KM Birla won't buy firms with global supply chains, cites protectionism

Aditya Birla Group is spread across 36 countries; its chief has acquired more than 40 companies in the last 25 years.

Indian billionaire Kumar Mangalam Birla, who oversees the $46 billion Aditya Birla Group spread across 36 countries, is no longer keen to acquire any firm with a globally diversified supply chain as protectionism and the pandemic increasingly curb the movement of products and people.

“We wouldn’t look at a company or a business where you source in one corner of the world and sell in another corner of the world,” Birla told Haslinda Amin in an interview during the Qatar Economic Forum. “That’s a reset that has happened on account of growing protectionism.”

Acquisitive conglomerates such as the one Birla