Inc’s Grand H1 show: For the half year ended September 2007, interest coverage ratio for Corporate India, excluding banking sector, has gone up from 10.8 to 11.7 times.

India-born Vikram Pandit is Citigroup’s new CEO: India-born Vikram Pandit has been appointed the Chief Executive Officer of Citigroup, the world’s largest financial services organisation, with immediate effect.

Rise of Indo-US execs reflects a Rising India: The ascension of Indian-born leaders like Vikram Pandit, the new CEO of Citigroup Inc., tracks the economic rise of their home country, once seen by US business as a large market and a source of low-cost technology workers, now viewed as a business power that rivals the US in some industries.

Lancaster University honours Infosys chairman: Infosys Chairman Narayana Murthy has been conferred with an honorary Doctorate degree- a Doctor of Science – by Lancaster University in recognition of his lasting contribution to the fields of business and business education.

New generation of cars to be launched in India: A global consortium of top students, professors and experts in various engineering fields plan to use the rapidly growing Indian automotive market as a launch pad for a new generation of cars that could revolutionize the international automobile industry.

We will be better than US: A new nine-nation opinion poll has found that an increasing number of Indians believe their nation will be a major global power by 2020, trumping even the US.

GE puts India on centre stage: GE has drawn up plans to make India a global sourcing hub for all its core businesses and has decided to develop and manufacture products locally for global markets and partner in large-scale projects in areas such as energy, water, aviation and rail transport.

Gulf Finance to invest $10 bn in Panvel SEZ: Bahrain-based Islamic investment bank Gulf Finance House (GFH) has signed an agreement with the Maharashtra government to set up a $10 billion (Rs 40,000 crore) special economic zone (SEZ) in five years.

Reliance plans $24 bn investments in petrochemicals: Reliance Industries has planned to spend $24 billion (Rs94,500 crore) over the next ten years to set up petrochemicals projects in the Middle East.

Nanotechnology-the new frontier for Indian IT power: India is hoping nanotechnology could provide a new thrust to its booming economy and to become a world leader in a market expected to be worth one-trillion dollars by 2015.

Wipro wins award for best software testing tool: IT major Wipro Technologies has won the best practice award for software testing, set up by the US-based International Institute for Software Testing (IIST). Wipro is the largest third-party offshore testing service provider worldwide and has also set-up the first wireless fidelity (Wi-Fi) pre-certification and certification lab at its Bangalore campus.Wipro focuses to system integration biz: Wipro Ltd, India’s third largest software services company, is looking to earn nearly one-sixth of its global IT revenues by March 2009 from system integration (SI) business, or by providing hardware, software solutions and services.

285 US dealers sign up to sell Scorpio: 285 US dealers have signed up to sell the vehicle and are investing $178 million in setting up sales and service outlets.

Daimler, Munjals to tie up for CVs: German automaker Daimler Trucks has zeroed in on the Munjals of Hero Honda for a joint venture to make commercial vehicles in India. Volvo, Eicher set up CV venture: Sweden-based Volvo AB and Delhi-based Eicher Motors announced a joint venture in India, the fifth biggest commercial vehicles market in the world, which will take on leaders Tata Motors and Ashok Leyland by selling the full range.

3 Indian cos bid for Singapore power giant: Three domestic power companies – Reliance Energy, Tata Power and GMR Infrastructure – have submitted indicative bids to acquire Singapore-government owned Tuas Power that has a capacity of 2,670 Mw and accounts for 26.1 per cent of Singapore’s electricity generation.

Maruti to invest Rs 1,750-3,500 cr for R&D: Maruti Suzuki India will put up a research and development (R&D) facility in India at an investment of between 50-100 billion yen (Rs 1,750-3,500 crore) over the next three to five years on the lines of Suzuki’s R&D facility in Japan, in which there would be facilities for test drives among other things..Suzuki’s next global car to drive out from India: After identifying India as a global export hub, Japanese auto major Suzuki Motor Co is planning to roll out its next ‘world car´ from the country. According to sources, the car that is being targeted at the European market will be rolled from Maruti Suzuki India’s (MSI) facility at Manesar.

Manufacturing drives IIP up: According to the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) data released by the Government on Wednesday, the manufacturing sector saw an impressive growth rate of 13.3 per cent during the month as against 3.8 per cent during October 2006.

India whizzes past China in ‘creativity’ alley: India has whizzed past China in the “creativity” alley, with the country occupying 15th position on the list of nations with most advertising awards as against the world’s most populous nation’s 19th rank. While India got 39 advertising awards, China received 18.

IT firms increase academia interaction: Tata Consultancy Services, the country’s biggest software exporter, as well as Infosys Technologies, Satyam Computer and HCL are among the companies that are either already working with engineering colleges or are planning to collaborate with the academia to churn out professionals with the right skills.

US market better money-spinner for Indian cos: For the 11 Indian companies listed in both US and Indian bourses, the market capitalization gain on US bourses was more than $1 billion higher than that on the domestic bourses here over the past week.

M&A deal sizes to touch $80-billion: The spurt in mergers and acquisitions (M&A) activity being witnessed since the last couple of years, involving Indian companies, is expected to touch a combined deal size of $100 billion next year.

LSI plans to up R&D from India: US-based LSI Corporation, a silicon-to-systems provider, plans to enhance the research and development activities at its Indian R&D centres in Bangalore and Pune.

India tops in providing education loans: India occupied first place in the world in providing education loans, benefiting one million students till September this year, according to Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram.

India emerges Top 3 economy in the world: With an estimated intangible assets component of 74% (as proportion of TEV), India is just behind US (75%) and Switzerland (74%), according to Global Intangible Tracker 2007 (GIT), the most extensive global study ever on intangibles assets by the London-based Brand Finance Institute.

Mkt sees Sensex touching 25K-mark in 2 years: Market players feel the stock market would remain bullish and the BSE Sensex may top the 25,000-mark in the next two years, according to a survey conducted by Industry body FICCI.

India no.2 in AT Kearney FDI confidence index: India retains second place in the Index, a position it has held since displacing the United States in 2005. China and India continue to rank first and second in the 2007 Foreign Direct Investment Confidence Index, a regular survey of global executives conducted by management consulting firm AT Kearney.

Rs 1-lakh Tata car trendsetter: BusinessWeek: It is turning out to be a dream year for Indian conglomerate Tatas — BusinessWeek has termed its Rs one-lakh car as one of the trendsetters of 2007, while naming Ratan Tata among the world’s Most Important People of the year.

IBM sees India as its global hub: Betting big on India advantage, one of the world’s biggest IT Companies IBM has said that the country would become a hub of global delivery for the company, providing research software besides contributing significantly to its revenue.

Mico integrates Indian subsidiaries with global biz: Most of Mico plants in India will now be global hubs or lead plants for some of the products they make. The Jaipur plant of Mico which manufactures about 5 lakh units of distributor pumps every year will now be the lead plant for this product globally. For injectors, the Nashik plant will be the lead plant.

Nalco to invest Rs30,000 cr in Indonesia: State-run National Aluminium Company (Nalco) plans to invest Rs30,000 crore over the next five years to build a five lakh tonne smelter and a 1,500 MW captive coal-fired power plant in Indonesia to expand its overseas business.

Computer software exports increases by 29%: The total export of computer software and services during 2006-07 has gone up by 29.4 per cent at $11.26 billion, according to the estimates made by the Electronics and Computer Software Export Promotion Council (ESC).

ITC readies hi-tech supply solutions for paan shops: ITC is working on developing an application that will allow the owners of the small shops that typically sell cigarettes and confectionery, the so-called paan and kirana stores, to place orders through mobile phones.

B`lore evolving gen-next in-car audio systems: An i-pod that can interface with the car audio and a music system that can play songs through voice command are just some of the products being developed at the chip level in the city by global corporations

BioSpectrum product award goes to Biocon: Bangalore-based Biocon’s BIOMAb EGFR, a therapeutic monoclonal antibody-based drug for treating solid tumours of epithelial origin, has bagged BioSpectrum’s product of the year award. It is for treats cancers of the head and neck.

Satyam Computer opens centre of excellence in Japan: Satyam Computer Services has opened a centre of excellence in Japan, code-named Kanzen, to strengthen its presence in that country significantly.

Grover and Associates wins US award: Karan Grover and Associates (KGA) has been awarded the US Green Building Council’s Platinum Award for creating one of the world’s “greenest” interiors in the ABN Amro Bank branch at Ahmedabad. Vadodara-based KGA is the first architect firm in the world outside the United States to bag this award.

India retains top offshoring slot: Gartner India continues to be the undisputed leader in offshore services owing to government support, English language capabilities and low cost of doing business. India accounts for about 65-70 per cent of the global offshoring pie.