Indian Economy - News & Updates - Archive

[Neo]

UAE group plans joint $5bn investment in India ​

Tuesday, December 04, 2007

NEW DELHI: A leading Gulf property developer said on Monday it would team up with a local partner to invest five billion dollars in India’s booming real estate sector over the next five years.

A flood of money, especially from the Gulf, has poured into the soaring property market in India, which experts say is among major nations where there is first-time real estate demand rather than only individuals trading.

RAKEEN, property arm of the Ras Al Khaimah government, said it would form a 50-50 joint venture with India’s Trimex mineral group to spend five billion dollars developing residential, commercial and office space in India.

The new company, RAKINDO Developers, “will have a committed capital outlay of over five billion dollars over the next five years,” said its managing director Prasad Koneru. “Our entry into real estate estate can’t be better timed. The last 10 years have seen India achieve a transformation process” to create “a booming economy,” he told reporters at the India Economic Summit in New Delhi. Ras Al Khaimah is part of the United Arab Emirates federation, the world’s sixth largest oil exporter. RAKINDO “will deliver truly world-class products,” said Khatar Massad, advisor to the Emirate’s crown prince.

The announcement came as giant Dubai-based real estate developer Emaar MGF said it would launch its initial public offering (IPO) to raise 1.7 billion dollars early next year. Emaar MGF, a joint venture of Emaar Properties and India’s MGF Development, plans to spin off a 10 per cent stake and filed its draft prospectus for the share issue in September.

UAE group plans joint $5bn investment in India

 

[aryan2007]

India can sustain rapid growth for 20 years: finance minister


NEW DELHI (AFP) — India can keep up its scorching economic growth for the next two decades, stoked by strong investment and capital inflows, the finance minister forecast.

But at the same time Finance Minister P. Chidambaram told an international conference on Sunday that Asia's third-largest economy was lagging in achieving financial reforms and would miss some key United Nations development targets.

Also, while India and China and the rest of the developing world are now the main global growth drivers, economic power "still resides with the developed world" that attracts the best brains and controls financial and energy resources, he said.

"The biggest challenge (for maintaining India's growth) is to keep investment growing," Chidambaram told the India Economic Summit organised by the World Economic Forum in New Delhi.

"We can keep this (high) growth continuing for the next 10, 15, 20 years" as long as investment remains robust which, he said, was "perfectly achievable."

India's economy has logged average annual 8.6 percent growth for the past four years and the government is targeting "close to nine percent" expansion this year.

India has been attracting huge foreign capital inflows, which have helped to expand its economy, and its investment-to-gross domestic product ratio, a key measure of growth potential, is running at a healthy 35 percent.

Chidambaram said he was targeting a rise in the ratio to 40 percent in the next five years.

"Indians are good savers. As long as I keep investment going, there will be more jobs" and that will translate into more savings and investment, he said, calling it a "virtuous circle."

His comments followed data late last week showing growth slowed to 8.9 percent in the second quarter, still second only to China's, from 9.3 percent in the first quarter.

At the same time, there are global risks over which India has no control, Chidambaram added, saying China needs a more flexible exchange rate and the United States must wrestle down its hefty budget and current account deficits.

Chidamabaram also acknowledged that crucial "financial sector reforms are lagging behind, in banking, insurance, pensions... there is an unfinished agenda."

"The financial sector is at the heart of the economy. We have not been able to push forward" with these reforms, he said.

"It's a disappointment," he said, but added the ruling Congress-led coalition had 16 months left before general elections in 2009 to "make some progress" in these areas.

The minority coalition depends for its survival in parliament on its communist allies, who vociferously oppose economic reforms.

Chidambaram also admitted India had fallen behind on some of the UN Millennium Development Goals that cover hunger, literacy and poverty reduction.

It might be possible to meet some goals, he said, without naming them. But others might need another three to four years beyond the UN target of 2015.

India's delivery of social security programmes also had not improved despite far higher outlays as "we still rely on tried and largely failed systems of delivery."

India's rigid bureaucracy is a major hurdle in achieving "more inclusive growth" that would encompass India's tens of millions who have not shared the benefits of the economic boom, he sad.

Also, while "India and China now contribute 60 percent of the world's economic growth... the key factors that drive economic power are knowledge, financial resources and material resources such as oil and gas.

"As long as the developed nations have control over these, they will have an edge over developing nations," he said.

"But with the hunger in our bellies and the drive in our younger population, we will continue to be drivers of world growth and add to our own growth and raise millions out of poverty."

AFP: India can sustain rapid growth for 20 years: finance minister

 

[Neo]

Indian business confidence slumps as economy slows ​

Thursday, December 06, 2007

NEW DELHI: Indian business confidence has slumped to a five-year low on the back of flagging exports, aggressive monetary tightening and a rising rupee that has slowed the economy, a survey said on Wednesday.

The report by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) was the latest sign firms are hurting from interest rates at five-year highs, a rupee up 12.5 per cent against the dollar this year and export woes.

“India Inc’s business confidence is at a five-year low and the outlook for exports, investments, employment and profits has taken a severe hit,” said the second-quarter survey of 321 companies in Asia’s third-largest economy. “Companies are worried about a slowdown with oil prices high, the rupee’s rise, high rates and uncertainty about how the US subprime crisis will impact,” federation economist Anshuman Khanna, who prepared the report, told AFP.

The Overall Business Confidence Index showed a 10.5 per cent decline to 61.2 points from 68.4 in the last survey. It was down 15 per cent from the July to September period a year earlier.

A lower reading on the zero to 100 scale means greater pessimism. The findings followed data last week showing economic growth slowed to 8.9 per cent in the second quarter to September, still second only to China, but analysts predicted a further weakening in months ahead.

Analysts have forecast between 8.3 per cent and nine per cent growth in this fiscal year to March 2008 after the economy expanded by 9.4 per cent last year, its fastest in nearly two decades. But some analysts say growth could slow to seven per cent next year.

“Even growth of seven, 7.5 per cent is very good when you look at growth in the West of two or 2.5 per cent,” said Khanna. “But we need to take growth to double digits to make it more inclusive,” he said, to embrace tens of millions of desperately poor Indians who have seen no impact from the nation’s economic boom.

The survey covered a wide range of sectors from cement, pharmaceuticals, textiles, heavy equipment and chemicals to India’s showcase information technology business. The proportion of companies projecting an increase in investments, vital to fuelling growth, fell to 33 per cent from nearly 50 per cent in the last survey.

Indian business confidence slumps as economy slows

 

[Neo]

India’s poor left behind by blistering growth: minister​

NEW DELHI: India’s scorching growth is failing to filter down to its hundreds of millions of poor people, a ruling Congress party minister has warned, stoking fears of social conflict.

India’s economy grew by 9.4 percent last year and the government is targeting nearly nine percent expansion or higher this year for the country of 1.1 billion people.

“Here we are kissing 10 percent growth and instead of living standards rising, they are falling (for many),” minister for local governments Mani Shankar Aiyar told the India Economic Summit in New Delhi that winds up on Tuesday.

“India is becoming prosperous but not Indians,” Aiyar said.

The boom is “disproportionately affecting a small percentage of the population,” Aiyar said, noting despite strong growth, India sank in the Human Development Index to 128th place from 126 last year.

While summit speakers have been upbeat about business prospects, they have also reminded delegates that India has no room for complacency.

A quarter of Indians exist below the poverty line with most living off small subsistence farms, delegates were told at the summit, whose theme is how to reshape India in an “inclusive and sustainable way. A report prepared by the summit, part of the World Economic Forum in Davos, listed a litany of challenges.

India’s crumbling infrastructure is stretched to its limits, it said. The country has 18 percent of the world’s population but only four percent of the planet’s water and demand for water will exceed supply by 2050. “Eighty percent of Indians don’t have access to proper sanitation, most don’t have access to power,” said Anand Mahindra, vice chairman of giant Indian truckmaker Mahindra amp; Mahindra.

India accounts for one-third of the world’s illiterates with just 64 percent of adults able to read.

Aiyar blamed a lazy, bumbling and sometimes corrupt bureaucracy for many social and infrastructure problems, citing estimates that only 15 percent of each rupee allocated to social spending reaches the needy.

Distribution of resources needed to be done by local councils, or panchyats, that would have better accountability, he said.

Finance Minister P. Chidambaram admitted on the weekend to the same meeting that India would fail to meet some UN Millennium Development Goals set for 2015 covering hunger, literacy and poverty reduction.

India also needs to stop the massive migration to the cities that are becoming unlivable, Aiyar warned.

“We must take (job and education) opportunities to rural India” using such tools as information technology, he said. afp

Daily Times - Leading News Resource of Pakistan

 

[Neo]

India business friendly, but more needed: WB ​

Friday, December 07, 2007

BANGALORE, India: India is becoming more business-friendly but has a long way to go before it catches up with fellow fast-developer China, a World Bank report released on Thursday showed.

India jumped 12 places to 120th of 178 countries on the overall ease of doing business, said the report by the World Bank and its private-sector arm, the International Finance Corp. China improved by nine places to 83rd, said the report entitled “Doing Business 2008.” India ranked 177 out of 178 in enforcing contracts.

It takes almost four years to resolve a commercial dispute through the courts in Mumbai, compared with slightly over a year in China’s Shanghai, said the report. It takes 10 years to go through bankruptcy in India, compared with less than two years in Shanghai.

There are also large discrepancies within India, with the time to obtain licences ranging from 159 days in Bhubaneshwar to 522 in Ranchi, both in eastern India. Meanwhile, the time to register property ranges from 35 days in Hyderabad and Bangalore in the south of India to 155 in Kolkata, eastern India.

“We are working with the World Bank Group to initiate reforms in the cities of Mumbai, Hyderabad, Kolkata and Delhi in the first phase,” said Gopal Krishna, a senior official in India’s department of industry policy. In a statement, he said the reforms would focus on the ease of starting a business, dealing with licences, registering property, trading across borders and paying taxes.

India business friendly, but more needed: WB

 

[aryan2007]

India will become hub for world manufacturing industry: Paul

London: Leading NRI industrialist Lord Swraj Paul foresees India becoming a hub for world manufacturing industry in the near future and says his $1.5 billion (Rs5,916 crore) Caparo Group remains “very bullish” about the country.
“We think India will become the hub for world manufacturing industry, which is why we are going in that direction,” Paul told a Cambridge Leadership seminar.
Paul, who is the chairman of the Caparo Group, said “at the moment, we are very bullish about India, which is changing very fast and has started enjoying globalization and the benefits from it.”
Recalling that his Group built the first factory in India in 1994, the leading NRI said “then, three years ago, we began investing in India in a big way. “We now have 16 facilities in operation, with another 16 being built which will be ready by 2008-09.”
The one-day seminar on “Entrepreneurship and Innovation in the 21st Century” was organised at the Judge Business School in Cambridge and attended among others by the Indian High Commissioner to the UK Kamalesh Sharma, who was chosen as the Commonwealth secretary general recently in Uganda.
Emphasising the need for entrepreneurs and innovators to work together, Paul, who is also Britain Ambassador for Overseas Business lamented that Britain was losing touch with its innovative base.
He said innovation and entrepreneurship were part of the fabric of modern universities and education institutions should provide the inspirational environment to encourage and develop the next generation of creative thinkers.
These are the people that will improve our standards of living and pay for the healthcare, education, defence and public services we require,“ Paul said
“Innovations come from a multitude of sources. They may come from people in industry, from workers in the service sector, or public sector, or even the lone inventor,” he said adding a good manager recognizes and implements a good idea, irrespective of where it comes from.
“Managers have to be prepared to recognize talent and then adapt it accordingly.”
Paul observed that historically, Britain was always good at innovation because its economy was made up of a great many small and medium sized businesses whose strength was to come up with new products that were simple but more competitive than anyone else.
“Unfortunately, we are losing touch with this innovative base because there is more glamour these days in working for the big companies; and in the big company culture innovation becomes a casualty.
“There is a lot of research and a lot of development, but there are no new products that are user-friendly and different enough to entice the consumer.”
“At the two universities of which I am Chancellor - Westminster and Wolverhampton - we are working to create better links between universities and industry. We are providing ways for entrepreneurs and universities to work together to their mutual benefit.
Paul said “today, Caparo is a conglomerate of small and medium-sized businesses with total sales of $1.5 billion employing some 6,500 people in Europe, North America and India. And we continue to expand.”

India will become hub for world manufacturing industry: Paul - livemint

 

[aryan2007]

10bn$ Expressway in UP

Mumbai: Twenty firms have submitted initial bids for building India’s longest and biggest expressway project yet—a Rs40,000 crore, eight-laned, access controlled expressway linking Ballia in eastern Uttar Pradesh (UP) with Greater Noida—located on the border of the Capital, New Delhi.
The 1047 km-long road project dubbed Ganga Expressway will, when operational, cut travel time between the backward eastern part of Uttar Pradesh and the more prosperous western part of the state, by 16 hours from the current 24 hours.
For a traveller, it would take just about eight hours to zip from the holy city of Varanasi to New Delhi when the project is completed.
The planned expressway will dwarf the 95km-long, six-laned, access controlled expressway connecting India’s financial capital Mumbai with Pune and the under construction and controversy-ridden 111km-long expressway linking Bangalore with the garden city of Mysore.
The firms that have applied for pre-qualification include Larsen & Toubro Ltd, Reliance Energy Ltd, DLF Ltd, IL&FS Ltd, Gammon Infrastructure Projects Ltd with Australia’s biggest investment bank Macquarie, GMR Group, the Omaxe Ltd-GVK Group-Nagarjuna Construction Co. Ltd consortium, the Bajaj Hindusthan Ltd-Apollo Group-D S Constructions Ltd consortium, Jaiprakash Associates Ltd, Canadian firm SNC Lavalin with Progressive Constructions Ltd, Unitech Ltd, Punj Lloyd Ltd, Oman’s Gulfar Engineering & Contracting Llc., Zoom Developers Pvt. Ltd, Australia’s Leighton Group with Oriental Construction Co. Ltd, and PLUS Expressways Berhad, a subsidiary of Malaysia’s UEM Group, according to an official with the UP government overseeing the bidding process who did not wish to be named.
UP has taken inspiration for building the Ganga Expressway from legendary Afghan leader Sher Shah Suri, who built the Grand Trunk Road connecting Delhi with Kabul in the 16th century after temporarily displacing Humayun from the Mughal throne.
Suri’s road ran alongside the right bank of the Ganga; the new expressway will be built on the left bank of the river.
The eight-laned expressway will be constructed on an embankment to be built by the state’s irrigation department for controlling floods on the left bank of the Ganga.
The proposed expressway will start at Ballia-Gazipur and pass through Varanasi, Mirzapur, Sant Ravidas Nagar, Allahabad, Pratapgarh, Rae Bareli, Unnao, Hardoi, Farrukhabad, Fatehgarh, Shahjahanpur, Badaun, Bulandshahr, Gautam Buddhanagar and terminate at Greater Noida.
The expressway project will make available around 5,000 acres of land for real estate development including residential and industrial units. This will make the project economically viable for the developers.
The work on the expressway project will begin next year.

20 cos bid for longest expressway in India - livemint

 

[aryan2007]

India emerges Top 3 economy in the world


NEW DELHI: India Inc holds far more within its folds than what meets the eye. In the knowledge-driven global marketplace, where intangible assets such as intellectual property, brand, customer relationship and talent hold much more value than tangible 'visible' assets such as capital, land, building, factories et al, India emerges at the top of the podium, head and shoulders above all developed countries and blocs, barring the US and Switzerland.

Move over European Union, G8, Organisation of Economic Co-operation & Development countries and yes, even the BRIC grouping. India Inc takes a bow, not just as most 'intangible' amongst Asian economies, but as the number three economy in the world with the highest intangible component as a percentage of the total enterprise value (TEV), value of disclosed and undisclosed tangible and intangible assets.

With an estimated intangible assets component of 74% (as proportion of TEV), India is just behind US (75%) and Switzerland (74%), according to Global Intangible Tracker 2007 (GIT), the most extensive global study ever on intangibles assets by the London-based Brand Finance Institute.

GIT 2007, exclusive global break with ET, covered over 5,000 companies in 32 countries. For India, GIT considered the top 50 companies (by market cap) on the Bombay Stock Exchange. Global intangibles to TEV average is around 65%.

This partly reflects the dominance of the software sector in the Indian stock market. And with rapid growth in healthcare, personal care, pharma and biotechnology, the country's intellectual capital is poised for a big leap. It also sets the stage for Indian brands and companies to attain critical mass and pursue global trajectories, says the study.

Today, India's TEV of $365-billion (2006) accounts for a measly 0.8% of the global figure ($ 47.7-trillion), and tangible assets make up a small $96-billion of that. The rest constitute a massive wealth of $269-billion of disclosed and undisclosed intangible assets ($3-billion and $266-billion, respectively).

And if the estimates for the first half of current year (HY 2007) are anything to go by, Indian economy with as high an intangible assets of $320.3-billion (up from $269-billion in 2006) could actually topple the top two economies on the intangible to TEV proportion parameter.

At the top of the heap amongst Asian economies, India leads China by far, with the latter's TEV showing 58% of intangible asset component. UAE comes third in Asia with 55% proportion of intangible assets in the economy. Other most intangible Asian economies include Japan (44%), Singapore (45%) and Taiwan (45%).

Malaysia (43%) and South Korea (25%) remains at the bottom of the intangibles heap. As Indian economy grows, it is likely to increase the lead. Interestingly, India Inc has in fact seen the proportion of its intangible assets soar since the beginning of this decade (2001) when it stood at just 56% of $75.1-billion TEV.

The GIT study assumes significance in the wake of changes in the accounting practices, which means that the valuation of intangible assets is now a boardroom issue and cannot be ignored. The ongoing GIT study has so far covered over 11,000 companies quoted in 32 countries over the last six year period. It demonstrates the importance of intangibles and highlights the significant rise in their value over a five-year period.

Even once commoditised sectors that were driven entirely by functional factors are moving rapidly up the ‘intangible value’ curve.” The companies had a TEV of $47.7 trillion at the end of 2006 of which $16.7 trillion represented tangible net assets and $5.9 trillion disclosed intangible assets. The remaining $25.1 trillion represents undisclosed value,” quotes the GIT 2007 study.

GIT 2007 is extensive in the sense it captures dominance of intangible assets across 50 industry sectors. Advertising, internet, software, healthcare services and cosmetics/personal care remain the top five sectors with the proportion of intangible assets to the total assets ranging between 90-97%.

Biotechnology, healthcare products, media, computers and pharmaceuticals are the next big sectors rated high on intangibles. Forest products & paper and automobiles are the ones with lowest proportion of intangibles, under 30% of TEV.

India emerges Top 3 economy in the world- Indicators-Economy-News-The Economic Times

 

[aryan2007]

IBM sees India as its global hub by 2010

NEW YORK:: Betting big on the ‘India advantage’, IBM, one of the world’s biggest information technology (IT) companies, eyes India as its hub for global delivery, providing research software, besides contributing significantly to the company’s revenue. Talking about its road map for 2010, IBM vice- president (financial management) Jesse Green said, “We think of India as a support to IBM. The country will be a hub of global delivery which will help us improve margin components and growth initiatives.”

The IT giant, which is already working with local telecom major Bharti Enterprises and has entered into pacts with some other Indian corporates, expects its revenue from the country to touch the $1 billion-mark by the end of the year. “We expect our revenues to reach $1 billion by the end of this calendar year, up from $700 million in 2006, driven by strong factors. In the first three quarters of the current financial year, our revenue has grown by over 39 per cent,” Green said. The recent deals with some of India’s big corporates are likely to contribute a good chunk to IBM’s revenues. Besides Bharti Enterprises, the IT behemoth has also entered into agreements with BSNL and Idea. Other big names to have inked pacts with IBM include realty major DLF, Central Board of Direct Taxes, Delhi International Airport, Financial Information Network and Operations and Apollo.

The $1 billion would include revenues from services and solutions provided by IBM to local clients and other global corporates operating in India, along with total revenues of IBM Daksh — its business process outsourcing unit. Green said factors such as competitive offerings, effective sales force, strong brand name, and technology base along with the ability to offer hardware and software combination would contribute to the expected figure.

Last year the company’s India revenue grew by 37 per cent against the same in 2005, while the CAGR from 2002 to 2006 is over 49 per cent. “The company experienced broad-base growth during 2002-2006 in telecom, financial services and small and medium businesses, growing at 58 per cent, 34 per cent and 35 per cent respectively,” Green said.

IBM brings world’s fastest chip to India

BANGALORE: IBM has launched the world’s fastest computer processor chip, called the dual-core POWER6, in India. With this launch, the company’s System p570 — which the company says is the world’s most powerful midrange consolidation machine — and bladeCenter JS22 servers, both powered by the new chip, would be available in the country, said IBM India and South Asia director (systems and technology group) Shashi B Mal. The POWER6 features virtualisation capabilities — a means of server consolidation — and is also the latest addition to IBM’s Project Big Green initiative. It allows “unparalleled power savings on mid-range servers,” Mal said.

IndianExpress.com :: IBM sees India as its global hub by 2010

 

[Neo]

India to auction 57 oil and gas blocks ​

Tuesday, December 11, 2007

NEW DELHI: India will launch the latest round of its auctions for nearly 60 oil and gas exploration acreages as it seeks to decrease dependence on foreign fuel sources, a government minister said on Monday.

The number of blocks on offer would be the largest so far. “We will announce NELP-VII on December 13,” Petroleum Minister Murli Deora said in the Indian capital. Of the 57 blocks to be offered under the long-awaited seventh round of auctions under the New Exploration Licensing Policy (NELP), nine are in shallow water, 19 in deep sea and 29 on land.

Bids in the auction, delayed by a dispute over pricing, are due on April 11, 2008 and the awards will be decided by June, Deora told reporters. Indian-born billionaire steel baron Lakshmi Mittal may take part in the bidding for the first time, Deora added. Mittal is keen on expanding fast in the oil and gas sector and has a joint venture with India’s state-run Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) for acquiring oil properties abroad.

He also is partnering India’s state-controlled Hindustan Petroleum Corp Ltd in the five-billion-dollar Bhatinda refinery in the northern Indian state of Punjab and a proposed refinery-petrochemical complex at Vizag in southern Andhra Pradesh state.

India to auction 57 oil and gas blocks

 

[Neo]

India to be regular wheat importer: Canadian body ​

Thursday, December 13, 2007

NEW DELHI: India will be a regular wheat importer in the future despite being the world’s second-biggest producer as demand from a growing population races ahead, a Canadian Wheat Board official said on Wednesday.

India imported 5.5 million tonnes of wheat in 2006, its first overseas buys in six years, and has tied up contracts for 1.8 million tonnes this year. “I would suggest that India is going to be importing on a more regular basis,” Dave Burrows, a wheat board director, told Reuters in an interview in New Delhi.

“Perhaps not every year, but on a more regular basis than they have in the past.” Burrows is in India as part of a delegation which aims to help the country set up food processing units. Analysts say India needs around 73 million tonnes of wheat annually to feed its more than one billion population.

India to be regular wheat importer: Canadian body

 

[Neo]

Nanotechnology the new frontier for IT power India​

(AFP)

13 December 2007

BANGALORE - India is hoping nanotechnology could provide a new thrust to its booming economy and to become a world leader in a market expected to be worth one-trillion dollars by 2015, officials say.

Bangalore, India’s science and information-technology capital, is at the forefront of a five-year initiative designed to help India become a global nanotechnology hub, using the country’s vast scientific pool and low costs.

“Nano is the boom science of the 21st century,” said M.N. Vidyashankar, who oversees technology industries in Karnataka, of which Bangalore is the capital.

“It will become the key emerging technology in the 21st century,” he told AFP at a nanotechnology conference hosted by the state government earlier this month.

The government has said it plans to spend 10-billion rupees (254-million dollars) to engineer applications using nanotechnology, which scientists say will create lighter, stronger, cleaner and cheaper materials.

Nanotechnology stems from the Greek word nanos, meaning dwarf, and centres on control of matter on an atomic and molecular scale. It is the manipulation or use of materials and devices so minute that nothing can be built any smaller.

“The talk of the day is nanotechnology with its wide applications,” T.K. Bhaumik, chief economist at India’s biggest private company Reliance Industries, told AFP.

“We’re looking at it,” he said. “The company is interested in any upcoming opportunity and nanotech is one of them.”

Scientists caution the development period could be prolonged.

“It’s easy to spot the commercial potential of a research finding in nanotechnology, but the time to market is very long,” said Anthony K. Cheetham, an expert at the materials science department at Britain’s Cambridge University.

But angel investors — affluent individuals who fund start-ups — pledged capital to six promising business projects at the Bangalore conference, said Vidyashankar, declining to identify them on grounds of confidentiality.

The worldwide market for nanotech-engineered consumer goods — from cosmetics and sporting goods to consumer electronics — is forecast to grow to one-trillion dollars by 2015 from an annual 15-billion dollars now, he said.

Already, nanotechnology has given the world materials used to make tennis balls that last longer, rackets that are stronger, golf balls that fly straighter and car wax that gives greater shine, says the US-based National Nanotechnology Infrastructure Network (NNIN).

The Indian Institute of Science and the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research in Bangalore are setting up the first of three national nanotechnology institutes on a sprawling campus.

And about 60 scientific institutions will help build “nano clusters” nationwide to develop applications for industrial products, agriculture, healthcare and drinking water, said Thirumalachari Ramasami, secretary in the federal department of science and technology.

“What nanotechnology has done is to create a new excitement in the scientific world,” said C.N.R. Rao, India’s foremost expert in the field.

“It has captured the imagination of a generation of scientists.”

Nanotechnology could lead to the creation of materials with 10 times the strength of steel and only a fraction in weight, or shrink all the information available in India’s libraries into a device the size of a sugar cube.

It can be used to treat diseases by sending tiny robots into human bodies, said Rao, who heads the Indian prime minister’s scientific advisory panel and will guide the five-year nanotech mission.

“Nanotechnology will have as much impact on our lives as transistors and chips,” said the Karnataka government’s Vidyashankar.

“It’s extremely important to the economy of our country and has the capacity to create new, affordable products that will dramatically improve performance.”

Khaleej Times Online - Nanotechnology the new frontier for IT power India

 

[Neo]

Employment outlook is buoyant in India​

(IANS)

12 December 2007

NEW DELHI — The overall manpower employment outlook in the country in the first quarter of 2008 is expected to remain buoyant, according to a new survey.

Employers in the mining and construction sector have forecast the strongest hiring plans among the seven sectors covered under the "Manpower Employment Outlook Survey", conducted by Manpower India and released yesterday.

"The strong hiring indications in the mining and construction sector comes in the backdrop of heavy investment in infrastructure across the country," Manpower India managing director Naresh Malhan told IANS.

"There is large-scale construction of roads, airports, power plants, malls and SEZs (special economic zones) all across the country. The introduction of the public-private partnership approach in the construction sector may be adding strength to the growth of this sector."

Of the 5,163 employers surveyed, 43 per cent expect an increase in staffing levels in the first quarter of 2008, one per cent anticipate a decrease, and 45 percent are expect no change.

Of the 27 countries and territories surveyed globally this quarter, the hiring intentions continue to be robust in India.

Employers in all eight countries and territories surveyed across the Asia Pacific region anticipate positive hiring activity for the first quarter of 2008.

Employers in the manufacturing and the public administration and education sectors report the least robust outlooks.

Employers in services, finance, insurance and real estate sectors have reported a considerable decline of 9 percentage points each in their net employment outlook since the last quarter.

Regarding IT, which falls under the services sector in the survey, Malhan said, "The IT sector continues to be a promising sector but it is currently facing pressure because of the appreciation of the rupee."

The seven sectors across which the survey was conducted in India include finance, insurance and real estate; manufacturing; mining and construction; public administration and education; services; transportation and utilities, and wholesale and retail trade.

Khaleej Times Online - Employment outlook is buoyant in India

 

[aryan2007]

India Inc profits to grow by 20% in next five years

MUMBAI: India Inc's profits are expected to grow more than 20 per cent over the next five years, a top in the financial sector official said.

"Corporate profits may grow 20 per cent-plus in the next five years" from the present level, Motilal Oswal Securities' Managing Director, Raamdeo Agrawal, told reporters while releasing the 12th Annual Wealth Creation Study here on Friday.

"India's net trillion dollar GDP journey in 2007 will see distinctly buoyant corporate profits and a boom in savings and investment. At current valuations, margin of safety in the market is low. However, very high liquidity can lift the market to rich levels of valuations for quite some time," Agrawal said, adding India will hit $2-trillion GDP by FY 12.

The top 100 wealth creators created Rs 7,065-billion of wealth between FY-02 and FY-07.

Agrawal said that Reliance Industries has climbed its way up the list of biggest wealth creators this year having created net wealth of Rs 1,856-billion, followed by ONGC at Rs 1,490-billion and Bharti Airtel by Rs 1,366-billion.

The IT bellwether, Infosys, ranked fourth with net wealth of Rs 855-billion, ICICI Bank Rs 566-billion, BHEL Rs 512-billion, SAIL Rs 451-billion, L&T Rs 433-billion, State Bank of India Rs 407-billion and Wipro Rs 394-billion.

During the study period 2002-07, MNCs mainly led by FMCG and pharma stocks underperformed the Indian companies both in terms of earnings CAGR and price CAGR.

However, Indian markets still believe in the long-term potential of MNCs as indicated by their significant P/Es.

Over the last ten years, MNCs have lost significant share, both in terms of number of companies and amount of wealth created. Within MNCs, there is a sharp change in composition with engineering and capital goods companies like ABB, Siemens and MICO, replacing FMCG companies like Hindustan Unilever and Golgate.

Given India's capex boom, the financial and stock market performance of MNCs is still in line with Indian companies, the study said.

The PSUs in aggregate also underperformed the Indian companies both in terms of earnings CAGR and price CAGR. The PSU laggards in price growth are Neyveli Lignite, Shipping Corporation, Indian Oil, NALCO and GAIL.

A steady growth rate of 16 per cent between 2002 and 2007 has already led to exponential growth in businesses such as telecom and cement. "We believe the next five years will accentuate this exponentially, which will also spread to several more sectors of the economy," Agrawal said.

India's forex reserves have bulged from close to zero in 1991 to a healthy USD 200-billion in 2007.

"Huge forex capital flows do pose problems for the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), to manage the triad of exchange rate, interest rate and inflation. However, the overall impact of such flows has been positive for India," Agrawal said.
India Inc profits to grow by 20% in next five years- Earnings-News By Company-News-The Economic Times

 

[Bushroda]

Forget China: India is the economic future
J. COLIN DODDS
Halifax Daily News, Canada

Media attention has focused on the rise of China to be the workshop of the world, yet waiting in the wings is India - a member of the BRIC countries (Brazil, China, India and Russia), the world's largest democracy and an emerging economic powerhouse in its own right. It also possesses a nuclear capability.

With a population of more than 1.1 billion, 23 recognized languages and over 1,650 dialects (Hindi is the official language and English a functional subsidiary official language), a stereotyped view many have of India would be one of poverty, illiteracy, disease and bureaucracy.

While these factors still exist, the India of today is showing both an internal and external economic dynamism that will catapult the country into one of the major economies of the 21st century.

With a more free-market approach than has existed since independence from the U.K. in 1947, and an emerging middle class of over 300 million, the economic emergence of India is illustrative of the fact that models of development are not uniform.

Indeed, India's approach has by necessity and culture been very different to that of China's, both in terms of the role of government and in the sectors of development.

Not exporting

Despite a strong manufacturing base, it has not sought to compete in offshore manufacturing, so its growth has not been exported.

Rather, building on its strengths, it has developed a very successful outsourcing capability in the service sector using the English-language skills of its population.

Of particular note is India's role as a world-class leader in the IT sector. After decades of exporting people, India is now attracting back former residents and their children, including many from Canada, to work in this sector.

With a more modest growth rate of six to eight per cent, the Indian economy is the fourth-largest in the world as measured by purchasing power. The development model adopted by India has been more demand-driven and bottom-up, using indigenous funds as opposed to foreign direct investment (FDI).

The entrepreneurial drive found so much in India has now expanded into Indian multi-nationals across the globe.

For example, less than a decade ago, few would have heard of Tata.

Founded in the mid-19th century, domestically, its operations are well diversified, but it has recently emerged as a global brand name with 246,000 employees and operations in over 85 countries including Canada (with Tata Consultancy).

Visitors to Boston might be surprised to learn that Tata owns the Ritz Carlton hotel.

Leading phone carrier

Through its ownership of undersea cables bought from Tyco International, it is the largest carrier of international telephone calls in the world.

Through its acquisition of Corus, an Anglo Dutch steel maker, Tata is now one of the largest steel producers in the world.

Closer to home, fans of Tetley Tea may not realize this is a Tata company

Also, the famous icons of the U.K. automobile industry - Jaguar and Land Rover - may be bought from Ford. While they are the favoured bidder, if they are not successful, there is another Indian firm, Mahindra and Mahindra, in the wings.

The continued economic success of India is important to the vision of an Atlantic Gateway and the Port of Halifax.

With congested ports on the West Coast, the Suez Canal provides a closer trade route and we have spare port capacity.

With Nova Scotia Business Inc. playing a key role, Halifax has hosted business delegations from India eager to see the opportunities for developing these trade linkages.

To assist in furthering these and other trade and investment opportunities (including in education), executive MBA students from the Sobey School of Business will be in India again in February 2008.

India is on the ascendency and unlike Vietnam, it is not a direct economic competitor to China.

However, it will assume not only a key regional economic and political role, but through its rich history and culture, it will be a strong and stable force in the world for democracy, civil society and social justice.

J. Colin Dodds is President of Saint Mary's University and a Professor of Finance in the Sobey School of Business.