Govt starts withdrawing retrospective tax on Vedanta

Government of India has taken the first step to withdrawn the retrospective tax demands imposed on Vedanta, the mining group said in a statement. Vedanta’s former subsidiary and oil producer Cairn Energy was hit with a retrospective tax bill of Rs 10,247 cr in January 2014, or Rs 20,495 cr including penalties and interest. Cairn […]

Vodafone Idea cracks the 4,000 Mbps barrier in 5G trials

Vodafone Idea said it achieved speeds of over 4,000 Mbps during its test deployment of 5G on the trial spectrum handed over by Department of Telecom. In comparison, in the early days of 4G, the maximum speeds achieved were in the range of around 200 Mbps. The company released two speedtest results — presumably using […]

Asian Paints issues detailed rebuttal of InGovern’s allegations on related party transactions

Asian Paints, India’s largest paint company and one of the largest listed manufacturing companies in the country, today issued a detailed and point-by-point rebuttal of proxy advisory firm InGovern. InGovern had, in a report brought out two weeks ago, alleged that Asian Paints was sourcing a considerable part of its raw material requirement from companies […]

Mukesh Ambani calls for subsidized mobile phones

India’s richest man and the chairman of Reliance Industries, Mukesh Ambani, has called for the use of universal obligation fund money to subsidize mobile devices. USO fund was set up during the early days of the mobile phone revolution as a tax or levy on existing phone users, to be used for extending telecom services […]

BSNL starts distributing live TV via IPTV in Kerala

The Kerala circle has become the first in India to support BSNL’s commercial IPTV services, and both direct and indirect customers of BSNL can avail of the service. IPTV refers to the distribution of television content via IP or internet protocol, instead of traditional broadcasting protocols like DVB. BSNL had been testing IPTV for several […]

Not in talks with Bharti Airtel for selling Dish TV – YES Bank

YES Bank, the single largest shareholder of DTH company Dish TV, today said it has not been approached by Bharti Airtel for buying the stake in Dish TV. Prashant Kumar, the MD & CEO of the bank, however indicated that bank is not averse to selling its nearly 26% stake in the company for the […]

NDTV rejigs Taboola deal, to get up to $100 mn over 10 years

NDTV, India’s oldest English-language broadcaster still in existence, said it signed a deal with content promoter Taboola that can generate as much as Rs 750 cr or $100 mn for the company over the next ten years, provided NDTV is able to maintain its traffic growth. Taboola is famous for its paid recommendation engine that […]

Reliance Industries ‘categorically denies’ any interest in BT

Reliance Industries said it wants to ‘categorically deny’ any plans to bid for British wired services operator BT. “We categorically deny any intent to bid for the UK telecoms group, BT, formerly British Telecom, as reported in the article titled “Reliance Mulling Bid for UK’s Telco BT Group” published in The Economic Times dated November […]

Hero MotoCorp to stick to scooters in major EV push in March

Hero MotoCorp, the world’s largest maker of motorized two-wheelers, said it will start its EV journey in March with a scooter developed fully in-house, but said current technology and battery prices prohibit the launch of electric motorcycles aimed at the mass market. The company has already announced that it would launch an electric vehicle in […]

Rising input costs, monsoon dampen Birla Corp’s Q2 earnings

The 102-year-old Birla Corporation, one of the oldest companies in India and one of its largest cement and jute producers, said the sharp rise seen in commodity prices in recent months and an extended monsoon hurt its margins during the Jul-Sep period. The company’s operating profit or EBITDA — a measure of profit that excludes […]

Dish TV to hold AGM this month as YES Bank fight lingers

In an unexpected announcement, Dish TV India Ltd, one of India’s largest TV channel distribution platforms, said its board of directors have called the company’s annual general meeting on the last day of this month. The announcement is unexpected given that the board had, a week ago, decided to seek government approval to postpone the […]

Dish TV says YES Bank cannot sell Dish shares

Adding another dimension to the legal battle over the impending extraordinary general meeting called by Dish TV’s largest shareholder YES Bank, the DTH operator said a local office of Uttar Pradesh Police has asked the company to ensure that YES Bank does not deal in or liquidate its Dish TV shares, pending an investigation by […]

KPIT Tech in tie-up with German auto parts giant

Two weeks after announcing that it plans to invest more and more in developing ‘computer controlled vehicle technology’, Pune-based embedded software company KPIT Technologies has announced a tie-up with ZF, a €33 billion German automobile technology provider. KPIT Tech said it will develop software for next-generation, automated vehicles with ZF, which is based in Munich […]

Biocon’s insulin glargine approved by US pharmacy benefits manager

Biocon subsidiary Biocon Biologics Limited (BBL) said its insulin substitute Insulin Glargine has been included by Express Scripts — a prominent ‘pharmacy benefits manager’ in the US — in its National Preferred Formulary. Pharmacy benefits manager, as the name implies, is a kind of outsourced service provider that manages pharmacy benefits extended to employees by […]

GTPL Android box coming in two weeks, soft-launch done

GTPL Hathway, one of the country’s largest cable feed providers, said it plans to launch its Android box by the end of this month or early next month. “The hybrid box has been soft launched,” said Managing Director Anirudhsinh Jadeja. “There are around 1,500 boxes in the market.” The box was originally set to be […]