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India's Tata Group spreads its interests and cash abroad

The Tata Group, whose sales of cars, appliances and computer software account for 5 percent of India's annual exports, said it's investing in Australia, Bangladesh and South Africa to increase overseas income.

India's biggest group of companies by market value is aiming for overseas sales to make up 30 percent of total revenue from 20 percent now to spread its risks, said Ratan Tata, the group's 67-year-old chairman, in an interview in Mumbai. He didn't give a time for reaching the goal.

"We are looking at creating a presence in different" countries, Ratan Tata said.

"I don't think we had a drive for the overseas push previously. We were focused domestically," he said.

The 126-year-old Tata Group, with sales of US$14 billion in the year ended March 31 last year, will put up factories, build hotels, buy mines and set up more branches abroad. The group's acquisitions since 2000 include a maker of components for buses in Spain, a maker of trucks in South Korea, Tetley Group Plc of the UK and a steel producer in Singapore.

"The Tata Group is not alone in its push for business interests outside India," said Adrian Lim, who owns shares of Tata Consultancy Services Ltd, among US$11 billion of assets he helps manage at Aberdeen Asset Management Asia Ltd in Singapore.

"The Indian market holds a lot of potential, but going global provides more opportunities, he said.

India's economy, the fourth-largest in Asia, expanded 8.5 percent in the year ended March 31 last year, recovering from a slump caused by three years of drought.

Rising exports and the lowest interest rate in three decades helped the Indian rupee to strengthen 2 percent against the dollar in 12 months, the seventh-biggest gainer of 16 Asia-Pacific currencies tracked by Bloomberg. That has made overseas acquisitions cheaper for India-based companies.

Indian companies spent US$7.1 billion since 2000 buying the units of foreign companies. In the same period, foreign companies invested US$12.7 billion buying businesses in India, according to Bloomberg's data on mergers and acquisitions.

Ratan Tata, chairman of the group since 1991, said Tata Group companies will invest mostly in so-called emerging markets such as Bangladesh because the Tata brand is better known there.

"We are looking at our international operations a little differently," he said in Mumbai.

"We are not looking at exports per se. We treated exports on a somewhat opportunistic basis, based on opportunities that arose," he said.
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