Daily News Roundup - March 18 2009

ICICI Bank is looking at setting up a new entity to house its ATM and point of sale terminals, and has sought bids from banking technology companies and PE players. (ET)

Government proposes to redistribute over 17,600 petrol pumps of IOC to BPCL and HPCL. (ET)

Infosys BPO, BPO arm of Infosys, has taken steps to reduce variable costs and accelerate staff redeployment by terminating services of over 600 contract workers in February. (BS)

NTPC has given technical approval for the establishment of coal-based thermal power plant at Kudagi in Bijapur district. (BS)

IOC plans to spend Rs15bn on additional pipelines, boosting its annual capacity to 10mn tons. (Mint)

Tata Sons pledged an additional 12.33% stake in TCS. (BL)

Reliance Industries and Essar Oil are keen on buying crude from Cairn India’s Rajasthan field. (ET)

JSW Steel plans to set up 600 outlets to supply steel in rural areas. (BS)

Differences have emerged between Tata Motors and Ashok Leyland, over a joint venture involving construction equipment and tractor manufacturer John Deere. (BS)

M&M unveils its defence auto facility in Faridabad and plans to enter into manufacturing of small aircrafts. (Mint)

Mahindra Defence Systems has called off talks with Italian aerospace and defence major. (BL)

M&M plans to confine Xylo exports primarily to South Africa for the next six months. (BL)

BPCL sells Rs950mn worth oil bonds under RBI’s special market operations. (ET)

Crisil has further downgraded Suzlon as it has concerns over its equity infusion and expanding working capital. (FE)

ICRA suspended its rating on Ansal Properties and Infrastructure Ltd after the real estate major failed to provide sufficient information to assess appropriate rating. (BS)

Mozambique government has allowed Coal India to begin exploring two carbon bed blocks that were awarded to it last year. (Mint)

GMR Infrastructure plans to spend Rs70bn during FY10. (Mint)

Maytas Infrastructure’s Rs121bn Hyderabad Metro Rail Project may go off track. (ET)

Dishman Pharmaceuticals announced 13% salary cut and reduced working days. (ET)

Telenor to acquire an additional 7% in Unitech arm at no extra cost. (ET)

Harrisons Malayalam plans to invest Rs900mn to vitalize its ageing rubber and tea plantations. (ET)

Essar Telecom Infrastructure is in talks with Tata-Quippo for a possible merger. (ET)

Multiplexes refused to share 50% revenues with the distributors. (ET)

Panacea Biotech has been asked by the Indian drug regulator to stop sale of its oral polio vaccine. (Mint)

Parle Agro, the Rs9.5bn FMCG company, raised prices of Frooti and Appy Classic drinks after a decade. (BS)


Commerce department proposes that companies in SEZ’s should be exempted from paying tax on the services they consume instead of seeking refunds. (ET)

Import of about 350 sensitive items went up by 33% during April-December period. (ET)

RBI has allowed Indian companies to hedge carbon credits and freight contracts on overseas exchanges to help them cope with high volatility. (ET)

CERC will take up the issue of inter-state electricity transmission with its stakeholders in a meeting today. (ET)

India’s oil imports dip by 7% in January. (FE)

Import duty sop on Naphtha sought. (FE)

Maharashtra has a revenue deficit of Rs84bn. (FE)

At least 70% of the 190 infrastructure projects are stalled due to land acquisition problems. (Mint)

Petroleum and Natural Gas regulator plans to complete the bidding process for piped gas distribution projects in six cities by March end. (Mint)

TRAI has made it mandatory for all broadcasters to have Reference Interconnect Offers (RIOs) for their addressable systems like DTH, IPTV and CAS. (BS)

Government extended the ban on export of edible oil by one year, up to March 16, 2010. (BS)