The Hindu : Thy name is just competition

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Dec 26, 2003

Business

Business

Thy name is just competition

By K. T. Jagannathan

CHENNAI DEC. 25. What is in a name? Everything, some may argue. Nothing, many may blabber. If time and tide don't recognise the name, the game of competition makes a mockery of it. Time, tide and competition have seen many a name just consigned to the pages of history in just a moment. As the famous Birbal retorted in the court of King Akbar, "this too shall pass away". In this apocryphal story related to Akbar, Birbal reacted this way showing his hand when the King asked him to describe in five words what would stand the test of time. You may call these quirks of fate. You may even argue that these are caused by competitive heat. Yet, the fact of the matter is that they have failed to survive the test of time.

A couple of developments in this music month of December are clear enough to conclude that the cannon of competition is finally out to blast big names in the Chennai corporate world. The move to take the software business out of SSI Ltd. and merge it into an yet to be named venture where the software division of Scandent will also be amalgamated and the proposal to merge Ashok Leyland Finance (ALF) with IndusInd Bank are explained as the inevitable consequences of competition. It may be recalled, a few years ago, Bank of Madura got merged into ICICI Bank. Not long ago, a reputed name ITI (Investment Trust of India), an H. C. Kothari group outfit, went down the M&A (mergers and acquisition) drain. Much prior to that, the country's first private mutual fund, Kothori Pioneer Mutual Fund, lost its name when its Indian parent, ITI, was sold to a Kolkata-based H. C. Kothari group. Today, it is Franklin Templeton. While it is likely that the name ALF will find way into archives once its merger is through with the Hinduja bank, top brass at SSI maintain that the company per se will exist for a while until they decide on its fate (eventual closure).

ITI, Kothari, Bank of Madura, ALF, SSI and the like are not `so-so' names. They have powerful parentage. People put not just their trust but money in them. These names represented a definite image about themselves and the fields they were engaged in. They formed the face of Chennai corporate world. Today, most of the names are gone. Many more are waiting to go.

Has the city changed? Yes, indeed from Madras to Chennai. Has the corporate face of the city changed? A big `yes' again. For those living in distant lands, the very mention of Chennai conjures up names like these and several others. For anyone who returns and takes a walk down the lanes of the city after an elongated interval, Madras, nay Chennai, may look vastly unrecognisable with many a formidable name of former times having gone inconspicuous, thanks to competition.

What is the moral of the story? There can be no permanency about these names as the size and reputation fall by the wayside in the whirlwind of competition. What is the lesson? Pure business has no attachment to name, size and reputation. So, what is so great in a name?

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