Top Indian Brands that have gone to foreign hand

Whenever we buy any consumer goods what do we look for? Brand name. Yes, we look for our favorite brand. We have grown up in this brand culture that brand is everything to us. Trust, quality, image, promises, and glamour – we see all of these things in our favorite brand and we are deeply loyal to these brands. From the plethora of these brands some are our very own – Indian and some are foreign and yet some are very much Indian but belongs to foreign companies.

Brand has become an important intangible asset and it is one of the key drivers of the growth of the business. Fortunes are spent in creating, establishing and nurturing a brand name. In the past decade, we have seen many brands – both Indian and foreign – rise and fall in the Indian market. Many have gained strong market share and yet many have fizzled out after an initial bang.

There are many Indian brands which enjoys tremendous brand recognition, have huge brand loyal customers and a lion’s share of market, yet they are owned by Multinationals. This is a competitive world, survival of the fittest and toughest and never dies attitude is needed for survival and for profitability too. In the past, Indian businesses enjoyed a monopolistic closed economy. With opening of the Indian economy to the world, a door to the bigger market was opened to the local products and also entry of the international products to Indian market. Many Indian brands died, many more were bought out by MNCs and yet many survive to not only maintain its market position in Indian soil but also venture into international arena.

Many strong Indian brands were acquired by MNCs. As buying an already established brand is one of the methods of entering a new market. While the reasons for selling of Indian brands to these foreign companies ranges from inability of the Indian company to compete against these foreign giants, lack of will to fight, inability to match the resources with these MNCs, profitability in joint venture and alliances to cashing in the brands when time is going good i.e. ‘making a fast buck’. Whatever, the reasons for selling their brands to MNCs, listed below are few top Indian brands which eventually went to foreign hands.

Thumps Up

A cola drink introduced in 1977 to offset the expulsion of American Coca Cola Company, an Indian brand by Parle Group gained a near monopoly in India with government closing the door to foreign companies/brands. When Government of India again opened its doors to multinationals, Thumps Up lost its will to fight with its resource packed international brands vis Pepsi and Coca Cola. It sold out to Coca Cola Company in 1993 in order to make quick money after enjoying a near monopoly for almost 15 years. As Thumps Up had a huge market share, Coca Cola Company decided to keep the brand alive rather than kill it to give competition to Pepsi.

Limca

Coca Cola Company bought Indian brand Limca along with Thumps Up when the Indian government opened its door to foreign companies. It tried to kill this brand as well but found out that lemonade is a favorite of Indians during hot sweltering summers; it was revived as a tangy and refreshing drink. Limca is still one of the top brands in soft drink segment in lemon flavor. With better marketing by Coca Cola Company, this brand is still going strong.

Lakme

Lakme started as a subsidiary of Tata Group in 1952. This Indian cosmetic brand was not making any profit. It had two options after perennially losses, one to close this brand and second sell it to another company. Tata Group took the second option and Lakme Limited formed a joint venture of 50-50 with Hindustan Unilever Limited in 1996 and later in year 1998 sold this brand to Hindustan Unilever Limited, a conglomerate in consumer goods sector. And today Lakme is a household name in cosmetics in India as well as abroad.

Kwality Ice Cream

This brand of ice cream found in every nooks and corner was a pioneer in the field of ice cream manufacturing in India. Kwality later ventured out from ice cream sector to restaurants. In 1995, Kwality tied up with Hindustan Unilever Limited, move that took this Indian brand to international market. Hindustan Unilever Limited introduced Kwality Walls ice cream to India and the world beyond, a very profitable venture indeed.

Viva and Maltova

This favorite Indian heath drink was brought by GlaxoSmithKline Beecham Consumer Healthcare Linited from Jagatjit Industries in the year 2000. Now with well known brands GlaxoSmithKline – Horlicks, Boost, Viva and Maltova – it has become a market leader in Indian health drink market. Viva has been repositioned as a traditional family health drink and Maltova as a tasty chocolate based health drink for the kids.

Kissan

The preserved food division of United Breweries Group (UB Group) was not doing well as compared to its liquor division. So, UB Group sold its food section along with Kissan brand to Hindustan Unilever Limited. Now Kissan is another of HUL’s Indian brand. HUL has revived and added more desi flavor to Kissan brand. Also, more items such as salt, rice, spices, chilli powder, atta, etc were added to Kissan brand and hence taking this Indian brand to another level.

Hamam

Hamam, one of the oldest Indian beauty soap brands, has created itself as a trustworthy brand in the market. It is a natural soap category with low pricing. It was owned by Tata Oil Mills Company (TOMCO). It was taken over by Hindustan Unilever Limited when it acquired TOMCO in the year 1993. Hindustan Unilever Limited continues to keep this brand alive as it is one of the trusted brands with strong brand loyalty in soap segment in Indian market. HUL did try to repackage and modify the brand but they found out that by changing the composition of the soap they were loosing the loyal customers, so HUL have gone back to old composition and is using ‘trust’ and ‘quality’ as this brand’s salient points in marketing it.