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China and Venezuela's economies, dominated by major state owned companies, offer the world a healthy model for growth as the global financial system crumbles, leftist Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez said on Wednesday. "Look at the crisis that we have in the world, and yet I am not worried for Venezuela," the fiery critic of Washington said, after signing a string of deals in Beijing. "China has no more worries than us. It may affect us (both), without doubt, but it will not throw us to the ground," he added. Allies in South America and the rest of the world are creating a new system to replace the defunct U.S. model that put market forces ahead of governments, institutions and ordinary people when setting policy, Chavez said. "Now we have to do it with more urgency and speed, because of the collapse of capitalism, of the Western financial system," he added, but the self-proclaimed Maoist appeared relaxed. "We still have time to save the world," he added. China's leaders, who have retreated from the central planning of the early communist era but still control prices for energy and keep a firm grip on strategic sectors of the economy, struck a more cautious note about the crisis. "China will enact economic control measures in accordance with the circumstances so as to maintain stable economic growth," Vice-Premier Li Keqiang told a high-level bilateral forum. "We will make efforts to increase the dynamism and power of the economy by fully leveraging our huge growth potential to sustain stable, rapid growth in the long run," he added.

NEW YORK, Sept 9 - Comcast Corp and Time Warner Cable Inc said on Tuesday they are confident of picking up a substantial number of new customers from the digital television transition early next year. The two largest U.S. cable operators said they see the government-mandated switch-over to digital TV from analog signals on Feb. 17 as an opportunity to win new subscribers. Comcast Chief Operating Officer Steve Burke said 2 million to 3 million non-pay-TV homes in Comcast's area will not be able to receive digital TV signals over-the-air, forcing them to consider options including pay-TV provider Comcast. "It's not out of the question that we could gain a substantial number of new customers through the transition," said Burke, speaking at a Merrill Lynch investor conference. Comcast, which has more than 24 million subscribers, will be marketing aggressively to existing customers to assure them that they will continue to receive TV signals after the transmission switch, according to Burke. He said the company is also offering a low-priced broadcast-only service as well as trying to sell its high-speed Internet and phone services to these customers. Comcast said the early investment in going all-digital could be around $800 million in capital expenditure, including the supply of an additional 25 million incremental set top boxes and digital converters. "We hope to get the majority of the company done in the next 12 to 18 months," said Burke, who said the investment would not have a significant impact on the company's free cash flow projections. On Monday, Wilmington, North Carolina, became the first U.S. TV market to switch to all-digital television broadcast as a test by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission ahead of the February deadline. Wilmington's cable television is provided by Time Warner Cable. "We're going to learn a lot a Wilmington," said Landell Hobbs, chief operating officer of Time Warner Cable. Hobbs, who was also speaking at the Merrill Lynch investor conference, said his company had already seen early migration to its service following the switch-over in Wilmington which could potentially replicated nationally. He said there are around 4 million homes in the Time Warner Cable area which receive analog TV signals over the air. "There's definitely an opportunity," said Hobbs, also pointing to the potential of bundling other services like phone and high speed Internet.

Standard Machinery Marketing Co Pvt Ltd, one of the major players in Indian machinery industry, is planning to showcase its technology innovations at International FoodTec India 2008, which is to be held on October 06-08 2008 at Delhi. This 60-year old organisation is one of the major exhibitors and has one of the largest stands at the exhibition. The company aims to make the event as a huge platform to be at its best in terms of service and technology. The company offers high-quality equipments for the bakery, biscuit, chocolate, confectionary, gum & pasta, namkeens, noodles, chips, ready-to-eat, packaging and dairy industry. It offers individual machines; undertakes orders for providing complete solutions, and works on turnkey projects on a large scale. Sanjay Kumar, managing director, Standard Machinery Marketing Co, said, ''The main objective of our organisation is to be highly customer oriented and therefore each and every customer is important to us. We focus on quality and not quantity. The company meets the customer's exact requirements and does not believe in only selling a standard range of machines.'' The International FoodTec 2008 will help potential customers as well as the individuals to understand the company policies and product range. It will be useful for people to analyse and assess the different European companies present at the event and use this opportunity to gain knowledge and make use of the food technology industry.

BEIJING, Sept 26 - Chinese industrial firms earned a combined 1.8685 trillion yuan ($273.9 billion) in profits in January through August, up 19.4 percent from a year earlier, the National Bureau of Statistics said on Friday. The figure marked a dip from annual growth of 20.9 percent in the first five months of the year. Profits grew 36.7 percent from a year earlier in the first 11 months of 2007. The agency did not give a full-year figure for last year. Some analysts are sceptical of the data, saying the results are driven by big monopolies that benefit from state protection. But others say the figures give a rough guide to profitability trends. Profits grew 31 percent in 2006, around 23 percent in 2005 and 40 percent in 2004. ($1=6.819 Yuan)

Sept 8 - Universal Pictures has agreed to back rollout of digital cinema equipment in U.S. theaters, people familiar with the matter told the Wall Street Journal. General Electric Co's Universal Pictures' is the third of six studios engaged in year-long talks with the Digital Cinema Implementation Partners (DCIP) -- formed by Regal Entertainment Group, Cinemark Holdings Inc and AMC Entertainment Inc, operators of 14,000 screens -- to reach a deal to help finance the theater upgrades. News Corp's Twentieth Century Fox and Viacom Inc's Paramount Pictures have already agreed to participate in the digital upgrade. The DCIP is working toward a $1.1 billion financing deal with Hollywood studios to deploy cinema digital technology. Universal Pictures is set to throw its support behind the consortium as soon as this week, the paper said citing people close to the situation. The other studios involved in the talks include Warner Bros, Sony and Walt Disney Co. No one was available at Universal Pictures for comments.