India Corner 

Tata Sky sets off in DTH race

Tata Sky, the DTH venture of Tata and STAR, has announced its partnership with NDS Group, the leading provider of technology solutions for digital pay TV. Tata Sky has chosen NDS end-to-end solutions for the launch of the company’s direct-to-home (DTH) television service in India in mid-2006. Tata Sky is investing in building a high quality digital infrastructure in the country to offer a superior television viewing experience to Indian households.

Grab a job over your cell phone

Having trouble landing the right job? There’s help on the way. You can actually grab a mobile, holler ‘jobs’ and ease into an exciting world of top-draw offers from some of the biggest corporates. Organised job hunting appears to have hit the next level with the mobile phone emerging as a powerful springboard. Hong Kong’s Hutchison has just teamed up with 2COMS Consulting Pvt Ltd, a city-based recruitment and staffing firm, to offer diverse job leads on the mobile across the banking, insurance, IT/BPO, telecoms and HR verticals to Hutch subscribers. The job hunting deal over mobile will initially be tested out in Kolkata and West Bengal circles and taken across all Hutch Essar networks should it prove a hit.

ONGC buys Exxon’s 30% in Brazil fields

Oil biggie ONGC is set to open its account in yet another Latin American country - Brazil - by acquiring Texas-based Exxon Mobil’s stake in the Campos Basin oil fields. This comes even as ONGC is on the verge of piercing the sovereign rating in the first ever issuer credit rating that the company has commissioned. Investment banking sources said that ONGC Videsh (OVL), the overseas investment arm of ONGC, has sealed the deal for acquiring the entire 30% stake of Exxon-Mobil in the past few days. Though no confirmation was available, sources said that the deal was clinched at an estimated value of $1.5bn. The offshore block is located off the east coast of Brazil’s south-eastern state of Espirito Santo.