Court Confirms Stay On Fujitsus Ficim Stake

The Bombay High Court has confirmed the stay order granted by the Pune civil court on the disposal of Fujitsu's 10 per cent shareholding in Fujitsu ICIM to the Rs 6,600-crore Rama Prasad Goenka group and on the removal of the Japanese giant's name from the infotech joint venture.

The legal battle between Fujitsu and the RPG group began at the begining of the last year when the Japanese major withdrew from selling off its 10 per cent stake in the infotech joint venture to the latter. The RPG group filed a suit in the Pune civil court in May and obtained an ad-interim order from the civil court at Pune, restraining Fujitsu Ltd and Fujitsu Australia from dealing with or disposing of their shares in Fujitsu ICIM Ltd pending further orders from the court.

 

The Bombay high court has also remanded the case back to the Pune civil court for expeditious hearing and final disposal of the RPG suit.

The RPG group's legal move in May, 1999 followed the desire expressed by Fujitsu of selling out from Fujitsu ICIM, the joint venture where Fujitsu holds a 10 per cent stake and Fujitsu subsidiary International Computers Ltd (ICL) holds 36 per cent. The RPG group has a 30 per cent stake in Fujitsu ICIM.

Fujitsu had also earlier expressed its desire to set up a separate subsidiary in India in the coming days, in line with its strategy for the region, and also to delete its name from the Indian joint venture.

However, the Pune civil court confirmed the ex-parte stay order on October 8 restricting Fujitsus from selling their 10 per cent stake to anyone else and from deleting its name from the Indian outfit.

Then Fujitsu filed an appeal in Bombay high court in December 1999 praying from admission of their appeal and for the stay of operation of the Pune court order.