Business & Finance - Current Affairs for June, 2016

Tech giant Oracle announced the five part benchmark US dollar bond sale ahead of pricing.

• The borrower is approaching investors with 5,7, 10, 20 and 30-year bonds, with initial price talk set at T+110bp area, T+125bp area, T+135bp area, T+165bp-170bp area and T+185bp area.
• Proceeds will be used for general corporate purposes including stock repurchases, dividend payments and debt referencing as well as future acquisitions
• Ratings are A1/AA-/A+.
• Oracle was last in the US dollar market in April 2015 when it raised USD 10 billion

Microsoft has announced the appointment of Crayon Software as a cloud distribution partner under its Cloud Solution Provider programme in the country

• Microsoft launched the Cloud Solutions Partner program for India in 2015
• Other Microsoft CSPs include Redington India and Ingram Micro
• Crayon will assist clients to adopt Microsoft cloud based technology like Microsoft Azure, Microsoft Office 365 and Enterprise Mobility Suite Subscriptions

To provide seamless digital content to users, domestic smartphone maker Micromax announced partnership with Eros international Digital platform EROS Now

• EROS Now will now leverage Micromax’s presence to distribute content

TATA Sons and Starbucks have finalised multiple new joint initiatives for expanding collaboration at an international level.

• Initiatives include sourcing Indian coffee from the US market and introduction of Teavana brand of specialty teas in Indian stores
• This has expanded the market of the TATA owned mineral water brand Himalayan.
• TATA Sons Chairman Cyrus Mistry met Starbucks Chairman and CEO Howard Schultz to finalise initiatives which will be rolled out by the close of this fiscal
• 2 groups have been running TATA Starbucks coffee chain in the nation since October 2012 as part of the JV
• JV operates 80 stors in 6 key cities
• Due to the collaboration, Starbucks will be offering single origin coffee from India in the US sourced from TATA Nellore estates
• The two companies have also come together to skill the youth over the next 5 years through TATA Strive which trained 43,000 people

Japanese listed mobile marketing adtech firm Adways has acquired Pocket Money for a non disclosed sum.

• Pocket Money is an Android incentivised app published by Indian reward based mobile video ad platform Pokkt
• Acquisition follows establishment of Indian subsidiary Adways Innovations India
• Microsoft has also recently acquired an Indian messaging startup
• The focus is on performance marketing and presence in China, Indonesia, Vietnam, Korea and other SE Asia nations
• This is part of the user acquisition strategy as an entry point for business in India
• Pocket Money provides top ups after apps have been downloaded on the platform
• App claims to have 7 million installs and over a million monthly instalments for advertisers

London Court of Arbitration has ordered TATA Sons to pay Japan’s largest mobile phone firm NTT DOCOMO USD 1.17 billion in compensation for breaching an agreement on a JV

• In January 2015, NTT DOCOMO Inc of the Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp filed a request against TATA Sons claiming latter had failed to find a buyer for the DOCOMO stake in TTSL
• The London Court ordered TATA Sons to pay DOCOMO US $1172 million for breach of the shareholders agreement
• Japan’s largest communications service provider entered the country by acquiring a stake in Tata Teleservices for USD 2.7 billion after the Indian telco was granted dual technology license that permitted CDMA operators to offer rival GSM based services as well.

India’s third largest software services firm Wipro has invested a non disclosed amount in Israel based VC firm TLV Partners marking the first investment in the venture capital firm. This gives the outsourcing firm access to portfolio of early stage enterprises and security ventures in one of the most active startup ecosystems in the world.

• As per Wipro’s latest annual report, company invested in Tel Aviv based VC firm during 2015-2016
• According to the latest annual report, company has invested in the Tel Aviv based venture capital firm during 2015-2016
• TLV partners has a corpus of US $115 million and focuses on ventures in the cyber security, enterprise software and IoT according to CrunchBase.
• Wipro’s latest move underscores the enhanced importance of Israel enterprise software industry to India’s US $160 billion IT industry.
• In 2015, Israel automation tech firm Panaya was sold to Infosys for US $200 million
• StartUp Genome which ranks ecosystems across the world rated the city of Tel Aviv as the fifth best startup ecosystem in the world in 2015 coming after Silicon Valley, NYC, LA and Boston.

Social media major Facebook has hired co-founder of Google Fibre high speed internet project to build up internet connectivity team. Social network major has hired Kevin Lo as director of the Infrastructure Connectivity and Investments to help FB partnerships such as Terragraph to bring WiFi to dense urban areas and FB partnership with Microsoft to build fibre optic cable

Telecom major Bharti Airtel and Malaysian firm Axiata have deferred agreement for merger of Bangladesh operations till September 26, 2016.

• Merger of the Bangladesh business will be completed in the first half of this year.
• Bharti Airtel Limited and Axiata Group Berhad agreed the merger has to be expected to be completed in the first half of this year 2016
• Axiata Group Berhad and Airtel on January 28 signed a Definitive Agreement for merging telecom subsidiaries Robi Axiara Ltd and Airtel Bangladesh Ltd
• As per industry sources, enterprise valuation of the merged entity is estimated to be around USD 2 billion
• Following completion of the merger, Axiata will hold 68.3 percent controlling stake and Bharti Airtel had 25 percent while remaining 6.7% will be held by existing shareholder NTT Docomo of Japan.
• Post merger, the combined entity operating as Robi will serve 40 million customers
• Airtel has entered Bangladesh by acquiring 70 percent stake in Warid Telecom in 2010 and picked up 30 percent in 2013.

Reliance Telecom Ltd is a wholly owned unit of Reliance Communications and will emerge operations in 5 circles back into RCom allowing customers seamless 3G and 4G services.

• Consolidation of RCom Wireless Business under one entity will be demerged at a later date and merged with Aircel
• RCom informed the stock exchange that subsidiaries will derringer the circles of Bihar, HP, Jharkhand, MP, Chattisgarh, Odisha and West Bengal
• Company will benefit from maximisation of synergies in operational processes, logistics alignment leading to economies of scale and increased customer experience
• Reliance Communications Q4 net profit fell 22 percent
• 3G and 4G/LTE network resources and platforms under single license per service area, customers will obtain seamless services and compliance requirements will be attained by the company under applicable regulations
• RCom will demerge the wireless business and merge it with existing unlisted Aircel with promoters of both sides owning 50 percent in the new entity

New York based VICE Media and TOI group on 23rd June 2016 said they would form a JV for launching the world’s leading youth media brand in the country

• As per the alliance, Vice founder and CEO Shane Smith said the news and entertainment group is the next MTV, ESPN and CNN rolled into one
• It will create domestic content from India’s rich cultural fabric and bring the VICE network to the rest of the world
• MD of Times Group Vineet Jain has said India is an emerging global player with a massive captive youth audience
• VICE will open a new bureau and production hub in Mumbai to create original content to be distributed across TV, mobile, digital and linear platforms in the region
• VICELAND a paid TV network and Virtue India, VICE”s in house creative services agency will develop branded content for the Indian market

The app delivers new content based on user’s research history and FB data consumption pattern delivering the latest and most revenant news to the individual.

• The group of four has introduced the country’s first news-bot and it can work on three platforms including FB, Slack and Telegram
• There are 50,000 active users of this app

Indian Angel Network has invested an undisclosed amount in AI focused research startup Staqu led by Ajay Gupta, Neeraj Singhal and Bikky Khosla of IAM

• This is a Gurgaon based startup
• It will use funding to build capabilities, lead to democratisation of technology and grow the team
• AI is a new concept in India and money will be utilised to expand the computational strength of VGrep Lab and fuel it with clusters of GPUs and other technical resources
• Staqu’s products have the capability to help e-commerce grow

A Reserve Bank draft was released on June 23 for computation of exposure to counterparty credit risk from derivatiev transactions and capital requirements for bank exposure to central counterparts or CCPs.

• Guidelines are framed on the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision according to the central bank
• Proposed revised guidelines will capture risks arising from OTC and centrally cleared derivative transactions
• Bimonthly policy statement announced by the Governor was first mentioned in the coming out of draft guidelines along with revision of securitisation framework
• The final guidelines will be implemented by the coming April against the BCB decision to have it moving from January 2017

Tech Mahindra, the country’s fifth largest software exporter, said it has acquired the U.K.-based The BIO Agency (BIO), which specialises in digital transformation across sectors such as retail, financial and travel.

• The acquisition was in an all-cash deal for an enterprise value of up to 45 million pounds.
• The payment of 22 million pounds and the surplus cash (of 5 million pounds) will be made upfront and the balance as deferred payments based on company performance
• Tech Mahindra will acquire 100 per cent of shares in BPO. The closing date of the transaction is expected to take place in the first week of July 2016
• The BIO Agency posted revenue of 12.5 million pounds during the fiscal year 2015-16 compared with 7.4 million pounds the previous year, according to the filing.

Tumblr, the Yahoo-owned blogging platform, said on 21st June 2016 it was launching live video to help compete against similar offerings from Facebook and Twitter.

Online retail company Flipkart has topped LinkedIn’s “top attractors” list of the most sought after company by professionals across India

• The second and third ranked companies are Amazon and Capgemini
• Apple has topped LinkedIn’s Top Attractors list of most sought after companies by professionals across the world
• Apple is the world’s largest IT company by revenue and total assets and the world’s second largest mobile phone manufacturer

Tata Advanced Systems Limited and Boeing on June 18, 2016 celebrated the laying of a fresh facility in Hyderabad for JV named Tata Boeing Aerospace

• JV has also been established to co-produce Boeing AH-64 Apache helicopter fuselages and other aero structures and pursue integrated systems in aerospace
• Facility has been under development for pursuing a framework agreement between the two companies in July 2015
• The JV location is in Adibatla IT and Aero SEZ (TATA Aerospace SEZ) about 50 km from Hyderabad
• Manufacturing aerospace and defence products like UAVs are essential here.
• It will also produce Ah-64 fuselage on a global scale and has been flown or selected for acquisition by US and 15 other nations including India

Nikesh Arora considered the top contender to succeed SoftBank Group Corp, founder and CEO Masayoshi Son will be handing over his current post as President of the Japanese company

• This became clear after Son clarified Arora won’t get the top job in the near future
• Development comes 24 hours after Arora was given a clean chit in an internal investigation for alleged irregularities in SoftBank Indian investments Housing dot com and Oyo Rooms.
• Arora is a former Google executive who made headlines as one of the top paid company officials in the world
• Arora made valuable contributions to SoftBank such as the monetisation of a stake in Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba, and sale of stake in gamemnaker Supercell.
• In May SoftBank said it aimed to sell US $7.9 billion of its stake in Alibaba.
• Arora joined SoftBank from Google where he was Chief Business Officer
• SoftBank invested in growth stage companies in India such as Snapdeal, Ola and Oyo

Controversial industrialist Vijay Mallya has quit as Chairman of BayerCrop Science Ltd promoted by Bayer AG

• He also resigned as director of the company
• Company has accepted his resignation
• He was appointed Chairman of the Board in 2004 in the month of March

Aircel has partnered with Bengaluru based Fastfilmz to permit customers in TN to see regional movies on the go. Integrated customers can approach the nearest retailer or Aircel store and ask for Aircel-Fastfilmz scratch card, downloading the application and getting a 14 day free subscription trial period

• Partnership permits Aircel customers to access library of 400 latest Tamil and Telugu movies

Future Group has entered into a collaboration with Bajaj Finance Ltd, the retail lending arm of Bajaj Finserv to enable customers to convert purchases into equated monthly instalments

• Both companies have come out with co-branded EMI Network card launched in Mumbai.
• Credit facility is available to customers of Future Group brands on minimum purchase of INR 5000 to maximum of INR 3 lakhs- payment can be made in a period of 3 months to two years

Microsoft on 17th June was selected as technical partner to build mobile app for the HRD SWAYAM platform (Study Webs of Active Learning for Young Aspiring Minds)

• Platform will launch 2000 MOOC courses for 3 crore students in 2016
• Microsoft has signed a deal of INR 38 crore rupees with AICTE to build and run the app for 3 years
• The app will be taken over by AICTE after that
• UGC Regulation 2016 was finalised in a credit framework for online learning through SWAYAM.

Siemens of German and Gamesa of Spain have decided to come together to form the world’s biggest wind power company

• As part of the agreement initialled, the wind power business of Siemens including wind services will be merged with Gamesa
• Siemens will receive newly issued shares of the combined company and hold 59 percent of the share capital
• Existing shareholders of Gamesa will hold 41 percent

International Finance Corp, the private sector lending arm of the World Bank indicated it was looking to invest US $75 million/INR 500 crore in Glenmark Pharmaceuticals Limited, raising US $200 million to reduce debt and fund expansion plans

• Mumbai based drug company is raising the capital by selling quasi equity instruments
• Company plans to use money for expansion of manufacturing capacity, (mostly in India) and building R&D capacity for fresh products and reducing debt
• Glenmark will invest a significant amount in capital expenditure over three years across facilities in India
• Glenmark has been facing pricing pressure across key markets
• Glenmark’s debt stood at INR 4000 crore with debt equity ratio of 0.6.
• For the year closing March31, Glenmark posted profit of INR 702 crore on INR 7649.6 crore of revenue

Technology major Microsoft has acquired a messaging app founded by Indian IIT Delhi alumnus Vishal Sharma, previously VP in Google in 2013.

• Through this acquisition, the technology giant has acquired a messaging app founded by an Indian as the US based software firm strengthens its position in combining human language with progressive machine intelligence
• Terms of the acquisition were not made public
• Acquisition strengthens the strategy for “Conservation as a Platform” which was introduced by current CEO of Microsoft, Satya Nadella at the Build 2016 conference

Electronics company Centum has purchased a 51 percent stake in privately held French company Adetel for an undisclosed amount for expanding presence in the European market

• Deal will assist Centum which has 80 percent of the revenue from exports to US, EU and Israel to increase the export to various countries about 60 percent from current 35%.
• This will also scale up production, technologies and competencies

TATA Group on 16th June announced a tie-up with ride sharing company Uber Technologies to offer drivers and owners on Uber platform comprehensive vehicle purchase and financing solutions among other benefits

• As part of the partnership those looking to operate Uber cars can buy TATA Vehicles such as Indica and Indigo from TATA Motors and obtain access to customised and flexible financing solutions from TATA Capital and TATA Motor Finance.
• Car buyers will also be able to purchase insurance from TATA AIG. TATA Business Support Services will also provide operational support to drivers using the new vehicle solutions program.
• TATA Opportunity invested in Uber in 2015

Flrksy, a company known for its pioneering gesture based keyboard app has been acquired by content sharing website Pinterest and financial details of the deal are not yet known

• Acquisition comes in 4 months since standalone keyboard app maker Flexy launched an application for visually impaired users.

The Union Cabinet has approved the merger of State Bank of India (SBI), the country’s largest lender, and its associate banks — a move which is expected to bring the state-owned entity on a par with global lenders.

• The merged entity will have an asset base of about Rs.37 lakh crore, with nearly 24,000 branches and about 58,700 ATMs across the country as of March 2016-end .
• SBI and its associates employed 2.85 lakh people in 2014-15.
• The merger of SBI with its associates began eight years ago when SBI merged State Bank of Saurashtra with itself in 2008.
• In 2010, State Bank of Indore was also merged with the larger bank. SBI has since made repeated attempts to merge its units but none came to fruition due to a shortage of capital.
• The shares of SBI associate banks rose sharply after the cabinet approval .
• The Cabinet also gave its ex-post facto approval to the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between Taipei Economic and Cultural Centre in India and India Taipei Association in Taipei, for cooperation in agriculture and signing of an Air Services Agreement between India-Taipei Association in Taipei (India’s representative office in Taiwan) and Taipei Economic and Cultural Centre in India (Taiwan’s representative office in India) got the nod.
• The Cabinet also gave its approval for the enhancement of the age of superannuation of non-teaching and public health specialists of the Central Health Service (CHS) from 62 years to 65 years and doctors of General Duty Medical Officers sub-cadre of CHS to 65 years of age.
• An ex-post facto approval for a pact on labour cooperation between India and Saudi Arabia and a 10 per cent disinvestment of paid-up equity in Housing and Urban Development Corporation were also cleared.

Reiterating its focus on contributing to the government's vision of 'Digital India', Intel India has inaugurated four 'Unnati Kendra' (UK) at 'Common Service Centres' (CSCs) in Gujarat.

• A part of Intel India's 'Ek Kadam Unnati Ki Aur' program, these UK at CSC's are part of company's nationwide plan to create a blueprint for the digitisation of non-urban India.
• Intel India, in collaboration with CSC e-Governance Services India Ltd., has set up these facilities across the districts of Banaskantha, Mehsana, Mahuva, and Valsad to drive the relevance of PC adoption at village level.
• With a total of 36 centres already live in Telangana, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, and Maharashtra, Intel India has now rolled out its programme in Gujarat, progressing towards its goal of establishing a network of up to a 100 CSCs across 10 states.
• Launched in November 2015, the 'Ek Kadam Unnati Ki Aur' program aims to accelerate access to technology in non-urban India.

Twitter Inc has invested about $70 million in Berlin-based music service SoundCloud.Twitter confirmed the investment, but did not provide any financial details.

• Soundcloud , a platform that enables people to upload and share music and other audio files, also confirmed that Twitter had made the investment.
• Twitter's investment was part of a funding round expected to be in the range of $100 million, which would value SoundCloud at about $700 million.

TATA Power Co Ltd on 12th June 2016 agreed to acquire renewable energy company Welspun Renewables Energy Pvt Ltd in a bid to grow clean energy portfolio to 2.3 GW

• TATA Power’s renewable energy uni TATA Power Renewable Energy Ltd has signed an agreement to acquire Welspun Renewables Energy Pvt Ltd
• This is the largest transaction in the renewables space in India and acquisition has been made at enterprise value of INR 9249 crore

Singapore Telecommunications and Bharti Airtel have joined hands to deliver high speed data network coverage across 325 cities in the Asia Pacific, Middle East, Africa, Europe and the US under one network

• Association will enhance value proposition for enterprise customers by offering wide global reach and largest reach within the country under a single platform
• This will benefit pharma, IT and ITes enabled services as well as financial segments
• This will form one of the largest Internet Protocol Virtual Private Networks internationally
• Singetel’s 200 points of presence in 160 cities across and world and AIrtel’s over 170 plus PoPs across 165 cities will be part of the new network
• With Airtel wide coverage of cities in India, network paves way for international customers to enter the most vibrant economies
• Partnership also opens the door to Indian companies to expand abroad
• Under this global network, multinational corporations can maintain a track of their operations across different regions by using high-bandwidth business applications such as video conferencing, cloud applications, unified communications and the like.

Virtualisation and cloud infrastructure VMWare has made the announcement to acquire a software defined data centre security and operations firm

• Company said it would close in Q2 2016
• Two companies are also collaborating for mutual customers like Nebraska Medicine and Columbia Sportswear
• Arkin is the company set to be acquired

WPI inflation is expected to average around 0.6 percent in 2016 compared to -2.7 percent in 2015 owing to rising input costs such as commodity prices

• On account of the Japanese financial services major, WPI inflation is expected to see a rise following gradual growth recovery
• Commodity prices have bottomed out and base effects are waning
• Wholesale price based inflation increased to narrowing output gap
• Output price inflation was relatively steady at 1.6 percent showing weak pricing power of corporates despite rising costs

Axis Bank has raised $500 million at the London Stock Exchange after it launched India’s first internationally-listed certified green bond to finance climate change solutions around the world.

• One of India’s leading private sector capital markets banks opened trading at the London Stock Exchange (LSE) with the bond, which is certified by the Climate Bonds Standards Board and raised $500 million.
• Axis Bank said the proceeds of the bond will be invested in green energy, transportation and infrastructure projects, reinforcing India’s commitment to produce 175,000 MW of renewable power by 2022.
• This is the first green bond for Axis Bank within its $5 billion Medium Term Note (MTN) programme, which has also listed entirely on LSE.

The Indian unit of search giant Google Inc and Tata Trusts launched 'Internet Saathi' program in West Bengal.

• The initiative will roll out from West Bengal’s Purulia district and will focus on training women and larger communities in the state to learn and explore various uses and benefits of the Internet.
• Launched in July 2015, the program has trained and benefitted over 2 lakh women across villages in Rajasthan, Gujarat, Jharkhand, Andhra Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh.
• The 'Internet Saathi' initiative is part of Google’s `Helping Women Get Online’ campaign, which is designed to create awareness about the benefits of Internet among women in rural India.

Central Mall, the leading lifestyle retail brand from Future Group, has joined hands with the largest independent mobile payments company in India, MobiKwik to build India's first chain of cashless malls. 32 Central Malls in 20 cities go cashless from June 13, 2016, and will accept MobiKwik for payments.

• MobiKwik has the highest reach in offline cashless payments and has over 30 million users currently.
• This partnership further supports MobiKwik's retail expansion strategy and the vision to ensure ubiquitous adoption of mobile wallets.
• MobiKwik, is India's largest independent mobile payments network, connecting 30 million users with 100,000 retailers.
• Founded in 2009 by BipinPreet Singh and UpasanaTaku, the company has raised three rounds of funding from Sequoia Capital, American Express, Tree Line Asia, MediaTek, GMO Payment Gateway and Cisco Investments. MobiKwik aspires to be the largest source of digital transactions in India.

• According to a statement issued on June 13, 2016, Dell and Shiv Nadar University have signed an agreement to drive partnership in research and innovation.
• As part of the agreement, Dell will engage with faculty members to meant students and work on technology projects in areas such as big data and cloud computing as well as IoT.

Microsoft has announced the launch of Microsoft Online store with Tata CLiQ, a new e-commece portal of TATA group. Website will see Microsoft products such as tablets, PCs and phones on the platform.

• TATA CLiQ follows a quasi digital model where products will be delivered from physical stores of retail outlets of TATA group such as Croma, Titan, Westside etc.
• TATA CLiQ is pioneering the phygital (physical +digital) revolution in India.

Nokia has signed a 1.36 billion euro one year framework deal with China Mobile according to the Finnish company.

• This eased fears it would lose market shares while merging with Alcatel Lucent.
• Nokia’s network equipment sales fell more than expected in the first quarter as buyers were held off due to Alcatel integration process.
• 4G LTE will be the fastest deployed technology in India released by Nokia.
• Nokia brought Alcatel-Lucent in an all share deal worth 15.6 billion euros.
• Deal has helped it to compete with Sweden’s Ericsson and China’s Huawei in both fixed and mobile network equipment.
• Company is expected to cut 10,000 to 15,000 jobs on an international scale or 14 percent of its workforce.

Cloud computing giant Salesforce.com Inc said prominent computer hacking expert Trey Ford will join the company's Heroku unit as its head of trust, starting on June 13, 2016.

• Ford, 36, told Reuters he will be responsible for cyber security and reliability of Heroku, a cloud-based platform for creating and deploying web software applications.
• Ford previously served as general manager of the Black Hat hacking conference.
• He was also security response manager for Zynga Inc and held positions with cyber security firms including Rapid7 Inc, McAfee and WhiteHat Security.

Microsoft is set to acquire LinkedIn for $26.2 billion in an all-cash deal, billed as one of the largest such pacts in the global social media space. The social media site has 10 percent of over 430 million users in India. It will retain distinct brand, culture and independence according to company and Jeff Weiner will remain the CEO of LinkedIn.

• Microsoft will pay $196 per LinkedIn share a 50 percent premium to LinkedIn's closing price on June 10.
• The news brought cheer for LinkedIn as shares jumped 48 per cent to $194.35 on Monday. But Microsoft shares fell nearly 3 percent.

Business confidence has fallen 6.7 percent in Q4 in the previous fiscal based on subdued sentiments according to an NCAER survey. The 96th round of Business Expectations Survey indicates that the Business Confidence Index registered a decrease of 6.7 percent in April over January 2016 on the quarter to quarter basis.

• This indicates business sentiments have been subdued since the previous quarter
• BCI has continued to fall on a Y-O-Y basis and a survey by economic think tank National Council of Applied Economic Research. Three of the four components of BCI have shown a deterioration in sentiments between January and April 2016
• One component has increased marginally. Only 43.8 percent of the firms expected the financial position would be better in the coming six months versus 59.8 percent of firms in January 2016.
• As many as 44.8 percent of firms perceive financial position would remain the same in the coming six months
• Maximum decline in BCI of over 11.4 percent has been recorded by firms with annual turnover of INR 1-10 crore
• Survey has also recorded improvement in political sentiments with in April over January 2016 with the Political Confidence Index showing q-o-q rise of 2.1 percent.
• NCAER has been conducting Business Expectations Survey each quarter since 1991 tracking business sentiments of close to 500 Indian companies

The Ministry of Commerce & Industry has given approval to establishment of Mega Leather Cluster at Kota Mandal, Nellore district, Andhra Pradesh. The project sanctioned under Indian Leather Development program would create state of the art infrastructure for labour intensive units and is expected to generate employment for 20,000 people and leverage an investment of at least Rs 500 Crores in the first phase itself. The Minister requested the Chief Minister that due process related to award of contract etc be completed so that the central government could release the funds to start the project as soon as possible.

Suzuki Motor Corp CEO Osamu Suzuki is stepping down and the Japanese automaker promised to cut executive pay and slash 2015 bonuses, hoping to draw a line under the bruising admission of major flaws in its fuel tests.

• Executive vice president Osamu Honda, who also served as chief technical officer, will retire, taking responsibility for the research and development team at the heart of the testing scandal.
• Japan’s No. 4 automaker by sales said it had used the wrong methods to calculate mileage for models going back to 2010, widening a mileage testing storm that had already rocked smaller rival Mitsubishi Motors Corp.
• The testing scandals at Suzuki and Mitsubishi come after Volkswagen AG was first discovered last year to have cheated diesel emissions tests in the United States.

MadRat Games is an innovative startup with an aim to provide the world a more wholesome, happy and healthy way of living.

• Founded by IIT Mumbai and Carnegie Mellon alumnus Rajat Dhariwal along with his team Madhumita Halder and Manuj Dhariwal in 2010, the offline product gaming startup will use the proceeds for product development and pre-order campaign.
• Initially, it built offline educational games such as board games, learning puzzles, toys and mobile games.
• Ratan Tata, Ola’s founders Bhavish Aggarwal and Ankit Bhati, Flipkart’s founder Binny Bansal, and Girish Mathrubootham of Freshdesk have funded the company. The total amount raised by the company comes to over $2.5 million with this funding round.

IMF on June 7th 2016 approved the US $1.5 billion loan to Sri Lanka. IMF has transferred 168 million US dollars as the first instalment with immediate effect to provide support for the country’s economy

• IMF executive board accepted the 36 month extended arrangement under Extended Fund Facility with Sri Lanka under SDR
• With an early disbursement of 168.1 million US dollars to be made immediately, the remaining amount will be settled in 6 instalments on quarterly review
• Additional 650 million US dollars support will be brought to other multilateral and bilateral loans bring total support to US 2.2 billion US dollars

States are being rated on ease of doing business in real time. The evaluation is done on 340 parameters as against 91 in the previous year. Bihar outperformed the 30 other states and UTs being ranked in ease of doing business with a score of 8.53 percent.
In the previous year’s final rankings Bihar was 21
Last year, Gujarat topped the list and is currently on the 6th position

Business intelligence (BI) software revenue is expected to grow 18.6% to reach $213.8 million by 2016 over the previous year as spending on data analytics solutions rises, research firm Gartner said on June 7th

• The revenue, which stood at $180.2 million in 2015, included revenue from platforms like BI, advanced analytics, analytic applications and corporate performance management software, it said in a report.
• BI platforms segment continued to lead the BI software market in India accounting for $115.6 million in revenues in 2015.

Cloud based software maker Salesforce. Inc has indicated it will be purchasing Demandware Inc whose software is used by businesses to run e-commerce websites. The deal will assist Salesforce to open a new front taking market share from traditional software companies like Oracle Corp and SAP AG.

• E-commerce market has been growing at a rapid pace with high demand for software that helps manage functions such as payment processing and inventory management
• Salesforce cash offer of US $75 per share represents a 56.3 premium to Demandware

The instant messaging firm is said to have acquired the 3D photo making app a couple of months ago.

• Seene permits users to capture an image with a smartphone and create a 3D version of it. Snapchat has been interested in Seene’s computer vision technology and engineering team.
• 3D technology has been used to introduce new filters inside the ephemeral messaging app

India Post has released a Rs.5 stamp to mark the third anniversary of Amazon India’s services in the country. Called My Stamp, it shows a delivery boy with a carton labelled Amazon. Amazon India, which launched its services in India in June 2013, serves customers in over 19,000 pin codes through a network of 155,000 post offices.

• The department of post has released ‘My Stamp’ for the first time to commemorate a milestone with an e-commerce marketplace.
• The launch reinforces the Amazon-India Post relationship. India Post is one of Amazon India’s prime carriers.
• The marketplace uses the extensive postal network to reach its customers.

HDFC ERGO General Insurance Co. Ltd, the non-life insurance joint venture between HDFC Ltd and ERGO International of Germany, said that it will acquire L&T General Insurance Co. Ltd in an all-cash deal worth Rs.551 crore. Promoter Larsen & Toubro Ltd (L&T) will exit the general insurance business via the deal.

• L&T General Insurance, which began operations in October 2010, sells auto, business, home and health cover.
• The company, with a paid-up share capital of Rs.705 crore, saw a gross written premium of Rs.483 crore during the year ended 31 March, which is 40% higher compared with the previous year.
• The company has 28 offices served by 800 employees. For the year ended 31 March, the company’s net-worth stood at Rs.142 crore.
• The insurer, a joint venture between India’s largest home finance company and Germany’s ERGO International, is currently the fourth largest general insurer in the country.

LG Electronics India has hired Saif Iqbal as Snapdeal business head for electronics to shape e-commerce strategy by December.

• LG is the largest white goods maker planning to launch televisions, white goods and smartphones exclusively for online sales to minimise conflict with brick and mortar retailing
• LG is also one of the biggest consumer electronic brands in the country to adopt an online route.

Report innovation centres in the country doubled to 16 during a 6 month period to leapfrog India to top 5 globally when it came to innovation, according to consulting major Capgemini.

• India has been rising in the ranks of favourite destinations to open innovation centres- the previous research identified 8 innovation centres in India in July 2015
• India has since seen 8 more innovation centres open their doors
• New innovation centres were opened making India emerge as the fifth global hub in the top 5 listed namely Silicon Valley, London, Paris and Singapore
• New innovation centres in the past few months included top brands like Visa, Apple and Airbus.
• Internationally the financial sector led the rest of the pack in opening innovation centres
• Close to 42 percent of leading financial organisations had innovation centres in February 2016 as against 28 percent in July 2015

The transaction marks the first sale of Alibaba shares by its largest shareholder since SoftBank began investing in the company in 2000. Japanese telecommunications and internet firm SoftBank Group Corp said it will sell at least $7.9 billion of shares in Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba Group Holding Ltd in order to raise funds to reduce its debt.

• The transaction marks the first sale of Alibaba shares by its largest shareholder since SoftBank began investing in the company in 2000.
• SoftBank’s Alibaba stake will fall to about 28 per cent of the Chinese firm from 32.2 per cent in March.
• Both companies said they would maintain a strategic partnership. SoftBank Chairman and Chief Executive Masayoshi Son will remain a director at Alibaba, while Alibaba Executive Chairman Jack Ma will remain on the board of SoftBank.

Tata Steel UK has announced the completion of the sale of Long Products Europe business to Greybull Capital LLP.

• Greybull has said it will invest 400 million pounds in the new business
• Long Products Europe business has implemented a transformation plan including portfolio restructuring of assets underpinned by committed support from employees and TUs

Core sector output was up 8.5 percent in April as against 6.4 percent in March on the basis of strong growth from steel, electricity and petroleum refinery output. The eight core industries are coal, crude oil, natural gas, refinery products, fertilisers, steel, cement and electricity.

• The steel output was up 6.1 percent and cement was up 4.4 percent for the month of April.
• Electricity output too grew at 14.7 percent versus a 11.3 percent rise in month of March.
• Petroleum refinery products output was up 17.9 percent as compared to month-on-month (MoM) rise of 10.8 percent.
• The MoM fertiliser output was up 7.8 percent. However, the coal output was down 0.9 percent versus a 1.7 percent rise in the month of March.
• Crude oil output too was down 2.3 percent versus a month-on-month (MoM) decline of 5.1 percent. Natural gas output was down 6.8 percent versus a MoM decline of 10.5 percent.