Mistry at Tata Helm as Investors Query $500 Billion Goal

Cyrus Mistry, who takes charge today at Tata, India’s biggest business group, may face an uphill battle if he is to meet his predecessor’s vision of boosting revenue fivefold to $500 billion in the next decade.
Mistry, 44, becomes chairman of Tata Sons Ltd., the holding company for the salt-to-software group, just as slower economic growth damps demand for products from steel to cars. Ratan Tata, who steps down on turning 75 after two decades at the helm, built the business into a $100 billion global conglomerate through acquisitions including the U.K.’s Corus Group Plc and Jaguar Land Rover. Tata succeeded his uncle in 1991 as India’s economy was opening up.

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Tata Sons Chairman Cyrus Mistry takes part in Tata Consultancy Services annual general meeting in Mumbai, India on June 29, 2012. Photographer: Rajanish Kakade/AP Photo

“It is not an easy task to grow fivefold in this global economic scenario,” said Shishir Bajpai, senior vice president at IIFL Wealth Management Ltd. in Mumbai. “The bar is set high for Mistry to deliver. Ratan Tata took a group well known in the domestic markets global, now Mistry has to take it forward.”
The change of guard marks a rare opportunity to shape the group of more than 100 companies, whose expansion has mirrored India’s emergence as a global economic power and ranks Tata above Japan’s Panasonic Corp. and Swiss food giant Nestle SA by sales. At stake is the equivalent of about 6 percent of India’s gross domestic product, and the future of firms including Tata Steel Ltd. (TATA), India’s biggest producer of the alloy, and Tata Motors Ltd., the nation’s No. 1 automaker by revenue.

Biggest Shareholder

Mistry’s performance could also weigh on his family’s fortune: along with his billionaire father, Pallonji Shapoorji Mistry, and his brother, the chairman’s family owns about 18 percent of Tata Sons. Little is known about the London Business School management postgraduate’s leadership style or strategic vision, and the man chosen by a select search panel in November 2011 has so far shied away from the media and investors.
“I haven’t heard from him on company plans, so I don’t know” how Mistry will lead, Koen Vanderauwera, a Luxembourg- based bond-fund manager at KBC Asset Management SA that holds the debt of Tata Steel and Tata Power Ltd., said in a phone interview. “I’ll wait and see what kind of announcements he makes, how he comments.”
The $500 billion revenue vision for Tata in 2021 was outlined by Ratan while addressing his top executives in April, and confirmed by Tata Sons director R. Gopalakrishnan. Group spokesman Debasis Ray declined to comment on the vision or Mistry’s plans for Tata. “Such matters are internal to the company,” Ray said in an e-mailed reply to a query.

Textile Trading

Mistry and the Tatas follow the Zoroastrian religion and belong to the small Parsi community, which originated in Persia and found sanctuary centuries ago in India. The Tata group was founded by Ratan’s great grandfather Jamsetji Nusserwanji Tata, who started a textile-trading business in 1868 and then built the country’s first steel mill and hydroelectric plant. He also built the Taj Mahal Palace & Tower hotel in Mumbai, which was damaged in the November 2008 terrorist attacks.
Mistry will also need all the project-handling skills honed at running the construction business at his family’s Shapoorji Pallonji & Co. to sustain profitability even as many of Tata’s key companies battle adverse market conditions or regulatory changes.
“Revenue without sustained profits and a high return on invested capital is of no use,” Neeraj Monga, head of research at Toronto-based Veritas Investment Research Corp., said by e- mail. The group’s biggest businesses, steel and automobiles, are both cyclical industries and maintaining profitability is a challenge, said Monga.

Steel, Autos

For a group that includes Tata Consultancy Services Ltd. (TCS), India’s largest software company, Tata Motors (TTMT), owner of the Jaguar and Land Rover luxury marques, and Tata Global Beverages Ltd., the local partner of Starbucks Corp., sales and profit growth is slowing at its biggest businesses.
Profit growth at Tata Motors decelerated to the slowest pace in four quarters in the three months ended Sept. 30 and sales growth slowed to the least in three years amid waning demand for luxury vehicles in Europe. Tata Steel posted an unexpected loss even as sales growth stayed below 5 percent for the third straight quarter.
“It’s not easy to grow fivefold organically, so Mistry at some point will have to pull a multibillion dollar surprise acquisition,” said Jagannadham Thunuguntla, head of research at New Delhi-based SMC Global Securities Ltd. “He has to be careful because the group’s experience on this front has been mixed.”

Overseas Acquisitions

Tata Steel, which acquired Corus for $12.9 billion in 2007, making it the group’s biggest overseas purchase, reported a loss of 3.64 billion rupees ($66 million) in the three months ended Sept. 30 as weak demand in Europe and China cut prices of the alloy. The steelmaker plans to restructure its U.K. business, cutting 900 jobs and closing 12 sites, it said in a Nov. 23 statement, to shore up margins in a market dogged by overcapacity.
In contrast, Tata Motors’ 2008 acquisition of Jaguar Land Rover from Ford Motor Co. for $2.3 billion helped boost the Indian automaker’s sales almost fivefold over four years. That pace of growth may be hard to sustain as Europe struggles to recover from a debt crisis.
Tata Steel shares have climbed 29 percent in Mumbai trading this year, outperforming the BSE India Sensitive Index’s 25 percent advance. The steelmaker’s shares rose 0.2 percent to 431.50 rupees in Mumbai trading as of 9:30 a.m. Tata Motors has surged 74 percent, making it the best performer on the 30- company benchmark index. The automaker’s shares gained 0.5 percent to 310.60 rupees.

‘Minds Open’

“We should always keep our minds open to acquisitions,” Mistry told recruits in comments that were viewable in a video on one of the group’s websites. “We would, in each company as part of its own strategy, look at M&A for growth but not as a must have.”
Purchases overseas have also proved harder in the past year with Tata’s recent attempts failing to clinch a deal.
Orient-Express Hotels Ltd. (OEH), owner of New York’s 21 Club restaurant and Hotel Cipriani in Venice, last month rejected a takeover offer by Tata’s Indian Hotels Co., saying the bid undervalues the company. In April, Tata Communications Ltd. (TCOM) decided against making an offer for Cable & Wireless Worldwide Plc after failing to agree on a price.
Mistry can look to fund acquisitions by tapping the cash pile at Tata Consultancy Services, the group’s most valuable company by market value, in which Tata Sons holds 74 percent. The Mumbai-based software exporter had 79.2 billion rupees in cash and short-term investments on Sept. 30, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Still, Tata’s new head may opt to look within and consolidate holdings to bolster profitability instead of continuing to pursue acquisitions, according to Tarun Kataria, chief executive officer at Religare Capital Markets Ltd.
“Cyrus takes over the reigns of a highly regarded but sprawling conglomerate at a time of great global uncertainty and muted economic growth,” Mumbai-based Kataria said in an e-mail. “His very deliberate focus will likely be on consolidation, deleveraging, exiting certain businesses and bringing related businesses under a unified whole.”