MUMBAI: The coincidences are hard to miss. Akash and Jai Anmol, cousins and scions of the country's leading business family, have joined the now-divided empire originally founded by their grandfather Dhirubhai Ambani, within months of each other. Both are stepping into areas that were the core strengths of Dhirubhai's sons, their fathers.
Reliance Industries (RIL) chairman Mukesh Ambani's elder son Akash Ambani recently joined RIL to help launch the conglomerate's re-entry in telecommunications with Reliance Jio, while Reliance Group chairman Anil Ambani's son Jai Anmol has joined Reliance Capital. While Akash will be in operations, it'll be finance for Jai Anmol. When contacted by TOI, officials in both companies confirmed the move.Rewind to the eighties when the family was still very much together. Mukesh gave up his management studies at Stanford midway to join Reliance Industries in 1981 when his father called him back. Famed for his project management skills, Mukesh initiated Reliance's backward integration journey from textiles into polyester fibres and further into petrochemicals and petroleum refining, and upstream into oil and gas exploration and production. In the process he created the world's largest grassroots petroleum refinery in Jamnagar. Two years later, his younger brother Anil after finishing his management at Wharton joined RIL as co-chief executive officer to pioneer financial innovations and lead India Inc's foray into overseas capital markets.
The clock appears to have come a full circle. The cousins, both 22, representing the third generation of the Ambanis, are joining their respective businesses at a time when the next big push is needed for both groups, as they chase growth in an economy struggling to come out of a slowdown. Their fathers had entered the business when they were around 24 and the group needed a big move forward.
Akash, an economics graduate from Brown University, who was first formally seen with his father in 2011 at the signing the $7.2-billion deal with BP Plc, is now involved in rolling out Reliance Jio's complex 4G broadband wireless service offerings, which could redraw the telecommunications landscape. His father did the same more than a decade ago with the launch of Reliance Infocom, now Reliance Communications (part of Anil Ambani's portfolio following the demerger of the Reliance empire in 2005).
On the other hand, Anil Ambani's son Jai Anmol, a graduate from UK's Warwick Business School, has joined Reliance Capital, as he is said to have demonstrated a keen interest in finance.
Jai Anmol is learnt to have been actively involved in the Rs 12,000-crore acquisition of Jaypee Associates's power assets, where the Adani Group and JSW Group had also thrown in their hats. "Reliance Capital CEO Sam Ghosh is mentoring Jai Anmol for a bigger role in the Reliance Group," said a company insider.
The Ambani cousins are joining their father's business at a time when a host of other business family scions are already learning the ropes in their respective groups. Gautam Adani's son Karan, who got married last year, is helping shape Mundra into a leading global port operator. Suzlon Group chairman Tulsi Tanti's son Pranav, on the other hand, is working to improve the group's financials for a turnaround in 2015. Vedanta Group chairman Anil Agarwal's son Agnivesh, who's based out of Dubai, is taking care of the metals trading business while his daughter Priya is a non-executive director at Cairn India and handles CSR and branding activities. RPG Group chairman Harsh Goenka's son Anant Goenka became the managing director of CEAT Ltd at 30. However, HCL promoter Shiv Nadar's daughter Roshni is stepping out of her father's shadow to make a foray into the healthcare business.
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