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News Updates - 11 December 2000 Emerging markets that live up to the name - Fortune magazine Rediff.com nominated For 'Exceptional Reporting' - PRNewswire 21 Indian-American firms in Deloitte & Touche list - PRNewswire Emerging Markets That Live Up To the Name -
After repeatedly disappointing U.S. investors, a few countries in Latin America and Asia
are finally reaping the benefits of a rising middle class. This time it really is
different. You could forgive U.S. investors for feeling a little xenophobic lately, especially when it comes to less developed markets. Take Latin America. Decades of crushing inflation and political turmoil kept economies there stuck in first gear. During the early 1990s some pro-reform leaders took a few positive steps, selling off state-run companies and coordinating aid packages from international banks. Then, after the early signs looked promising, foreigners rushed to invest, just in time to see Mexico devalue the peso in 1994 and send the entire region reeling. Southeast Asia is a similar story. By the mid-1990s, countries like Singapore and South Korea had catapulted their economies from agrarian fiefdoms to high-tech havens. The Asian Tigers were roaring, foreigners poured money in, and then Thailand devalued its currency in 1997. The resulting turmoil sent the Korean exchange down 67% that year. Those markets weren't emerging; they were submerging. To find out where this effect is strongest now, FORTUNE canvassed money managers, economists, and key strategists at international banks. They gave us four countries to focus on: Mexico, Brazil, India and China. We then went a step further and found a single company in each country with the best prospects of catering to this growing army of consumers. All four of our picks are listed in the U.S. as American depositary receipts (meaning they're easier to trade and follow stricter, U.S.-style accounting standards). Now, we're not suggesting you sink your life savings into some exotic overseas locale. But if you can tolerate some risk and believe--as we do--that these four countries are rising for all the right reasons, you might consider putting a modest slice of your portfolio in them (the pros suggest anywhere from 1% to 5%). That said, on to the Cook's tour.
You only need to know one number to understand India's economy: 124,000. That's how many engineers graduate in the country's universities each year--twice as many as in the U.S. All those bright young stars have helped turn India's economy into a major global producer of software. This year alone the country will export some $6.5 billion in computer programs, and experts project that figure to increase fivefold by 2004, to $30 billion. And while Indian companies have established a clear expertise in data-processing programs, they're now moving into e-commerce and wireless technology. Both Nortel and Cisco are setting up R&D centers there. That kind of educated work force is why India's middle class is so large--about 200 million people, more than any other country in the world. In part because of the software boom, per capita income is increasing 3% to 4% a year. Purchases of mobile phones and cars are up. Sure, the country's 2.4 million cellular subscribers are only a fraction of China's 70 million, but new customers are signing on at accelerating rates--about 70,000 a month at last count. The total number of subscribers is expected to double by next year, to five million. How best to invest in India? We chose Wipro, a conglomerate that does heavy-duty computer consulting for businesses around the world and also sells consumer products in India, everything from light bulbs to vegetable oil to soap. As you'd expect, most of its revenue comes from the technology side (nearly 50% of its first-half sales this year were from R&D clients, mostly in the wireless business). The company currently trades at $55, giving it an admittedly steep P/E ratio of about 65 times forward earnings. But Wipro's projected growth rates are huge--analysts expect earnings to increase more than 50% a year for the next five years. "The stock has extremely high multiples, but extremely high growth rates too," says Moore at USAA. "It's not out of line with its global peers." Rediff.com Nominated For 'Exceptional Reporting' at
Online Journalism Awards - One of Three Finalists in 'Breaking News: Original To
The Web' Category in Global Contest MUMBAI - Rediff.com India Limited, one of India's leading Internet portals focusing on India and the global Indian community, was one of the three finalists in the Breaking News: Original to the Web category at the Online Journalism Awards 2000 presented by the Online News Association and the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism. The Awards honours excellence in Internet journalism. The category acknowledges and rewards the coverage of a spot or breaking news event or development that displays exceptional reporting. Clear presentation and creative use of the medium was also considered while selecting the finalists. Rediff.com was nominated for its coverage of Nightmare of Flight 814 (http://www.rediff/com/news/iacrisis.htm). The Online Journalism Awards site has described Rediff.com's 'Nightmare of Flight 814' reporting as "Extensive coverage of a hijacked Indian Airlines flight featuring almost hourly updates, an interactive map and message board, bringing alive this Christmas time drama." "Being one of the finalists at the Journalism Awards is a recognition of Rediff.com's philosophy and what we stand for - to achieve journalistic excellence every day and to give our readers breaking news as it happens," says Nikhil Lakshman, Editor in Chief, Rediff.com India Limited.
The Online Journalism Awards has been instituted to set a high standard for people to trust and value Internet journalism, by recognizing excellence in Internet journalism. The Awards has drawn entries from over 200 English-language media outlets around the world including MSNBC.com, WSJ.com, ABCNews.com and BusinessWeek.com amongst others. A two step process was used to determine the finalists and the winner. First, a group of 100 international journalists screened and narrowed the entries to five. These entries were then reviewed by the Online Journalism Award Judges including Tom Goldstein, Dean, Columbia Graduate School of Journalism, Merrill Brown, editor-in-chief, MSNBC.com, Stephen Shepard, editor-in-chief, BusinessWeek, Walt Mossberg, personal technology columnist, The Wall Street Journal, and a number of other distinguished journalism leaders. Twenty-one
Indian-American firms in Deloitte & Touche list NEW DELHI - AT least 21 companies founded and run by Indian Americans made it to the prestigious Deloitte & Touche Technology Fast 500 list this year. Primus Telecommunications Group of McLean, Virginia, headed by K Paul Singh, a communications company with a revenue growth from $1.16 million in 1995 to $832 million last year, is first on the list. "We attribute our fast growth to anticipating opportunities and being ready before those opportunities came knocking," said Singh. Primus saw gold in the deregulating telecommunications markets and quickly established operating units in targeted regions throughout the world. It now offers internet service provider services, Web-hosting and application service provider services. Among other well-known Indian American founded companies that made the list was Exodus Communications of Santa Clara, California, which ranked 22nd. Publicly-traded Exodus was started with the participation of several Indian American Silicon Valley pioneers. Gaurav Dhillon's Informatica Corporation, of Palo Alto, California, another publicly-traded company, ranked 43rd in the Fast 500. Diaspark of New York, a private company with Jitendra Muchhal as chief executive officer, ranked 89th. MicroStrategy, co-founded by Sanju Bansal and Michael Saylor, made it to the list despite its problems with revenue revisions and the Securities and Exchange Commission. It appeared first in the list in 1996, when it ranked 206th. It rose in the rankings to 137th in 1999 only to drop back to 259th this year. The Canadian company Matrikon, of Edmonton, Alberta, which has as chief executive officer Nizar Somji, made it to the list in the 349th position. Intelligent Information Systems (IIS), an innovator in transforming information systems for the new economy, for the second consecutive year was named among the Deloitte and Touche Fast 500. IIS was ranked 386 on the list. Rankings are based on five-year percentage revenue growth from 1995-1999. IIS grew 866 percent over that period. This honor follows closely on the heels of an announcement that IIS was ranked the 16th fastest-growing high-tech firm in North Carolina. "We founded IIS in 1992 armed with a determination to break away from a paradigm where employees and clients were treated as a commodity," said Shail Jain, CEO of IIS. "Conversely, IIS is rooted in the belief that businesses' greatest challenge is to engage hearts and minds and to build trust, collaboration and the confidence to innovate. Seventy-seven per cent of the 2000 Fast 500 winners are in the computer, software and communications industries. With 46 per cent, software companies make up the greatest sector represented in the ranking. Internet companies comprise 17 per cent, up from just nine per cent in 1999. |
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