One of India’s biggest industrialists and philanthropists Mr Ratan Tata turns 84 today (born on 28th December 1937). He is the former Chairman of Tata Group, which he headed from 1991-2012 and then briefly in 2016-17. At present, Ratan Tata continues to head Tata’s charitable trusts.
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Background and highlights
Mr Ratan Tata graduated from Riverdale Country School of New York City in 1955. 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. He joined Tata Group in 1961, with his first assignment being as an apprentice on its shop floor.
In his career spanning over almost six decades, some of the highlights include- Tata Tea acquiring Tetley, Tata Motors acquiring Jaguar Land Rover, and Tata Steel acquiring Corus, in an attempt to turn Tata from a largely India-centrist group into a global business. Undoubtedly, Ratan Tata is a pioneer in whatever he does and is amongst the most respected business tycoons not just in India but all around the world.
Also Read: Ola To Add Around 1000 Nano Electric To Its Fleet Following Rs 40 Crore Fund From Tata Motors
The mistake that cost Tata Motors thousands of crores
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In his otherwise extremely successful career, there’s one mistake that Ratan Tata himself admits to having cost his company Tata Motors thousands of crores.
It’s the branding of Nano as the ‘cheapest car’.
Addressing students at the convocation of the Great Lakes Institute of Management in the year 2015, Ratan Tata had admitted that the greatest mistake was in the branding of the Nano as the cheapest instead of “most affordable”, which was actually the intention of the company.
In his words, “Nano was made to reach out to people, (but) it never has. It is meant to be reachable throughout India with our dealerships. But we made our bunch of mistakes,”. But as per Tata, the launch of Nano was a great success, one that went beyond expectations.
A few years ago, former Tata motors chairman Cyrus Mistry had revealed that Tata Motors and Tata Motor Finance had suffered a huge loss of nearly ₹ 4,000 crore due to Tata Motor’s practice of lending without any risk assessment for Tata Nano and other small commercial vehicles. As per him, the NPAs were huge, and although the easy finance artificially bolstered the market share figures, Tata motors saw a steep drop in the volumes of small commercial vehicles (SCV) and the Nano as soon as this was reigned in, with SCVs’ volumes falling by more than 50%.
The post-retirement era
After stepping down as the head of Tata Sons in 2012, Ratan Tata has been focussing on investing in startups, primarily in the e-commerce space, which is an area that he sees full of potential for growth in the country. He has invested in companies such as Xiaomi, Ola, Paytm, Snapdeal, Zivame, Urban Ladder, CashKaro, Lenskart, Dogspot, Kyazoonga, Firstcry, etc., to name a few.
Also Read: Dog-Lover Ratan Tata Shares An Adoption Post On Instagram To Find A Loving Family For ‘Sprite’
Besides all this, Ratan Tata has been quite active on social media platforms like Twitter (over 10 million followers) and Instagram (over 5 million followers), where he keeps sharing posts that will leave you with a smile. Here are some of the adorable tweets and posts by him.
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