Category: Excerpts

But for the company itself, the most perilous years were those that followed the first world war. These years form the most interesting part of Keenan’s memoir, especially in light of Tata Steel’s current predicament. If the current glut of cheap Chinese steel has Tata haemorrhaging losses of £1m a day, in 1922, the company was brought to the brink of ruin by the flood of “cheap Continental steel smelted out of scrap from the French and Flemish battlefields”. At one point it seemed that they were not going to weather “the boatloads of Belgian steel raffled off and dumped in Calcutta and Bombay for next to nothing”. The situation became so bleak that someone suggested the colonial government be asked to take over. But the son of J. N. Tata—he had died in 1904—“pounded angrily on the table and shouted that day would never come as long as he lived”. 

Fortunately, there was a plan beyond the theatrics. The company approached the government with figures to prove that it was impossible to survive against tariff-free continental steel. The government acted decisively and set up a Tariff Board to create a protective Act. It saved the day. Soon the company was back to paying shareholders a handsome dividend. All this, acknowledges Keenan, “largely because of the staying hand of a much-maligned Government.”-from Economist

BSE Ltd, Asia’s oldest stock exchange, is looking to launch its initial public offering (IPO) before the end of this calendar year to raise up to Rs.800 crore, according to two people aware of the development.

The exchange and the intermediaries it has hired are working on regulatory aspects of the IPO, and the draft share-sale prospectus is expected to be filed before the end of the April-June quarter, said one of the two persons, both of whom requested anonymity.

The size of the IPO is likely to be Rs.700-800 crore, said the second person.

BSE is looking at September or October to launch the public offer, said the first person.

“The exchange business is a very well-regulated space and therefore BSE has most of the regulation-related things in place, which will make work quicker,” he added.

Work on the IPO has been under way since January, when the BSE invited three or four merchant banks to initiate work on the share sale.

“BSE hopes to complete the formalities within 9 to 12 months. BSE has already appointed merchant bankers and lawyers for the purpose of preparing of documents including DRHP (draft red herring prospectus). Initial meetings have already been conducted amongst different participants for document preparation,” said a BSE spokesperson in response to an email from Mint seeking comment.

We had decided in January to allow stock exchanges to list. We have granted an in-principle approval to BSE to list,” said Sebi chairman U.K. Sinha.

The exchange is looking at a valuation of close to Rs.6,000 crore for the public share sale, said the second person quoted.

BSE counts foreign stock exchanges such as Deutsche Boerse AG and Singapore Exchange Ltd among its shareholders. Other investors include Life Insurance Corporation of India, State Bank of India and Bajaj Holdings and Investment Ltd. Foreign investors such as US billionaire George Soros’s hedge fund Quantum’s Mauritius investment arm Quantum (M) Ltd, Canada-based investor Thomas Caldwell’s Caldwell India Holdings Inc. and US fund Argonaut Private Equity are also investors in the exchange.-from Mint

Larsen & Toubro Infotech Limited (“L&T Infotech”), one of India’s global Information Technology (“IT”) services & solutions companies and a subsidiary of Larsen & Toubro Limited (“L&T”), today announced its entry in the ‘PEAK Matrix Service Provider of the Year™: ITS Top 20’ by the Everest Group.

In 2015, Everest Group published 26 PEAK Matrix^TM IT services evaluations featuring 59 service providers across various parameters related to scale and scope of operations, technology, domain investments, delivery footprint, innovation, buyer satisfaction and resultant market success in the context of a given outsourcing function. Of these service providers, the Top 20 were shortlisted using a consolidated score reflecting points received on individual evaluations based on tiered scores for Star Performer, Leader, Major Contender, and Aspirant positions.

Further, the assessments also offer insights into the strategies pursued by service providers for key business lines, geographies and technologies.

“The global services industry is witnessing significant disruption due to rapid evolution in technology and sourcing models. The PEAK Matrix IT Service Provider of the Year™ ranking for L&T Infotech is indicative of a service provider’s broad-based capabilities and services strategies to help enterprises successfully navigate the disruption in global services,” said Jimit Arora, Partner, Everest Group.

Speaking on the achievement, Mr. Sanjay Jalona, Chief Executive Officer & Managing Director, L&T Infotech, said, “This recognition reflects our top-class talent, which has further enhanced our deep domain knowledge and emerging technology strength for all our customers. It is this breadth and depth of capabilities that enables us to solve complex business challenges at the convergence of the digital and physical world. We aim to further strengthen these capabilities for our clients.”-from BusinessWire

(Anybody interested in buying/selling shares of L&T Infotech,kindly email me at Alpha Ideas)

HDFC Bank “has got no love and respect for India” as it put the country’s reputation at stake by not activating a debit card of a couple “trapped in a foreign country”, the apex consumer court has said.

The National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (NCDRC) made the observations while asking the bank to pay a compensation of Rs 5 lakh to the Indian couple, who were stuck in Thailand and Singapore as the bank did not activate their debit card for 10 days in 2008.

“The bank has got no love and respect for India. The reputation of India was at stake. Knowing fully well that Indians were trapped in a foreign country, it was the bounden duty of the manager to swing into action immediately. He committed an egregious mistake for taking no action for 10 days. It exposes the sloth and callousness on the part of the manager. This shows negligence, inaction and passivity on the part of the bank.”

“Foreigners always complain that due to procedural delays, they do not want to have business relations with this country. The lackadaisical approach by the bank is surprising. The bank manager did not make any effort to straighten out the problem,” the Bench headed by Justice J M Malik said.-from BS