Corporate Annoucements

Listing of equity shares of GSS America Infotech Ltd
Trading Members of the Exchange are hereby informed that effective from March 07, 2008, the equity shares of GSS America Infotech Ltd (Scrip Code: 532951) are listed and admitted to dealings on the Exchange in the list of 'B' Group Securities.

Sundaram Clayton - Updates on Scheme of Amalgamation
Sundaram Clayton Ltd (SCL) has informed BSE that the Hon'ble High Court of Madras has on February 20, 2008 pronounced the Order sanctioning the Scheme of Arrangement between Sundaram Clayton Ltd (SCL) and Wabco-TVS India Ltd and their respective shareholders and creditors.

GL Hotels - Updates on Open Offer
JM Financial Consultants Pvt Ltd in their capacity as "Manager to the Offer" has issued this Corrigendum to the Public Announcement, which is in continuation of earlier public announcement issued on July 28, 2007 for the acquisition of shares from the public shareholders of GL Hotels Ltd by Dunearn Investments (Mauritius) Pte Ltd ("Acquirer").

Tata Communications & BitGravity Announce Global Strategic Partnership to Address Growing Demand for High-Quality Video over the Internet
Tata Communications Ltd has informed BSE that Tata Communications and BitGravity, Inc, the pioneer in Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) for interactive broadcasting, announced on March 05, 2008 a strategic partnership. Tata Communications will co-brand, resell and jointly market BitGravity’s technology platform worldwide as part of a value-added services offering on top of Tata Global NetworkAs part of the arrangement, Tata Communications, with a global presence in more than 200 countries across 300 PoPs will provide tight integration with BitGravity’s platform and their carrier-grade infrastructure, including collocation and IP-network capacity, and local sales presence in each region for the CDN offering. BitGravity will provide technology and manage the content delivery operation. The service will be sold in Europe and Asia and branded as Tata Communications’ CDN Powered by BitGravity.
BitGravity is an award-winning technology provider in the content delivery space. The company has won numerous awards including DemoGod, LightReading's Service Company of the Year, Digital Hollywood 100, and RedHerring 100. Built on top of BitGravity’s patent-pending routing architecture, BitCast, BitGravity’s services include BitGravity’s High-Definition Service and BG LiveBroadcast, the Internet’s first affordable, high-quality, massively scalable live product.

Satyam inaugurates Global Solutions Center (GSC) in Egypt
Satyam Computer Services Ltd, on March 05, 2008 announced the inauguration of its Global Solutions Center (GSC) in Egypt. The GSC is located in Smart Village, Giza, and will employ about 300 professionals to serve as a major technological development and software support for Satyam's customers in the Middle East, North Africa and European region. As a part of the company's globalization spree, the GSC is Satyam's 28th globally and the 14th in the Asia-Pacific, Middle East, India and Africa region.
The rising IT spend in Egypt, which according to IDC has been projected to grow by 12.4 per cent over the next five years and reach USD 120 million by 2010, has amplified its repute as the next important IT hub in the Middle East and African region. Recognizing the tremendous opportunity amidst the country's growing IT services market, Satyam has identified Egypt as the perfect location for its first GSC in the Middle East and African sub-continent which will serve as a near-shore to the Middle East and North Africa markets and also cater to the BPO, KPO and ITeS needs of European markets due to the availability of European language skills in Egypt.
"Our investments in the Middle East and North African markets are in line with our larger globalization strategy," said B. Rama Raju, Co-founder and CEO of Satyam. We are confident that our investments in the region will also benefit the local economy by way of increased job opportunities for the local population, as we are keen on hiring and training a significant number of locals. The Egyptian Government has been extremely supportive of our expansion plans in the country, and we are committed to giving back something to the Egyptian economy". Raju also pointed out that Satyam is building world-class Global Solution Centres (GSC) across the world, in line with its strategy to strengthen its presence globally.

NEWS UPDATES

Tata seeks $3 bln loans for Jaguar, Land Rover

India's Tata Motors is seeking about $3 billion in loans to fund its planned purchase of Ford Motor Co's Jaguar and Land Rover luxury brands, the Financial Times reported on Thursday.
Tata has assigned its advisers, Citigroup and JPMorgan, to arrange the financing with a number of other international and domestic banks, the FT said, quoting people familiar with the matter.
The loan, expected to be mostly short-term bridge financing, is larger than the expected purchase price, estimated at around $2 billion.
A person familiar with the deal said part of the loan could be used for working capital, the newspaper said.

SEBI Board Meeting held on March 05, 2008 at New Delhi

The Hon’ble Union Finance Minister Shri P. Chidambaram addressed all the Board Members and Executive Directors of SEBI today at New Delhi. Highlighting the role of SEBI in the development of the securities market, the Minister, emphasized on the need for greater investor protection, investor education and market development to increase the base of genuine investors, particularly from non-metro cities.

Proceedings in respect of NSDL: A Committee comprising of non Whole Time Members of SEBI headed by Dr. Mohan Gopal, Director, National Judicial Academy, Bhopal has been constituted to oversee the conduct of all proceedings initiated by SEBI against NSDL. The other members of the committee are Shri V. Leeladhar, Deputy Governor, RBI and Shri Anurag Goel, Secretary, Ministry of Corporate Affairs. The Committee may seek the advice of Shri Ravi Kadam, Adovate General of Maharashtra in its work.

Rationalisation of Fees: The Board in its previous meeting formed an internal committee headed by Mr. V K Chopra, Whole Time Member, SEBI to examine the SEBI’s fee structure for rationalization. The Committee submitted its report to the Board and gave a set of wide ranging recommendations for rationalizing the fee structure so as to directly or indirectly benefit common investors. The Board decided to rationalize the following fees:

• The ad valorem fee for filing of an offer document by a mutual fund has been reduced from 0.03 per cent at present to 0.005 per cent subject to a maximum of Rs. 50 lakhs. Further, annual registration fee from custodians has also been reduced from 0.001 per cent to 0.0005 per cent. of asset under custody. This would directly benefit the small investor investing in mutual funds .
• The ad valorem fee for filing of offer document in case of public issue has been reduced from 0.03 per cent , at present, to 0.005 per cent subject to a maximum of Rs. 3 crores.
  The ad valorem fee in respect of filing of offer document for rights issue has been reduced from 0.05 percent, at present, to 0.005 per cent, subject to a maximum of Rs. 5 lakhs.
• The ad valorem filing fee in case of offer documents for buy back of securities and draft letter of offer filed under SEBI Substantial Acquistion and Takeover Regulations, is reduced from 0.5 per cent, at present, to 0.125 per cent subject to maximum of Rs. 3 crores.
• Registration fee in case of venture capital fund has been reduced from Rs. 10 lakh at present to Rs. 5 lakhs.

The above rationalization of fee structure will come into effect from April 1, 2008.

Proposed arrangement between NSE and Madras Stock Exchange (MSE): The Board approved the proposal for granting “in-principle” approval for the proposed arrangement between NSE and MSE subject to suitable safeguards / conditions. As per this arrangement, the members of MSE will be permitted to trade on NSE’s platform subject to certain terms and conditions.

Primary Market: The Board decided that the Primary Market issuance process will be reviewed to reduce the gap between the opening of an issue and the listing of shares.

INCAT-HAL in joint venture

INCAT,a engineering services outsourcing (ESO) and product development IT services company, and Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) today announced a joint venture creating INCAT-HAL Aerostructures limited. The new organisation is immediately positioned to establish itself as a global leader in the engineering and design of aero structures, said M Fakruddin, HAL Director - Corporate Planning and Marketing.

"The objective of this joint venture is to undertake work packages related to engineering design services in aerostructures and also the captive offshore and on-site work load of both partners from aerospace OEMs, including offset programes," he said. "HAL and INCAT are set to capitalise on the global aerospace demand by leveraging their combined core strengths - HAL's offset business and INCAT's global offshore/on-site engineering business," said Patrick McGoldrick, Managing Director - Tata Technologies, INCAT's parent company.

The joint venture, based at Bangalore, will be the preferred delivery centre, for both organisations. The JV agreement was signed between HAL and Tata Technologies, INCAT'S parent company. Both HAL and Tata Technologies will contribute 50 per cent to the equity of the JV.

INCAT, a Tata Technologies company, was founded in 1989.

Tax holiday withdrawal proposal in Budget

A 2008-09 Budget proposal may compel ONGC to review its proposed new refinery investments. The Budget proposal stipulates withdrawal of tax holiday for such projects being commissioned after April 1, 2009.
Speaking to newspersons at the sidelines of an Oil and Gas Summit 2008 here on Wednesday, Chairman and Managing Director, ONGC, R.S. Sharma said, “This proposal raises a major question mark and I have asked my people to work out the financial implications.
We don’t want to carry on with uncertainties.” ONGC is planning to set up a new refinery in Kakinada, Andhra Pradesh, and another in Rajasthan, and a project in Mangalore. ONGC had planned to set up a 15-million-tonne greenfield refinery at Kakinada and had also planned to expand capacity of the Mangalore refinery to 30 million tonnes. “After the withdrawal of the seven-year income tax holiday, the projects would be reviewed,” he said.
Proposal The Budget for 2008-09 has proposed withdrawing the income tax holiday for refineries being commissioned after April 1 2009. “When there was a conscious decision to make India a refining hub, this withdrawal of tax incentive will not only impact projects but will also be a negative sentiment for the sector,” he said. Sharma said the memorandum notes on the Budget proposals have also raised question marks on oil and gas field development projects getting the seven-year tax holiday with a sub-section defining mineral oil for the purpose of tax incentives does not include petroleum and natural gas. “This would make the risky E&P business less lucrative,” Sharma said. He hoped that this is an inadvertent aberration which would be set right before the passing of the Finance Bill. ONGC has firmed up $12 billion of investment for developing the oil and gas fields found off the east-coast and also those on the west-coast. “The rate of return would come down if such a proposal is implemented,” Sharma said. However, the production sharing contracts already signed should not be impacted by a note in the memorandum for the tax proposal, he said.
“Whatever agreements have been signed cannot be changed. They are sacrosanct,” he said. ONGC and other exploration companies like Reliance Industries Ltd had entered into a production sharing contract with the Government for various E&P blocks with a clear provision for a seven-year tax holiday.

MARKET PREDICTION FOR FRIDAY

AS PER GLOBAL CUE MARKET WILL OPEN FLAT TO POSITIVE NOTE .
AS PER OPEN INTEREST AUTO LOOKS GOOD.
BUY AT EVERY DIPS 4820 IS SUPPORT AND 4950 IS RESISTANCE .