What is it with desis and competitive eating? Lakshmi Mittal, the world’s third-richest man, launched a surprise bid today for his nearest steel industry rival:
While Bill Gates and Warren Buffett–numbers one and two on last year’s Forbes Billionaires list– engage in a genteel game of bridge, Lakshmi Mittal is ripping apart the world’s steel industry and reshaping it to his liking. This morning, his Mittal Steel… launched an audacious bid for Arcelor… Mittal Steel, the world’s first-largest steel maker, is seeking to pay 18.6 billion pounds ($22.7 billion) to buy the world’s second-largest producer. [Link]
By buying Arcelor, billionaire owner Lakshmi Mittal would control about 10 per cent of the global steel industry, more than three times as much as his closest rival. The purchase would be the biggest ever in the industry… creating a company with 320,000 employees and annual sales of more than $69 billion. Arcelor supplies steel to every second car in Europe… [Link]
… if successful, [the deal] would bring together the world’s number one and number two steelmakers and create the first producer capable of generating more than 100 tonnes of steel a day. [Link]
Mittal, who lives in London, floats Mittal Steel in the Netherlands and maintains Indian citizenship, has lost a couple of recent deals:
Mittal lost a relatively minor deal for a Czech steel mill to a Russian group, despite having the higher bid. And a foray outside steel into the world of oil ended in frustration when Mittal Steel’s joint bid with Indian oil company ONGC for PetroKazakhstan was topped by China National Petroleum Corp. [Link]
But his drive sounds very Roarkian:
He looked at a streak of rust on the stone and thought of iron ore under the ground. To be melted and to emerge as girders against the sky. [Link]
Azim Premji and the Ambanis clock in at numbers 38 and 60 on the Forbes list.
Related posts: World’s biggest steel company will be desi-owned, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett and…, Forbes names India’s richest, Midnight’s oil
(Comments are off: every single comment last time was someone trying to hit Mittal up for a job or cash, or someone else flaming said lamers.)
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