Wockhardt Ankleshwar unit gets ISO 9002: Wockhardt's bulk drug manufacturing plant at Ankleshwar has been awarded the ISO 9002 certificate by the UK-based SGS Yarsely ICS, an internationally recognised certifying authority. The certificate confirms the product quality management systems of the company's bulk drug unit. The unit manufactures the anti-tussive drug, dextropropoxyphene, and caters to nearly 15 per cent of the world market.

Hegde to attend Saarc trade fair in Colombo:Commerce minister Ramakrishna Hegde is scheduled to attend the second Saarc trade fair commencing in colombo on Tuesday. The eight-day fair will be inaugurated by Sri Lankan president Chandrika Kumaratunga. During his visit, theminister is likely to call on the Sri Lankan president and prime minister besides meeting ministers of commerce, industry and finance, an official statement said.

Mainframe computers staging comeback in India: Proving the doomsayers wrong, the mainframe computer is staging a quiet come back to the country, thanks to the booming electronic commerce and enterprise resources market. According to industry estimates, the country's mainframe market will grow by 60 per cent in the coming years against the 35 per cent growth predicted for the personal computer market, an IBM release said.

Concept of global brands yet to catch up:: The concept of global brands is yet to catch up in the country despite considerable efforts to globalise the Indian economy and multinationals by-and-large have failed in their assessment of the Indian consumer and his buying habits, University of Delhi professor (marketing) and dean (planning development and international relations) S Neelamegham said. "The multinationalcorporations came to India with some fundamentally wrong assumptions like their method of estimating the middle class. While MNCs take into account income only, we include lifestyle classification too while defining the middle class numbers," he said.

NTF urges centre to go slow on DoT corporatisation: The National Telematics Forum (NTF) has urged the central government to go about corporatising the department of telecommunications (DoT) in a phased manner. NTF vice-president Virendar Trehan, in a release on Monday, said that while private operators in the basic service will be make profits, the corporatised DoT will become a loss-making, unviable entity. According to Trehan, the private service providers will be offering bulk discounts to corporate users, like they are doing in Madhya Pradesh, and will not care to provide for the general public.

Criticare to launch anti-fungal drug:: Criticare, a Mumbai-based pharmaceutical firm, has tied up with Sequus pharmaceuticals of USA, to market aformulation of potent anti-fungal drug called Amphocil in the country. Criticare chief A Suryanarayan and Sequus business development executive Ian Hick said leishmaniasis or kala azar, which was a major problem in India and being treated by conventional Amphotericin B, now can be treated with Amphocil. Under the agreement signed between two companies, Criticare will have the exclusive right to market Amphocil for a period of five years in India, Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka.

Project to implement latest wireless technology:The department of telecommunications (DoT) has undertaken a pilot project in collaboration with the US-based Ericsson Communications to implement on a trial basis `IS-136 TDMA' -- the latest digital wireless technology in local (wll) networks on 500 subscriber lines in Bangalore. With IS-136, operators could rapidly instal networks in remote areas and efficiently maintain them and thereby provide rural India access to telecommunications.