The executive vice-chairman of Texmaco Ltd, Mr. Saroj Poddar announced on Monday that the company, which deals with making of rail wagons, is planning to hive off its total manufacturing business to a separate arm to strengthen its business.

By selling part of its stake in the proposed new entity to private investors, the company is looking forward to raise Rs 200 crore. The holder of the company would be Texmaco.

To draw out the modalities for raising the amount, the company has appointed ICICI Securities.

By September 2009, the company would be capable of making 40 wagons per day, whereas presently it is manufacturing 20 wagons per day, Mr. Poddar said in the annoucement.

The Vietnam steel project will give 65% equity stakes to Tata Steel Global Holding, and a 30% stake in Thach Khe iron Ore Company.

Washington - Luxury automaker BMW issued a recall Wedn

State-run NMDC, India's largest iron ore company, has informed that it will sign a memorandum of understanding with global miner, Rio Tinto on August 18 to prospect for iron ore.

Both companies plan to jointly explore for iron-ore assets in India and overseas. According to reports, Rio is seeking to tap India's iron-ore reserves, the world's fifth biggest, as it plans to triple production to 600 million tons a year with expansions in Australia, Guinea and Brazil.

India exports about 90 million tonnes of iron ore, mainly to China. Iron- ore prices have grown almost four-fold since 2001 to a record level because of surging demand in Chinese market.

Bangkok - General Motors Wednesday announced plans to invest 445 million dollars to build a new diesel engine plant in Thailand and to upgrade its existing vehicle assembly plant.

The diesel engine plant, GM's first in South-East Asia, is to be located in Rayong province, eastern Thailand, where the US automotive giant has been operating an assembly plant for the past eight years.

The new plant, scheduled to begin production in 2010, will produce more than 100,000 2.5-litre and 2.8-litre turbo-diesel engines annually.