The Union Communications Minister Manoj Sinha on Tuesday said foreign direct investment in the telecom sector rose nearly five times in the last three years.

Speaking at a seminar here on FDI in the telecom sector, he said India is the second largest telecommunications market in the world with around 1.18 billion customers.

“FDI in the telecom sector has grown nearly five times over the last three years – from $1.3 billion in 2015-16 to $ 6.2 billion in 2017-18 and we look forward to continuous inflow of FDI in the sector,” Sinha said speaking at a seminar here on FDI in the telecom sector.

“In addition to domestic investments in the sector, FDI being an important component of economic growth can play an important role in the sector as it has been doing,” he added.

Speaking at the seminar, Aruna Sundararajan, Secretary, Department of Telecommunications, noted that foreign investment is necessary not only to supplement domestic capital, but also to secure scientific, technical and industrial knowledge.

(IANS)

The Dena Bank board on Monday approved the merger proposal with Bank of Baroda and Vijaya Bank proposed by the government last week.

The government last Monday announced the merger of three state-run banks — Dena Bank, Vijaya Bank and Bank of Baroda — that will make it the country’s third-largest bank with a combined business of Rs 14.82 lakh crore.

In a stock exchange filing, Dena Bank, the smallest of the three banks proposed to be merged, said the consolidation would enable creation of a bank with business scale comparable to global banks and capable of competing effectively in India and globally.

Dena Bank has a total business size of Rs 1.73 lakh crore and is also under the Prompt Corrective Action (PCA) framework of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on account of its high non-performing assets (NPAs), or bad loans, which for the Indian banking system as a whole have crossed the staggering level of Rs 10 lakh crore.

“To be more efficient in the changing environment, the banks in the public sector space need to be bigger to meet the credit needs of a growing economy, absorb shocks and have the capacity to raise resources without depending unduly on the exchequer.

“Consolidation would enable creation of a bank with business scale comparable to global banks and capable of competing effectively in India and globally,” the filing said.

“Amalgamation of our Bank with Bank of Baroda and Vijaya Bank would result in a strong amalgamated bank, equipped with financial cushion to deal with post-amalgamation requirements during the stabilisation phase.”

While making the merger proposal last week, Finance Minister Arun Jailtey said the consolidated entity’s capacity to absorb a weaker bank guided the decision “to propose this merger to the boards”.

The government said the amalgamated entity will have a net NPA ratio at 5.71 per cent, which is significantly better than the public sector banks’ (PSBs) average of 12.13 per cent, and declining further.

“The combined business of amalgamated entities would make it second-largest PSB of the country,” Dena Bank said.

This is the second such exercise in the last 18 months. In the previous mega merger, five associate banks and the Bharatiya Mahila Bank became part of the state-run State Bank of India on April 1, 2017, making the country’s largest lender among the world’s top 50 banks.

IANS

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley will meet the heads of public sector banks (PSBs) on Tuesday to review their performance and to take stock of the sector reeling under non-performing assets (NPAs) and scams.

“Finance Minister Arun Jaitley will chair the Annual Review Meeting of the CEOs of PSBs scheduled to be held on Tuesday in New Delhi,” the Finance Ministry said in a tweet.

The meeting comes in the backdrop of huge losses reported by many of the PSBs in the previous fiscal, various allegations of frauds and scams, identification of higher NPAs, credit related issues and government-induced consolidation.

Last week, the government proposed the merger of three state-run banks – Dena Bank, Vijaya Bank and the Bank of Baroda – into an amalgamated entity through Alternative Mechanism, set up to fast-track consolidation to create strong lenders.

“The meeting is likely to discuss the challenges facing the banks like NPAs and credit growth. Steps taken by banks to recover the bad loans will also be reviewed,” said an official adding that the meeting with banks will happen at Vigyan Bhawan here.

(IANS)

Software major Infosys said on Tuesday that Australian Military Bank (AMB) in Sydney went live digitally on the Finacle cloud platform of its subsidiary EdgeVerve Systems.

“Our Finacle cloud software has enabled AMB offer world class banking experience on digital platform, implemented on the software as a service (Saas) model in 10 months,” said the city-based IT firm in a statement here.

As Australia’s longest serving defence financial institution, AMB has been serving its defence personnel and their families since 1959.

“Our financial software product (Finacle) has enabled the bank gain operational benefits and cost efficiencies besides enhanced security and scalability,” said the statement.

The Finacle solution has replaced the bank’s legacy systems to keep pace with new technology developments and allow a speedy response to market demands.

“The solution also enables open application programming interfaces (APIs) that overcome limitations for the bank’s ability to work with ecosystem partners,” noted the statement.

The bank has been processing about 40,000 mixed transactions per day, with 22,000 card transactions and nearly 7,000 composite payments transactions on average per day on the digital platform.

The system has helped the bank make the origination process simpler and drive the creation of a pipeline of 61 million Australian dollar worth of loans during the first month of using the new software.

“The bank is able to onboard new members and open accounts, complete with transactions enabled, within minutes,” added the statement.

(IANS)

A former content moderator at Facebook has sued the company alleging that moderators who face mental trauma after reviewing distressing images on the platform are not being properly protected by the social networking giant.

“Ex-contractor Selena Scola has sued Facebook for allegedly ‘ignoring its duty’ to protect moderators who deal with mental trauma after seeing disturbing imagery.

“Rather than create a safe environment, it’s producing a ‘revolving door of contractors’ who are permanently scarred by what they’ve seen, Scola’s lawyer Korey Nelson said,” Engadget reported on Tuesday.

According to the lawsuit, moderators at the social media giant under contract are “bombarded” with thousands of videos, images and livestreamed broadcasts of child sexual abuse, rape, torture, bestiality, beheadings, suicide and murder.

The company has said it was “reviewing” the lawsuit and took moderator support “seriously” and pointed to its existing assistance, including “in house” psychological and wellness support.

“We are currently reviewing this claim. We recognise that this work can often be difficult. That is why we take the support of our content moderators incredibly seriously, starting with their training, the benefits they receive, and ensuring that every person reviewing Facebook content is offered psychological support and wellness resources,” Facebook was quoted as saying by Engadget.

The social networking giant has maintained that all of its content reviewers have access to mental health resources, including trained professionals onsite for both individual and group counselling and that they receive full health care benefits, according to The Guardian.

IANS

Terming data privacy and cyber security concerns as biggest barriers to digital transformation, almost half of Indian businesses say they will struggle to meet changing customer demands within five years, a survey by Dell Technologies revealed on Tuesday.

The other half of Indian businesses believe they will disrupt rather than be disrupted, said Dell Technologies’ “Digital Transformation Index” completed in collaboration with Intel.

“It’s an exciting time to be in business. However, only technology-centred organisations will reap the rewards offered by a digital business model, including the ability to monetise the data, identify actionable insights, move quickly and automate everything to delight customers,” said Rajesh Janey, President and MD – India Enterprise, Dell EMC.

Nearly 12 per cent of Indian businesses are digital leaders — 5 per cent more than the percentage of digital leaders in China, said the survey.

“A quarter (25 per cent) of Indian businesses fear their organisation will get left behind within five years while 38 per cent of business leaders are worried they’ll be left behind,” it added.

According to the research, 93 per cent of Indian businesses are facing major impediments to digital transformation.

The top five barriers to digital transformation are: data privacy and cybersecurity concerns, regulation or legislative changes, lack of the right in-house skill sets and expertise, information overload and weak digital governance and structure.

Dell Technologies and Intel surveyed business leaders from 42 countries and benchmarked 4,600 businesses for the survey.

IANS

In an effort to empower companies to derive more value from their data and deliver better customer experiences, Adobe, Microsoft and SAP have introduced the Open Data Initiative (ODI).

Announced at the “Microsoft Ignite” conference here late on Monday, the initiative will enhance data exchange between the applications and platforms offered by the three companies.

“Together with Adobe and SAP, we are taking a first, critical step to helping companies achieve a level of customer and business understanding that has never before been possible,” said Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella.

“Organisations everywhere have a massive opportunity to build AI-powered digital feedback loops for predictive power, automated workflows and, ultimately, improved business outcomes,” he added.

Companies around the world use software and services from Adobe, Microsoft and SAP to run product development, operations, finance, marketing, sales, human resources and more.

The core focus of the Open Data Initiative is to eliminate data silos and enable a single view of the customer, helping companies to better govern their data and support privacy and security initiatives.

“Adobe, Microsoft and SAP are partnering to reimagine the customer experience management category,” said Shantanu Narayen, CEO, Adobe.

“Together, we will give enterprises the ability to harness and action massive volumes of customer data to deliver personalised, real-time customer experiences at scale,” he added.

According to Bill McDermott, CEO of SAP, the three companies understand that the customer experience is no longer a sales management conversation.

With the open data initiative, we will help businesses run with a true single view of the customer,” said McDermott.

IANS

External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj met nine leaders from across the globe in a whirlwind of bilateral interactions and spoke at the Nelson Mandela Peace Summity.

She began her day on Monday by attending the high-level event on counter-narcotics convened by US President Donald Trump, where she was seated at the front row.

India is one of 129 countries that have signed the pledge drafted by Trump on commitment towards international fight against drugs.

Although it was not a formal meeting, she greeted Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina when she came to the UN, India’s Permanent Representative Syed Akbaruddin tweeted.

Sushma Swaraj met the Foreign Ministers of Australia, Spain, Ecuador, Colombia, Mongolia, Nepal, Morocco, Lichtenstein and Federica Mogherini, the European Union (EU) High Representative for Foreign Affairs.

The topics discussed during the meetings with the foreign ministers depended on the relations with those countries and ranged from strategic cooperation to trade and investment.

Meanwhile, Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale participated in the Special Meeting of the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA) — a 26-member forum for cooperation in promoting peace, security and stability in Asia.

Ruchi Ghanashyam, the Secretary (West), spoke at the Africa Adaptation Initiative High-Level Roundtable. The organisation aims at facilitating finance and cooperation for the continent’s development.

After Sushma Swaraj’s meeting with Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne, External Affairs Ministry spokesman Raveesh Kumar tweeted: “Strategic partnership gaining momentum!”

The two countries have been building up their strategic relations reinforced by the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue that includes the US and Japan.

Closer to home was the meeting with Nepal’s Foreign Minister Pradeep Kumar Gyawali, which “took stock of our bilateral relationship”, Kumar tweeted.

At the meeting with Ecuador Foreign Minister Jose Valencia Amores, there were “good discussion on ways to further consolidate bilateral relationship in the areas of trade, agriculture, pharma, IT and capacity building”, according to Kumar.

Also from Latin America, Colombia’s Foreign Minister, the discussions centred on cooperation on trade investment, pharma, mining, petroleum and capacity building, he tweeted.

With Spanish Foreign Minister Josep Borrell, Sushma Swaraj “explored ways to intensify ties in investment, renewable energy, water treatment, tourism and their contribution to our flagship initiatives”, according to Kumar.

Mogherini and Sushma Swaraj “discussed issues related to trade and investment and exchanged views on the regional and global issues,” Kumar said in a tweet.

He noted that India and the EU were bound by a “strategic partnership based on common values of democracy, freedom and rule of law.”

“Celebrating the 25th anniversary of our diplomatic relations” Sushma Swaraj and Lichtenstein Foreign Minister Aurelia Frick “exchanged views on enhancing bilateral relations in trade and investment, particularly through participation at Indian trade fairs and tourism,” Kumar tweeted.

On relations with Morocco, he noted that they stretched back to the time of Ibn Battuta, the 14th century explorer, and tweeted that Sushma Swaraj and “Morocco Foreign Minister, Nasser Bourita discussed strengthening cooperation in areas of commerce, pharma, cyber security, defence and culture”.

She also met with Mongolian Foreign Minister Damdin Tsogtbaatar.

The High-Level General Assembly session begins on Tuesday.

On the sidelines, she was to meet Fiji Prime Minister J.V. Bainimarama and the Foreign Ministers of Iraq, Cyprus, Moldova and Estonia.

Ians

Mumbai Slump in the financial stocks along with a weak rupee and high crude oil prices dragged the S&P BSE Sensex down 536 points on Monday and the NSE Nifty50 lost nearly 170 points to close below 11,000-mark — slipping into the red for the fifth consecutive session.

On the other hand, the rupee weakened during the day to trade around 72.59 (4.15 p.m) per US dollar against the previous close of 72.20 per greenback.

With all the major sectors contributing to the sell-off, top sectoral losers were banking, auto and finance.

At 3.30 p.m, the wider NSE Nifty50 provisionally closed at 10,974.90 points, lower 168.20 points or 1.51 per cent from the previous close of 11,143.10 points.

The BSE Sensex, which had opened at 36,924.72 points, provisionally closed at 36,305.02 points, lower 536.58 points or 1.46 per cent from the Friday’s close of 36,841.60 points.

The Sensex touched an intra-day high of 36,945.50 points and a low of 36,216.95 points.

(IANS)

DCM Dr. G Parameshwar announced that in next few days, the state government will launch free WiFi scheme in Bengaluru city. “It will be free of cost for the first six months and after six months the WiFi will be provided at a nominal charge.

Speaking at an event in Govindarajanagar of the city, he stated that after Delhi, Bengaluru will be the second city to offer free WiFi service to the residents. “Our idea is to take technology to the doorsteps of the people,” he said.

He also stated that the BBMP and the state government are considering the proposal of extending the White Tap roads across the city. “Potholes is one of the biggest problems in the city. We are trying to find a technological intervention to ensure quality, long lasting roads,” he said.

He also assured of a 200-bed hospital in the Govindarajanagara constituency where all the super specialty services will be provided under a single roof.

He also made it clear that there will not be any political crisis in the state. “Everything is a false hype. This government will last for five years,” he said.

PTI