Forward planning

Naresh Goyal is busy drawing up plans to build a maintenance, repair and overhaul MRO facility in India. The aviation tycoon has decided to invest Rs 900 crore over the next six years in the facility, which will look at aircraft maintenance, repair and pilot training. While nobody is willing to confirm this, Goyal8217;s MRO plan, may also extend into a cargo airline plan, simply because it8217;s too big an opportunity to ignore.

Given that Goyal recently added a fleet of Boeing 737, he certainly needs to look seriously at maintenance options available in the country even if it8217;s just for his passenger airline. He is already in talks with leading global players like Lufthansa Technik, which has been maintaining his fleet all this while, to set up the new venture. Considering that Lufthansa has filed an application with the government to invest in a MRO facility in India and Goyal already has a working relationship with it for quite sometime, he should not find it hard to strike a joint venture deal. Market watchers estimate the revenue growth in the sector to be well above 10 per cent during 2004-05. Given the number of airlines that have entered the fray, the potential for MRO services in India certainly looks quite bright in the coming years. The facility will not only strengthen his capacity at aircraft maintenance and repair and pilot training, but also be a new profit centre and a launch pad for cargo aircraft plans, when they fructify.

Rampur express

Lalit Khaitan is set to take advantage of UP government8217;s latest policy on promoting distilleries producing alcohol from grain and potatoes in the state. So Khaitan has now decided to set up a distillery in Rampur for alcohol extraction from grains to produce 2.7 crore-bulk litres of potable alcohol. The UP government has also given its necessary approval seeing other ventures the tycoon has already undertaken in the state. The state government, in a bid to promote investors to set up distilleries, said if they managed to set up before March next year with a minimum investment of Rs 50 crore, they could be allowed concessions and tax exemptions equal to the total investment. The tycoon surely would not like to miss out on an opportunity like this and not at any cost from the state where he already has two functional units. His will be the first grassroot distillery coming up in UP after a gap of 30 years, as the Centre had banned issuing licenses for new distilleries.

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