SCI sale: Govt may invite bids from four companies

MUMBAI: Vedanta Resources, Safe Sea Services, JM Baxi and Megha Engineering are among firms that are likely to be asked to place bids for the strategic disinvestment of state-run Shipping Corp. of India (SCI) by nextmonth,sourcesrevealedrecently.

The Government is expecting an equity value of about Rs. 6,000 crore from the strategic sale, which will see managementcontroltransferredtothewinningbidder.

As part of its strategic disinvestment plan, the Government will transfer its entire shareholding of 63.75% in SCI, along with management control, to a private entity. TheremainingequityoftheBSE-listedcompanyisheldby the public. The company’s disinvestment process gained paceafteritcompletedthedemergerofitsnon-coreassets intoaunit.

SCI’s South Mumbai headquarters Shipping House, a training institute in Powai and some other properties will not be sold but instead, be transferred to the demerged Shipping Corp. of India Land and Assets Ltd.

These assets will be dealt with later after the disinvestment of the shipping business. The unit will also be listed. The Government, which intends to complete the sale within the first half of this financial year, has set itself a disinvestment target of Rs. 51,000 crore for 2023-24.

Record high Container order book of 7.54 million TEU signals significant change : BIMCO

OSLO: Despite the collapse in freightrates,shipownersstillhave an appetite for new container ship orders and the order book has continuedtogrow.Therecordhigh order book of 7.54 million TEU will result in significant changes to the container fleet in the coming years,” says NielsRasmussen,ChiefShippingAnalystatBIMCO.

During the last 10 quarters, 8.61 million TEU has been contracted, matching the level contracted during the preceding 30 quarters. The order book has now increased for ten straight quarters, reaching a new record high in each of the last four quarters, and at 7.54 million TEU it nowequals28.9%oftheexistingfleet.

“The large order book will result in significant fleet growth.Scheduleddeliveriesfor2024andtheremainderof 2023 are currently at 5.03 million TEU. We estimate that recycling will hit nearly 1 million TEU during that period and the fleet could therefore soon exceed 30 million TEU for the first time; up 16% compared to today,” says Rasmussen.

Delivery of the ships will also increase the fuel types used. 57% of TEU capacity in the order book involves ships withsomelevelofalternativefuelspreparationcomparedto only 10% in the current fleet. The first ships using methanol willbedeliveredandthefirstammonia-readyshipswillalso be launched Soon, five different fuels could be in use: low- and high-sulphur fuel oil, LNG, methanol, and ammonia. As the use of alternative fuels increases it will become increasingly difficult to establish a single relevant ratebenchmarkforthetimecharterandassetmarkets.

Atthesametime,theoperators’ownershipshareofthe fleet will continue to grow. Ten years ago, the operators’ ownership share of the fleet capacity bottomed out at 50% but has since climbed to 61%. This share will increase further in the coming years as 65% of the order book capacity is controlled by operators. Many of the nonoperating owners’ largest ships are fixed on long-term charter contracts and it is increasingly only smaller ships that operate in the short-term charter market. Combined with the increasing ownership share, operators’ ability to usethetimechartermarkettoquicklyadjustfleetcapacity isthereforedecreasing.

“Most importantly, the new ships will be more fuel efficient than most of the existing ships and the introduction of alternative fuels will help reduce their greenhousegasemissions,”saysRasmussen.

At $11 bn exports, India to become global mobile device leader: Union Minister

NEWDELHI:Withthedoublingofsmartphoneexports from India to over USD 11 billion, the country is on its way to become global leader in the mobile devices segment, UnionMinisterAshwiniVaishnawsaidrecently.

Mobile phone exports from India reached close to USD 11.12 billion with iPhone maker Apple accounting for aroundhalfofthetotalexports,accordingtoindustrybody ICEAandestimatesfromindustrysources.

“With the doubling of exports of smartphones to more than USD 11 billion, India is well on its way to become a leader in the mobile device market of the world and play a majorroleinIndia’selectronicexports.Thisisamajorwin for PM Modiji’s ‘make in India’ programme,” Vaishnawsaid.

India Cellular and Electronics Association (ICEA) said that mobile phones export from India have doubled to surpass Rs 90,000 crore, about USD 11.12 billion, in the financialyear(FY)2022-23fromRs45,000croreinFY22.

“No economy or sector in the economy can become a great and vibrant global economy without large exports. The mobile phone export juggernaut continues. Riding on the 100 per cent growth in mobile phone exports, which have crossed Rs 90,000 crore for FY 2022-23, electronics exportshavealsogrownby58percenttoRs1,85,000crore. Itisextremelysatisfyingthatwehavecrossedthetargeted figure of Rs 75,000 crore for the year,” ICEA Chairman PankajMohindroosaid.

The Government has set a target of USD 10 billion worth of mobile phone exports from the Country. According to industry sources, Apple is estimated to have clocked 50 per cent share with export of ‘made in India’ iPhonesworthUSD5.5billion,aboutRs45,000crore.

Sources estimate that Samsung accounts for about 40percentsharewithexportworthRs36,000crore.