Daily News Roundup - Apr 13 2010

Gail India is in talks with Interoil Corp for a possible stake in the Canadian oil firm’s proposed liquefied natural gas project in Papua New Guinea. (ET)

NTPC may soon get to allocate up to 50% of the output from its new plants to the home state, allowing it to compete with private developers. (ET)

Glenmark Pharmaceuticals has entered into an out of court settlement with GlaxoSmithKline over patent actions on doses of atovaquone and proguanil hydrochloride, the generic version of GSK’s Malarone malaria treatment tablets. (ET)

Essar Steel Holdings (ESHL), the parent company of Essar Steel, plans to raise US$500mn this month through sale of foreign bonds. (BS)

HCC has received an order worth Rs6.08bn from Director General Naval Project, Mumbai, for reconstruction and completion of Dry Dock and Associated North and South Wharves at Naval Dockyard, Mumbai. (ET)

Renault is learnt to give M&M the licensing rights to produce the Logan as part of the restructuring proposal for the joint venture. (BL)

GAIL to invest Rs150bn over the next two-three years in expanding its pipeline network to connect consumption centres. (BS)

Tata Sasol, a joint venture between Tata Steel and Sasol of South Africa, has been allocated coal blocks in Angul region of Orissa to meet the requirement of coal for its proposed coal-to-oil project. (BL)

RBI has given the Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development (Akfed) time till March 2014 to lower its stake in co-operative-turned-commercial lender Development Credit Bank. (BS)

Hydropower generator SJVN plans to invest Rs150-160bn over the next five years to take its total capacity to 6,500MW from the current 1,500MW. (BS)

Emerging as the single largest export zone in the country, RIL Jamnagar SEZ has seen its export nearly touch Rs800bn till March 2010. (BS)

Heavy Engineering Corp., plans to take up manufacturing of electric locomotives as part of its diversification initiative. (BL)

IVRCL Assets & Holdings Limited, formerly IVR Prime Urban Developers, is targeting to have assets worth Rs200bn in three years from the current asset base of Rs75bn. (BS)

The country’s industrial production was up 15.1% in February on the back of expansion in mining, manufacturing and electricity generation. (BS)

The Government has brokered a truce between the two warring financial sector regulators—SEBI and IRDA — over the supervision of ULIPs, signalling a return to normal business for the insurance industry. (ET)

The third day of spectrum auction for 3G telephony saw the all-India licence bid touching Rs43.2bn at the end of 16 rounds, ensuring that the government would get a minimum of Rs176bn. (FE)

The proposed free trade agreement (FTA) between India and Israel would boost trade and economic ties. Post FTA, the trade volume is expected to triple to US$12bn. (ET)

The RBI fixed the limit for issuing bonds under the Market Stabilisation Scheme (MSS) to Rs500bn for 2010-11. (BS)

The mutual fund industry witnessed a net inflow of Rs830bn as against a net outflow of Rs283bn in FY09. (BS)