Word: mittal
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They won't make that mistake again. For delivering such a lesson, and for doing it with good humor in spite of sometimes odious personal attacks, Lakshmi Mittal is Time's International Newsmaker of the Year. "Whether I'm Indian or the citizen of another country is irrelevant in this global environment," he says...
...truth, Mittal is almost as European as he is Asian. He was born and grew up in a modest but well-connected family in Sadulpur, in the northwestern Indian state of Rajasthan, but his business empire has been constructed entirely outside India. Mittal began making his fortune a decade ago after breaking away from his father's Calcutta-based steel business and building his own firm, buying up steel plants in countries ranging from Algeria to Kazakhstan, Ukraine and the U.S. His timing was brilliant: worldwide demand for steel has been soaring because of massive demand from China and other...
...those who follow Indian business, and many will stress Mittal's global links. "Mittal is not really Indian. He's floating somewhere above India Inc.," says James Winterbotham, founder of London-based merger consultant India Advisory Partners. But in one sense, he is very Indian indeed, for a host of companies from the subcontinent are now getting into the global game. Even excluding the Mittal-Arcelor deal and the pending bid by Tata Group for Corus, data compiled by Winterbotham's firm shows that Indian companies spent about $6.5 billion on international acquisitions in 2006, almost triple the volume...
...Mittal himself credits his son Aditya with the idea of buying Arcelor. They first discussed the possibility in 2005, while in the midst of acquiring a Ukrainian company, then drilled into the detail of a possible bid last December, during a family skiing holiday in St. Moritz. On Jan. 13, Mittal made an informal approach to Dollé over dinner at his London mansion and, when Dollé gave a noncommittal answer, he took his bid directly to shareholders...
Personal lobbying helped to overcome some political obstacles. For weeks, Mittal made the George V Hotel in Paris his home base, jetting around Europe to shake hands and put his case to anyone who would listen. Critically, labor unions weren't hostile; they had already worked with his company and knew what to expect. And Mittal won a powerful French ally early on: François Pinault, a fellow self-made billionaire whose holdings include luxury designer Gucci. Pinault was appalled by the reaction to the bid. "I didn't like the welcome he received in France, nor the xenophobic...