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Hiranandanis to set up 2,500-Mw gas-based power project

P B Jayakumar & Raghavendra Kamath / Mumbai May 1, 2010, 1:40 IST

The Hiranandani Group, one of the largest privately-held real estate developers, is foraying into power generation in a big way. The group is setting up a 2,500-Mw gas-based power project at a location near Pune.

The Group, which has interests in premium township projects and hospitals through 200 subsidiaries, has floated Hindustan Electricity Generation Company (HEGC) to spearhead the power ambitions, Darshan Hiranandani, director, told Business Standard.

Sources said the Hirandanis would require Rs 11,000-12,000 crore for setting up the power project, to come up at Navlakh Umbre village in the outskirts of Pune.

“We will set up the project with a 75:25 per cent debt to equity ratio and will dilute stake of HEGC to private equity players to raise a part of the equity portion,” said Darshan.

Niranjan Hiranandani, promoter and managing director of Hiranandani Constructions, said the company was still working on details of the project.

The Group has acquired close to 200 acres at Navlakh Umbre and suburbs to set up the plant. A 355 Mw gas turbine will come up in an area of 30 acres and that unit will take off within 30 months. Another six-seven turbines of the same size will come up in the same location within the next 18 months, he said.

Maharashtra is experiencing an average 5,000 Mw of power shortage in summer. The company has also tied up with GAIL for supply of natural gas for firing the project, said Darshan Hiranandani.

The Group, which has mega townships at Powai and Thane in Mumbai and new mega projects coming up in Chennai and Navi Mumbai, would require only 300-400 Mw for captive use.

It will not foray into coal-based power projects, as these are polluting. Nor is it looking at renewables like solar and wind energy, since big projects in these segments would require huge investments, said Niranjan Hiranandani.

Another real estate major, Indiabulls, is developing close to 6,600 Mw of coal-based power plants through a recently listed entity, Indiabulls Power. DLF, India's largest real estate developer, also had interests in power generation, but is now selling off its proposed power venture to reduce debts.

India would add a little over 60,000 Mw of power during the current Five-Year Plan and over 1,00,000 Mw during the next Five-Year Plan.
 
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UIDAI in talks with RBI to expand banking services

Press Trust of India / New Delhi April 30, 2010, 15:33 IST

The Unique Identification Authority of India and the Reserve Bank of India are in talks to explore linking the unique identity number with bank accounts to enable cashless transactions at outlets like 'kirana' stores.

The Authority has proposed a UID-enabled Bank Account (UEBA) which will give customers access to their account through Business Correspondent (BC) operating a handheld microATM device.
Transactions on the UID-enabled bank account function essentially as a prepaid system, similar to that used by mobile operators.

"This enables local BCs such as self-help groups and kirana shops to offer basic banking services at low risk to the bank. The customers are already familiar with this model and comfortable with paying for talk-time, an electronic good," the Authority said.

Explaining the process, UIDAI said the BC starts out by depositing a certain amount with the banking institution.

This 'prepaid balance' paid up by the BC to the bank changes with every transaction the BC makes.

It decreases when a customer makes a deposit transaction, when some part of it is transferred to the customer's account, and increases when a customer withdraws money.

"When the customer is making a deposit, he pays physical cash to the BC, who subsequently makes an electronic transfer from the BC account to the customer account. When making a withdrawal, the electronic transfer is made from the customer account to the BC account, and the BC hands out physical cash to the customer," the Authority said.
 
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'India should take its innovation to the developed world'

Q&A: Sylvie Ouziel, Group Chief Operating Officer, Accenture
Amit Ranjan Rai / New Delhi April 26, 2010, 0:57 IST

Sylvie OuzielThe downturn has made companies the world over more sensitive to the way they manage and grow business. Aware of the uncertainties of today’s business environment, they are taking every step with caution. Yet they are eyeing growth and see emerging markets as their playground. Sylvie Ouziel, group chief operating officer for management consulting, Accenture, spoke to Amit Ranjan Rai on some of the key issues companies are facing post-recession, the growth opportunities for businesses in emerging markets and how the business of consulting is changing.

What are some of the key business issues and problems companies are coming to you for in the post-recession period?
A lot of it is still in the area of cost-cutting. Companies are focused on maintaining the good discipline they had put in place during the downturn. They are looking at cost-cutting from a mid- and long-term perspective — it is no longer about short-term cost-cutting. It is about being efficient in the long term. They are all deeply impacted and changed by the downturn — it is not back to the past and let’s grow again. Companies know that it can happen again. If you look at the big macroeconomic cycles, downturns are becoming more frequent, and companies want to be prepared for that and be more flexible and viable. A lot of them are thinking on setting flexible subcontracting agreements — which part of the value chain should be handled internally and which can be handled externally through contracts. They are thinking of flexibility in terms of scaling up or down as the need be.

Growth is the other big obsession with most companies. The good news is that since the beginning of the year, growth is back — we say that from the sold jobs we do for our clients. Companies are looking at geographic expansion; they are looking at the BRIC countries and emerging markets. Most of our clients are also looking at innovation in a big way. We are helping them with new services they can take to clients, new product ideas, new positioning in the value chain, in their ability to integrate upstream or downstream and innovations involving consumers and partners.

In the growth space, mergers and acquisitions are back. But there is a new flavour to them in the post-crisis world. Companies are looking out more for joint ventures, alliances and flexible solutions, because M&As take a lot of resources, cash and time, and yet there is no surety that they will succeed and deliver as expected. That’s because you try to marry two large organisations which may not have synergies in all areas. Moreover, when you do a merger it keeps you busy for two years. You have to focus on properly aligning the two organisations. It may probably destroy as much value as it may create. So, more and more companies are today focusing on specific and targeted alliances by forming joint ventures or finding partners. The pharmaceutical industry used to go for big M&As — to an extent, that is still happening — but a lot of companies are now going for targeted joint ventures to innovate on molecules or in biotech.

What is your advice on some of these problems and taking business forward?
Companies are today rethinking on the kind of products and services they can take to their clients and market, and the way they innovate in different areas. One key area we are helping our clients with is how to go about more open innovation within their business ecosystem with their partners and consumers. For instance, what Procter & Gamble has been doing for years — instead of having a big R&D department inventing all the products, the people at the distribution centres and partners propose ideas and innovate for them. Lego, the toymaker, invents most of its products through a community of heavy players of their building-block toys. These players, who are completely into it, exchange ideas with the company such as what parts have been missing when building something and so on. IKEA, the furniture maker, too, is taking ideas from its consumers. So you see a lot of companies today are not generating all the ideas internally or having big R&D departments; instead, they are open to ideas from partners and consumers.

Another area we have been working with clients is around the value chain. The relations between companies, partners, wholesalers, retailers and so on are moving to a new level. Companies are today going to emerging markets and they cannot find all the traditional channels in place as they find in developed markets. So they are rethinking what they can do in the value chain.

Then there are new technologies that are enabling you to do what you cannot think of before — with retail or mobile commerce you can directly reach your consumers. For instance, ICICI Bank has developed mobile banking for emerging markets, for regions where people don’t expect to find a branch or even a PC and plain mobile banking is very effective. So, companies today are rethinking about their place in the value chain, their distribution channels, the customer experience and a lot of innovation is happening in all these areas.

Companies are today looking at emerging markets for growth. Do you see a change in the process of globalisation?
Globalisation today is in a totally new phase. It is no more about emerging markets being the factories of the world, which was the first phase of development. Globalisation today is much more multidirectional. The world today is multipolar. If you look at emerging markets today, they are made of a new set of consumers, and the internal demand is huge. So the internal market is a huge opportunity.

Emerging countries themselves have rising multinational companies which are global players. It you look at the global workforce growth in the next 10 to 20 years, all of it is happening in the emerging markets. Of course, these economies will require a lot of natural resources and cash. Both China and India have emerged as players in the global economy.

Where should companies in emerging markets like India focus?
Indian companies looking for overseas footprint need to focus first on solid domestic growth and internal demand, they need to have a solid domestic growth engine, other than an export growth engine. They are not the only ones from emerging markets — we see companies from Mexico, Vietnam, Indonesia and Malaysia as tough challengers.

The other important thing would be to have some roots in the developed world (through acquisitions), not only to tap the export potential, but also to think in terms of developing bonds, reaching out to consumers, building distribution channels, connecting with local markets and so on. Compared to other emerging countries, Indian companies have a head start in this direction. Despite the challenges, they are on the right track, which is still not the case with many Chinese companies which are still struggling to emerge as local players in the developed world.

Another way to grow would be from emerging market to emerging markets. That is, by taking what you have done in your domestic market to other emerging markets such as Vietnam or Indonesia.

So there is a clear shift from the West to East and North to South?
It is not really the shift it used to be in the past. It’s more a multidirectional game. An Indian company would need to be strong in India, strong in other emerging markets using a similar recipe to what it has done in India, and then it has to be strong in the developed market as well having some local presence and roots and connecting to the local market and consumers.

What Indian companies should also do is export to the developed markets the innovation they have done in India for Indian purpose. If you’ve innovated under more difficult conditions and come up with robust, smart and very cost-effective products, then these products also make a lot of sense to the Western world. So if GE is innovating on medical devices that are smaller and cost-effective in India for emerging markets, these are equally beneficial to the US and European markets where the healthcare system is under pressure. What Tata has been doing with local acquisitions, acquiring strong brands, connecting with consumers and distribution channels in developed markets is another good example.

A lot of companies in emerging markets today are also moving up the value chain from just being, at times rather anonymous, a low-cost manufacturer of products. They are moving up in terms of adding value to their products, improving quality through innovation, working on the brand image and so on. Many Chinese brands which were rather unknown outside the country are establishing themselves in the West and emerging markets. For instance, Hisense, an anonymous Chinese electronics company to the rest of the world a few years ago, is reaching out to the global market with branded stores in cities like Milan, Paris, Los Angles and so on, building a direct connect of the brand with the consumer. This also means you can have higher margins because if you just subcontract, your margins are squeezed.

Companies need to have the broader part of the value chain — from innovation, design to distribution — instead of just having one piece. That will help them with a solid strategic position in the market. If you are doing just a part of the value chain, that part may well move from, say, India to Vietnam depending on market conditions, and you will suddenly lose business. So if you have a hold on the entire supply chain, it is more profitable today. Chinese companies are clearly seeing that as their growth slowed down before the crisis in 2005 and their profitability never reached the European standards. Many of them are today upscaling from design to distribution and building brands that are synonymous with quality and building direct links to consumers in the West.

How has the consulting business changed for you in this new business environment?
What clients are demanding these days is actually less consulting and more outcomes and results. Clients no longer want PowerPoint presentations or a set of advice on the things they should be doing; they want results and want us to commit to some of the results such as growth, reduction in costs and so on. They even want us to do things with them.

So the whole nature of consulting business is undergoing a change. And you are more involved in actual operations…
What I am describing will never be 100 per cent of what we do. But as a trend there are more and more expectations, and a part of our fees would be linked to actual outcomes. So often we run a part of the client’s business for a while and then we do capability transfers. So the next time when they launch a new product, they are better at doing it themselves. Many deals today are variable — we get a fixed component of the deal but we get a variable component only when the project goes right.

How are companies de-risking their businesses?
The structured official approach to risk used to be mostly something financial institutions have been dealing with — all the Basel II types of regulations saying that you need to have enough cash to be able to support a commitment. If you look at the role of a chief risk officer at a financial institution, it was clearly to look that companies are not taking too many loans or financial commitments when compared to the cash they actually had to their assets and so on. So you had prudential rules limiting the business that you can do based on the capital you have. You can argue that these didn’t work very well because everyone had some off-balance sheet commitments which created a big bubble. A lot of tricks were found to develop off-balance-sheet commitments which could not be monitored. So, all those rules were not enough.

So, the financial sector today is rethinking its regulation rules, trying to find a new generation of rules which would not prevent growth, but would be safer, and create less space for regulatory arbitration. The old notion of financial institutions playing a major role in managing risk is changing. Today, most companies are having a chief risk officer and they are working around operational, market, currency risks and so on. The function of chief risk officer getting more professionalised even in sectors where it was not formalised.
 
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General Electric 2.0

Bhupesh Bhandari / New Delhi April 26, 2010, 0:54 IST

GE India’s new president & CEO, John Flannery, plans to resurrect the company’s fortunes by localising operations

John FlanneryTill recently, General Electric (GE) honchos would often talk of a turnover of $8 billion in India by 2010. This was 16 per cent of the company’s projected emerging market business for the year. At that time, GE hoped to sell gas turbines, consumer loans, water treatment plants, medical equipment et al in large numbers; hence the ambitious target. GE had ended 2008 with $2.8 billion. So, will it hit $8 billion when the books are closed for the year? The day of reckoning is almost here.

GE India President & CEO John Flannery says the company no longer discloses numbers for one country alone. So it’s difficult to get him to comment if GE is on course to reach that size. But he does indicate that the target may have been ambitious. “There is no shortage of opportunities in India, and there is a good fit to become two or three times the size we are today. That puts us somewhere close to the number you are poking at,” says he. “Some of those things were aspirational, an attempt to get the organisation excited.”

In his letter to shareowners in the 2009 annual report, GE Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Jeffrey Immelt had said that GE had a $38-billion business in growth markets, which include resource- and people-rich regions like West Asia, Latin America, China and India. “We sought out pockets of growth wherever we could find them. We deepened our position in fast-growing markets in Australia, Brazil, China and India.”

That GE may have fallen short of its target for India does not mean that GE hasn’t tasted success in India. It ran a hugely successful business process outsourcing outfit, Gecis, till 2004 when it was sold to General Atlantic Partners and Oak Hill Capital Partners for almost $500 million. The John F Welch Technology Centre in Bangalore, which was inaugurated in September 2000, has helped GE cut drastically go-to-market time (up to 50 per cent in some cases), save huge amounts of money and develop products for world markets. No estimates of the benefits are publicly available. Bangalore is a cost centre for GE, into which it has so far invested $175 million. It has four partnerships going in India with state-owned Bharat Heavy Electricals Corporation, State Bank of India, Wipro and now Triveni Engineering. And it is very much in the reckoning for the Indian Air Force’s order for 126 fighter jets.

But there have been serious reverses too. GE Capital had taken a huge exposure to unsecured loans and delinquencies were high. It so much wanted to invest in a diesel locomotive factory in the country; but right before the general elections last year, the government scrapped the bids and decided to put up the factory on its own. The GE gas turbines at the Dabhol power plant of Ratnagiri Gas & Power broke down. Nuclear power is another huge opportunity (GE was one of the most vocal supporters of the Indo-US civilian nuclear deal), but nobody knows when it will start rolling. Then TPS Chopra, the successor of GE’s first CEO in India, Scott Bayman (he drove GE in India for ten long years), left last year. Chopra would often complain of the slow pace of affairs in India.

Clearly, things haven’t gone the way they were intended. How much has that deterred GE? “We are very proud of what we have accomplished so far in India. Are we satisfied with where we are? No, we have still higher aspirations,” says Flannery. “We are here for the long haul. We will make major investments. We are going to do what it takes to win in India. Some things have balanced favourably, some unfavourably. That’s not uncommon in a developing economy.”

The task ahead
Flannery brings with him considerable experience. A 1983 graduate of Fairfield University and an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, he has spent 22 years in GE. Before he moved to India, he was president & CEO of GE Capital for Asia Pacific. His brief, before he winged his way to India in January, from Immelt was three-fold: Grow GE’s presence in multiple dimensions, localise it and transform the organisation for the long haul. Flannery doesn’t like to call it Plan B — it is more like revised Plan A, says he. The macroeconomic opportunity in India still excites GE. The opportunities in GE’s core areas of infrastructure (power, railway, water treatment and so on), oil & gas and finance continue to remain huge. “These (growth) markets are investing trillions of dollars in infrastructure and favour a multi-business company that can bring solutions. This allows us to form a ‘company-to-country’ approach in countries where government and business work together to solve infrastructure needs,” Immelt had said in his letter to shareowners.

Flannery’s first step has been to change GE’s reporting structures in India. Ever since GE set up shop in India, all the business lines reported to their global business headquarters. As a result, they didn’t have a reporting relationship with the Indian CEO. What it meant was that GE’s business in India was not looked as a single profit & loss centre. Key decisions on products, distribution and investments were taken outside India. The results, as a consequence, were less than desired.

All management thinkers have stressed the need for multinational corporations to think local. Those who listened carefully to the Indian customer have gained immensely; those who didn’t have failed miserably. The success of LG and Samsung of Korea and Suzuki of Japan can largely be attributed to strong local product development, manufacturing and distribution. All of them empowered their local employees to take important decisions. GE now is a standalone profit & loss account in India. Business lines all report directly to Flannery. “I will be able to control the vast majority of decision-making,” says he. In fact, the buzz in the market place is that the Bangalore technology centre too may become a part of the integrated Indian operations soon.

This will help GE go to a customer with more than one product. Till recently, various GE teams often made separate sales pitches to the same customer. Flannery admits this can often become very frustrating for the customer. With integrated operations, GE will be able to present a unified face to the customer. “It also gives us more scale and critical mass, creates better jobs and career opportunities. The company with the best team on the field ends up number one or number two,” says Flannery. But he stresses that India will still stay very closely connected to GE’s international business: “The centre of gravity will be India, but we are not seceding from the company. We will get the best from GE. It has the history of evolving as the markets change. The hallmark of the company is constant evolution.”

Go local
That taken care of, Flannery wants to localise GE’s business. This means sending people out to the market to gather what products and services are required, designing and manufacturing those products in India, and finally distributing them in India. The first is on track, says he. For design, Flannery plans to leverage the skill sets of the Bangalore technology centre. So far, it has focused on GE’s global requirements. To save cost and time was the first brief to the centre. The business verticals for which this work is done are aviation (commercial aircraft engines), energy (oil and gas, power and water treatment), transportation (diesel locomotives and signal systems) and healthcare. In addition, there is a 400-strong team which carries out work on “Blue Sky” technologies — new substances, materials, nanotechnology and solutions.

The brief could now change. In addition to the work it is doing, it will work on products that could be relevant for India. “The brief is changing as we speak in an incremental and supplemental way. It will continue to be a key base for GE’s global operations; that won’t stop. But we will add resources to go local; some resources may be shifted,” says Flannery. “For the past 18 months, there has been in-country, for-country team at work for India-specific products and designs.” To be fair, some products developed at Bangalore have already found their way to the Indian market — the electrocardiogram that weighs just 1.1 kg and costs around Rs 35,000, the low-cost baby warmer which sells for around Rs 150,000, for instance.

The next part of the jigsaw puzzle is local manufacturing. Here, Flannery wants to make use of frugal Indian manufacturing skills. Immelt had outlined the strategy in his letter. “Our focus is on introducing more new products at more price points. We are driving management practices to capture new opportunities, called reverse innovation. Essentially, this takes a low-cost, emerging-market business model and translates it to the developed world,” he had said. “To this end, we have developed a full line of high-margin, low-cost healthcare devices, designed in China and India, and now marketed successfully in the developed world.”

GE already has two manufacturing joint ventures in India with BHEL and Wipro; it has now signed a third one with Triveni for steam turbines. GE, says Flannery, found Triveni efficient in turbines of up to 30 MW. Its own strength is above 100 MW. So, the two have come together for turbines of 30 MW to 100 MW. “If it works well, you’ll have a new player in 30 MW to 100 MW with the best in technology and cost-competitiveness. We could distribute these turbines globally in the long term. That’s where GE’s distribution capability, global footprint and customer relationships would come in,” says Flannery. GE, of course, is impressed with Triveni’s supply chain, production design and costs. It can deliver turbines at low price points. “Triveni can do reverse innovation. It, we observed, was consistently hitting price points lower than that of global manufacturers. We are not talking of a 5 or 10 per cent change in margins,” says Flannery. The prices could be 30 to 40 per cent below global prices, experts reckon. The reason for the tie-up is clear.

GE could do more such tie-ups with low-cost manufacturers in the days to come. “You will see more investments in supply chain and direct manufacturing capabilities. That can be green-field or partnerships or even acquisition of companies with a manufacturing footprint,” says Flannery. So far as a distribution network in the country is concerned, Flannery says he still needs to figure out how to go about it.

Ups and downs
A broad strategy is fine, but Flannery needs to look at individual businesses as well. In financial services, it was an open secret that GE Capital was stuck with huge delinquencies in its retail portfolio. There was also talk in the market that GE Capital was looking for a buyer for its portfolio. Flannery admits there was a problem of delinquencies with unsecured retail loans. To deal with that, GE Capital has shrunk its retail loan book. A part of its transportation finance portfolio was sold to Shriram Transport Finance Company in December last year. This, says Flannery, has brought down the delinquencies as well as the losses. “GE Capital became profitable in India for the first time in two years during the January to March 2010 quarter,” says he.

Going ahead, Flannery has decided to focus on institutional finance in areas that tie up with GE’s business. In other words, it could finance the purchase of turbines by power plants, water treatment equipment by factories and healthcare machines by hospitals. At the moment, this book is as small as that of retail finance. “We aren’t talking of big dollars at present,” says Flannery. On the positive side, he adds that the partnership with SBI, India’s largest lender, for credit cards is steady. “We would like to build on this relationship,” says he, but does not give details.

There have been some positive developments on the railway business as well. Strained for resources, the Indian government has come round the view that it won’t be such a good idea to put up the locomotive factory on its own. So, it has restarted the process to find a private investor. And this time the stakes are bigger: Not just diesel locomotive, it also wants an electric locomotive plant and another one to make spares for the two factories. “We will take another crack at it. We will definitely restart our interest in the diesel locomotive factory and assess the other two; they look interesting as well,” says Flannery. In the last round, GE had developed a prototype for the diesel locomotive in its Bangalore centre. So, it has a product ready to offer. Flannery says it is not certain if GE will return with the same prototype.

Power play
Power will be a tougher nut to crack. One, GE’s strength is gas turbines, renewable energy (wind and so on) and nuclear power — the gap in its portfolio is coal, which is 50 to 60 per cent of the market. “We will continue to look at ways to play in that,” says Flannery. But he is convinced that the dependence on coal to generate power will decline over time. “Coal tends to be more commodity- and less technology-driven. We are trying to stay up on the technology curve. Coal tends to be a very basic technological and engineering undertaking. For environmental reasons, higher growth will be in other sectors of the energy space.”

Two, there have been aggressive sales from China. So much so, local manufacturers of power equipment are lobbying hard with the government for protection in some form. Flannery feels GE still has an advantage over others. “It’s very important to look at the life-cycle cost of this equation. We have a very strong story there around technology and service offering. These are very long-lived assets.”

Three, Dabhol was bad publicity for GE’s turbines. Flannery says GE engineers have fixed the problem and all turbines at the power plant in Maharashtra are on stream. A service contract has been written for GE. And, adds he, Dabhol no longer crops up when GE executives make a sales pitch to power companies. Four, the fate of nuclear power in India, which can be a huge opportunity for GE, still hangs in balance. Consensus is yet to emerge on the liabilities that could arise from a Chernobyl-like accident. Still, Flannery is convinced of the opportunity for GE in power; what also excites him about the business is that every order for turbines comes with regular revenues from maintenance contracts.

Jack Welch, GE’s best-known CEO and Immelt’s predecessor, had laid down the principle that the company ought to be amongst the top three players in every line of business in a market; it should exit any business where it is a laggard. It may not be the right time to put India through that test. Flannery, on his part, says if he can grow the company, localise it and change its structure, his job will be done. “If I can do these three things, my bosses, I think, will be happy.”
 
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Govt may revive hydel project on Bhagirathi

Kalpana Jain / New Delhi May 01, 2010, 1:58 IST

The government is taking a fresh look at the 600 Mw Loharinag-Pala hydel project on the Bhagirathi river following an expert committee report cautioning against stopping work at an advanced stage, as it might be disastrous for an active seismic zone. Work on it was suspended last year.

A three-member committee comprising the Union power secretary, the environment secretary and the chairman of the Central Water Commission told the government after visiting the area, the tunnels that had been dug through the mountains for this project could potentially devastate the region if there was any seismic activity. The region falls under the most severe seismic zone.

Chairman of the Central Water Commission A K Bajaj said the team made its assessment after talking to the local people and consulting technical experts.

Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh has set up another committee to look into the possible fallouts of the decision to stop work on the project as also to find ways to safeguard the tunnels.

Experts have been calling for a 200 km stretch free of hydel projects on the Ganges, following reports of receding Himalayan glaciers. They have demanded that all new projects on the Bhagirathi be decommissioned and new ones banned between Gaumukh and Haridwar in Uttarakhand. Three independent experts of the National Ganga River Basin Authority (NGBRA) have urged the government to clean the river of hydel projects. They also disagree with reports that the tunnels could lead to devastation in the region.

Ravi Chopra, member of NGBRA, said: “I do not think abandoning tunnels will create major problems. All dams have to be abandoned some day. Tunnels can be lined with steel or cement. In China, abandoned tunnels are used to store military stocks. Not far away is Harsil, a major military encampment. These tunnels can provide space for their stocks. To my mind, length of tunnels is not very long. Most of them are entrances to tunnels.”

A ministerial group led by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee has already decided not to go ahead with two projects at Bhairon Ghati and Pala Maneri in the area.

Gaumukh is on the edge of Gangotri glacier — from where Ganga originates — and is the source of Bhagirathi. A report submitted to the environment ministry has said that Tehri dam has already destroyed the free flowing character of the Bhagirathi. The dam, said to be the world’s fifth tallest, is killing the river, it said.

Public-sector NTPC Ltd last year announced that work on its 600 Mw Loharinag-Pala barrage project on the Bhagirathi had been suspended in the wake of protests by environmentalist and former professor at the Indian Institute of Technology G D Agarwal. Work on the project had commenced in 2005 at an investment of Rs 2,200 crore.
 
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Made in India, Nokia production crosses 350 mn handsets in four years

CHENNAI: Nokia’s manufacturing facility at Sriperumbudur near Chennai has crossed production volumes of 350 million handsets. This milestone was achieved in April 2010, over four years of operation of the facility. The facility also added another milestone to its local operations by starting exports to North America and Europe, taking its total export markets from India to 70, Nokia said in a statement on Friday.

The facility has achieved the fastest ramp-up across all Nokia’s manufacturing plants globally. The current production is supplied to both the domestic market as well as exported to countries in the Middle East and Africa, Asia, Australia and New Zealand, besides North America and Europe.

"Achieving production volumes of 350 million and exporting to some of the world’s biggest mature markets in a short span of time is testimony of the world-class manufacturing operation that Nokia runs in India and reflects our commitment to establish India as a global telecom manufacturing hub. We are also working closely with authorities to provide necessary impetus to the local electronic component manufacturing ecosystem to ensure more and more localisation in finished products – telecom and beyond," said Mr. Sachin Saxena, Operations Director, Nokia India.

Besides providing a huge employment opportunity, Nokia has also established its foundation and endeavoured to empower its employees and the region with better livelihood and socio-economic conditions. Committed to the well-being of its employees, the facility today boasts of a dedicated healthcare centre and a crèche for its people. Nokia is also actively involved in various community programs in the region such as Factory Fence Line School Improvement, Village Upliftment Programme, Nokia Helping Hands, among others.

The Nokia Telecom Park, India’s first, also houses five global component manufacturers that include Salcomp, Foxconn, Perlos, Laird and Wintek. Nokia has emerged the engine of the investment train in Chennai’s manufacturing corridor.

The Finland major had set up the world’s largest electronic hardware manufacturing unit on 210.87 acres allotted at Telecom SEZ park promoted by State owned Sipcot. The State Government has also extended a structured package of assistance to the MNC.

Under the MoU signed in 2006, Nokia had committed to invest $ 150 Million over four years. However, encouraged by the buoyant demand for mobility in India, total investment touched $ 285 Million in less than three years of its operations. Nokia started its operations with 550 employees in January 2006 and scaled it to the current 8000, 70% are women.
 
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I am a little surprised of people not being aware about this project. These are two projects:

1 delhi-mumbai industrial corridor (dmic) and
2 ludhiana-kolkatta industrial corridor (lkic).

To begin with the freight corridor will be set up in partnership with the Indian Railways along the delhi-mumbai stretch, along will come the industrial infrastructure at various locations in the forms of industrial zones/towns/cities and the total investment is expected to the tune of rs3,60,000crores.

At the moment a dmic project fund has been created to the tune of 150m usd, with 75m usd committed by both the countries. The financial partners are going to be Japan-World Bank-GoI/private playes.

Japanese industries will be given exclusive rights on construction though they can sub lease to revenues and profits, which will also build typical traditional Japanese style localities.

There is a complete presentation on what to expect from DMIC:-

Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor

Once this corridor is taken up along will come the ludhiana-kolkatta corridor on exact the same lines which at the moment has been kept in the cold storage but India is quite keen that japan gets involved in this project as well, and the investment in this corridor is expected to the tune of 60b usd, total investment going up to 150b usd. The present status is that the Indian Railways is going alone on this section of freight corridor.

The attempt of these two corridors (dmic, lkic) along with the SEZs is to bring about an industrial revolution in India, an attempt which saw a slow down because of the global economic meltdown but signs are appearing that now industrial houses have started reviving the SEZs.
 
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May i please know the source of this news? and if possible some more details about the project like what really is going to be built with this 72 billion dollars?

I don't find this project to be realistic - seems the figures are not correct in my opinion

I think u have not heard about it.

Delhi Mumbai Industrial Corridor project of USD 90 billion

DMIC :: Delhi Mumbai Industrial Corridor, An Indo-Japan Mega Infrastructure Project

Delhi Mumbai Industrial Corridor Project - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 
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The Delhi Mumbai Industrial Corridor Project is a State-Sponsored Industrial Development Project of the Government of India. It is an ambitious project aimed at developing an Industrial Zone spanning across six states in India.

The project will see major expansion of Infrastructure and Industry – including industrial clusters and rail, road, port, air connectivity – in the states along the route of the Corridor.

Conceived as a Global Manufacturing and Trading Hub, the project is expected to double employment potential, triple industrial output and quadruple exports from the region in 5 years. The total employment to be generated from the project is 3 million the bulk of which will be in the manufacturing/processing sectors.

The ambitious project will be funded through private-public partnership and foreign investment. Japan will be a major investor for this project. The corridor will span 1483 km.

Japan was roped in as partner for this project during Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit in December 2006. The project will cover the seven states of Delhi, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra.

It will include a 4000 MW Power Plant,

Three sea Ports

Six Airports in addition to connectivity with the existing ports.


The industrial corridor project will be implemented by the Delhi Mumbai Industrial Corridor Development Corporation, an autonomous body comprising of Government and Private Sector.

It will be implemented through special purpose vehicles [SPVs]. The project is expected to deliver a 2-3-4-5 benefit, to double employment (2), triple industrial output (3) and quadruple exports (4) from the region in five years (5).

Delhi Mumbai Industrial Corridor Project - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 
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Hitachi, Toshiba, Mitsubishi and JGC ready to invest in DMIC

P B Jayakumar / Mumbai March 28, 2010, 0:14 IST

Leading Japanese corporations such as Toshiba Corporation, Hitachi, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and JGC Corporation are planning big investments in the proposed Rs 3.6-lakh crore Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor (DMIC) project.

These companies are planning projects in solar power, power transmission, infrastructure development, water supply and sewerage treatment, according to reports appearing in Japanese newspapers that quoted Masayuki Naoshima, the Japanese minister for economy, trade and industry.

However, he did not specify the nature of the projects and the investment by each of these companies. The companies are scheduled to begin feasibility studies in April and will launch full-fledged construction work as early as 2011-12, according to the reports.

Besides, the city of Kitakyushu will provide its knowhow on environmental technologies, while Yokohama is expected to help develop and manage water supply and sewerage systems for DMIC, said the minister.

Business Standard could not independently verify the development with the companies. DMIC Development Corporation Chief Executive Amitabh Kant was not available for comments.

According to sources, the $76-billion Toshiba Corporation is targeting $1 billion in revenues from India by 2015, with a range of new products from computers to televisions and washing machines. Hitachi also has extensive presence in India, with a dozen odd trading and manufacturing companies. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, one of the largest heavy engineering players in the world, had last year started a Rs 880-crore steam turbine and generator venture in India with Larsen & Toubro. Toshiba and JSW Energy also have a joint venture in Chennai to make steam turbines and generators, which will take off by 2011.

JGC Corporation, formerly Japan Gasoline, is one of the leading petrochemical companies in Japan and is yet to make major investments in the country, said the sources.

Hitachi, Toshiba, Mitsubishi and JGC ready to invest in DMIC
 
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DMIC to pave way for 11 projects in Noida-Greater Noida

UP govt and Delhi-Mumbai industrial corridor development corporation have signed an MoU which has paved way for 11 new projects.

1. Greater Noida airport (at Jewar) - It will cost Rs. 5000 crore
2. Dadri (Greater Noida) - Tughlaqabad (Delhi) - Ballabhgarh (Faridabad) rail link
3. Noida-Greater Noida-Faridabad expressway - Traffic from Noida to Faridabad will not have to pass through Delhi after this
4. Rail link for Greater Noida airport (Jewar)
5. Noida city centre to be developed at world class level
6. Auto mart in Noida - For national and international auto expo
7. Power plant near Greater Noida
8. Noida-Greater Noida-Jewar metro line - Noida-Greater Noida in 1st phase and rest in 2nd phase
9. Noida multilevel parking - For parking thousands of cars
10. Logistics hub in Greater Noida
11. Bokari railway junction to be developed at world class railway station
 
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Haryana marks four projects for DMIC

The Haryana government has decided to put its “early bird” projects within the Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor (DMIC) sub-region of Haryana in the fast track mode for speedier implementation.

Disclosing this, HSIIDC Managing Director Rajeev Arora said the state government had identified four early bird projects to be implemented as a pilot initiative within the DMIC region, including a mass rapid transportation system on the Gurgaon-Manesar-Bawal route, exhibition-cum-convention centre, integrated multimodal logistics hub and a new passenger rail link.

He said that Delhi Mumbai Industrial Corridor Development Corporation Limited (DMICDC), the SPV floated by the Government of India for implementing the DMIC projects, had appointed the consultant for undertaking a study on the Master Plan for the Manesar Bawal Investment Region (MBIR) and undertaking pre-feasibility studies for two early bird projects that are exhibition-cum-convention centre and the integrated multimodal logistics hub.

Arora pointed out that in the report submitted by DMIC consultants for the exhibition-cum-convention centre, space requirement of about 15 million square meters had been estimated by the year 2025 within the MBIR. The consultants had also shortlisted location in Gurgaon after studying about eight prospective sites. Based on the study, the project was to be developed over an area of about 300 acres providing exhibition space of about 1,20,000 square meters besides convention facilities for about 4,000 persons. The land at the site identified for the project was already under acquisition by HSIIDC, he added.

He added the logistics hub project was being developed in collaboration with Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation of India Limited (DFCCIL) for which an MoU had been signed between the two parties.

The consultants in their report had estimated container traffic of about 1.62 million TEUs by the year 2018, he said. The site for the project has been finalised in Rewari district and the consultants have been advised to submit a final feasibility report.

For the third project, study for identifying the right of way alignment has already been completed by the consultants and being finalised in consultation with the state government of Haryana.

Haryana marks four projects for DMIC
 
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Work on DFC going on in full swing

Work on dedicated freight corridor (DFC) on both eastern and western regions has been going on in full swing. The railways intends to complete this project at an estimated cost of about Rs 50,000 crore latest by 2016-2017 to give an impetus to freight and goods loading.

The corridor of the eastern region linking Dankuni in West Bengal to Ludhiana in Punjab is likely to prove a boon for the railways and business community. It will pass through Asansol, Gomoh, Sonnagar, Mughalsarai, Kanpur, Khurja and Saharanpur.

The civil work of the eastern corridor, which was inaugurated by Congress president and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi at Dehri-on-Sone on February 10, 2009, will give a boost to railway economy. This ambitious project covering a stretch of about 1,806 km will be completed in a record time at an estimated cost of Rs 23,500 crore while the western corridor is likely to cost about Rs 26,124 crore.

According to a Railway Board official, goods traffic has been the mainstay of the Indian Railways yielding about 80 per cent revenue from freight traffic only. The railways has registered a substantial increase in the goods loading segment, he said, adding the construction of the DFC would attract more market for the railways to carry goods from one place to another across the country.

The proposed eastern corridor will be a rare gift to the business community belonging to West Bengal, Jharkhand, Bihar and Punjab as their goods would be carried to their destination on priority basis. Moreover, the goods trains will run at 100 kmph on this corridor, a Board official said.

According to the official, iron, coal, cement and other minerals are being sent from Jharkhand, Bihar and West Bengal to other parts of the country. Similarly, these states are the major recipients of other products from Punjab and Haryana to cater to the needs of business community.

According to sources, the railways has already suffered a huge loss due to sudden freight rate discount on various items meant for export. The container traffic has registered about 40 per cent decline during the past few months.

According to a Board official, the railways has set up a Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation of India Ltd (DFCCIL) to expedite early completion of the project for which international agencies, including Japan Bank, World Bank and Asian Development Bank, have been providing funds.
 
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Dedicated Freight Corridor Project on track

November 24th, 2009
The Western and Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor (DFC) Projects of Ministry of Railways are approved and being implemented by Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation of India Ltd (DFCCIL), a wholly owned Public Sector Undertaking of Ministry of Railways.

Final Location Survey has been completed on Western DFC and Ludhiana-Sonnagar section of Eastern DFC. Process of land acquisition has been started for about 2400 kilometers.

Construction contracts for 105 kilometers of Eastern DFC and 54 major and important bridges of Western DFC have been awarded. Funding has been sought from World Bank and Asian Development Bank for Eastern DFC and Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) for Western DFC. Eleven field units headed by Chief Project Managers have been set up for project implementation and two initial construction contracts for Railway funded portions i.e. 105 km on Sonnagar-Mughalsarai section and 54 major and important bridges on Surat-Virar section have been awarded. External funding has been sought from bilateral/multilateral agencies.

In respect of funding sought from Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) under the Special Terms of Economic Partnership (STEP) scheme of Government of Japan for the Western Corridor, loan discussions have taken place coordinated by Department of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance. An engineering Services loan agreement has been signed in October 27, 2009.
Dedicated Freight Corridors (DFC) on Eastern and Western trunk routes have been approved.

The Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor starts from Dankuni in West Bengal and terminate near Ludhiana in Punjab and will pass through West Bengal, Jharkhand, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Punjab.
The Western DFC will start from Dadri/Tughlakabad and terminate at Jawaharlal Nehru Port in Mumbai and will pass through Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, Haryana, Rajasthan, Gujarat and Maharashtra.

Dedicated Freight Corridor Project on track | Projects | Construction News | ConstructionWeekOnline.in
 
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