Business News

• Genpact Acquires Empower Research
• Services exports Down 5.8% in July
• India unhappy over British move

Genpact Acquires Empower Research

India's largest business process outsourcing firm, Genpact Ltd has acquired Empower Research, a media and business research company with capabilities in social media research, media monitoring and measurement. The acquisition, which is expected to be completed by the end of this month, will add to Genpact's analytics business.

Analytics contributes 15% to the company's revenues. The company did not disclose the financial details of the transaction. Empower has 360 employees based in New York, Bangalore, Cincinnati, New Jersey, San Francisco, and London. Tiger Tyagarajan, president and chief executive officer of Genpact, said: “We are seeing a significant increase in demand for our smart decision services, and Empower adds tremendous capabilities in extracting insights from social media, a fast emerging source of data about consumer behavior. This aligns very well with our vision of supporting our clients in smarter decision-making and in delivering improved business out comes”.

Services exports Down 5.8% in July

India's services exports in July were worth $10.40 billion (`49,710 crore) , a fall of 5.8% from June.

The country's total receipts from services exported were $11.04 billion in June, 2011, according to data released by the Reserve Bank of India on Friday.

Imports of services also fell 18.2% in July to $5.89 billion, compared with $7.20 billion in June.

Overall, the services sector contributes over 50% to India's gross domestic product. During the April July period this fiscal, the country's cumulative exports of services amounted to $44.74 billion. Imports of services, meanwhile, stood at $27.07 billion during the first four months of 201112.

India unhappy over British move

India has registered its displeasure over the British parliament's moves to discuss alleged human rights violations in Kashmir, saying it had taken “due note of the issue”.

India has effective mechanisms with in the country's democratic framework to address any grievance or any aberration, said a government official who did not want to be named. “We have taken due note of this debate or discussion which is planned in British parliament.
India is a vibrant democracy, the largest democracy in the world which fully respects rule of law and human rights”, the official said. `PTI' reported that the subject was listed for discussion after Conservative MP Steve Baker, along with four others gave a notice for a debate in the House of Commons.

(Source-:mintlive.com)