Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Tuesday, Jun 17, 2003
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Tuesday, Jun 17, 2003 |
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Marketing
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Strategy Patak's Foods mulls outlet in India Kohinoor Mandal
WIGAN (UK), June 16 THE UK-based Patak's Foods Ltd — a world-renowned name in Indian food and cuisine — wants to expand operations in its country of origin. The 70-million-pound-sterling Patak's Food started its business in the early 1950s and currently is one of the leading brands in the ``Indian-food'' sector. The company, with an employee strength of around 2,000, sells its products in more than 40 countries and has separate marketing joint ventures in the US and Canada. Mr Kirit Patak, Chairman and Chief Executive of Patak's Food, is a second generation Indian settled in the UK. His father, Mr L.G. Patak, migrated from East Africa and started the business in London by selling samosas. At present, Patak's has a frozen food factory in Dundee, an Indian bread manufacturing unit in Glasgow and it is headquartered at Haydock in Lancashire. Its latest factory - inaugurated in February 2002 - was built in the town of Leigh near Wigan for an investment of 18 million pound sterling. The company is well-known for its pickles, curry pastes, chutneys, ready-made kebabs and kormas, papads, ready-to-eat breads, frozen Indian snacks, microwaveable curries and chilled ready-to-cook restaurant quality meals. It claimed that more than 90 per cent of Indian restaurants in the UK use their products. The Pataks use their Indian connections for outsourcing spices and other food materials. The company is also selling some of its products in India. ``We want to expand our operations in India. At present, it is in embryonic stage. However, the hygiene standards in India are too low and I cannot risk my global business just for the Indian market. I personally visit India regularly to see that proper hygiene standards are maintained by our outsourcing units,'' Mr Patak told Business Line. In this context, he said that the Indian Government must realise that food processing should not be restricted to the small-scale sector. He claimed that they were not just the ``world's largest producer of Indian food'', but also the ``educators and pioneers'' of it in the Western world. ``We have created the market and now we are facing the competition. But that happens to all first-timers. We are not afraid of competition and we are confident that we will continue to maintain our number one position in this industry'', he said. To maintain its numero uno position, the company is investing more than 7 million pound sterling every year for the development of its brand, which is called Patak's. New recipes are also created to remain a step ahead of fellow competitors. At present, Patak's Foods is a family-owned company and Mr Patak ruled out any immediate plans for going public to raise funds.
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