In a latest report, Motilal Oswal, one of the leading stock research firms in India, revealed that Beauty and wellness company Marico's March quarter sales are expected to go up by 23.6% to Rs 578 crore on Y-o-Y basis.

In addition, the company's net profit is also expected to surge by 22% to Rs 36.8 crore on Y-o-Y basis.

It may be noted that apart from Motilal Oswal, many market analysts are also positive on Marico's upcoming results.

For its two-year postgraduate programme (PGP) in management, Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A) has raised its fees by Rs. 1 lakh, which means a rise of Rs. 50,000 in each of the two years.

The new fee structure will affect the students securing admission in the academic year 2010. They will have to pay Rs. 12.5 lakh for the PGPM - which means a break-up of Rs. 6 lakh instead of the earlier Rs. 5.5 lakh for the first year; and Rs. 6.5 lakh in place of Rs. 6 lakh for the subsequent year.

With the IBM - International Business Machines Corp. - stock having done better than the company's large-capital technology contemporaries,

Chairman and CEO Samuel J. Palmisano, in a letter to the stockholders, expressed optimism that IBM is "positioned to lead in the era that lies on the other side of the present crisis."

Saying that IBM is confident of thriving despite the economic downturn, as the company plans to develop money-saving computer services, and spread out further, by the way of the so-called 'cloud computing' concept of delivering software, data and computing power over the Internet.

After grand success of muscular and hottest-looking bike FZ16, India Yamaha Motor (IYM) has come with another new bike 'FZ-S' priced at Rs 67,000 (ex-showroom Delhi).

The FZ-S, a 150cc motorbike, will be available in two colours -- Yellow Streak and Silver Tech to Indian consumers.

In a case pertaining to copyright theft, four men working at The Pirate Bay file-sharing Web site go on trial in Stockholm. All four of them - Peter Sunde, Gottfrid Svartholm Warg, Carl Lundstrom, and Fredrik Neij - were supposedly accomplices in breaking copyright law.

If convicted, the four men face a fine of $143,500, and a two-year prison term.

The real value of Facebook's stock appears to have become a contentious issue - while a $240 million investment by Microsoft for a 1.6 percent stake in the company in 2007, puts Facebook's value at $15 billion, the company claims its own evaluation to be $3.7 billion.

In June last year, Facebook's self appraisal pegged the price of its privately held stock at $8.88 per share; while the Microsoft investment put the related figures at $35.90 per share.

The incongruity with regard to Facebook's actual worth has come to light because of the revelations pertaining to the Palo Alto-based company's $65 million lawsuit settlement with ConnectU.