THE

WEEKLY
THE OPERATIONS CLUB NEWSLETTER

In This Issue:

National News 02

ISSUE Mergers & Acquisitions 06

Steel Industry Insights 07

22 - 29 Aug '20
International News 08

General News 10
Ease of investment: One-stop repository
of India’s land bank launched

In a move to make it easy for investors to identify sites for setting up

manufacturing units, commerce and industry minister Piyush Goyal on
Thursday launched a one-stop repository of the country’s land bank comprising
information on available and vacant plots, satellite view of terrain and heat maps
on the natural resources there.
The National GIS-enabled Land Bank system- a database of industrial areas
and clusters across states- has information on more than 3,300 industrial parks
across 31 states and UTs covering about 4.75 lakh hectare land.
Read more...

Government launches contest to

promote startups in small towns

The government has launched another contest “Chunauti”- Next Generation

Startup Challenge Contest on Friday to boost homegrown startups and software
products companies with special focus on firms from small towns of the country.
300 startups working in select areas will be identified and provided with a seed
fund of up to Rs 25,00,000 along with other support.
Read more...

The Weekly : 22 - 29 Aug '20 Page 02

 India's business climate has been
continuously improving

"India' s business climate has been continuously improving and the government will
work tirelessly to make India one of the easiest countries to invest and create
wealth", Niti Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant said. Kant also emphasised that Prime
Minister Narendra Modi's vision of ease of living for the citizens of India will be the
government's focus. His comments come a day after the World Bank announced
the decision to pause publication of its global 'Doing Business Report' due to
irregularities in reporting of data based on which countries were ranked with
regard to their business climate.
Read more...

Indian state refiners halt oil

imports from China

India is the world's third biggest oil consumer and importer and imports nearly 84%
of its oil needs. China does not export crude to India but Chinese firms
are major traders of the commodity globally. The new regulation, put in place
on July 23, comes after a border clash between India and China. Last week, Indian
state refiners decided to stop sending crude import tenders to Chinese trading firm
like CNOOC Ltd , Unipec and PetroChina, among others.
Read more...

The Weekly : 22 - 29 Aug '20 Page 03

Ample monsoon rains push India’s
summer crop plantings to record

After a spell of patchy rain in the last two weeks of July, India received rainfall in
August that was 24% above the average, a trend weather officials see as likely to
run until the end of the month
Read more...

Infosys launches Artificial Intelligence driven

solution to automate helpdesk operations

IT services major Infosys on Wednesday announced the launch of its AI-driven

'Cognitive Email Workbench' solution that gives enterprises the ability to
augment query management and scale their helpdesk operations. Infosys
leveraged its partnership with Blue Prism, a Robotic Process Automation (RPA)
provider and a strategic partner to develop the solution that promises to
significantly enhance productivity and customer satisfaction.
Read more...

The Weekly : 22- 29 Aug '20 Page 04

 Auto components major Motherson
expects demand to be normal by October

VC Sehgal, chairman of Motherson Sumi Systems Limited (MSSL), said while

recovery in demand in India after the lockdown has been weak compared with
markets in China, Korea and Japan, automakers across segments have restarted
operations and are growing on a sequential basis in the local market. “In Europe,
markets are stronger--they are at 65-70%-plus. US is also similar. In that sense,
India is a bit weaker. It is a mixed bag, but everybody is in a hurry to come back to
normal. That I think is a huge positive,” said Sehgal. “From October, things will
start to normalise.”
Read more...

India's natural gas demand rebounds,

reaches near pre-Covid level

Higher demand from fertilizer plants, refineries and power plants has helped
natural gas demand recover to almost pre-Covid levels with consumption in July
just 2% lower than last year. India consumed 5,333 million metric standard cubic
meters (MMSCM) of natural gas in July as against 5,433 MMSCM in the same
month last year, official data showed. This is a sharp recovery from June when the
consumption of 4,925 MMSCM was 9% lower than a year earlier.
Read more...

The Weekly : 22 - 29 Aug '20 Page 05

 Future Enterprises board meets to
seal Reliance Retail deal

The board of Future Enterprises will meet on Saturday to finalise the sale of the
group’s retail business to Reliance Retail. The all-cash deal will see the Mukesh
Ambani company take on Future Group’s debt and liabilities, and pick up a
minority stake in the latter’s FMCG arm. According to the terms of the deal,
valued at about Rs 29,000-30,000 crore, Future Group will merge five listed units
across grocery, apparel, supply chain and the consumer business into Future
Enterprises Ltd., which currently houses the group’s retail back-end
infrastructure.
Read more...

Urban Ladder buyout plan to

consolidate furniture e-tail

Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) may buy a 75-90% stake in Urban Ladder, according
to three people aware of the negotiations. The online furniture retailer was valued
at around ₹1,200 crore in 2018, which dropped to around ₹750 crore in 2019. The
startup has now agreed to a 66% cut in its valuation in the ongoing acquisition talks
with RIL, which will value it at around $30-40 million, the people said on condition
of anonymity.
Read more...

The Weekly : 22 - 29 Aug '20 Page 06

 JSW Group is combining distribution,
supply chains into a single integrated
initiative

The $12 billion JSW Group is combining its distribution and supply chain network
across the group's steel & cement businesses under an integrated retail initiative
called JSW One. The group is initially targeting revenues of Rs 2,300 crore
through JSW One in the first year of operations. JSW One will also combine the
Group’s expertise across product portfolio to provide comprehensive service
capability to its customers. JSW acquired Monnet Steel, a producer of TMT bars
used in construction activities.
Read more...

Surging demand for steel lifts prices

Domestic steel companies have increased prices by Rs 2,700-3,000 per tonne in

August — the third time since the start of the pandemic — as demand improves
and input costs remain high due to shortage of iron ore. The uptick is in line with
an increase in the international price of steel. While both primary and secondary
steel players increased benchmark prices of hot-rolled coils by Rs 700-750 per
tonne on an average from July 2020, for cold-rolled coils, prices have gone up by Rs
500-550 per tonne. A number of domestic user industries, including
infrastructure, are showing strong demand trends which have also led to the price
increase, the official said.
Read more...

The Weekly : 22 - 29 Aug '20 Page 07

 Walmart’s bid for
TikTok reveals retailer’s big digital
ambition

Walmart confirmed Thursday that it’s pursuing TikTok’s U.S. operations in a

partnership with Microsoft, but in a brief statement the company offered few
details about the bid or the nature of its involvement. That didn’t stop investors
from getting excited, sending Walmart’s shares up 4.5%, the biggest gain in seven
weeks.
Read more...

Corporations will assume burden of

safety, raising costs post-COVID

The coronavirus pandemic will profoundly affect the way corporates interact with
employees, customers, governments and one another, according to the latest
sector in-depth report by Moody's Investors Service. Supply-chain dependent
businesses will experience pronounced changes.
Read more...

The Weekly : 22 - 29 Aug '20 Page 08

Earth Overshoot Day:
A reminder that our demand outstrips
the planet’s ability to supply

Earth Overshoot Day is not just another day on the calendar. It is a reminder that
our collective demand on nature’s goods and services outstrips the planet’s ability
to continue supplying them. In terms of money, it is the equivalent of a deficit and
persisting with such behaviour would mean human beings would go ecologically
broke at some point.
Read more...

Oil falls 1% on sluggish coronavirus

recovery, supply concerns

Oil prices lost about 1% on Friday as the economic recovery worldwide runs into
stumbling blocks due to renewed coronavirus lockdowns and on worries about
rising crude supply. The euro zone's economic recovery from its deepest
downturn on record stalled this month as pent-up demand unleashed by the
easing of lockdowns in July dwindled, a survey showed.
Read more...

The Weekly : 22 - 29 Aug '20 Page 09

Sitharaman says 'Act of God' may
see economy contracting

The Goods and Services Tax (GST) revenue shortfall to states is estimated at
more than Rs 3 lakh crore in 2020-21, but only around 22 per cent of this can be
compensated through cess collections, the central government has estimated. Of
the Rs 3 lakh crore, Rs 1.5 lakh crore is the shortfall in the first four months of this
fiscal itself, showcasing the massive impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and the
subsequent lockdown on state finances. According to government estimates,
compensation cess collections in the current fiscal will be around Rs 65,000
crore, leaving a gap of Rs 2.35 lakh crore.
Read more...

Indian Railways' carbon emission will

be zero by 2030

Union Railway Minister Piyush Goyal on Wednesday (August 26) said that the
Indian Railways has set a target of reducing carbon emission to zero by the end of
2030. “Indian Railways transports nearly 8 billion passengers and 1.2 billion tonnes
of freight every year. Ours will be the world's first railways of this scale to go
green," Goyal tweeted.
Read more...

The Weekly : 22 - 29 Aug '20 Page 10