Cover Story

Delhi: Capital challenge
No doubt the city’s infrastructure is improving, but its satellite towns are still a mess and, worst of all, crime continues to be a serious problem.

Bhopal: A beautiful little boomtown
Below the radar of the national media, Bhopal is industrialising rapidly and emerging as an increasingly important manufacturing hub.
How we did it?
The rationale behind the survey has always been the same: to rate the top cities in terms of their business appeal. Broadly, we wanted to find out the quality of work life, the quality of social life and suitability for doing business.
Surat: Moolah city
Booming industries, a unique demographic make-up, the entrepreneurial skills of its populace, and a pot-pourri of cultures all contribute to make Surat the city with the highest average household income in the country.
Lucknow & Kanpur: Against all odds
Despite negative perceptions about law and order and poor infrastructure, two cities from Uttar Pradesh—Kanpur and Lucknow—rise buoyed by positive consumer and investor sentiment. Do they denote a glimmer of hope for the rest of UP?
Best cities for business
Infrastructure creation is doubtlessly being touted as the balm of salvation for our metropolises, but what if it becomes unviable to use those fancy expressways, viaducts, flyovers and suspension bridges?
Chennai: Can it cope?
India’s southern-most metro has been receiving lots of IT and auto industry investments.The big question: is the city capable of handling such explosive growth?
Bhubaneswar: Catching up with the big boys
A slew of big-ticket investments in Orissa is transforming its capital from a sleepy tourist town to a glitzy business destination.
Bangalore: Back at #2
Its infrastructure may be creaking at the seams, but a slew of recent improvements have ensured that India’s ‘Silicon Valley’ is back among the top cities.
Mumbai: The sun hasn't set, not yet
Mumbai might be the maximum city with most people surveyed voting for it as the best city to do business in, but it’s among the toughest cities to live in.

2008-09-07

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Editors note

From the editor

Though jobs are still the prime mover of people, for an increasing number of middle class Indians, the quality of life is becoming as important as the quality of work. And as life and work become more intertwined, businesses and people flock to cities that cater most appealingly to both.

People

Fresh challenge

Featuring Puravankara’s Jayakar Jerome, Motorola’s Sanjay Jha, Apollo Health’s Ratan Jalan, HCL’s Vineet Nayar, Satyam’s B. Ramalinga Raju and Economist C. Rangarajan.

Current

Capital boost

The Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) relaxed pricing norms for qualified institutional placements, making it easier for corporates to raise money.

In overdrive

M&M eyes more auto segments, and more markets. he company is likely to launch the Scorpio in the US through a Georgiabased distributor named Global Vehicles.

Rosy outlook

A Bangalore exporter of cut roses rides high on the Olympics.

Wholesale interest

After Walmart, it’s the turn of another global retailing giant to dip its toes into the domestic market. Tesco is the latest global retailing giant to announce India plans.

Mobile magic

Rather than developed markets, Google may find that its fortunes lie in emerging economies, where mobile phone sales are skyrocketing. India’s R&D and market will play a key role in Google’s next wave.

The science of growth

Call it the six-year-itch. Set up in 2002 by GVK scion G.V. Sanjay Reddy, GVK Biosciences is now talking leadership and on ways to get there quickly.

Creative itch

Multiplex owners want to start making films. After the Delhibased PVR Cinemas and the southbased Pyramid Saimira Group, it is the turn of the Mumbai-based Fame India Ltd (FIL) to foray into film production.

No-frills fitness

Snap Fitness wants to add a new dimension to health clubs in India. The CEO of Snap Fitness Peter Taunton is now looking to make inroads into the Indian market and hopes a combination of low costs and rapid expansion will make his chain competitive.

Cracking the whip

Rising inflation and interest rates have now started to hurt banks as well as borrowers in more ways than one. The country’s largest private sector bank, ICICI Bank, has now declared that it will stop financing two-wheeler loans through the dealer network.

Slowdown blues

The residential realty market is in the midst of a downturn. In spite of a steep rise in costs of inputs such as cement and steel, prices are significantly down from their highs.

Taking the plunge

Avesthagen may have got its IPO timing wrong as BSE Sensex (as on August 14) is down 30.6 per cent from its January 10 peak of 21,210 and most well-known stocks in biotech, pharma and IT are trading at well below their 52-week highs.

IPO muddle

With the left no longer in the equation, the government, perhaps, thought it was an opportune moment to push ahead with state-owned telecom major BSNL’s proposed $10-billion (Rs 43,000-crore) IPO plans.

More the merrier?

With TRAI’s proposals suggesting that the DoT permit MVNO services in India, the picture is getting slightly clearer. Grey areas, though, still remain.

Under the spot-light

With Futures trading under fire from various quarters in recent times for pushing up prices of essential commodities, Electronic spot exchanges are the flavour of the season.

Editorial

Invest more in sports

Abhinav Bindra merely touched the tip of the iceberg when he clinched the gold in the Men’s 10-metre air rifle event at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. But please note that his success did not come

Give TRAI more powers

The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) and the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), theoretically at least, are supposed to work in tandem to govern, improve and regulate telecom and allied services in the country.

Municipal mess

It’s a fairly common scene no matter what part of urban India you are in: it rains for a few hours and the city comes to a grinding halt. Waterlogged and potholed roads hold up traffic, backing up cars for miles.

Letters

Commitment is the key

The cover story, India@75— Prahalad’s Plan (BT, August 24), was a fitting tribute to those who believe in themselves, think differently and have leadership acumen.

Trends

The BT 50 index

Markets in decline

IT hiring in slow motion

After years of rapid hiring, the IT industry is finally being hit by the slowdown blues. With its main market, the US, grappling with a slowdown, and its focus market, financial services, in turmoil, companies across the board are going slow on recruitments.

Rates are rising; So?

The numbers are staring us in the face. RBI’s data for non-food bank credit for the 12-month period ending May 2008, clearly points to a holding back of personal consumption in view of rising interest rates.

3G is coming, sort of

If you catch a flight from India and head east for five or six hours, you will find yourself in countries where people do very strange things with their mobile devices.

Cars sales hit roadblock

A day after the society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM) released monthly sales and production figures, the country’s largest car maker, Maruti-Suzuki (MSIL), issued a release pointing out that some data was wrong.

India still incredible'

The slowdown in the west may be worrying economists silly. High inflation and terrorism in India may have our politicians in a flap. But guess which group isn’t bothered about any of this?

Entertainment goes mobile

Entertainment-themed websites are most popular with mobile Internet users in Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC), according to a global survey by The Nielsen Company.

Global mergers and acquisitions will push IFRS

Manfred Hannich, Global Head of Accounting Advisory Services, KPMG, was in India, to meet top companies on the adoption of the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) by April 1, 2011. He spoke to BT’s Suman Layak on the subject.

Instant tip

The fortnight’s burning question. Will the government seriously pursue disinvestments, now that the left has lost its veto?

Crude off the boil?

Falling crude prices will make life easier for oil marketing companies. This should come as a relief for oil marketing companies (OMCs) in India whose under-recoveries had been mounting exponentially.

Aaj Tak's dream run continues

Hindi news channel Aaj Tak, the TV Today Group's flagship news channel, underlined its status as India's most popular news channel by winning the Best Hindi News Channel Award at the NT Awards on August 14.

Just wondering ...

Purnendu Chatterjee’s battle with the West Bengal government to wrest control of the company is now being fought in the Supreme Court. In dispute is the majority shareholding in the company.

To be precise

“The growing importance of India, to the world and to Dow Jones and News Corporation, is obvious to all of us. What the world needs is a trusted means of measuring this country’s development, an index that can be used by investors around the world to track the progress of Indian companies and the Indian economy”Rupert Murdoch, Chairman, NewsCorp, to CNBC

The iPhone wannabes

The Apple iPhone 3G is coming on the Airtel and Vodafone networks soon. As the most hyped-up gadget on the planet arrives 'legally' on Indian stores, we take a look at some gadgets that get less media attention, but are, nonetheless equally capable as, and sometimes better than, the iPhone.

Numbers of note

$100 million (Rs 430 crore): The amount of money Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp plans to invest in India over the next year to start six regional television channels

Talebearer

The National Airline Corporation Of India (NACIL), formed after the merger of Air India with Indian Airlines, is bleeding and, we hear, things are going from bad to worse.

Economy watch

FDI inflows into India touched $19.56 billion (Rs 78,989 crore) in the first five months of 2008-09, 91 per cent more than in the corresponding period last year.

Gold glitters to deceive

After hitting a peak of $1,011.25 (Rs 40,472.50) per troy ounce in the international markets on March 17, gold prices have fallen about 20 per cent to $817.75 (Rs 34,345.50) on August 12.

Where have M&As, PE deals gone?

This is yet another trend reversal on Deal Street. After going through the roof for almost five years in a row, corporate India is showing signs of winding down on mergers and acquisitions (M&A) activity, according to a recent report by advisory firm Grant Thornton India.

Doha Round: Undead, but not quite alive

As efforts begin to salvage a deal from the Doha Round of WTO trade talks, experts say the first task is to break the deadlock around farm safeguards that were the stumbling block in the latest, unsuccessful round of negotiations in Geneva recently.

In debt we trust

Equity is passé and debt is back on the radars of investors. Following the sharp fall in share prices, investors are now focussing on protecting their capital. Result: fixed deposits (FDs) and fixed maturity plans (FMPs) floated by mutual funds are in demand.

Features

Meet anand.jain @ril.com

The inside story of how Ambani’s trusted lieutenant is attempting to make over a modest family business of plastics processing and textiles into an infrastructure Goliath.

The Piramal principle

Drugs, diagnostics, real estate, private equity and glass may seem a motley bunch of businesses, but it doesn’t matter how diverse your portfolio is if you can emerge top dog. And it’s leadership that Ajay Piramal is aiming for, reports S. Layak.

Sitting on a time bomb

Several leading NBFCs, all boasting impeccable pedigrees—CitiFinancial, SBI Cards, BoB Cards, Cholamandalam DBS Finance and GE Money—have extended unsecured loans to high-risk, non-salaried borrowers. They are now facing massive delinquencies. Can the problem spiral out of control like the subprime crisis in the US? A report by Anand Adhikari.

C-suite dynamics

There’s little literature on relationship dynamics between external CEOs and owners in family-owned companies. Now, an Amrop International study reveals that understanding and managing the “No Man’s Land”, the overlapping turfs of CEO and promoter, is key to professionalising this relationship. A report by Tejeesh N.S. Behl.

Slashing on the street

For most finance professionals, the days of dizzying salary hikes and fat bonuses are over. In fact, many have been retrenched. The downturn in markets—India and global—has forced a number of hitherto gung-ho financial services firms to wield the job axe. Rachna Monga reports.

Columns

Urban legends and boomtowns

Mumbai and Delhi— part of the 5 millionplus-population group of urban centres we term ‘megacities’—may be heavyhitting markets overall, but for marketers and investors looking for expansion, there is now provocative data that sheds light on how smaller cities are clocking record growth shifts.

Leadership Spotlight

A prescient patriarch

Munjal has always been a prescient reader of trends. As a young man, he, perhaps sensed, which way the wind was blowing and left his native place in West Punjab (now in Pakistan), thus, saving himself and his family from the horrors of Partition.

BT More

Namastey London

A Gorilla race, a feast by the river and the star-studded London Film Festival: London’s where it’s at this September and October.

Guide to work and play

From the laptop and the smart phone when at work to the latest in iPods, MP3 players and fitness gadgets when chilling out—this is the Road Warrior’s definitive guide to work and play.

The devotees gadget

Owning the latest gadgets has become a happy addiction with these men, all of whom are jet-setting executives.

Rebel with a cause

We met the owner of Hidesign, Dilip Kapur, for a chat to discover what turned an anti-war, anti-capitalist student who grew up in the protected environment of the Aurobindo Ashram, into a successful entrepreneur.

Cars of the future-III

The latest company to showcase a personal mobility device is Volkswagen, which has made concepts for the year 2028. Volkswagen has showcased the One, a threewheel vehicle with a host of advanced features.

The best chef's tables

Want to treat a few important guests to a meal they won’t forget? Book the chef’s table at these fabulous restaurants and get a special menu laid out for you.

Monster madness

As news reports reach us of a man escaping from the notorious Area 51 in the US with ‘proof’ that NASA does, indeed, possess an alien, we thought it was a good time to feature some alien invasion movies. Here’s something to quench your desire for little green men.

Jet set go

If you take a lot of long flights, then you’ll know the side effects—aching joints, lack of sleep and irregular sleeping and eating patterns. Sure, you know that drinking enough water and flexing your limbs from time to time will help ease the pain. But it’s not that simple. Here’s a lowdown on how to really stay fit before, during and after a long haul.

Nawabi repast

A seventh generation chef from Lucknow, Chef Irshad Ahmed Qureshi speaks about his culinary legacy... while he prepares one of his legendary biryanis for us.

Backpacking gadgets

Roughing it out on a holiday? We get the tech-savvy CEO of Backpackers Co., Yogen Shah, to tell you what to carry when you’re headed off to the wild.

From aircraft to golf gloves

The FootJoy glove factory in Laem Chabang industrial area, outside Pattaya, Thailand, employs over 1,500 people who put together 19 glove models in 16 different sizes. In all, 12 million gloves are made here each year.

The best buys

In a mood to spend a bit of money? Check out what’s hot this fortnight.

Marrying bordeaux with india

Snobs may shudder at the idea, but if Indian food can evolve, why can't we have something much more evolved than lassi or lager with it?

Sense and sensibility

The Volkswagen Jetta 1.6 is quintessentially German—unassuming to look at but brilliant to drive.

The white stripes

Shelve all other colours for now. As the rains recede and autumn advances, we take you through the paces on the colour white. Here’s how you should be wearing white this season if you wish to carry it off in style.

Top Mind

Speedo LZR

As Michael Phelps began his odyssey to become the greatest Olympian of all time, he was helped immeasurably by this new swimming costume from Speedo.

Buy your kids a Hamleys toy

It’s the world’s most famous toy retailer and was established by Cornish William Hamley in London in 1760. So, why are we talking about it? Reliance Retail has entered into an exclusive franchise arrangement with Hamleys to bring its toys to India.

Policy Watch

Wrangling over number portability

TRAI and DoT have crossed swords once again. This time, it’s over mobile number portability (MNP), which will allow consumers to retain the same number but switch operators.

Liberal norms for private PFs

The investment guidelines for private provident funds are being reworked. The revised norms are more liberal and allow a higher proportion of their corpus to be invested in stock markets and corporate debt.

Reprieve for exporters

There might be some cause for cheer for exporters. With the rupee depreciating steadily against the dollar in recent months, the government had declared that it was all set to withdraw the sops it had extended to exporters last year.

News Maker

Abhinav Bindra

Cash rewards are pouring in from everywhere for India's new shooting champion Abhinav Bindra, who struck gold for the country at the Beijing Olympics.

Noted

Mobilised: By India Inc., $22.3 billion in loans so far this year, 18 per cent more than what it had raised over the same period last year. Led by Tata Motors’ $3-billion loan for the Jaguar-Land Rover acquisition, the third-largest Indian loan on record, India Inc. raised $22.3 billion against $18.9 billion in the year ago period, says global consultancy firm Dealogic.

60 minutes

Lean is about a shared process: James P. Womack

As a research scientist at the MIT between 1975 and 1991, James P. Womack directed a series of comparative studies of world manufacturing practices. Impressed by Toyota’s ‘lean’ manufacturing system, he turned a lean evangelist in 1997. Since then, Womack has been propagating the lean religion. He spoke to BT’s R. Sridharan on the benefits and challenges of going lean.

Back of the Book

On a (merit) roll

In a country where quotas are ubiquitous, many students from poor households in Andhra Pradesh are getting their share of the higher-education pie purely on merit basis—thanks to a unique programme that aims to "poverty-proof" them. A report by E. Kumar Sharma. Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas: Schools of hope

Book

The food divide

An impassioned, but one-sided, harangue on what’s wrong with the food system.

In This Issue

The Singur conundrum

This picturesque town in West Bengal's Hooghly district has long turned into political hot potato over Tata’s land acquisition. Kushan Mitra tells the villagers’ side of the story.

Managing multiple bosses

In today's global offices, managers are reporting to as many as four bosses, each with conflicting priorities and impossible deadlines. As a result, navigating between numerous reporting points can be trying, but there is a way out of this complex work matrix. A report by Tejaswi Shekhawat.

Jobs

Wanted: Fund managers and analysts

New jobs emerge as private players step in to manage pension funds.

Money

The gems in the corner

As a slowdown looms, it’s time to look at niche companies that are insulated from the downturn.

Rise of the silver brigade

Prices of precious metals such as silver and platinum have kept pace with gold. Should you invest in them?

Fitted to your choice

Tailor-made structured products provide capital protection and add the kicker of equity-like returns to your portfolio. Their design might look complicated, but they are not.

One up on Bond Street

Rising interest rates have made debt more attractive as an investment option. But where are the best opportunities available now?

Printed Circuit

A nice little machine

Good things come in small packages—HP has gone and proven that. HP Mininote 2133 slots in comfortably between a high-end mobile phone and a full-fledged computer.

Treadmill

Five things that affect memory

Ageing alone does not affect memory. Read on to find out what else can harm it.

The four cardinal sins of working out

If you’ve been regular at the gym for four weeks in a row and are failing to see any major results, you may be falling prey to one of the following common mistakes.

Cover Story

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