Daily News Roundup - Dec 15 2009

Reliance Industries, in its efforts to gain control over LyondellBasell, is looking to team up with the unsecured creditors and bond holders of the bankrupt Dutch petrochemicals giant. (BS)

Reliance Industries will decide today on submitting a financial bid to buy Lyondell-Basell, based on the outcome of the hearing by the Bankruptcy Court of New York South District of rescue plans proposed by the management team of the world’s third largest petrochemical company. (ET)

Government has revised the target to mop up around Rs110bn from the proposed divestment of 5% stake in utility giant NTPC as against the original target of around Rs82bn. (ET)

BHEL plans to acquire Hungary-based boiler maker TGR to establish a manufacturing facility in Europe. (FE)

SAIL said it was looking to raise the rates next month following a recovery in demand. (BS)

Coal India is not willing to hand over any coking coal mines to SAIL and Tata Steel but may explore opportunities to jointly develop such mines with the steel behemoths seeking to secure coking coal supplies. (FE)

The DLF board will meet today to consider the integration of DLF Assets Ltd with the real estate company. (BL)

Tata Motors said that it plans to finish deliveries of Nano by December next year. (BL)

Tata Motors launched the Sumo Grande MK II, which will replace the Grande MK I. (ET)

RCOM is looking to sell its undersea fibre optic network and US network businesses, hoping to raise around US$3bn in cash. (FE)

Tata Teleservices, RCOM and other private mobile telecom operators owe over Rs6bn to the government towards outstanding spectrum charges and licence fee for the last three years. (ET)

Delhi-based businessman Sanjay Dalmia and Indiabulls Financial Services have arrived at an out-of-the-court settlement of their legal dispute. (BS)

GMR Holdings, part of the diversified GMR Group, has completed the sale of its entire 20% stake in GMR Ferro Alloys to the Dubai-based Cronimet Mercon Invest Ltd. (BL)

GMR Group is in an advanced stage of talks with Temasek Holdings and ICICI Bank to raise Rs12bn to support the expansion plans of its power generation arm GMR Energy. (ET)

The Lok Sabha on Monday put its seal on merger of the State Bank of Saurashtra (SBS) with SBI. (FE)

Bank of Baroda plans to open a foreign branch in Auckland, New Zealand. (BL)

Suzlon Energy plans to complete its US$2.8bn refinancing by January end. (BS)

HDIL plans to raise Rs11.5bn via issue of long term nonconvertible debentures. (ET)

Parsvnath Developers plans to raise around Rs2.4bn by diluting its holdings to private equity funds in its various residential as well as commercial projects. (FE)

Future Capital Holdings has constituted a committee of directors to look into consolidation of the group’s retail financial services, undertaken through a few joint ventures. (ET)

Dabur plans to launch ready-to-cook products under its ‘Hommade’ brand. (ET)

After expanding its footprint in northern India, Indian Hotels, signed a management contract for a hotel in Srinagar with SAIFCO Hill Crest Hotels under the brand ‘Vivanta by Taj’. (BS)

Tata Group plans to construct 50 hotels of its no-frills chain, Ginger, in India over four years. (BS)

Shree Cement plans to raise around Rs1bn through external commercial borrowings. (FE)

European drug major, GlaxoSmithKline said its business strategies in emerging markets including India, will be driven by its supply partnerships with generic companies such as Dr Reddy’s here and Aspen of South Africa. (BS)

GlaxoSmithKline Consumer Healthcare has resumed operations at its plant in Dowlaiswaram, Andhra Pradesh, after the plant was temporarily shut down following unrest in the state. (BS)

Sun Direct announced its High Definition TV services with the launch of five HD channels along with regular standard definition channels already available through its Sun Direct service. (BL)

Suven Life Sciences secured two patents from the Canadian Intellectual Property Office for its New Chemical Entities for the treatment of neurodegenerative diseases. (BL)

LIC raised its stake in software firm 3i Infotech to 10.69%. (FE)

Pawan Kumar Ruia, owner of Dunlop India and Jessop, has acquired a 60% controlling stake in German firm, Henniges Automotive Grefrath, with its manufacturing facility in Grefrath (Germany) for an undisclosed sum. (ET)

ArcelorMittal India is yet to submit statutory forest and environment clearances for beginning mining of iron ore and manganese in West Singhbhum, Jharkhand. (BL)

Dewan Housing Finance will offer a fixed rate of 8% for the first two years for all new loans up to Rs0.5mn. (BL)

Locals have stepped up their agitation against Nirma Group’s proposed Rs25bn cement plant near Mahuva, Saurashtra. (BS)

Dishtv has re-introduced the set top box free offer on buying content of Rs1,990 till January 15. (BS)

Reliance Big TV has entered into a marketing alliance with Fox Star Studios for the India release of James Cameron's Avatar. (BL)

United Bank of India is likely to file a red herring prospectus with SEBI for their IPO next week. (BS)

United Bank of India has obtained licenses for opening 11 new branches in such unbanked gram panachayats. (BS)

Headline inflation rate surged to 4.78% for November, primarily due to rising prices of primary articles, especially food items. (BS)

Enthused by robust performance of the economy in the second half of 2009-10, Finance Minister said fiscal deficit would not exceed the target of 6.8% of the GDP. (BS)

The department of revenue plans to change the proposed direct tax code to exempt infrastructure companies from MAT for the first few years since they execute projects with long gestation periods. (BS)

Gujarat Electricity Regulatory Commission has directed Gujarat Urja Vikas Nigam Ltd and its affiliate power utilities to keep power tariffs unchanged and continue to levy existing tariff rates. (BS)

Bengaluru International Airport’s passenger traffic would top 9.3mn, higher by 22% yoy, in the calendar year 2009 with cargo handled during the 12 months estimated at 161,896 tons. (BS)

Bengaluru International Airport would add at least three international routes in the summer of 2010. (BL)

The much anticipated goods and services tax is unlikely to be introduced on April 1, 2010 as the process of constitutional amendment to bring the new indirect tax legislation may take another five months. (BS)

A Union finance ministry notification has extended the basic customs duty concession of 2.5% applicable on equipment for greenfield power projects to brownfield projects too, which is subject to 17% presently. (BS)

The government said bottlenecks in road transportation and movement of utilities had led to delays in capacity augmentation of the power sector during the first two years of the plan period. (BS)

India’s apparel exports fell by 17% yoy in October to US$603mn as the country lost market share to China, Vietnam and Bangladesh due to uncompetitive pricing of fabrics in the domestic market. (BS)

The Orissa government has decided to withdraw 2% concession in Central Sales Tax given to the small scale industries in the state. (BS)

Centre has approved the development of four sectors in Orissa - including granite, handicrafts, sponge iron and plastic - through the cluster approach under the Lean Manufacturing Competitiveness Scheme. (BS)

To improve the road communication in the rural areas, the Orissa government has decided to upgrade 10,000kms of rural roads in next three years. (BS)

Karnataka plans to add 6,000MW through renewable energy resources in the next four years. (BS)

Banks are exploring the option of increasing the sub-prime lending rate, mainly offered to companies, while keeping the benchmark prime lending rate untouched. (BS)

Tamil Nadu Government formally launched the Tamil Nadu Transmission Corporation the first step in the process of unbundling the operations of the Tamil Nadu Electricity Board. (BL)

India’s share in the global flow of FDI has almost doubled to 2.45% in 2008 compared to the previous year. (ET)

The government said exports from software technology parks increased 15.1% to Rs2trn in 2008-09. (FE)

The National Mission on Enhanced Energy Efficiency will be implemented from April 1, 2010 to create an energy efficiency market worth Rs 740bn over the next five years and resulting into an annual saving of about 23mt of oil. (FE)