The financial distress at Vodafone Group Plc’s Indian venture has dragged down the wealth of Kumar Mangalam Birla, to about $6 billion from $9.1 billion two years ago, Bloomberg has reported. His group is the second-largest investor in the teetering wireless carrier.
Kumar Mangalam Birla, who joined forces with the British operator last year, has lost about a third of his fortune since the end of 2017 as mounting losses and debt decimated the equity of the troubled Vodafone Idea Ltd.
Apart from his telecom venture, shares of his flagship firms that produce chemicals, metals and cement have also tumbled amid a demand slump, eroding his wealth further.
The net worth of Birla has shrunk to about $6 billion from $9.1 billion two years ago, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. A majority of his fortune is derived from his ownership of Aditya Birla Group, a conglomerate that controls his main holdings.
According to Bloomberg, Birla is the latest mogul to burn his fingers in India’s cutthroat phone-services market since Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd. entered the fray in 2016 and drove two rivals to bankruptcy. Formed by the merger of Vodafone’s local unit and Birla’s cellular operator, Vodafone Idea last week reported the worst loss in the nation’s corporate history, while the British partner flagged the risk of a collapse.
