Nik's Diary
The Indian market opened flat today, tracing the
marginally negative opening trades in the SGX nifty and the mixed opening
across major Asian bourses. The US markets ended the day lower on Monday after
showing a notable move to the upside last week. The weakness came following the
release of report from Institute for Supply Management showing a notable
slowdown in the pace of growth in the manufacturing sector which fell to 51.3
in March from 54.2 in February. The disappointing manufacturing report overshadowed
a separate report from the Commerce Department showing a notable rebound in
construction spending. Meanwhile, Indian markets rose on Monday despite weak
Asian cues and disappointing economic data. India's CAD widened to a record
high 6.7% of GDP in the 3QFY13, however, it failed to have any considerable
impact on investor sentiment. Investors also shrugged off disappointing
manufacturing PMI data after a knee-jerk reaction.
SC rejects the Novartis patent plea for Glivec
In a major blow to Swiss pharma giant
Novartis, the Supreme Court on Monday rejected its plea for a patent on cancer
drug Glivec, a verdict that is expected to pave the way for Indian firms to
provide affordable drugs to lakhs of cancer patients in the
country. Ending a seven-year legal battle by Novartis to have exclusive
right for manufacturing Glivec and to restrain Indian firms from making generic
medicines, the apex court while dismissing its plea held that there was no new
invention and no new substance used in the drug prescribed for treating blood,
skin and other types of cancer. Indian pharmaceutical companies had
opposed the claim of Novartis saying it is not entitled for the patent and
alleged that it is indulging in “ever-greening” of patent by simply changing
the composition of the ingredients of the drug. A Bench comprising
justices Aftab Alam and Ranjana Prakash Desai dismissed the claim of the Swiss
firm seeking exclusive rights for manufacturing the cancer drug. The Bench
held that ‘imatinib mesylate’ used in Glivec is a known substance and Novartis
can’t claim patent over the drug for using this chemical. It is stated
that a one-month dose of Glivec costs about `1.2 lakh, while generic drugs,
manufactured by Indian companies, cost about `8,000 for the same quantum. Thus,
the verdict is seen as a great boon for cancer patients in India. Justice
Aftab Alam, writing the judgment, noted that Novartis had filed an application
on July 17, 1998, for grant of a patent for imatinib mesylate in beta
crystalline form at the Chennai Patent Office. After the application was made
and before it was taken up, several amendments were introduced in the Indian
Patents Act, 1970, bringing about fundamental changes in the patent law of the
country, he noted. The Assistant Collector of Patents and Designs heard
all the parties in December 2005 and rejected its patent application of
Novartis. After this, Novartis filed two writ petitions in the Madras High
Court seeking a declaration that Section 3(d) of the Patent Act is
unconstitutional. However, the High Court dismissed them. The Intellectual
Property Appellate Board also dismissed Novartis plea challenging the Assistant
Collector’s orders. Source:
newindianexpress
L&T has bagged `5,689cr contract in
Rajasthan
Larsen & Toubro
(L&T) has bagged a complete engineering, procurement & construction
(EPC) order. The company, on Friday, announced that it had secured an order of
Rs. 5,689 crore from the Rajasthan Rajya Vidyut Utpadan Nigam for setting up a
2 x 660 MW supercritical thermal power project on a complete EPC basis. The
project has a stringent completion schedule of 42 months for Unit 1 and 45
months for Unit 2. The company’s manufacturing plant in Hazira has joint
ventures with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries to make supercritical boilers and turbines.
“The plant is very new, and it is premature to say what the break-even point
would be,” S.N. Roy, senior executive vice-president & member of the board
of L&T, told a press conference here. With the Rajasthan contract, L&T
now has orders for supply and installation of 26 supercritical steam generators
and steam turbine generators of 660 MW, 700 MW and 800 MW. The plant has a
capacity of around 5,000 MW per annum, and this can be expanded to 6,000
MW.
Increased
utilisation “But
we would be well off at a 60-65 per cent capacity utilisation at the plant,”
Mr. Roy said, adding that the current order would increase capacity utilisation
to 70-75 per cent. He said that L&T was doing up to 91 per cent of EPC
project in-house, with the rest coming from vendors. He added that there were 8
large orders likely to come up for bidding this year and that “we are starving
for orders and expect to get about 2 to 3 of them. There is no order likely to
come this quarter, and we can take up to 50 per cent more orders. Our order
book for power plants is at Rs. 25,000-26,000 crore and the mix is 30:70
between public and private sector. The Rajasthan order would change it to
50:50.” Source: thehindu
Coal India
misses FY2013 production target
PTI reported that Coal
India Limited has achieved an output of only 452.5 million tonnes for the just
concluded fiscal, missing the target of 464 million tonnes. CIL CMD Mr S
Narsing Rao said “We produced 452.5 million tonnes of coal in the last fiscal
while the off take was 465 million tonnes.” The Coal Ministry had earlier
said that CIL would miss the production target for the FY 2013 by 2 million
tonnes to 3 million tonnes. It had attributed the shortfall to workers strike
and other issues. The Coal ministry has set a production target of 482
million tonnes and off-take of 492 million tonnes for CIL for the current
fiscal. Source - PTI
DRL-
Launches Zenatane in US market
Hyderabad-based
pharmaceutical major Dr Reddy’s Laboratories (DRL) stated that it has launched
Zenatane in 20 mg and 40 mg in the US following its approval by the United
States Food & Drug Administration (USFDA). Zenatane, used for the
treatment of acne, is a therapeutically-equivalent generic version of Accutane
(Isotretinoin capsules USP) in the US market. The total value of the drug
sales in the US was approximately $309 million for the 12 month-ending January
2013, according to IMS Health. DRL’s Zenatane capsules will be available
in boxes of 30 (three prescription packs of 10 capsules). This comes just
weeks after Dr Reddy’s announced that it had launched Zoledronic Acid Injection
(4 mg/5 mL), a bioequivalent generic version of Zometa (zoledronic acid) 4 mg/5
ml injection in the US market March 4, 2013. Dr Reddy’s Zoledronic
Acid Injection 4 mg/5mL is available in a single use vial of concentrate. Source: Business Standard
Ranbaxy Labs
resumes the supply of Atrovastatin Tablets in the US markets
Drug major Ranbaxy
Laboratories on Monday said it has resumed the supply of Atorvastatin calcium
tablets, a cholesterol lowering drug, in the US market. "Ranbaxy
Pharmaceuticals Inc, the US subsidiary of Ranbaxy Laboratories Ltd, has resumed
the supply of Atorvastatin calcium tablets that includes 10 mg, 20 mg, 40 mg
and 80 mg dosage strengths to the US market," Ranbaxy Laboratories said in
a BSE filing. The company had stopped production of generic version of
cholesterol lowering drug Lipitor last year as it investigated the issue of
potential glass particles in certain lots of the drug. On November 9,
2012, Ranbaxy had informed customers of a voluntary recall of certain lots of
the company's 10mg, 20mg, and 40mg dosage strengths of atorvastatin tablets from
the US market. The lots of atorvastatin, packaged in bottles of 90 and 500
tablets, were recalled due to possible contamination with very small glass
particles similar to the size of a grain of sand (less than 1 mm in
size). Ranbaxy had launched generic atorvastatin in the US market in
December 2011, after the USFDA gave final approval to market its generic
version of Lipitor produced at Ohm Laboratories facility in New Brunswick, New
Jersey. The Gurgaon-headquartered firm supplies the generic version of Lipitor
to the US market from its two facilities -- NewBrunswick-based Ohm Laboratories
and Mohali plant in India. Shares of Ranbaxy Laboratories were trading at
Rs 450.35 apiece on the BSE in late afternoon trade, up 2.38 percent from their
previous close. Source: Zeenews
IVRCL
monetizes `2,200cr BOT projects to TRIL Roads
IVRCL
Ltd said on Friday it will sell its stakes in three road projects in Tamil Nadu
to TRIL Roads Pvt Ltd, a unit of steel-to-salt conglomerate Tata Group. The 154.83 km-long roads are build-operate-transfer
(BOT) projects with a total project cost of Rs. 2,200
crore, it said in a statement. IVRCL
has plans to sell three more assets out of 9 BOT projects within a span of six
months, it added. Shares of IVRCL
closed nearly 13 per cent higher at Rs. 21.75,
outperforming the Sensex which closed up 0.15 per cent. Source:
NDTV
KEC International wins orders
worth `914cr
KEC International, a RPG Group
company, has secured orders worth Rs 914 crore in transmission, power systems
and cable businesses from domestic and overseas markets. In the transmission
business, SAE Towers, KEC’s wholly owned subsidiary, has bagged orders worth Rs
73 crore from Canada. It has also secured orders for lattice towers and
hardware from Canada, the US, Brazil and Mexico, totalling Rs 115 crore. In
Indonesia, KEC has bagged a Rs 129-crore order from the state electricity
corporation for the design, supply and erection of a 150-kV transmission line.
In Saudi Arabia, it has got a similar contract worth Rs 196 crore for a 380-kV
transmission line. Power Grid Corporation has awarded a Rs 219-crore contract
to KEC for a 400-kV transmission line between Kurukshetra and Jalandhar and a
220-kV line from Jalandhar to Hamirpur. In addition, orders from existing
transmission projects total Rs 68 crore. In the power systems business, KEC has
secured a Rs 40-crore order for setting up a 765-kV gas insulated substation
(GIS) in Tamil Nadu from PowerGrid. This marks the company’s entry into the
765-kV GIS substation space, KEC said. In addition, KEC has got Rs 74 crore
worth orders for the supply of power and telecom cables. Source: thebusinessline
Comments
Post a Comment