Assorted articles and Information

Russia is looking for foreign investors for a nuclear power plant in the nation’s westernmost Baltic Sea region of Kaliningrad, a top nuclear official said on 16th April. Sergei Kiriyenko, head of the nuclear power agency Rosatom said. “We are ready to offer foreign partners, primarily European ones, up to 49 percent in the Kaliningrad nuclear power plant”. Kiriyenko said foreign companies will have the opportunity to supply equipment for the plant in the Baltic Sea port city. He said the new generator would be an updated version of the Belene facility now under construction in Bulgaria. Atomstroyexport, which is building the Bulgarian plant, will be the main contractor of the latest project, with other partners to be chosen soon. Whoever offers the best price will be chosen to supply equipment, Kiriyenko added.

Sergei Kiriyenko says construction of the plant is the only way to ensure the “energy security” of the region sandwiched between Poland and Lithuania. The exclave currently receives about 30 percent of its energy supplies from a Soviet-era built nuclear plant in Lithuania that is set for closure next year. Russia has 31 reactors at 10 nuclear power plants, accounting for 16-17 percent of the country’s electricity generation. President Vladimir Putin has called for increasing the proportion of nuclear-generated power to at least 25 percent by 2030.

Parsvnath Developers ties up with two Saffron Group managed funds, Yatra Capital and Saffron India Real Estate Fund I, for developing the BEST bus depot near Bandra Kurla Complex in Mumbai. The 30, 820 square metres of land area in Kurla, Mumbai is situated on L.B.S. Road on East side and S. G. Barve Marg on North side at Kurla (West). The land from BEST was awarded for planning, designing, constructing and re-modeling a fully equipped bus depot, staff housing and constructing buildings for commercial utilization.

Development activities will be undertaken through a special purpose vehicle under the name of Jarul Promoters & Developers Private Limited being a subsidiary of Parsvnath Developers Ltd. PDL and Jarul have entered into agreements with Yatra Capital Limited and SIREF I whereby investors will each hold a 15% equity stake in Jarul, on a fully diluted basis. For the purpose of acquiring this stake, they will make an investment of Rs186 crore, valuing the project at Rs620 crore.

Pradeep Jain, chairman, Parsvnath Developers said, “This is a significant achievement for us as investors are showing interest and confidence in our group. We are expanding at a good pace and these developments would further help in our commitment to work towards better results for our investors”. Meanwhile, the real estate company has announced the launch of Parsvnath Premium, a group housing project in association with Mass House Building Cooperative Limited at Sidhra, Jammu.

The development activities will be undertaken through a special purpose vehicle (SPV) under the name of Jarul Promoters and Developers Private Limited, a subsidiary of Parsvnath Developers Ltd. Last year in August, Parsvnath Developers Ltd also bagged a redevelopment project for Mahim Bus Terminus, Mumbai from BEST for commercial and residential utilisation along with remodelling of the existing bus station.

Way2SMS, a leading messaging solutions portal, is offering a unique service to people to send SMS free of cost to their near and dear ones across the nation.Every message the portal sends is appended by an advertisement from its clients. The Hyderabad-based company has come out with this unique mobile advertising platform to bring together the users and the advertisers.

Way2SMS CEO V.V. Raju, in a conferance said that the portal launched 15 months ago was sending 15 million messages per month and this number is expected to reach 40 million this year. He said with 264 million mobile subscribers by May, India was set to overtake the United States to occupy the second position after China, which has 534 million mobiles. The country is expected to have 450 million mobile subscribers by 2010, which means that every third Indian will have a mobile phone. This growth also gives a great potential for SMS, which is expected to grow from 59 billion messages in 2006 to 180 billion in 2010. And the company invested over Rs.40 million and hopes to reach break-even point this year, Raju said.

Komal Gupta, Business Head, Way2SMS, said the portal has more than a million registered users and its clients include Citi Bank, ICICI, Karvey Group, Murugappa Group, Bharat Matrimony and Tata AIG. Users have to log onto Way2SMS to send SMS to any mobile phone anywhere in the country. It is not mandatory to register with the portal to receive the messages. A registered user can send a maximum of 100 SMS free per day through the portal.

City-based Electrotherm (India) Ltd, an engineering company engaged in steel and two-wheeler businesses, announced on 17th April,  that it would issue 1.3 million shares to German financial institution DEG on a preferential basis. Electrotherm shareholders approved the proposal at an extra-ordinary general meeting, the company said in a filing with the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE). In 2006-07, the net sales income of the company was Rs.7.3 billion.

The preferential issue will be made at a price not less than Rs.600 per share. At the maximum price, this could fetch the company around Rs.800 million ($20 million). However, the shares prices including premium are yet to be decided. The meeting, which was held March 28, also authorised the board to Qualified Institutional Buyers (QIBs) allotment of shares for an aggregate sum not exceeding Rs.3 billion. The company has also made a preferential issue of shares to ICICI Venture Fund and International Finance Corp (IFC) in the past.

Electrotherm has three divisions - engineering, steel and electrical. The engineering division manufactures induction, melting and refinancing furnaces, heating and hardening equipments used in steel and foundry industry. The steel division manufacturers TMT bars/construction and stainless steel, besides structural steel and DI pipes, while the electric vehicle division makes electric scooters.

Religare Finvest Ltd (RFL), a non-banking finance company, has signed a strategic agreement with the Pune-based three-wheeler manufacturer Kumar Motors Private Ltd for financing commercial vehicles. According to the agreement, RFL, a 100 percent subsidiary of Religare Enterprises Ltd, would finance the vehicles made by Kumar Motors.

Sachindra Nath, chief operating officer of Religare Enterprises said ,”The first year target is around 10,000 three wheelers. We may go for funding second hand truck purchases”. According to Nath, three wheeler transportation accounts for over 70 percent of all cargo movement within the country offering good business opportunity for any organised player.

Currently, the City-based Shriram Group is the pioneer in financing second hand trucks and is one of the leading truck financiers in the country. RFL’s loan book size is around Rs.20 billion ($502 billion) consisting of loans against shares, personal loans and Initial Public Offering (IPO) loans.