India’s Tata Group is in talks with potential investors about the possibility of participating in a new digital platform, said people familiar with the matter, who are looking to modernize their consumer businesses as retail giants like Amazon.com Inc. and billionaire Mukesh Ambani join the incipient e-commercial market.
Tata Sons Pvt., The controlling company of the $ 113 billion auto-coffee conglomerate, is working with advisers to explore the possibility of attracting financial or strategic investors, including global technology companies, said the people, who asked not to be identified. because they are not. t authorized to speak to the media. The group plans to pool digital assets across various Tata businesses to create the new entity, according to the people.
A representative for Tata Sons declined to comment on the stake sale discussions.
Tata’s platform, an e-commerce gateway for its consumer products and services ranging from beverages to jewelry to resorts, may look to compete with the ambitious plans of Ambani, Amazon.com, and Walmart Inc’s Indian company Flipkart. to tap into the nascent market of more than one billion consumers. Ambani, president of Reliance Industries Ltd., seeks to forge a digital empire, raising more than $ 20 billion from big-name partners like Facebook Inc. and Google for his newly formed technology company, Jio Platforms Ltd.
The talks with potential investors are at a very early stage and there is no certainty that they will result in a deal, the people said.
Adding weight
While attracting outside investors would lend credence to Tata’s digital ambitions, it may also help the group reduce debt after the coronavirus pandemic hit its flagship businesses. The net debt of the Tata Steel Ltd. group was $ 14 billion as of June 30, while the net auto debt of Tata Motors Ltd., which owns Jaguar Land Rover, was around 480 billion rupees (6.5 billion). Dollars).
Tata Group already has a lot of entrenched consumer businesses, many of which also have an online presence. These include Tanishq jewelry stores, Titan watch showrooms, Star Bazaar supermarkets, the Taj hotel chain, and a joint venture with Starbucks in India. The intention is to consolidate these currently fragmented web operations.
As part of that push, the conglomerate is building an all-in-one e-commerce application for its wide range of consumer products and services, Bloomberg News reported last month. It is expected to launch in late 2020 or early next year.
Natarajan Chandrasekaran, Chairman of Tata Sons and longtime CEO of Tata Consultancy Services Ltd., is championing the group’s digitization push and Tata Digital Director Pratik Pal is in charge of creating this all-in-one app, one person said last month.
Pal has three decades of experience at TCS, where he was Global Head of Retail and helped with the digital transformation of some of the world’s largest retail chains, including Walmart, Tesco Plc, Aldi Inc., Target Corp., Best Buy Co . and Marks & Spencer Group Plc.
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