How Bajaj Became India's Fourth Most Valuable Group!

How it became india's fourth most valuable group and what it is doing to stay on top

- Nevin John

As he relaxes at home on the premises of Bajaj Auto’s plant in Akurdi, near Pune, Rahul Bajaj, 80, has every reason to smile. The year 2018 has been good for the Bajaj group. Bajaj Finance, run by younger son Sanjiv Bajaj, has been on a tear over the past few years, and the stock has been included in the BSE Sensex from December 24 as a proxy for the financial services sector.

Meanwhile, elder son Rajiv Bajaj is planning to introduce new super bikes in association with the British motorcycle maker Triumph, launch electric vehicles, and capture the commercial car market with the quadricycle Qute. Mukand Ltd, the group’s steel arm, has started work on the 600-crore steel rolling plant of Mukand Sumi Special Steel in Karnataka – a joint venture between Mukand Ltd (run by cousin Niraj Bajaj) and Sumitomo Corporation of Japan.

Above all, the Bajaj group ended the year 2018 as the fourth biggest in the country by market capitalisation (the market cap of the group was 3.77 lakh crore on December 31, 2018, as against 30,321 crore on March 31, 2007), behind just HDFC, Tata group and Reliance Industries, and pipping such worthies as the AV Birla group, the Wadias, the Godrejs, the Mahindras, the Adanis...They are now the third-largest family group after Tatas and Ambanis.

In a first ever exclusive interaction with the Press, the entire Bajaj family met with Business Today in Mumbai and Pune, to talk about what the next steps would be for the many businesses that the family members head.