The document provides a summary of various business and economic news headlines from India. Some of the key stories include LinkedIn acquiring SlideShare for $118.7 million, an Indian IPO failing with only 23% subscription, and industrial output in India plunging 3.5% in March. The Reserve Bank also announced new measures to support the struggling rupee, including requiring exporters to sell half their foreign currency holdings.

1. Top Headlines
 Largest Indian IPO In 18 Months Fails To Sail Through
 LinkedIn Buying Slide Share for $118.7M
 OrangeScape Raises $1M Angel Funding From IAN
 Anchor investors step up selling in MCX shares
 LIC HFL Asset Management Co Raises $47M For Maiden PE
Fund
 Cleantech Firm ProKlean Raises Rs 2.5Cr From Chennai
Angels, Others
 Parag Milk looking to raise $28M; To close deal in a month
 Warburg Pincus sells bulk of 33% stake in Moser Baer at
huge loss.
 Panasonic acquires 76.2% stake in Bangalore-based
Firepro
 UK’s OCS acquires Radiant Hospitality for $5.63M
Weekly Economic Review
One of the most controversial tax proposals in recent times has finally
been postponed. On Monday, finance minister Pranab Mukherjee told
Parliament his government would delay the rollout of the general anti-
avoidance rules or GAAR. Mukherjee said the delay would help both
taxpayers and authorities address issues arising out of the proposal.
Crucially, he added that the burden of proving tax evasion would now lie
with tax authorities rather than investors. Meanwhile some companies
that have invested directly in India have good reason to be scared. On
Tuesday, Pranab Mukherjee said the government could still tax overseas
deals that make capital gains by selling Indian assets. On cue, tax
authorities announced the next day that it would make a fresh claim on
Vodafone. That will include Rs7,900 crore in basic tax, and also a
penalty and interest of Rs4,300 crore. The government plans to send
Vodafone a notice once the Finance Bill 2012 gets passed.
1

2. And switching to other developments, the Reserve Bank is pulling all
stops in its efforts to defend India’s battered currency. On Thursday it
laid out new measures that could help shore up the rupee. Most
significantly, it told exporters they would have to sell half of their
foreign currency holdings. The move is expected to infuse at least $2.5
billion into the market. RBI also allowed banks to take intraday
currency trading positions up to five times their overnight limit. Until
Thursday’s announcement, banks were not allowed to take intra-day
positions greater than their overnight limit. RBI is hoping the move will
dampen rupee volatility. But the currency continues to get battered. The
rupee ended Friday at 53.64 to the dollar.
And while the rupee may be falling, it may not be enough to boost
exports. Indeed, on Thursday, commerce secretary Rahul Khullar
warned that export growth may plunge to 10 to 15% this fiscal, from the
previous 21% growth. He also released trade figures for April.
According to them, India’s exports for the month went up just 3.2% to
$24.5 billion. Imports meanwhile fell 3.8% to $37.9 billion. That meant a
trade deficit of $13.4 billion for the month
The disappointments for India’s economy don’t end there. The country’s
industrial output has also plunged. The Index of Industrial Production
for March actually contracted 3.5% In February it grew 4.1%. The latest
decline in the volatile IIP index came largely because of capital goods.
They dropped 21.3% in March.
And moving to corporate news, India’s biggest company has effectively
downgraded the value of one of its most important businesses. On
Monday, Reliance Industries slashed the value of its proven gas
reserves. It cut its estimate by 6.63% of proven reserves at the
beginning of the last fiscal. That amounts to a reduction of 0.43 trillion
cubic feet.
While RIL hasn’t mentioned any particular fields that have been
affected, its management has indicated that this is largely because of
falling production at the once-lucrative KG D6 gas block. RIL’s estimate
comes even as it repeatedly clashed with the government over the costs
of developing fields and the selling price for gas.
2

3. Inside The Story
Largest Indian IPO In 18 Months Fails To Sail Through
The initial public offering (IPO) of Samvardhana Motherson Finance Ltd,
the holding company of the automotive component manufacturing
group Samvardhana Motherson, has failed to sail through and has been
subscribed just 23 per cent or less than a quarter, according to stock
exchange data. This may come as a major downer for the primary
market in the country and put a question mark over the prospects of
large-sized IPOs.The company has now withdrawn its IPO due to the
poor response, according to a statement issued.
LinkedIn Buying Slide Share for $118.7M
World’s largest professional networking site LinkedIn is acquiring the
presentation sharing platform SlideShare, co-founded by persons of
Indian origin, for $118.75 million in a stock-cum-cash deal. This
includes 45 per cent or around $53.4 million to be paid in cash and the
rest through LinkedIn shares.At the current market price, it would
translate into holding around 0.5 per cent for SlideShare equity
owners.The acquisition is expected to close during Q2, 2012 or within
the next eight weeks.Rashmi Sinha, CEO of SlideShare, said, “We built
SlideShare to help professionals share presentations and connect people
through the content. What we can build with LinkedIn is the most
natural extension of this vision.”
OrangeScape Raises $1M Angel Funding From IAN
Chennai-headquartered OrangeScape, a cross-Cloud PaaS (Platform-as-
a-service) provider, has raised $1 million from the Indian Angel
Network. The capital raised will be largely used for business and
product development. As part of the deal, Sharad Sharma of IAN has
joined OrangeScape’s board of directors.The company builds business
applications using a visual-style modelling interface in a 5GL
environment. This is done through the OrangeScape Studio on browser.
Applications developed using the OrangeScape platform can be
3

4. Deployed on various Cloud platforms (such as Google App Engine,
Microsoft Azure, IBM Smart Cloud and Amazon EC2) and claim to
provide scalability, administration and monitoring capabilities for a cost
that suits you the most.
Anchor investors step up selling in MCX shares
Barely two months after Multi Commodity Exchange (MCX) turned the
darling of the stock markets post-listing on the Bombay Stock Exchange
(BSE) in March, have anchor investors hit the sell button, ask stock
brokers.As a consequence, the share price of the Rs 660-crore initial
public offering (IPO) is now trading below its issue price of Rs 1,032.
The MCX scrip is down over 20 per cent in over a month and was traded
at Rs 1,009 last Friday. MCX was an offer for sale by promoters,
including Financial Technologies, State Bank of India, GLG Financials
Fund, Alexandra Mauritius Limited, Corporation Bank, ICICI Lombard
General Insurance Company and Bank of Baroda.
LIC HFL Asset Management Co Raises $47M For Maiden PE
Fund
LIC HFL Asset Management Company, the asset management arm of LIC
Housing Finance Ltd, has raised Rs 250 crore (approx. $47 million) for
its first private equity fund – a dedicated urban development fund –
according to a senior executive of the company.VK Sharma, director and
chief executive of LIC Housing Finance Ltd, said, “The fund has managed
to raise Rs 250 crore as of now and we are looking at deals. We will go
out and invest at one go once we have blocked four-five deals.”LIC
Housing Finance Ltd is the 50 per cent partner in this private equity
fund, along with its parent company Life Insurance Corporation of India.
The fund was looking to invest Rs 200 crore by the end of the fourth
quarter of FY2012.
4

5. Cleantech Firm ProKlean Raises Rs 2.5Cr From Chennai
Angels, Others
Chennai-based ProKlean Technologies Pvt Ltd, which develops clean
technology products for various industries, has raised Rs 2.5 crore in
angel funding. The money has been raised from Chennai Angels, an IIM
alumni group and a strategic American investor for a minority
stake.ProKlean develops chemical-free, bio-degradable formulations,
used across tanneries, textile firms and hospitality industry. The funding
will be used to expand manufacturing facilities, increase sales &
marketing reach and also for product R&D.Investors from Chennai
Angels included Lakshmi Narayanan (Cognizant), Prabhakar Ram
(NextGen), Rajeev Mecheri (Mecheri Capital), Gopal Srinivasan (TVS
Capital) and Sameer Mehta (Atlas). Besides Mehta from Chennai Angels,
Sunil Nikhar (founder of Pyxis Systems) also joined the board of
ProKlean as a representative of the IIM alumni group.
Parag Milk looking to raise $28M; To close deal in a month
Pune-based Parag Milk Foods Pvt Ltd (formerly Parag Milk & Milk
Products) is in talks with mid-market private equity investors to raise
Rs 150 crore ($28.3 million), after its initial round of discussions with
top global PE firms fell apart due to valuation disconnect, sources close
to the negotiations have said.In its second round of fundraising, the
company is looking to raise capital to fund its expansion and set up new
facilities.A deal with top tier PE investors failed to materialise as the
company was seeking a valuation benchmarked to FMCG firms, said one
of the sources privy to the developments. “Unlike other consumer
businesses, the dairy business runs on thin margins and investors were
not comfortable with the valuations,” he added.
Panasonic acquires 76.2% stake in Bangalore-based
Firepro
Panasonic Corporation is acquiring 76.2 per cent stake in AIG and
Standard Chartered PE-backed Firepro Systems Pvt Ltd, the company
has said in a release on Friday. Although Panasonic did not disclose the
5

6. financials of the transaction, sources with knowledge of the deal said
that it could be upwards of $200 million or Rs 1,066 crore.Panasonic
will acquire a portion of Firepro's ordinary shares, previously owned by
investment companies. Following the acquisition, it will hold 76.2 per
cent in Firepro while Firepro’s management will continue to own 10.8
per cent stake and the investment companies will have 13 per cent
stake.
UK’s OCS acquires Radiant Hospitality for $5.63M
UK’s OCS Systems has acquired Mumbai-based Radiant Hospitality
Services Pvt Ltd, a facility management services company, for Rs 30-35
crore. This is the second such transaction by the company in one month
after it acquired a controlling stake in Absotherm Facility Management
Services Pvt Ltd. The company would follow a string-of-pearl strategy to
expand its offerings in India by acquiring another 3-5 companies, people
with direct knowledge of the company’s plans said.“The company has
been acquired for around Rs 30-35 crore,” said one of the persons with
direct knowledge of the deal.
6