How Ratan Tata is changing India’s biggest company

Ratan Tata trained to be an architect. Then he worked for the family firm, the Tata Group – one of the biggest companies in India. It has companies in many different sectors, including the car industry and the steel industry. The company’s latest project is producing a car that costs under $3,000.

Mr Tata does not drink or smoke and he does not like publicity. He became chairperson in 1991. At that time, Tata was a difficult organization to manage. There were more than 300 different companies in the group and some were old-fashioned*. Today, there are only 96 companies and the group is more modern.

In the past, it was difficult for Tata to trade outside India because of competition from other countries. Now it exports internationally. The Tata Group is also buying companies in different countries. At the moment, one of the companies in the group, Tata Steel, is trying to buy Corus, a European steel company. But it has a competitor: CSN, a Brazilian company, also wants to buy Corus.

Ratan Tata is making changes to the company. Many of these changes help make the group more competitive. But he isn’t changing all the group’s traditions. For example, the Tata Group still tries to help its workers – the children of Tata’s steelworkers first started to have free education in 1917. Two thirds of the Tata Group is owned by charitable foundations**, and today they are still helping people in India. Investors sometimes ask: “Is Tata doing the right thing? Is charity good for business?” But Mr Tata thinks it is possible to help people and be competitive at the same time.

old-fashioned*- несовременный; устаревший

charitable foundation**- благотворительный фонд

G Which of these sentences summarises Ratan Tata’s ideas?

a) A successful chairman is only interested in profit.

b) A company can be competitive and help people.

c) A group with a lot of companies is easy to manage.

H Do the following refer to the Tata company in the past or at the moment? One thing refers to both.

1 producing a cheap car	3 96 companies in the group 5 a Brazilian competitor
2 300 companies in the group	4 helping its workers

 

I Read the article again and asnwer the questions:

1 Which two sectors does the Tata Group have companies in?

2 How much does Tata’s new car cost?

3 What doesn’t Ratan Tata do?

4 What doesn’t he like?

5 When did he become chairperson?

6 When did Tata first give free education to employees’ children?

7 How much of the group is owned by charitable foundations?

8 Who asks if helping people is good for business?

J Discuss the following questions in a mini-group. Choose a speakperson to report on the results of the discussion.

- What things can a company do to help its workers?

- Do you think that it is possible for a company to be competitive and also help people? Do you know any companies that do both?

 

TEXT B

1 In small groups, discuss these questions:

1 What kind of products are often advertised as ‘natural’?

2 What is important for people when they buy cosmetics and things like soap, shampoo or toothpaste?

3 Nowadays, many companies want to be ‘ethical’, i.e. to behave in a morally right way. What do you think that means in practice?

2 Study this vocabulary and definitions and think of Russian equivalents:

toiletries – things like toothpaste, soap, shampoo, etc.

sophisticated – who knows a lot about fashion and the modern world

revenues – money that a business gets from selling goods over a period of time

a range – a group of products of the same type that a company makes

biodegradable [ˏbaiəudi'greidəbəl] – that you can destroy without making the environment dirty

net income – the money a company has after paying tax and other costs

 

3 Read the text and complete the fact file.

Name:	Natura	Type of products:	…………………..
Location:	…………………..	Number of products:	…………………..
Chief Executive:	………………….	Revenues:	…………………..

 

NATURA AIMS TO EXPAND INTERNATIONALLY

By Peter Marsh

Natura is a fast-growing Brazilian cosmetics and toiletries company which started as a small laboratory in a garage in São Paulo 37 years ago. Today, it is trying to go international.

Natura picked France as the first country outside Latin America to try out its ideas.

“We wanted to choose a sophisticated market where people want things to be very good,” says Alessandro Carlucci, Natura’s Chief Executive. “We wanted a test that was tough.”

Mr Carlucci says the experiment was successful. Within five years, he says, Natura wants to have ‘at least’ 10 per cent of its revenues coming from outside Brazil, compared with 3 per cent now. Apart from Brazil and its small operation in France, Natura currently sells its cosmetics in a few other South American countries.

It sells a range of 600 soaps, shampoos, skin-care lotions and similar products. All of them are based on about 900 natural ingredients, sourced mostly from farmers in the Amazon rainforest.

The company promotes itself as an ‘ethical’ company that works with growers who harvest their products in an environmentally sensitive way. It also uses biodegradable packaging.

‘What makes them different from other companies is their corporate values. They really want to make the world a better place,’ says Mauro Cunha, Chief Investment Officer at Franklin Templeton Investimentos Brasil.

Results are good. In the first nine months, revenues were up 21 per cent to US $1.3bn. Net income rose 33 per cent to $344 m.

FINANCIAL TIMES

4 Answer these questions:

1 Where does Natura sell its products?

2 What is the company’s target for the next five years?

3 Where does the company get the ingredients for its products?

4 What makes Natura an ‘ethical’ company?

5 Why did Natura choose France to find out how successfully it could expand abroad?

5 Match the words (1-5) to the nouns (a-e) to make word partnerships used in the article.

1 a fast – growing	a) values	1______
2 chief	b) ingredients	2______
3 corporate	c) lotion	3______
4 skin-care	d) executive	4______
5 natural	e) company	5_______

 

6 Make a note of two facts about Natura that you find particularly interesting. Then compare and discuss your ideas in pairs.

7 Work in pairs. Say what you know about the companies in the table.

Nationality
Product(s)
Other information

8 Tom Armstrong and Rachel Humphries talk about the four companies. Listen and complete the table.

 

9 Listen again and check your answers.

TA = Tom Armstrong

RH = Rachel Humphries

RH:	So Tom, what do you know about the Virgin Group?
TA:	They’re a very large group, erm, they exist in a lot of different sectors and they’re run by Richard Branson – they’re British.
RH:	Yes, yeah and they, they produce Virgin Cola, don’t they?
TA:	Yeah and I think they’re also famous for the airline, the Virgin Atlantic.
RH:	Um, and they have a radio station – Virgin radio.
TA:	Yeah, and they still have the megastores*, and I think they have megastores all over the world now
PH:	Yes.
TA:	selling videos, music. What do you know about Benetton?
RH:	Well, they’re Italian, and they’re very successful clothing manufacturers.
TA:	I think they produce sportswear** now.
RH:	Yes, that’s right – sportswear, and erm, another, they have another trademark called Sisley, which produces more expensive clothing.
TA:	And Mercedes-Benz – do you know anything about them?
RH:	Well, they manufacture expensive, luxury*** cars and they’re German, I think, or maybe German – American now, perhaps.
TA:	I think they’re part of the Daimler Chrysler Group, which again is a large group… I’ve heard that they also produce a very small car called the Smart.
RH:	Oh right, it’s good for the towns and cities.
TA:	Yeah.
RH:	And what about Sony?
TA:	Oh Sony, they’re, they’re as far as I know they’re still the world leaders in electronics, and produce, for example, the Sony Walkman.
RH:	Mmm, and they’re Japanese.
TA:	Yeah.
RH:	And er, what else do they produce?... computer games
TA:	Yeah, and they also do music now; they did the music for the film the Titanic.

megastore*-крупный магазин, универмаг

sportswear**- спортивная одежда

luxury*** - предмет роскоши

10 Close your notes and write a paragraph describing Virgin, Benetton, Daimler Chrysler or Sony.

GRAMMAR FOCUS 2 – PRESENT SIMPLE vs CONTINUOUS

i The Present Simple is used for permanent or regular actions.

e.g. She often calls her parents.