Out Of Water

Shapoor Mistry’s Eureka Forbes controls 80 per cent of the water purification business in India. Industry watchers believe he may be pl...

Shapoor Mistry’s Eureka Forbes controls 80 per cent of the water purification business in India. Industry watchers believe he may be planning on offloading a significant stake in the company in favour of consumer durables major Philips. Speculation is rife that the MNC major is currently doing a due diligence on the company at its headquarters in Amsterdam with the help of some leading merchant bankers from India. Mistry however continues to be in the denial mode ever since the rumours surfaced. To vouch for his stance that he remains committed to his water purification baby the tycoon mentions that only last year he bought out Electrolux’s 40 per cent stake in the company to make it a 100 per cent subsidiary. He further adds that Eureka has just entered a joint venture with Lux International AG of Switzerland to focus on market expansion as well as product development and he sees a bright future for the company and remains as committed to it as ever. Considering that Mistry has already spent so such to be the undisputed king of water purification business in India one does not really see any reason for the tycoon to sell off a majority stake. But as they say there is no smoke without the fire, market watchers will have to wait for some time for the whole story to unfold.

Carbon Credits

Arun Bharat Ram’s SRF is trying to cash on an unusual business opportunity thrown up by United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) — trading in ‘‘Certified Emission Reductions (CERs)’’ or ‘‘carbon credits’’. The company has just received the UNFCC approval for its greenhouse gas (HFC23) reduction plan. Post this approval the tycoon will be able to sell his ‘‘carbon credits’’ (‘units’ of greenhouse gas emission) to companies in the developed markets who fail short of the required carbon dioxide emission reduction targets. Under the Kyoto Protocol these companies are required to offset their carbon dioxide emissions by buying ‘‘carboncredits’’ from projects/companies in the developing countries. SRF is expected to generate 3.8 million ‘‘carbon credits’’ annually. Though the tycoon is not ready to disclose the price of his ‘‘credits’’, observers maintain that forward contracts are being signed at $5 per ‘‘credit’’. In fact Arun has already signed deals with Shell Trading International, a unit of Royal Dutch/ Shell and ICECAP, to sell 5,00,000 carbon credits each and is currently in talks with EDF Trading of France, Barclay’s Capital and a London-based private fund to sell more ‘‘credits’’. European and Japanese companies are likely to remain at the top of Arun’s list of buyers.

dilipcherian@gmail.com

Donald Trump may replace H-1B lottery with wage-based selection process

World8 hr ago

Days after hiking the fees for new H-1B applications to $100,000, the Donald Trump administration has proposed to overhaul the visa process for high-skilled non-immigrant workers. The Trump administration has suggested a wage-based selection process for the H-1B programme, instead of the current lottery system.

View all shorts

Live Blog