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The ongoing crisis in global financial scenario notwithstanding, the value of merger and acquisition deals announced across the world has crossed one trillion dollar mark since the beginning of this year. However, India’s share in this global tally is just about one per cent, or about 10 billion dollar. This is less than half of about 2.5 per cent share in the comparable period of 2007. While the value of year-to-date global deals has declined by 27 per cent from the comparable period of 2007, that for deals involving India Inc has dropped by 71.5 per cent.

According to data compiled by deals tracking advisory firm Dealogic, the global M&A volumes announced so far in 2008 has just crossed $1,000 billion against $1.4 trillion in the corresponding period last year. However, the number of announced deals at 11,286 this year is the record high year-to-date figure, Dealogic said. The number of deals involving Indian companies this year stood at 125 at the end of March, with a total value of $9.64 billion dollar, according to global consultancy firm Grant Thornton. This compares with 148 deals with a total value of $33.85 billion dollar in first three months of 2007.

India’s 2008 tally includes a significant contribution from Tata Motors’ $2.3 billion dollar acquisition of luxury car brands Jaguar and Land Rover from the US auto major Ford. According to industry experts, the crisis in financial markets is acting as a dampener for M&A deals. Although, the valuations of the companies have gone down, the banks are cutting down their exposure to funding the deals.

Public sector lender State Bank of India will tie up with a domestic firm to roll out its mobile banking services within a month, a senior bank official said.  He added that the technology platform is ready for the launch of the mobile banking service. and they have finalised a domestic firm as their partner to roll out the product. SBI has finalised a technology partner to take the services to its nearly one crore customers pan-India, he said.

The bank will join a handful of banking majors, including Standard Chartered Bank, Barclays, Union Bank and Yes Bank, who are already active in this space. Initially, the bank plans to offer basic banking services to its customers. These would include money transfer, account status enquiry and cheque book order, while other services such as bill payments and buying movie and travel tickets would be introduced later, he said. “Transaction costs of our customers will come down. Besides, it will also enable them to perform their transactions faster,” the official said.

SBI’s entry into mobile banking is also expected to give a fillip to the government’s ongoing efforts to achieve financial inclusion, given the large customer base of the bank and its extensive reach in rural areas. State Bank, the country’s largest lender, presently, has over 10,000 branches across the country. It opened 954 branches last fiscal (FY 08) and plans to add an additional 2,000 branches this fiscal, which when completed, would take its branch network in the country to around 12,000, the official said.

India and Sri Lanka are working on a plan to lay a transmission line under the sea to connect the power distribution networks of the two countries so that electricity can be supplied by one when the other is running short. An initial report prepared by the Indian state-owned transmission utility PowerGrid has pegged the cost of the project at Rs 2,292 crore and said it could be completed within 42 months of getting investment approvals.

The report projects laying a power cable under the Gulf of Mannar between Rameswaram in Tamil Nadu and Talaimannar on the left flank of the Mannar islands in Sri Lanka. On the Indian side, the undersea cable will be connected to the southern grid at Madurai through an overhead transmission line. On the Sri Lanka side, the underwater cable will be linked to that country’s network at Anuradhapura through an overhead line. The undersea link will be laid on the sea bed just as telecom and internet cables run across ocean beds around the world. It will have safeguards on both sides against electrocution in case of damage from ship anchors or sharks. An optic-fibre cable will also run alongside the main power cable to keep an eye on the link and also provide extra telecom capacity between the two countries.

The report prepared by PowerGrid says the power supply scenario between India and Sri Lanka will allow them to exchange about 500MW of electricity in the short term, or by 2009-10. Once the two sides settle down with this quantity, the flow of power can be ramped up to 1,000MW, roughly one-third of Delhi’s present consumption, in the medium-to-long term of 2011-12 through 2015-16. These are the time frames when the generation capacities in both countries are projected to improve, with surplus in the Indian southern grid.

At present, India is facing a 16% electricity shortage, with a peak demand of 1,07,000MW. The government plans to add 78,500MW capacity by 2012, with more envisaged in the captive and merchant segments by private investors. Though it has plans to add 3,080MW capacity by 2016, it faces a tough situation. Almost half of the total hydel potential of 2,000MW has been tapped and new projects will be difficult to implement due to social and environmental problems. The existing hydel projects run low during poor monsoon and in the dry season. It is clear that the planned interconnect between the two countries will provide hydel support to Sri Lanka, while India can seek thermal support from its neighbour in winters. The link will help Sri Lanka reduce use of expensive fuels and import cheaper power.

India have invited investment from Saudi Arabia, particularly in infrastructure and power generation sectors, to raise the longstanding economic cooperation to greater levels. “India and Saudi Arabia have a long tradition of economic cooperation which is being enhanced today with the pursuit of ties in areas such as energy, information technology and telecommunication,” External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee said at an Indian community reception on 19th April.

Indo-Saudi joint ventures are increasing as businesses continue to identify new areas for partnership, he said, specifying IT sector in which companies like Infosys, Wipro and Tata Consultancy are already flourishing in this country. He said that many Indian entrepreneurs have shown interest in setting up joint venture operations in Saudi Arabia in sectors like construction, pharmaceuticals and industrial processing. Similarly, India too is looking towards Saudi Arabia for investment in our infrastructure, power generation and other mega projects,” said the External Affairs Minister added.

Earlier, he noted that India would need investment to the tune of 600 million dollars over the next five years in these critical areas to sustain its high economic growth. Referring to India’s energy security, he described Saudi Arabia as an important component in this aspect as 26 per cent of its fossil fuel requirement is sourced from this hydrocarbon-rich country.

The world’s largest steel-maker ArcelorMittal would spend about Rs 2,400 crore towards Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) programmes, including resettlement and rehabilitation in India where it was setting up two giant greenfield projects. ArcelorMittal Vice-President (CSR), Remi Boyer said, “We will spend USD 600 million towards the CSR programmes in Orissa and Jharkhand where the company is setting up two mega steel plants of 12 MTPA capacity each”.

Boyer, who visited the proposed plant sites in Orissa’s Keonjhar district and also in Jharkhand in the last three days to review the CSR work, said the expenditure on these activities in each project would be of the order of USD 300 million. Besides rehabilitation colonies for people facing displacement due to the projects, the company would disburse compensation to affected families and build basic infrastructure for them using the CSR funds, he said.

Infrastructures like roads, electricity, water, sewage disposal system and sanitation would be provided and project affected people would be resettled. Two medical units were also functioning in the proposed site for the Rs 40,000 crore project in Keonjhar. A comprehensive socio-economic study has been conducted at Keonjhar where about 2400 families in 14 villages were expected to face displacement for setting up the mega steel plant, Boyer added.