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I’ve been to the offices of lots of engineering companies. The most impressive was United Technologies Corporation’s headquarters, the eponymously named “
Gold Building”. The 26 storey building in downtown Hartford, Connecticut, USA, has amber tinted windows that reflect the light to make it appear to be actually made of gold.
The Tata Group’s headquarters in Mumbai is the exact opposite of that ostentation.
Bombay House is an unimposing four-storey grey-stone building that wouldn’t look out of place on a street corner in Leeds. It looks like a local branch of Lloyds bank.
But Tata is significantly larger than UTC. A multinational conglomerate with a presence in 150 countries, it has 540,000 employees and revenues of $96.8bn. It’s one of the largest companies in India and the country’s most recognised brand. The Group is diverse, with over 100 subsidiaries, from a grocery-selling supermarket chain to a precision engineering firm that supplies aeroengine components to Rolls-Royce. However, this is a predominantly industrial company - engineering makes up 40% of the Group’s activities and materials and mining 28%.
Tata has grown tremendously in recent times. Ten years ago its revenues were around $10bn. Almost all of this growth has been outside of India and achieved through acquisitions. International activity accounts for 63% of Tata's revenues.
Although the diminutive size of the corporate headquarters fails to impress, the company’s ethos and culture inspire. Indian people love the Tata Group and its employees gush with pride for their company. It’s a national institution that you aspire to work for. Two thirds of the Group is owned by trusts set up by past members of the Tata family. Each year, the trusts distribute hundreds of millions of dollars to several national organisations they have founded, such as the Indian Institute of Science, the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research and the Tata Memorial Hospital. The company really has no British equivalent unless you can imagine a combination of the BBC, John Lewis and Rolls-Royce that gives the lion’s share of its profits away to charity.
Most people in the UK and Europe will only know Tata as the large Indian conglomerate that bought British / Dutch steel firm Corus in 2006 and then Jaguar Land Rover JLR in 2008.
However, the UK and Tata have a shared history that goes back almost 150 years. Jamsetji Tata, the founder of Tata in 1868, first came to England in 1862, where the industrial revolution and in particular the cotton mills of Lancashire left a strong impression on him. He returned to India and built the country’s first textile factory, Empress Mills, at a time when Indian industry was discouraged by the British Empire.
Despite the yoke of colonialism Tata companies flourished, underpinned by Jamsjetti’s patriotic belief that industrialisation done for the benefit of all could improve India radically and lift millions out of poverty. That patriotic philanthropy was passed on to his sons Dorabji and Ratan and combined with a pioneering attitude towards industry and innovation. For example, the Tatas founded India's first hydroelectric power company in 1912, its first steel mill in 1932 and its first airline in 1932. Not all the ventures over the years have been successful, but in the 21st Century the Tata Group is buying major British firms.
Back on the fourth floor of Bombay House, sitting in the wood-panelled board room, Mukund Govind Rajan, brand custodian and chief ethics officer of the Tata Group is being quizzed on these firms. When Tata bought Corus and JLR, many in the UK were suspicious that a foreign-owned company spelt the gradual decline of yet more British industry. However, Rajan says the company believes in long term value creation in its businesses: "We regard ourselves as a global corporation and we are not an aggressive acquisitive company that strips assets and walks away."
He adds that the recent success of JLR has surprised the company: "The perception in India at the time was that JLR was the dodgy deal of the two.
"When we went in we saw it had tradition, heritage and a great product pipeline. Ratan Tata made a huge difference. His passion for automobiles and comfort with technology provided strong support. We see ourselves as the brand custodian for JLR for decades to come and would not change the brand in any way.
"For Corus we are employing the right people and making the right investments. We absolutely see a bright future for the company."
Yes, my visit to Tata and its companies was orchestrated by public relations executives who have a strategy to win journalists over. But I talked to so many employees, they couldn’t all have been briefed. Locals only confirmed the high esteem in which the company is held. It’s easy for a company to dazzle a journalist with revenue statistics, employee numbers and large shiny buildings. It’s a much more difficult task to win them over with openness and ideas about corporate social responsibility that stretch back centuries.
I’ve no doubt that Tata suffers from the same failings that other global conglomerates do and that it makes business decisions about its subsidiaries according to their performance. But Tata is one of the most earnestly altruistic and socially responsible companies I have ever visited. Two very important companies in the UK are under its care and Tata is as safe a pair of hands as you could ask for.
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