PUNE: At a time when motorcycles sales have plummeted over 15 per cent in the first half of this fiscal in the prolonged slowing economy and a challenging business environment, Bajaj Auto’s Pulsar 125 Neon in the Pulsar series has emerged a winner.

The Pune-headquartered auto maker sold over 40,000 units of Pulsar 125 bike within two months of its launch in August, the company said in a statement.

Homegrown auto major Tata Motors on Friday reported a consolidated net loss of Rs 187.7 crore for the quarter ended September 30, hit by subdued demand for its vehicles in the domestic market.

The company had posted a loss of Rs 1,009.49 crore in the same period of 2018-19.

The Supreme Court verdict on adjusted gross revenue in telecom has dealt a huge blow to the operations of Vodafone Idea, severely battered by the vicious price war in the sector since the launch of Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Jio in 2016.

The company on Thursday warned the latest verdict on the definition of telecom revenue will have “damaging implications” for the industry, and indicated it could explore filing a review application after legal consultation.

Maruti Suzuki India (MSIL) reported a Q2FY20 Ebitda margin of 9.5% (Nomura: 8.5%, Consensus: 9.3%), helped by a 30 bps benefit to gross margin (Our estimate: 50 bps fall). The company said that the cost reduction helped margins. A fall in commodity prices and better inventory absorption may have also helped gross margins.

MSIL’s retail sales were slightly positive during the festive period, which is a good sign. However, the management said it needs to see if the turnaround sustains as the average `26,000/vehicle discount (was ~`17,000) helped demand.

Though loan growth slowed to just 8.4% year-on-year, State Bank of India (SBI) on Friday reported a good set of profits for Q2FY20, thanks to higher yields and a modest rise in expenses of just 7% year-on-year. At a time when interest rates are expected to trend down, SBI’s loan yields in Q2FY20 were 8.69%, higher than the 8.56% in the June quarter and 8.43% in September 2018.

Adobe Inc. exposed the data of 7.5 million of its creative-software customers, a person familiar with the matter said, in the latest example of a company leaving consumer information visible on the internet.

Adobe addressed the vulnerability the same day it was discovered, Oct. 19, said the person, who asked not to be identified discussing the breach.

NTPC’s invitation for bids for setting up 1,200 MW of solar generation units received a tepid response, with only one company winning bids for 300 MW. According to industry sources, Chinese government-backed TBEA Energy was the lowest bidder, quoting a tariff of Rs 2.63/unit. The company specialises in making power transformers.

The ceiling tariff for the auction was set at Rs 2.65/unit.

The Pentagon has awarded Microsoft a USD 10 billion cloud computing contract called JEDI. The contentious bidding process for the contract pitted Microsoft, Amazon and Oracle, among others, against one another. Bidding for the huge government contract has attracted more attention than usual, sparked by speculation early in the process that Amazon would be awarded the deal. Tech giants Oracle and IBM pushed back with their own bids.

Reliance Industries (RIL) on Friday announced a structure to make Reliance Jio (RJIL) debt-free, which is seen as a move to pave the way for a likely listing of its telecom business. As part of it, the company intends to transfer its telecom business and other digital initiatives to a wholly-owned subsidiary.

In the new scheme, RJIL’s debt will move to RIL. RJIL’s board approved an arrangement between RJIL and certain classes of its creditors, including debenture holders, for transferring identified liabilities of up to Rs 1.08 trillion to RIL.

Jeff Bezos retained the title of world’s richest person Friday as Amazon.com Inc.’s stock recovered from a sharp slide. Shares of the biggest online retailer fell 1.1% to close at $1,761.33, rebounding from a drop of as much as 9.1% in extended trading a day earlier, after the company reported its first profit decline in two years. Friday’s modest dip trimmed Bezos’s net worth to $109.9 billion, or $2.36 billion more than Bill Gates’s, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

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