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India - News
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News Snippets - April
2001 India says Yes Minister- BBC Indian pharma firm listed on NYSE France woos Indian Techs - Reuters Bill Clinton in India - New York Times Indian company to buy Hollywood firm - LA Times India test fires missle - BBC India bids tearful farewell to Dewang Mehta - Reuters and BBC
Bombay - The first episode of Ji Mantriji - the Hindi adaptation of BBC classic 80s political comedy Yes Minister - has received a good response from primetime TV viewers as well as critics. The show faithfully follows all the 38 episodes of the original, which starred Nigel Hawthorne and Paul Eddington. The actors, of course, are Indians with Surya Prakash Singh (Farooque Sheikh), a TV and Bollywood veteran with a flair for comedy, playing the minister's role (Jim Hacker) and well known stage ariste, Jayant Kriplani, donning the bureaucrat's garb. Like the original, Ji Mantriji is a satirical look at India's colourful political canvas and bizarre political characters. Subhash Jha, TV critic for The Statesman newspaper, gave the show a favourable write-up. "I think both the main actors have been extremely well cast," he said. "The serial is a refreshing change to the family soaps and mythological serials which abound on Indian TV. Ji Mantriji is a clean comedy which allows us to laugh at the expense of our politicians." And one of India's best known TV critics, Amita Malick, also found the first episode enjoyable, despite the canned laughter. "It's sure to catch on with the audience," she said. "The casting is good, dialogues are racy and the wit of the original has been kept intact.
NEW YORK - Dr. Reddy's Laboratories Ltd., an Indian pharmaceutical company, gained only 6 cents in its first day of trade Wednesday on the New York Stock Exchange. Dr. Reddy's hit a high of $10.25 and then fell, closing at $10.10. Dr. Reddy's sold 11.5 million American depositary shares at $10.04 each through underwriters led by Merrill Lynch. Each ADS represents 1/2 of an equity share. Dr. Reddy also trades on the Mumbai (Bombay) Stock Exchange and the National Stock Exchange in India.Hyderabad, India-based Dr. Reddy's makes and develops generic drugs and pharmaceuticals in India and exports its products to 60 countries. Brands include Omez, Nise, Stamlo and Enam. Dr. Reddy's also does drug research and has several products in development to treat diabetes, cancer and pain management through its research foundation. Last May, Dr. Reddy's Labs acquired Cheminor Drugs, making it the third-largest pharmaceutical firm in India.
BANGALORE, India - The French are coming late for India's hi-tech party but the timing may be perfect. A slowdown in the United States is setting the stage for India to discover the European market and France wants to be a gateway for Indian software firms aiming for the continent. "The U.S. downturn is a stimulus because suddenly companies have decided it is not the safest market to be in," said Tobby Simon, chief executive of the France-India group, a private body involved in boosting business between the two countries. "The timing is critical," Simon told Reuters on Monday on the margins of a seminar to showcase France as a beachhead for European markets. Industry analysts expect Europe's share of India's software exports to show a strong rise from the 24 percent of the estimated software exports of $6.2 billion for the year ended March. Right now, France accounts for a negligible 0.8 percent of India's software exports with the United States taking more than 60 percent of the exports.
This time, he came as chairman of the new American India Foundation, which was formed by wealthy Indian-American entrepreneurs, executives and doctors. They have set themselves a goal of raising $50 million to rebuild 100 of the 1,000 villages that were more than 50 percent destroyed by the earthquake here in the western state of Gujarat. So far, they said they had collected more than $8 million. They are among the growing ranks of successful Indian-Americans, many of them from Silicon Valley, looking for a way to give something back to India. They said they were awed by the scale of the devastation and determined to find a way to spend their money so it goes to the people who need it. "Unless you're here, you can't really feel it and you've got to feel it," said Rajat Gupta, managing director of McKinsey & Co., the management consulting firm. "It's a fact-finding and experiencing mission". Mr. Gupta and Victor J. Menezes, president and chief executive officer of Citibank, who are the foundation's vice chairmen, were among those who met with Mr. Clinton in early February to discuss what to do in response to the earthquake. He finished up in Bhuj with a tour of the Red Cross field hospital and a stint at the microphone for a news conference. As he left, he spoke briefly with the Indian journalists who mobbed him. In his last words, as he tried to explain why he gone so far from home to find people to help, he said, "I'm just trying to find something useful to do in a place I care about." Indian Company to Buy Animator of 'The Simpsons' 6 April 2001, LA Times, By Meg James India's largest multimedia software company is buying a financially bruised and battered Hollywood boutique studio that animates several television hits, including "The Simpsons." Pentamedia Graphics Ltd., a publicly traded company based in Chennai, India, has agreed to pay $15 million for 60% of Film Roman of North Hollywood, which also provides the animation for the Fox TV series "King of the Hill" and the new Warner Bros. show "The Oblongs." But Silverman said existing shows will continue to be animated at Film Roman's contractors in the Philippines and South Korea. Special effects and animation for Film Roman's new ventures would be produced at Pentamedia's digital studios in India - including its 22-acre campus in Chennai, where the company already employs more than 800 animators. "They're buying cash flow and a nameplate, a $15-million nameplate," said Steve Hulett, business agent for Motion Picture Screen Cartoonists Local 839. Film Roman does not hold an equity stake in the three hit shows it animates. The sale of Film Roman marks the end of an era that began 17 years ago when Phil Roman, a former Disney animator and 10-time Emmy Award winner who won acclaim for directing "Garfield the Cat," opened his own shop. Roman was in Italy on Thursday to accept an achievement award and could not be reached for comment. Two years ago, Roman left the company he founded, but last week shareholders reinstated him to the board of directors. His former company, which has expanded into non-animated television and the Internet, has been bleeding red ink for several years. Pentamedia is also spending nearly $20 million to buy the Hollywood movie production company Improvision Corp. It is also developing a satellite-TV network for South Asian children, cinemas and a theme park in India. India
test fires missile Officials in Delhi say India has successfully tested its medium-range surface-to-surface missile from a remote testing range on the eastern coast. The Press Trust of India news agency quoted officials as saying the Prithvi II missile was fired over the Bay of Bengal from the range at Chandipur in Orissa.
The 38-year-old Mehta, president of industry body the National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM), died of a massive heart attack on Thursday in his Sydney hotel room, while on a networking trip to Australia. Chiefs of India's tech firms also flew into the capital for the funeral of the artful Mehta, described among others as a one-man public relations machine of the tech industry. Some friends and colleagues of Mehta - who was single with no immediate family - broke down as priests chanted prayers and a cousin lit his pyre according to Hindu tradition at a central Delhi crematorium. BBC reported that Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, who is currently visiting Iran, said: "I send my heartfelt condolences to the family of this young icon of India's software industry, whose promising life has been cut short." President KR Narayanan said in a statement on Thursday that Mr Mehta's death was an irreparable loss to the country's IT sector. In May 1998, Dewang Mehta was appointed as a member and spokesman of the high powered National IT Taskforce set up by the Indian Prime Minister to draft a National Informatics Policy. In 1997, Dewang Mehta was awarded the 'IT Man of the Year' Award by Dataquest magazine. He has also been awarded by Computerworld Magazine as 'Software Evangelist of the Year' for three years in succession in 1997, 1998 and 1999. In 2000, Mehta was awarded 'IT Man of the year' award by Computerworld. In September 2000 Ernst & Young awarded Mehta 'Entrepreneur of the year' award. Later in October 2000, Geneva based World Economic Forum selected Dewang Mehta as one of the 100 'Global Leaders of Tomorrow' Mehta was also the vice-chairman of Internet Users Community of India (IUCI). Mehta was highly influential in convincing the government to allow private Internet Service Providers to operate in India and let Indian companies list on overseas stock exchanges. Mehta was on several Public sector and private sector boards. He was also member of the Andhra Pradesh State Planning Board and on Board of Governors of National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT). As the person at the helm of affairs at NASSCOM, Mehta's job included interaction with the Indian and several other governments around the world; building a Global Brand Equity of the software industry of India and campaigning against software piracy. To increase Indian software exports, Dewang Mehta travelled and organised more than 100 International Seminars around the world. These activities have resulted in more than 140 formal joint ventures / strategic alliances. Excerpts from Dewang Mehta's last published article in Times of India (9 April) "According to Nasscom, the software export statistics for 2000-01 are expected to be around $6.2 billion - a jump of over 55 per cent over the $4 billion achieved in the previous year. By all accounts this is healthy growth. While the figure of $6.2 billion is significant for the Indian market, in terms of the overall size of the US economy, this is but a small portion. If we place the positives and negatives face to face and analyse the situation, we can confidently say that the Indian software industry will continue to grow at a handsome pace. In 2000, 185 of Fortune 500 companies outsourced their software requirements to India. The idea through the road shows will be to target the remainder 315 Fortune 500 organisations and convince them about the viability of outsourcing their software requirements to India. Such road shows will also spotlight the Indian software industry's expertise in segments such as IT-enabled services especially call centres and back-office operations. An extremely positive response to the Indian pavilion at the recently held global conference and exhibition, CeBit in Germany has also given software companies cause for encouragement. Indian participants received more business queries than ever before. This suggests that Europe has woken up to India's potential and Japan too is a new emerging market." |
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