Rupert Murdoch-promoted News Corporation on Monday said it will invest $100-million in the next 12-months to start six regional channels under the Star brand in India.

"We will invest $100-million in the next 12 months to launch six regional channels under the Star brand in India," News Corporation Chairman and CEO Rupert Murdoch told reporters in Mumbai.

News Corporation company Dow Jones announced the launch of Dow Jones India Titans 30 index. "We are unveiling the Dow Jones India Titans--a 30-stock index tracking the stock-market performance of prominent Indian companies," Murdoch said.

"It will be licensed to financial institutions as the basis of investment products such as exchange-traded funds," he said.

Explaining the reasons for launching the Dow Jones index, Murdoch said, the world is changing both economically and financially and there is a growing interest in India.

"We have seen a re-weighting of risk around the world, but the world itself is being economically re-rated and so we need an index that allows investors to take advantage of these changes," Murdoch said.

The top five Indian companies in the index are Reliance Industries [Get Quote], Infosys [Get Quote], HDFC [Get Quote], Bharti Airtel [Get Quote], and Larsen and Toubro. The index would be represented by three sectors: financials, basic materials and oil & gas.

Dow Jones has lots of investment plans in India, Murdoch said. It is looking at growing digitally such as in the mobile space, he said. To grow in the digital space, the company is looking for partnership, he added.

It also plans to increase its number of journalists from the present 25 to 70 in India, he said. -- PTI

Image: US media mogul Rupert Murdoch addresses a press conference in Mumbai on August 4, 2008. | Photograph: Sajjad Hussain/AFP/Getty Images