India's growing influence around the Globe
Indians have been dominating the global mergers and acquisitions for the past decade and it got aggressive just in the past 5 years or so.
For instance it all started with TATA's who took over the Tetley Tea Brand in UK making them enter into the Premier Tea Segment.This marked the first entry by an Indian Conglomerate.This was then turned into a major attraction by NRI Steel Tycoon Lakshmi Mittal who even though had taken over lot of other steel companies across the globe but when he eventually won a prolonged battle to take over Arcelor which was then the 2nd Largest Steel Co and Lakshmi Mittal's Ispat International was No.1,the combined entity was almost 3 times bigger than its nearest rival to form Arcelor Mittal.
Mittal has to fly to various countires and meet various heads to get the European Union Clearance which cried for this deal because of Lakshmi Mittal's Nationality because Mr.Mittal still holds Indian Passport though he resides in UK and richest Indian in the world till last year. After Lakshmi Mittal's take over of Arcelor, TATA's again came into picture.This time it was CORUS Steel Company making TATA to enter into World's Top10 Steel producers for the first time.
Remember Corus was much bigger than TATA Steel but no one commented or said anything because they knew about the History of TATA Group.Then came Aditya Birla Group which took over Nuvo. TATA again came into picture when they took over Jaguar-LandRover car companies to mark its entry into Luxury/Premier car segment.TATA's this time assured the employee union that it would not cut its cost.
When it comes to entertainment and sports,we saw Indians winning T20 World Championship in Cricket,Visawanathan Anand winning World Championship in Chess,Pankaj Advani in Billiards and Snooker,Abinav Bindra winning first Individual Olympic Gold Medal in Shooting,Sachin Tendulkar breasking World Records in both Test and One Day International Formats in terms of number of runs being scored.We also saw Ghajini making 1 billion in 1 week of its release which is phenomenal which is why biggies like Walt Disney,John Travolta Productions,Bradd Pitt Productions and Richard Gere are working with Indian entertainment companies now like EROS and ADAG which has made its mark in the entertainment segment.
We also saw Satyam acquiring a SAP company(Orion) based in the UK making it mich bigger in SAP segment than its rival Infosys.We saw Shashi Tharoor competing for the post of UN Secreatry General with Korea's Ban Ki Moon which itself is an apt evidence for importance given to Indian's globally.Then we saw Indira Nooyi,a Chennai born exectuive elevated to CEO for global beverages major Pepsi.We also saw Citibank appointing Vikram Pandit as its CEO.One of President Elect Barack Obama was also an Indian. We saw Kalpana Chawla bringing pride to our nation in aeronautics by flying in Space Shuttle.
For the first time,Indian brothers featured in Top 10 richest people's list respectively in 4th and 5th position.It was none other than our Ambani brothers.Mukesh went ahead to create mass wealth for his investors and setting up biggest petro refiniery in the world in Jamnagar.Anil who made $24 billion in 1 year lost $30 billion because of market crash.
We also saw Vijay Mallaya taking over Scott and Mackay in Scotland in breweries and at the same time bough an IPL team(Bangalore) and also an F1 team(Red Bull) with Adrian Sutil and Gabriella Fischella as its lead driver and has plans to but Honda racing team as well and is competing with Mexican Tycoon Carlos Slim Helu(who is considered to be the Richset person the world now).
Indians also placed maximum orders for Airbus320 and Boeing all thanks to Kingfisher Airlines,Deccan Aviation,Paramount Airways and Jet Airways.We are the largest defence material buyers for Russia.
There are lots to mention here about Indians who have made their mark in their own ways but considering the time and space restriction, I would wind up here with the small note mentioned below.
From the above examples,we can clearly say that Indians have started dominating in all the sectors and this year(2009) might see many more positive acquisitions and mergers.We would salute all those who has made Indians Pride in their respective fields.
S SARATH Babu MBA,MCA(Bangalore)
