Tata Industries Ltd, one of the initial shareholders divested its stake in favour of Tata Finance, TMF managing director K N Atmaramani told newspersons here today. TAM was set up as a joint venture with the Tatas holding an 80 per cent stake and 20 per cent with Kleinwort Benson which was later taken over Dresdner RCM Global Investors Holdings Ltd.

Currently, Tata Sons Ltd (29 per cent), Tata Investment Corporation Ltd (29 per cent) and Tata Finance Ltd (22 per cent) make up the Tatas 80 per cent holding in the company. As a stakeholder Tata Finance would have a greater commitment towards marketing the mutual fund, he added.

Meanwhile, TMF has launched a multi-sector equity fund investing in growth sectors such as information technology, pharma, agrochemicals, telecom and fast moving consumer goods. The `Life Sciencesand Technology Fund' offers the investor maximum returns with minimum risk as it allows for greater risk diversification, Atmaramani said.

Exposure to any particular sector would not be more than 80 per cent, while simultaneously allowing the fund manager sufficient flexibility to move between sectors, he said. ``The fund's investments will be in recession proof, export-oriented and knowledge-based companies with immense consumer potential,'' he said adding that 20 per cent of investments would be in debt instruments.

Investors in the scheme would have three choices, under Section 54 EA of the Income Tax Act with a three-year lock-in, or Section 54 EB with a seven year lock-in or without any lock-in. Atmaramani, however, suggested that investments should preferably be for a period of more than year to derive maximum benefit and has, accordingly, imposed a one per cent load on redemptions within less than a year. TMF plans to mobilise Rs 150 crore in fiscal 2000 compared to a mobilisation of Rs 330 crorein the previous fiscal. "The attitude of the investor towards mutual fund products has changed drastically with the investors looking positively at mutual funds," he said.