Uday Suresh Kotak (born 15 March 1959) is an Indian banker and Founder of Kotak Mahindra Bank, where he currently serves as its non-executive director.
In the early 1980s, while India was still a closed economy and economic growth was muted, Kotak decided to start out on his own, refusing a lucrative job option from a multinational. Over the next few years, he diversified his business into various areas of financial services, establishing a prominent presence in bills discounting, stockbroking, investment banking, car finance, life insurance and mutual funds. On 22 March 2003, Kotak Mahindra Finance Ltd. became the first company in India’s corporate history to receive a banking license from Reserve Bank of India.
Bloomberg Billionaires Index estimated his wealth to be US$14.8 billion as of April 2021. In 2006 he and Goldman Sachs ended their 14 year partnership when Goldman Sachs sold their 25% stake in two subsidiaries for $72 million to Mr. Kotak
The majority of Kotak’s fortune is derived from a 26% stake in Kotak Mahindra Bank. His shares in the Mumbai-based bank are held by a promoter group, which includes family members and a trust, according to a June 2023 stock exchange filing. The fortune is attributed to him because he’s the founder and family patriarch.
The Reserve Bank of India has previously decreed that Kotak should cut his stake to 15% by March 31, 2020. He sold a 3.2% interest in May 2014, and a 2.5% interest in the first half of 2017. In January 2020, it was reported that Kotak had come to an agreement with the Reserve Bank of India, in which he would reduce his stake to 26% from 30% within six months of approval. He sold another 2.8% stake in June 2020. Kotak Mahindra Bank has about 1,800 branches, according to its website.
The billionaire and his family also own about 95% of Business Standard, a daily financial newspaper. The valuation of the media property is based on the average enterprise value-to-sales and enterprise value-to-earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization of three publicly traded companies: HT Media, Jagran Prakashan and DB Corp.
The value of his cash investments is based on an analysis of dividends, insider transactions, taxes and market performance.
Rohit Rao, a spokesman for Kotak Mahindra Bank in Mumbai, declined to comment on the billionaire’s net worth.
Biography
Early life and education
Kotak was raised in an upper middle class Gujarati Hindu family. household with 60 people sharing a common kitchen under one roof. The family was originally into combine trading. He called this “Capitalism at work and Socialism at home”. His two pastimes had been cricket and playing the sitar. In a 2014 interview with NDTV, he admitted that he was no longer pursuing his playing of the sitar. His talent in mathematics influenced his choice of career. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Sydenham College and completed a postgraduate degree in management studies in 1982 from Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies
Career
After completing his MBA, Kotak started Kotak Capital Management Finance Ltd (which later became Kotak Mahindra Finance Ltd). From a seed capital of less than US$80,000 borrowed from family and friends, he converted a bill-discounting start-up into a financial services conglomerate with assets of US$68 billion (as of March 2022), and the third largest private sector bank by market capitalization in India with over 1752 branches.
During 2014, Kotak almost doubled his wealth as shares of his Kotak Mahindra Bank hit an all-time high after he sealed a $2.4 billion deal in November 2014 for rival ING Vysya Bank, partly owned by Dutch financial services group ING.
In 2015, Kotak enters the general insurance business and is partnering telecom magnate Sunil Mittal’s Bharti Airtel to start a small payments bank.
Kotak has reduced his stake in the Kotak Mahindra Bank to 30% as of now, as he is required to bring it down to 20% as per RBI directions.
In August 2019 he was reported to be one of the most highly paid CEOs of any Indian bank with a monthly salary of ₹27 lakh (US$34,000).
He took over as President of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) for the year 2020-21.
In August 2023, it was announced that Kotak’s alternate fund management and investment advisory businesses would be combined into one entity called Kotak Alternate Asset Managers (KAAM). It was reported that the entity would have $18 billion in assets under management, making it the largest asset management entity in India.
Honours and awards
- In June 2014, he was named Ernst & Young World Entrepreneur Of The Year.
- In 2015 he won the ‘Business Leader of the Year Award’ by Economic Times
- He was the sole Indian Financier to feature in Money Masters: The Most Powerful People in The Financial World, by Forbes magazine, US (May 2016)
- India Today magazine ranked him #8th in India’s 50 most powerful people of 2017 list.
- In 2018, he won the USIBC Global Leadership Award
Memberships
Kotak is a member of the Government of India’s High Level Committee on Financing Infrastructure, the Primary Market Advisory Committee of the Securities & Exchange Board of India, Member of the Board of Governors of the National Institute of Securities Markets and ICRIER. He is also Governing Member of the Mahindra United World College of India, and Member of National Council of CII. Kotak is also a member of the strategic board which advises the national law firm, Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas
Personal life
He is married to Pallavi Kotak, has two children and lives in Mumbai.
Milestones
- 1959 Uday Suresh Kotak is born in Mumbai, India.
- 1985 Sets up Kotak Capital Management Finance.
- 1986 Company name changed to Kotak Mahindra Finance.
- 1995 Forms partnership with Goldman Sachs in India.
- 1998 Enters mutual fund business with asset management company.
- 2003 Converts Kotak Mahindra Finance into a full-fledged bank.
- 2006 Kotak Mahindra sells stake in Hutchison Essar.
- 2006 Buys out Goldman Sachs’s stakes in their two ventures.
- 2012 Central bank orders Kotak to cut stake in Kotak Mahindra.
- 2016 Kotak Mahindra acquires BSS Microfinance for $21 million.
