While launching its new brand campaign, cement maker Jaypee Cement, a wholly owned arm of the Jaypee Group, has appointed master blaster Sachin Tendulkar as its brand ambassador.

Mr. Manoj Gaur, Jaypee Group Executive Chairman, said, “Sachin and Jaypee Cement are a perfect fit as they stand for similar values of inner strength, endurance and ever lasting performance. These value have spurred both to set new benchmarks and made good the dreams and aspirations of all those who believe in Sachin and Jaypee Cement.”

On the eve of entering its 145th year of service, Kolkata-based Allahabad Bank, has made announcement about the retail selling of gold coins publicly.

The public sector lender said that it will shortly launch the scheme in other areas.

While speaking to media persons, Mr. KR Kamath, Allahabad Bank Chairman & Managing Director, stated that at first, the coins will be available in denominations of four (4), eight (8) and ten (10) grams in select core banking solutions branches of the bank.

In a latest development, India's largest utility NTPC has informed that it would start coal production from its mines in Jharkhand in the second half of this fiscal.

The company plans to achieve a coal production target of 15 million tonnes per annum by 2012.

It should be noted that NTPC has ventured into the coal mining business with an aim to meet about 20 per cent of its fuel requirement from its captive mines by 2017.

BT India, the Indian subsidiary of BT group, which is one of the world’s leading providers of communications solutions and services, has announced the opening of its first ever BT Asia Pacific Security Operations centre (SOC) in India.  

The centre which is located in a BT dedicated building at Noida, will provide security device management services involving critical customer components including firewalls, intrusion detection devices and Bluecoat Proxy devices used for securing networked-IT environments.

ABB, a leader in power and automation technologies, has signed a frame agreement with BMW Group to support the carmaker’s operations in Germany, the U.K. and the U.S.

Under the arrangement, ABB will supply 2,100 industrial robots over five years, beginning 2010 and commission a variety of robot models for BMW, including the IRB 6640, 6620, 7600 and the new mid range robot IRB 4600; a compact, light-weight industrial robot with the longest vertical reach in its class.

With the board of the Securities and Exchange Board of India, SEBI, divided on the issue related to its lawful right to inspect if the committee appointed to look into the National Securities and Depository Limited (NSDL) matter, it was decided on Monday that an independent legal opinion will be sought.