Having reversed the falling output at KG-D6, Reliance Industries (RIL) and its partner BP plc will quadruple production at the eastern offshore fields to around 40-45 million standard cubic meters per day by 2020. With addition of a well this month jacking up output by 2.5 mmscmd to 13.7 mmscmd, RIL-BP is repairing shut wells that will help further raise output to 16 mmscmd. The new fields in the KG-D6 blocks will start coming on stream from 2018 and if the company gets all the right support and approvals from the government then it hopes to quadruple its production by 2020. The Bay of Bengal KG-D6 fields, which began gas production in April 2009, had hit a peak of 69.43 mmscmd in March 2010 before water and sand ingress led to shutting down of more than one-third of the wells. While the company carries out remedial measures to augment production from the currently producing Dhirubhai-1 & 3 (D1&D3) and MA fields, it plans to invest $3.155 billion in producing 20 mmscmd of gas from R-Series discoveries in the block and another $1.529 billion in four satellite fields to produce 10 mmscmd.
Biocon, Asia’s premier biotechnology company, has introduced CANMAb (150 mg/ 440 mg), a biosimilar trastuzumab for the treatment of HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer in India. CANMAb, developed jointly by Biocon and Mylan under a global partnership, is the world’s first biosimilar version of Herceptin and is being introduced for the benefit of patients in India. Breast cancer is the most prevalent cancer among Indian women ahead of cervical cancer and CANMAb will offer a high quality, more affordable option to breast cancer patients in India. CANMAb is being manufactured at Biocon’s biologics facility in Bangalore and will be available to patients around the first week of February 2014. CANMAb will be available at about 25% discount to the current list price of the reference product in India, which is already significantly lower than its price in developed markets. In addition, CANMAb’s 150 mg formulation, priced at Rs 19,500/vial, will allow extra savings to patients as they can buy smaller quantities as per their requirement.
Power producer NTPC appears determined not to clear dues of about Rs 2,000 crore to the monopoly miner Coal India (CIL) without third-party sampling of coal, indicating a protracted tussle ahead over the quality of coal that had led to a stand-off between the two state-owned firms for much of last year. Coal produced from almost all the mines of Eastern Coalfields is sampled by an independent party before it is dispatched to NTPC’s thermal power plants. NTPC recently paid CIL 1,000 crore, following a decision taken at a meeting held in the finance ministry after its dues touched 3,000 crore. It was decided that NTPC would pay on the basis of average gross calorific value of coal supplied by CIL over three months. However, the facility of third-party sampling is not available at all mines operated by CIL or its subsidiaries. At Mahanadi Coalfields, for example, the facility is yet to be installed. In this case, NTPC had been paying CIL on the basis of the quality of coal it receives at its power plants.
Aurobindo Pharma has inked a binding offer to acquire commercial operations in seven Western European countries from Actavis plc. The closing of the transaction is conditional on certain antitrust approvals and completion of employee consultation processes. The company expects to acquire personnel, commercial infrastructure, products, marketing authorizations and dossier license rights in seven European countries. Actavis and Aurobindo will be entering into a long term commercial and supply arrangement in order to support the ongoing growth plans of these businesses. The acquisition expands Aurobindo’s front-end operations into five segments (generics, prescription products, over-the-counter products, hospital products and generics tenders) with approximately 1200 products and an additional pipeline of over 200 products. The management estimates the net sales for the acquired businesses would be around EUR 320 million in 2013 with a growth rate of over 10% year-on-year.
The country’s largest two-wheeler maker Hero MotoCorp is set to showcase its future road map at the upcoming Auto Expo with over a dozen models, including concepts and hybrids, set for display. These are developed with the company’s own technology and also some in collaboration with its partners. In the last Auto Expo held in 2012, the company had displayed the concept hybrid scooter - LEAP, which it had indigenously developed with the help of an international consultant. The scooter was aimed to be equipped with an engine that gets started on when the battery power comes down. The company has also called all its global and domestic distributors for the event, during which it also plans to have riding experience sessions.
Tata Communications, which is betting big on data centre services, views healthcare as an emerging vertical and aims to achieve a growth rate of over 25 percent in the segment in next three years. As part of its solutions for the healthcare sector, the company has recently become an advisory partner to Nova Medical Centres. The company is in advanced stage of discussions with at least a couple of firms which are like hospital chains or clinics that are very similar to Nova Healthcare. Tata Communications has about 50 data centres at 44 locations. It has over a million square feet of space for its data centre equipment. All this space is cooled and powered, and has a large team to support the leaders in operations.
Saddled with high bad assets from the infra sector, the state-run Andhra Bank, going forward will concentrate on retail lending. Andhra Bank’s 19 percent of the assets are in the infra sector-- 11 percent to the power companies and 8 percent to infra companies -- and the bad loan problem is mainly due to that. As of now, the bank has a total business of Rs 2.30 trillion of which Rs 1.30 trillion is in deposits and Rs 1 trillion in advances. The bank plans to increase its deposits and advances to Rs 20,000 crore by the end of the current financial year. The bank is planning to extend financial assistance to Hindustan Shipyard.
Rallis India, a Tata Group company, plans to replicate its success of ‘Grow More Pulses’ programme in Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka in association with the respective State Governments. Besides, Rallis has started working with 100 farmers growing chilli in Andhra Pradesh’s Guntur district. Metahelix Life Sciences, a subsidiary of Rallis, markets a variety of chilli seed which increases yield by at least 15-20 percent. The company currently provides quality inputs and supports pulses farmers on best farming techniques to 2.5 lakh farmers in Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu to increase yield by 15-25 percent. Rallis plans to increase its coverage in Maharashtra to eight districts from three last year. In this process, it will double its farmers’ reach to 80,000 covering pulses grown on one lakh acres.
Federal Bank will open up to 100 branches every year as part of its plan to expand its branch network. Already, the Aluva-headquartered private bank has 1,142 branches and 1,312 ATMs across the country. More than a half of the branches are outside Kerala. In the third quarter of the current financial year, the bank opened 18 branches. The bank would also hire 3,000 people in the next three years. In spite of the difficult economic situation of the country, the bank’s performance was reasonably good in the third quarter. The net profit, at Rs 230 crore, was slightly more than in the previous quarter.
After United Breweries Holdings (UBHL), a second winding-up petition has been admitted in the High Court against Vijay Mallya’s grounded carrier Kingfisher Airlines (KFA). Ananda Byrareddy admitted the petition by a consortium of banks, led by the State Bank of India (SBI), a month after a similar petition was admitted from the UK-based engine service provider, Aerotron. The news comes a day after Mallya had been summoned by the Delhi high court to appear on February 14 in a case by Delhi International Airport (DIAL) on bounced cheques of Rs 1 crore from Kingfisher. Mallya was summoned by the Karnataka high court in September last year on non-payment of dues to creditors, but failed to make an appearance. Besides DIAL and Bangalore International Airport, Kingfisher has defaulted on loans to the income-tax department, vendors and lessors and several public sector banks. At Rs 1,600 crore, SBI has the largest exposure to the carrier among banks. Aerotron has sued the airline for $6-million (Rs 35 crore) dues.
