansion of current facilities and forward integration. “The company has facilities to manufacture the first stage downstream products and intends to further expand into the second stage of value added downstream products like esters which are used in the fla-vour and fragrance industry,” said Ashwin Kothari, chairman, GCIL. The issue will open for subscri-ption/bids on September 11 and close on September 14. The price band for the offer has been fixed between Rs 71 and Rs 85 per share of face value of Rs 10.

Richa Knits IPO opens on Sept. 13:
Gurgaon-based knitted fabric and ready-made garments manufacturer, Richa Knits Ltd will enter the capital market with an IPO of 90 lakh equity shares of Rs 10 each for cash at a premium of Rs 20 per share aggregating to Rs 27 cores. The issue opens on September 13 and closes on September 19, 2006. The issue comprises promoters participation of 15 lakh shares, 7.5 lakh shares by QIBs, 7.5 lakh shares by NRIs and FIIs and 3.75 lakh shares reserved for employees. The net issue to the public would be 56.25 lakh shares.