Ratan Tata says group's firms have to survive on their own

NEW DELHI: The head of India's oldest and biggest conglomerate Tata Group says each of its nearly 100 companies will have to find its own way to survive the global financial crisis

. The group's 96 companies include India's largest outsourcing firm, Tata Consultancy Services, the world's sixth-largest steelmaker Tata Steel and Tata Motors, the country's top vehicle manufacturer. 

"Those who will survive will survive, those which will not, will fail," Tata Group chairman Ratan Tata said in an interview late Friday. 

"Each company has to find its way of sustaining itself," he said in a wide-ranging interview. 

The 141-year-old group would rationalise its operations, he said, without elaborating. 

Tata called the global slump "probably the most difficult time most of us ever had in our lives." 

"We need to have the spirit to face, to adapt into the hardship," he said. 

Each group in the firm has been told to devise its own strategy to cope in a global crisis which has slowed India's economy, he said. 

"Each one will have to critically examine what they have to do and I've mandated that each of our companies come back to us with the plan." 

The Tata Group is a colossus in India with an  annual revenue of 24 billion dollars in the 2007-2008 financial year and is the biggest private employer with 289,500 people on its payroll. 

But a number of its companies have been struggling recently as the financial turmoil saps global demand. 

In 2007, Tata purchased Anglo-Dutch steelmaker Corus for 13.7 billion dollars and the company now faces a sharp drop in demand for steel. 

The following year Tata bought Britain's prestigious Jaguar and Land Rover car marques for 2.3 billion dollars but their sales have since plunged. 

"The companies (Jaguar and Land Rover) were on the cusp of recovery, and were it not for this downturn, we would have acquitted ourselves really well," Tata said. 

He said he still had confidence in the two luxury brands. 

"There is a great deal of technology in these two companies and the brands I think can be nurtured to their original glory." 

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