Tata Sons board to meet on Tuesday; discussions on loss-making cos likely

The Tata Sons board is set to discuss the group's loss-making companies, including their business performance and future strategies, at its upcoming meeting on Tuesday.

The board of Tata Sons will meet on Tuesday, and discussions on the diversified group's loss-making companies are likely to come up, sources said on Monday.

However, sources made it clear that any discussion on Tata Sons chairman N Chandrasekaran's reappointment is unlikely at the board meeting, which comes amid rising frictions within the group.

Individual companies, especially those currently loss-making, are likely to make a presentation on the state of their business and the way ahead, a source said.

Chandrasekaran and Tata Trusts chairman Noel Tata, who is a nominee director on the Tata Sons board, are understood to have met over the weekend to discuss the same matter on the performance of the companies.

In FY25, Tata group's unlisted businesses posted a loss of Rs 10,905 crore, which is likely to go up to Rs 29,000 crore, according to reports.

It can be noted that the Tata group, which includes the Tata Trusts owning two-thirds of Tata Sons, the holding company of the group, has seen a lot of top-level friction lately, which has included expulsions or attempts to expel some members and also a deferment on Chandrasekaran's continuation as the chairman of Tata Sons.

As per reports, Noel Tata is concerned over mounting losses at Tata Sons, especially the ones by new businesses, which were started under the helm of Chandrasekaran, like Tata Digital and the electronics ventures, and also the financially struggling carrier Air India, bought from the government a few years ago.

Noel Tata is also reluctant to take Tata Sons public through an IPO. At present, Tata Sons, a core investment company, has been classified as among the top-15 non-bank finance companies (NBFCs) by the RBI, which are mandated to list.

Neville Tata, the son of Noel Tata, has already been inducted into a few of the trusts or foundations linked to the group.

E-mails sent to a Tata Trust representative were not answered till the time of filing the story.

Days ahead of the board meeting, InGovern, a proxy advisory firm, said that a listing for Tata Sons is an imperative.

''A holding company of this large scale and systemic relevance should not remain outside a stronger transparency and governance framework of a listed company,'' the report said.

''Where control is exercised through a complex trust-based holding arrangement, the case for listing becomes stronger, not weaker, because governance should not depend on private consensus alone,'' it added.