Thursday, June 27, 2013

Aditya Birla Group has the largest business turnover among Indian companies in Latin America


Aditya Birla Group is a late entrant to Latin America and came very much later than the Tatas and Reliance, the other big iconic Indian business groups. However Birla has made up for lost time by emerging as the Indian company with the largest annual business turnover in Latin America, which was around 1.8 billion dollars last year. Birla is also the largest investor from the Indian private sector in Latin America.
Novelis Brazil, which is part of the Aditya Birla Novelis (with a global turnover of 11.1 billion dollars in 11 countries), had a turnover of 1.3 billion dollars in 2012. Birla had bought the global assets of Novelis in 2007 for six billion dollars. Novelis Brazil has 2000 employees in their three Aluminium plants in Brazil located at  Pindamonhangaba and Santo Andre in Sao Paulo state and Ouro Preto in Minas Gerais. They are investing over USD 300 million in these plants in the coming years to increase the production capacity. 
After Aluminium, the Group has entered manufacture of carbon black with the company Columbian Chemicals Brazil. This was again part of another acquisition of the Atlanta-based Columbian Chemicals in 2011 for 875 million dollars. This has made the Aditya Birla Group as the largest carbon black producer in the world with production facilities in 12 countries. There are two plants in Brazil, one in Cubatão in Sao Paulo state and another in Camaçari in Bahia. The turnover of the two plants was 476 million dollars last year. The plants are being modernised with new investment. 
Aditya Birla Yarn Brazil is the market leader in supply of viscose yarn to Brazilian textile companies. The Group is the world’s largest producer of Viscose Staple Fibre.
The three Indian giants (Tata, Reliance and Birla) enrich three distinct sectors of Latin America and the growing Indo-Latin American business partnership. Tata is a leader in Information Technology and human resources development in Latin America with 8000 Latin American staff in nine countries of the region. Reliance is the largest trader with the region accounting for a quarter of the total trade between India and Latin America. Birla is plugged into the industrial sector of Brasil and the region. The products made in the five plants of Birla are inputs which help the growth of Brazilian and Latin American industries in sectors such as packaging, automobiles, construction,chemicals and tyre production.

While employing 2260 Brazilians, the Group has only one Indian in Brazil Mr Anil Jhala, the Latin America head of the Group. This is typical of the Indian companies who believe in local Latin American talents and in training and nurturing them.

Anil Jhala, settled in his elegant office in the World Trade Centre building of Sao Paulo, is upbeat about the long term growth prospects of Brasil and the region and is actively exploring opportunities for further investment in areas such as Cement, Fertilizers,Insulators, Cellulose,Commercial forestry, Plantations, Commodity trading and Mining.

Friday, June 21, 2013

Peru - the macroeconomic star of Latin America


"Peru has become Latin America’s macro-economic star, combining sustained high economic growth with low inflation",says Joachim Bamrud editor of Latinvest magazine and former editor of Latin Business Chronicle and Latin Trade, in a recent analysis based on IMF data. More from his analysis below
- Peru has had the region’s second-lowest inflation despite having the
second-highest GDP growth rate. The economy grew on average 6.5 percent in the 2008-12 period, while its inflation remained at an average of 3.5 percent.
-Peru is expected to see Latin America's second-lowest inflation rate in 2013 ( 2.1%)as well. 
- As a result of its strong GDP growth and low inflation, Peru is expected to have Latin America’s second-highest increase in purchasing power this year.
- For the past eight years – during the period 2005 through 2012 – Peru’s GDP has consistently been higher than that of Latin America each year. While Peru’s economy grew on average 7 percent during that period, Latin America’s GDP expanded by 4.1 percent. 
- Overall, Peru has a very favorable business climate. It has Latin America’s best environment for doing business, according to The World bank’s latest Doing Business report. 
- In 2012, foreign direct investment grew 48.8 percent to a record $12.2 billion. That’s almost as much as Mexico received ($12.7 billion).
Bamrud says that the Peruvian success of high growth with low inflation could be studied by Brasil which is struggling with low growth and high inflation.
Of course, Peru has the usual developmental challenges of poverty, inequality, infrastructure and education. But Peru is progressing in the right direction under the leadership of President Ollanta Humala who pursues Inclusive Growth policy in a pragmatic and mature manner and, setting himself as a role model for other leaders in the region.