Sir Ratan Tata
Ratan Tata | |
|---|---|
 Ratan Tata | |
| Born | Ratan Naval Tata 28 December 1937 |
| Alma mater | Cornell University (BArch) |
| Occupation |
|
| Title | Chairman Emeritus, Tata Sons and Tata Group[2] |
| Term | (1991–2021) (2016–2017) |
| Predecessor | JRD Tata |
| Successor | Cyrus Mistry (2012) Natarajan Chandrasekaran (2017–present) |
| Parent(s) | Naval Tata |
| Relatives | See Tata family |
| Awards | Padma Vibhushan (2008) Padma Bhushan (2000) |
Ratan Tata was born in Bombay, now Mumbai, on 28 December 1937, and is the son of Naval Tata (born in Surat). His biological maternal grandmother had been the sister of Hirabai Tata, wife of group founder Jamshedji Tata. His biological grandfather, Hormusji Tata, had belonged to the broader Tata family; Ratan, therefore, was a Tata by birth. Parents Naval and Sonoo separated in 1948 when Ratan was 10, and he was subsequently raised by the widow of Sir Ratanji Tata, his grandmother, Navajbai Tata, who formally adopted him through the J. N. Petit Parsi Orphanage. He has a half-brother, Noel Tata (from Naval Tata's second marriage with Simone Tata), with whom he was raised. His first language is Gujarati.
He studied at the Campion School, Mumbai till the 8th class, followed by Cathedral and John Connon School, Mumbai, and at Bishop Cotton School in Shimla, and, in 1955, graduated from Riverdale Country School in New York City. In 1959, he then received a degree in Architecture from Cornell University, and in 1975, attended the seven-week Advanced Management Program of Harvard Business School — an institution which he has since endowed.[13][14]
Promoted to management during the 1970s; he then endured trial by ordeal and was able to turn Group company National Radio and Electronics (NELCO) around, only to see it collapse during an economic slowdown. In 1991, J. R. D. Tata stepped down as chairman of Tata Sons, naming him his successor. When he settled down into the new role, he faced stiff resistance from many company heads, some of whom had spent decades in their respective companies and rose to become very powerful and influential due to the freedom to operate under JRD Tata. He began replacing them by setting a retirement age, and then made individual companies report operationally to the group office and made each contribute some of their profit to build and use the Tata group brand. Innovation was given priority and younger talent was infused and given responsibilities. Under his stewardship, overlapping operations in group companies were streamlined into a synergized whole, with the salt-to-software group exiting unrelated businesses to take on globalization.
During the 21 years, he led the Tata Group, revenues grew over 40 times, and profit, over 50 times. Where sales of the group as a whole, overwhelmingly came from commodities when he took over, the majority of sales came from brands when he exited. He boldly got Tata Tea to acquire Tetley, Tata Motors to acquire Jaguar Land Rover, and Tata Steel to acquire Corus. All this turned Tata from a largely India-centric group into a global business, with over 65% of revenues coming from operations and sales in over 100 countries. He conceptualized the Tata Nano car. In 2015, He explained in an interview for the Harvard Business School's Creating Emerging Markets project, the development of the Tata Nano was significant because it helped put cars at a price-point within reach of the average Indian consumer.
Ratan Tata resigned his executive powers in the Tata group on 28 December 2012, upon turning 75, appointing as his successor, Cyrus Mistry, the 44-year-old son of Pallonji Mistry of the Shapoorji Pallonji Group, the largest individual shareholder of the group and related by marriage. On 24 October 2016, Cyrus Mistry was removed as the chairman of Tata Sons, and Ratan Tata was made interim chairman. The decision went through intense media scrutiny that made many scrutinize the root causes of the sudden removal, and the resultant crisis. A selection committee was formed to find a successor. The selection committee consisted of Mr. Tata, TVS Group head Venu Srinivasan, Amit Chandra of Bain Capital, former diplomat Ronen Sen, and Lord Kumar Bhattacharya. All of them, except Mr. Bhattacharya, were on the board of Tata Sons. On 12 January 2017, Natarajan Chandrasekaran was named as the chairman of Tata Sons, a role he assumed in February 2017.
Tata invested personal savings in Snapdeal – one of India's leading e-commerce websites –and, in January 2016, Teabox, an online premium Indian Tea seller, and CashKaro.com, discount coupons and cash-back website. He has made small investments in both early and late-stage companies in India, such as INR 0.95 Cr in Ola Cabs. In April 2015, it was reported that Tata had acquired a stake in Chinese smartphone startup Xiaomi. In October 2015, he partnered with American Express, investing in Bitcoin venture Abra. In 2016, he invested in Nestaway an online portal to find fully furnished flats for bachelors which later acquired Zenify to start family rental segment and online pet care portal, Dogspot. Tata Motors rolled out the first batch of Tigor Electric Vehicles from its Sanand plant in Gujarat, regarding which Ratan Tata said, "Tigor indicates a willingness to fast-forward India's electric dream. The government has set an ambitious target to have only electric cars by 2030.
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