| Serving
over 25 millions NRIs worldwide |
|
|||||||||||||||
| Lornamead Group: Mike Jatania Britain’s richest Asian businessman, May, 2007 |
|
|||
 |
Jatania’s Lornamead group, which he runs with his three NRI brothers
Cosmetic King, UK NRI Mike Jatania, Britain's richest Asian businessman Updated, Feb. 01, 2007 Lornamead, running under NRI Mike Jatania, 41, with the help of his hree brothers is a leading manufacturer and marketer of Home and Personal Care products has acquired Woods of Windsor from Disperse Group plc (“Disperse”), which went into administration on February 01, 2007. Mike Jatania has already amassed a £650m fortune by building a portfolio of cosmetics and personal care brands such as Harmony hairspray, Lipsyl lip salve and Yardley perfume through his family company Lornamead. Woods of Windsor, established in 1770, is a quintessentially English brand renowned for its classic fragrances which have extended to toiletries, gift sets, beauty and home fragrance. Lornamead has acquired the assets, rights and inventory to all Woods of Windsor products globally (excluding the retail outlets) as well as the transfer of the Woods of Windsor team. Woods of Windsor is a well known heritage brand that has a range of key distribution channels including pharmacies, gift stores, department stores and garden centres. The brand generated £18 million in retail sales value in 2005. Jatania bought the cosmetics firm Yardley, famed for its lavender soap and talcum powder and as quintessential an English company as they come, for an estimated $100 million from the US giant Procter & Gamble. Jatania is a member of TIE (The Indus Entrepreneurs) and the International Advisory Council of the Association of MBAs and is evolving a philosophy which he feels may help to prevent Indian business families from becoming victims of their own success. Promotion in Indian business families should be on the basis of merit, he insists, and not automatically go to the idiot cousin simply because he is family. He was born in Kampala, Uganda, on February 17, 1965, and arrived in Britain in 1969 with his parents and three brothers and three sisters. His grandfather had emigrated from Rawal in Gujarat to East Africa in the early part of the last century and was eventually joined in Uganda by his family. Mike is the CEO of Lornamead. All his fanily as Hindus, they are devotees of Shreenathji (“an avatar of Lord Krishna”), and Jatania supports several charities, including Save the Children, the Prince’s Trust, the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award and number of others, both in Britain and in India. He is also a trustee of the Tamasha Theatre Company. All his family lived in Leicester for ten years and move to London in 1979, Jatania played cricket for Leicestershire U-13 where he was a useful wicketkeeper batsman. Later, after a brief stint at Dulwich College, the south London public school, he studied accountancy at South Bank University before entering the family business after a life-changing trip to Nigeria. He relaxes by listening to Indian music. The Lornamead Group is a leading manufacturer and marketer of quality home and personal care products including brands such as Harmony hairspray, Lypsyl lip balm, Amplex deodorant and breath fresheners, Ingram shaving preparations and Yardley. Founded by the Jatania family in 1978, the Group was conceived originally as a trading house to represent the interests of blue chip brand owners on the African continent. Since 1985, Lornamead has been developing and launching its own brands in various international markets and has built a strong management team, all of whom have a proven track record in a variety of companies and disciplines. In the last eight years, the Group has focused on acquiring brands from multinational companies including Unilever, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Procter & Gamble, Sara Lee and Henkel. These brands are typically household names with strong brand equities which when focussed on by Lornamead can deliver growth and sustainable profitability. In December 2002, the Group acquired the Natural White business, a manufacturer and supplier of both branded and private label products for the oral care market. The Natural White acquisition enabled the Group to expand into the North American market as well as providing a manufacturing base in the region. Following this, in April 2003 Lornamead acquired Network Health and Beauty a company with significant sales, marketing, warehouse and distribution infrastructure to service the UK Market and become a Headquarter for Lornamead Europe. Leading to Lornamead’s most recent acquisitions of six Procter & Gamble Brands and the well loved British Yardley. The Lornamead Group has a proven track record of operating on a low fixed overhead base and outsources all non-core and specialist activities. In recent years, brands owned by the Lornamead Group have demonstrated that they can deliver operating profit margins above industry norms. The Group is now headquartered in the UK with affiliate offices in Dubia, Jersey, Ireland, Toronto, Lagos, Johannesburg and Cape Town and has a distribution network that spans over 50 countries, employing over 400 people directly. The Jatania family originally came from India, but their father, an entrepreneur, emigrated to Uganda in the 1930s and moved the family to Britain in 1970. The most active family members in Lornamead today are Mike Jatania
(41), who joined the Lornamead Group in 1985 and has been its Chief
Executive since 1990, and his brothers, George (53), Vin (50) and
Danny (47). In the recent past, the Group has acquired the following brands: Brand Category Vendor Date Te Tao Sally Hansen Bristow, Vosene Fabrics Handwash
|
|||
Mike
Jatania |
|
LORNAMEAD – AT A GLANCE Name: Mike Jatania * Sunday Times Rich List Items: Fragrances: |
