US food giant McCormik enters Indian market

New Delhi: US food giant McCormick and Company signed a joint- venture with country’s major basmati rice supplier Kohinoor foods and marked its entry in packaged food business.
Satish Rao, Managing Director of the venture in India today said, “This is an exciting strategic initiative and enables McCormick to expand its flavor business into India. Key growth drivers for this business are distribution expansion, product innovation and brand building investment.”
He also said that the company is targeting sales of around $85 million in the first year of operation.
Alan Wilson, Chairman McCormick on his visit said, “Our mission is not only to grow Kohinoor’s basmati rice business but also to expand it further in a big way through other food categories that deliver flavor like cooking ingredients and convenience food.”
Talking about Indian markets Wilson, said, “India is a top priority market for McCormick and is in line with our emerging market growth strategy. We foresee India to be a significant business for McCormick in 10 years and the company has been participating in the Indian economy for more than 100 years beginning with sourcing of pepper and other flavor ingredients from the country for international markets.”
So far McCormick has invested more than $150 million in India, he added.
While talking to reporters, Gurnaam Arora MD Kohinoor foods said that his company enjoys a market share of 25 per cent of organised rice retail.
The joint-venture Kohinoor Speciality Foods India Private Ltd., is in the

ratio of 85:15 between McCormick and Kohinoor.

PNB’s profit grows by 12.1 per cent, to decide on interest rates as per market trend

New Delhi: Country’s leading public sector bank, PNB today announced its results for the quarter ending on September’ 11 and said that they are waiting for market reactions to decide on increasing savings interest rates.

The bank registered a growth of 12.1 per cent in the net profit reaching to Rs 1205 crore as compared to a profit of Rs 1075 crore in second quarter of FY’11.
A growth of 22.5 per cent in total business of bank and 25 per cent in deposits was recorded in second quarter for the present financial year compared to the second quarter of previous year.
The total income of the bank rose by 37.2 per cent to Rs 9841 crore due to healthy growth of 38.7 per cent in interest income which reached Rs.8952 crore in the second quarter.
In the loans segment, the retail loans by 20.2 per cent on YoY basis and crossed Rs 24,000 crore at end September’11. On the other hand credit to MSME sector grew by 22.7 per cent to more than Rs 49,000 crore as at end September’11.
Talking about increase in deposit rates PNB Chairman and Managing Director KR Kamath told the reporters that "We are waiting for larger market players to react. Once more number of banks announce (new rate), our ALCO (asset liability committee) will take a call."
PNB currently offers an interest rate of 4 per cent on savings bank account, as was mandated by RBI.
But RBI last week had freed the banks to decide interest rate on their savings bank account.
Following this few private sector players raised their interest rates up to 6 per cent on their deposits of over Rs 1 lakh.
Talking about overseas plans of PNB, the bank said that it is upgrading its offices at Norway and China into branches, and is also exploring possibilities in Maldives, Bangladesh, Brazil and Singapore.
At present PNB's branch network stands at 5,300 with more than 5,600 ATMs.

ONGC net profit in Q2 jumps to 60%

New Delhi: State run oil exploration major, ONGC today announced a jump of 60.4 per cent in net profit of quarter ending on September, 11 compared to quarter – 2 of previous financial year.

With the support of lower subsidy payments and gains from high crude oil and gas prices, ONGC’s net profit for its fiscal second quarter ended September rose to Rs 8,642 crore, compared to Rs 5,389 crore in the previous financial year.
The net sales rose to Rs Rs 22,620 crore from Rs 18,190 in the previous financial year.
ONGC also made three new discoveries during the second quarter and one more in October'11 totaling to nine discoveries (five were made in the quarter ending in June, 11) so far in this fiscal. All these discoveries have been notified to DGH.
ONGC is required to partially subsidise crude oil sales to state-run refiners, which in turn sell fuel products at state-set, below-market prices.
The company holds 30 per cent stake in the Cairn-operated oil and gas fields in western India, also gave its nod for London-based miner Vedanta Resources' deal to buy a majority stake in Cairn India, subject to royalty payments being shared between the two partners.
It is expecting to get about Rs 1,900 crore on account of royalty recovery from Cairn India's Rajasthan blocks.
"The total recovery will be about Rs 2,500 crores. After tax, it should be about Rs 1,900 crores," ONGC Chairman Sudhir Vasudeva told reporters, adding this would be accounted for in the December quarter.