Masterstrokes of Mukesh Ambani
The pandemic has landed most of the countries in recession. Many big-equity firms and industrialists have lost a huge amount of money. Soon after Canada and Germany, even the United States declared that they entered the recession. But has our country fallen in the same traps?
Things were not looking quite good in India as well and realizing that there might be a severe financial crisis, he took this as an opportunity and attracted many foreign companies. Wondering who the " He " is? Yes, undoubtedly, he is the most ambitious business tycoon and the richest man of India-Mr. Mukesh Ambani.
He always believed that technology is the biggest driver of human development and if you can use technology to benefit people then that's the business you can have. Getting adapted to the new technology, understanding the situation, and investing wisely differ him from the other industrialists. In the pandemic situation, he used one of his best traits which are raising funds from multiple foreign companies in a short period. According to an article from The Economic Times Mr. Ambani raised 15.2 Billion Dollars in just nine weeks. A few weeks earlier Facebook invested 5.7 Billion Dollars in Jio. The prime motivation for Facebook was to keep the huge user base in mind and bringing Jio's small venture platform Jio Mart to its messaging app Whatsapp. Execution and inspiration are much bigger than Innovation. With this, he also emerged as the fourth richest man in the world gaining a total net worth of $80.6 in the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
The curious case of Jio is that Mr. Mukesh Ambani was aware of innovation and that no telecom company has ever invested in the ‘New Oxygen’ of the 21st century that is ‘data’ in the Indian Subcontinent. Let it be Airtel or Vodafone-Idea, these companies were always investing in the phone calls, messages, and miscellaneous extra charges. These companies never charged for data usage. Then came the Jio and invested three times the total revenue in the new technology model of his 4G Service. Though they are accused of reigning monopoly, Reliance Jio has its advantage of competitiveness and Sustainability. They will not harm the revenue and reputation if they first took a very hefty amount for data usage and now charging a somewhat affordable and more exactly cheap to their customers. Where Other companies were eccentric to think about themselves, Jio ushered the Digital Revolution.
Reliance Retail Ventures Limited announced that it will acquire the Future Group’s retail, wholesale, logistics, and warehousing business for Rs.24,713 Crore. The company will be merged into Future Enterprises. Mr. Ambani also announced that Jio's parent company Reliance was planning to bring its 5G network solution making it difficult for the other national and global telecom companies. Google later announced that it will invest 7.7 Billion Dollars and acquire a 7% stake in Jio. After raising funds from such tech-giants and giving them a chance for FDI with an assurance of a promising business he didn't only prove that he was a man of a great vision but also proved that 'A penny saved is a penny earned'.
The Joint CFO of Reliance industries Mr. Srikanth had announced in 2018 that their company will become debt-free by May 2020. In Mid-June he announced that Reliance Industries became debt-free after raising 15 billion dollars in just 58 days. Fast raises from equity firms in the pandemic situation was a masterstroke and gained more trust from foreign companies. After the launch of the video conferencing app, Jio Meet which gained popularity in a few weeks was also a success, after all, it also met the standards of India's Data Sovereignty movement.
Thrashing the Chinese telecom giant Huawei, the United States Secretary of State Mr. Mike Pompeo praised Jio calling it a 'clean telecom company'. Always seizing the opportunity and staying ahead of his competition contributes a lot towards his success. All these strategies and masterstrokes make Mukesh Ambani a Tech-Visionary Industrialist!