Business

New Delhi, Sep 16 (IANS) Siemens Digital Industries Software on Friday announced it has appointment Mathew Thomas as Country Manager and Managing Director for its India operations.

Thomas succeeds Suprakash Chaudhuri with immediately effect, the company said in a statement.

"His strong experience in business will help Siemens continue to develop solid relationships with our customers in the region, assist them in making the switch to a software-driven manufacturing strategy and open up fresh prospects for the market," said Bas Kuper, SVP and MD Asia Pacific, Siemens Digital Industries Software.

Thomas earlier served as head of sales for software and hardware business for four years.

"I look forward to helping strengthen our client and ecosystem relationships in India that support our growth ambitions in this region," he said.

Prior to joining Siemens Digital Industries Software, Mathew worked at Ernst & Young (EY) where he was part of the digital and technology advisory leadership team and helped grow the technology Business in the country.

He has also worked with companies like SAP, Oracle, Wipro, Tata and Godrej.

--IANS
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New Delhi, Sep 16 (IANS) Domestic air traffic in August recorded a strong growth as nearly 1.01 crore passengers travelled during the month in the country as against 67.01 lakh in the same period last year, said the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) on Friday.

As per the latest data released by the aviation regulator, domestic airlines during the first eight months this year carried 770.70 lakh passengers as against 460.45 lakh during the corresponding period of previous year thereby registering an annual growth of 67.38 per cent and monthly growth of 50.96 per cent.

The passenger load factor or occupancy of the airlines remained on the higher side in the range of 70 to 80 per cent. Newly launched Akasa Air marked the occupancy of 52.9 per cent during August.

SpiceJet recorded the highest occupancy of 84.6 per cent while Indigo witnessed 78.3 per cent of passenger load factor. Air India had 73.6 per cent and GoFirst had 81.6 per cent of occupancy during the month.

Industry sources said that the downward trend in the Covid cases in the last couple of weeks have resulted in the restoration of normalcy in the aviation traffic.

Recently, the aviation regulator announced the removal of lower and upper limits on airfares in the country. It was done after discussions on removing the fare bands for domestic airfares among the stakeholders, including the government authorities and airlines. Carriers were of the view that the removal of the pricing caps was required for the full-fledged recovery of domestic air traffic.

--IANS
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Mumbai, Sep 16 (IANS) Actress Genelia Deshmukh went down memory lane and shared one of her old advertisements in which she is seen alongside megastar Amitabh Bachchan.

The pen advertisement takes us back in time and shows Genelia as a student, who is fascinated by Big B and asks for an autograph.

Genelia said: "I stumbled upon this ad and couldn't help sharing it. This was special to me as I was actually a fan of Amitabh Sir and I mean who isn't, right? Anyway working with him was so fun as he is the most natural of actors and makes you feel comfortable at another level altogether."

On the acting front, the actress will next be seen in 'Mister Mummy'. It also stars her husband Riteish Deshmukh.

--IANS
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Mumbai, Sep 16 (IANS) The Monetary Policy Committee in the September credit policy is likely to increase the repo rate by 50 basis points to 5.90 per cent and will keep stance unchanged, according to a report by Morgan Stanley.

"We were earlier expecting a 35bp increase,however, sticky inflation and continued hawkish stance of DM central banks, warrants continued front loading of rate hikes, in our view," the report said.

The inflation which is ranging above the upper tolerance band of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) for the eighth straight and therefore Morgan Stanley too expect inflation to remain sticky around 7.1-7.4 per cent in September as well, driven by increases in food prices as per high frequency food price trend.

Thereafter, we expect the trend to moderate but remain above 6 per cent until January/Februaru 2023. Risks to the inflation outlook are skewed to the upside due to uncertainty around food inflation trajectory (sowing for rice, pulses is lower YoY), changes in global commodity prices and possibility of imported inflation if exchange rate weakens amid dollar strength, the report added.

Going forward, the key to track in the policy will be: (a) changes to growth or inflation forecast. While incoming inflation data is along expected lines,growth for QE Jun was a tad below our expectations (even RBI's projections), (b) comments around comfort on external balance sheet in the context of external risks and (c) overall tone of the policy statement and path on real rate normalization.

The RBI has lifted the repo rate by 140 basis points and surplus liquidity has fallen significantly (now $19.1 billion from $89 billion in January 2022), pushing the weighted average call rate to 5 per cent from 3.5 per cent in April.

However, the normalization in real rates has been less stark, with real policy rates at -1.6 per cent currently vs. -3.8 per cent in April. The external environment remains challenging, with generally higher commodity prices vs. pre-pandemic, stronger dollar and continued hawkish response from DM central banks. While domestic macro fundamentals are strong, risks from continued elevated commodity prices need to be tracked.

Against this backdrop, we expect monetary policy normalization to continue, pegging the terminal repo rate at 6.5 per cent by February 2023. Risks seem skewed to the upside for the terminal repo rate driven by external factors, which could potentially keep inflation higher for longer.

--IANS
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New Delhi, Sep 16 (IANS) Samsung India on Friday kicked off the seventh edition of its pan-India campus programme -- Samsung E.D.G.E -- inviting students from the top colleges of the country to work on real-life problem statements.

The company said it will also let them interact with Samsung's top leaders and provide unique solutions to the problem statement at hand.

"At Samsung, innovation is at the heart of everything we do. Over the years, Samsung E.D.G.E. has proved to be an enabler wherein students have the platform to showcase their creative solutions to real life problems," Ken Kang, President and CEO, Samsung SWA, said in a statement.

"As we enter the seventh edition of the program, we are confident that the young talent participating in the program will bring in even more insightful solutions and display their problem-solving skills," Kang added.

This year, students from 27 campuses that include top B-Schools, engineering colleges and design schools will participate in the event, which will be held physically at campuses spread across the country.

The programme consists of three rounds. The first round, which is the campus round, is about ideation, where the team members come together and put up an executive case summary based on their research and analysis.

The top teams that are shortlisted in campus round work on a case study, submit and present their detailed solutions at the regional round.

At the end of the regional round, top 8 teams are selected and mentored by Samsung leaders on their respective solutions. The final eight teams battle it out in the National Round to arrive at the three winning teams.

--IANS
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Chennai, Sep 15 (IANS) The shares of two Tata group companies have been on the upswing, touching new highs at the bourses.

The two are non-banking finance company Tata Investment Corporation Ltd and material handling equipment manufacturer TRF Ltd.

Tata Investment is an investment company promoted by Tata Sons and other group companies.

During the first week of June, the Tata Investment scrip was in the Rs 1,340-Rs 1,470 band and on the upward route. And on Thursday, the scrip closed at Rs 2,886.50.

For the first quarter of FY23, the company, on a revenue of Rs 126.30 crore, had posted a net profit of Rs 108.69 crore.

The company invests in equities, mutual funds, debentures, and bonds.

Replying to a query from the BSE on the scrip's price, Tata Investment on Thursday said: "In connection with your mail L/SURV/ONL/PV/KS/ 2022-2023/2653 dated 14th September, 2022, we would like to inform you that to the best of the information available with Management; we do not have any information/announcements to share with the Stock Exchanges under Regulation 30 of the SEBI (Listing Obligations & Disclosure Requirements) which have a bearing on the price/volume behaviour of our scrip traded."

But what is interesting is the upward movement of the other Tata company - TRF's scrip.

On July 25, the TRF share closed at Rs 124.35 and the 52 week low price was Rs 108.

But on Thursday, it hit the upper price band circuit at Rs 267.35 after its previous close of Rs 243.05.

In August, credit rating agency CARE Rating revised its outlook on the long-term rating of TRF from 'Negative' to 'Stable' on account of reduction in outside liability through the support of funds received from the parent Tata Steel.

"Furthermore, the company has recorded continuous declinein cash losses over the past two years and CARE envisages that the company is likely to turn marginally cash positive in FY23, largely on the back of order-book execution for TSL (Tata Steel)," the agency said in its report.

According to CARE Rating, 75 per cent of the order book of TRF is from Tata Steel. Additionally, the parent supports TRF by infusing funds in the form of inter-corporate deposits and unsecured loans in case of any liquidity mismatch.

"As on July 1, 2022, TRF has a total outstanding order book of Rs 363 crore with about 25 per cent of the order from the external parties," CARE Ratings said.

"As on March 31, 2022, capital structure of the company remains weak owing to the negative net worth base. The company has been reporting losses for the past three which led to the deterioration of net worth," CARE Ratings said.

Steel major and group company Tata Steel Ltd holds 34.11 per cent stake in TRF.

--IANS
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Chennai, Sep 15 (IANS) Two-wheeler-maker Eicher Motors Ltd on Thursday joined the Rs 1 trillion market capitalisation club during the intra-day trade.

The shares of Eicher Motors - that rolls out the 350cc Bullet and other brands of higher capacity bikes - on Thursday opened at Rs 3,541.30, touched a high of Rs 3,670.90, and closed at Rs.3,622.50.

While the scrip touched a market capitalisation of Rs.1 trillion intra-day, market capitalisation at the close of trading hours was about Rs 99,059 crore.

Eicher Motors also holds majority stakes in the commercial vehicle joint venture with Volvo - VE Commercial Vehicles.

In the two-wheeler segment, Eicher Motors has been on the upswing with sales going up.

Between April-August 2022, the company has sold 312,872 units, up from 213,538 units sold during the comparable period last year.

While the 350cc models account for the majority of the sales numbers, the sales of over 350cc bikes are growing at a faster clip.

For the first quarter of the current fiscal the company has logged revenue of Rs 3,247.94 crore and a net profit of Rs 580.17 crore.

--IANS
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San Francisco, Sep 15 (IANS) Software major Adobe on Thursday announced it would acquire design software company Figma for about $20 billion in a cash and stock deal.

Founded by Dylan Field and Evan Wallace in 2012, Figma pioneered product design on the web.A

The combination of Adobe and Figma will usher in a new era of collaborative creativity.

"Adobe's greatness has been rooted in our ability to create new categories and deliver cutting-edge technologies through organic innovation and inorganic acquisitions," said Shantanu Narayen, Chairman and CEO, Adobe.

"The combination of Adobe and Figma is transformational and will accelerate our vision for collaborative creativity," he added.

Figma has a total addressable market of $16.5 billion by 2025.

The company is expected to add approximately $200 million in net new ARR this year, surpassing $400 million in total ARR exiting 2022.

"With Adobe's amazing innovation and expertise, especially in 3D, video, vector, imaging and fonts, we can further reimagine end-to-end product design in the browser, while building new tools and spaces to empower customers to design products faster and more easily," said Dylan Field, co-founder and CEO, Figma.

--IANS
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New Delhi, Sep 15 (IANS) Edtech major BYJU's is set to pay the remaining amount of nearly Rs 2,000 crore to VC firm Blackstone in the $1 billion acquisition of Aakash Educational Services on September 23.

According to BYJU's financial report FY21, "as per the terms of the agreement for acquisition of Aakash Educational Services, consideration to the extent of Rs 1,983 crore was due to be paid by the company to the sellers in June, 2022. This has been deferred to September 23, 2022".

Blackstone has nearly 38 per cent stake in Aakash and BYJU's has paid nearly 75 per cent of the Aakash acquisition amount.

Meanwhile, BYJU's is likely to raise over $500 million (nearly Rs 3,900 crore) at a valuation of around $23 billion soon, and the funds may be utilised to pay the remaining amount in the Aakash deal.

In its FY21, BYJU's registered Rs 2,428 crore as revenue over a massive loss of Rs 4,500 crore.

According to the company, the rationalised growth between FY21 and FY20 is a result of the changes made in the way BYJU'S recognises its revenue, "as advised by its auditors".

According to legal experts, If BYJU's does not pay Aakash by September 23, the edtech major will need to knock at the Reserve Bank of India's (RBI) doors for completing the transaction.

BYJU's did not comment on the development.

Last month, BYJU's said it had closed the $1 billion acquisition of offline test preparatory services provider Aakash, one of the largest deals in the edtech space.

The company had said in a statement that its payments to Aakash are "closed".

--IANS
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San Francisco, Sep 15 (IANS) Tech giant Microsoft has created a sample app for teams that allow people to sign documents during remote meetings.

According to Windows Central, the application lets users add a document to a meeting for attendees to sign, such as a purchase agreement, invoice, or NDA.

The sample app was made by Teams Ecosystem Engineering as a proof of concept aimed at independent software vendors (ISVs) or other customers implementing it.

The entire project is available and documented on GitHub, which should help organisations that would like to use it within meetings, the report said.

The app allows users to add a document to a meeting to be reviewed or signed by attendees. It supports Teams single-sign-on (SSO) for authentication.

The report mentioned that it also supports sharing content during a meeting stage, adaptive cards, and the Teams people picker.

Microsoft noted that the app could be adapted to work with other scenarios that require signing off, such as reviewing and approving code or working together on a document.

The sample app is currently available for desktop clients of Teams. Mobile and web support is on the way, though Microsoft did not specify when in its Tech Community post announcing the feature, the report said.

Currently, the app only works with users from the same organisation or tenant. Guest and anonymous user support are also on the way, it added.

--IANS
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