Sir Martin Sorrell
Born	Martin Sorrell (1945-02-14) 14 February 1945 (age 67) London, England
Nationality	British
Education	Haberdashers' Aske's Boys' School Christ's College, Cambridge Harvard University.
Occupation	Businessman
Known for	Saatchi & Saatchi WPP Group
Net worth	£115 million, (US$175 million) or more
Spouse	Sandra Finestone (m. 1970–2005) «start: (1970)–end+1: (2006)»"Marriage: Sandra Finestone to Martin Sorrell" Location: (linkback:http://en-wiki.pop.wn.com/index.php/Martin_Sorrell) Cristiana Falcone-Sorrell (m. 2008) «start: (2008)»"Marriage: Cristiana Falcone-Sorrell to Martin Sorrell" Location: (linkback:http://en-wiki.pop.wn.com/index.php/Martin_Sorrell)

Sir Martin Sorrell (born 14 February 1945, London, England) is an English businessman and the chief executive officer of WPP Group. He has served in that role since he started the company.

Biography[link]

Born in London to a Jewish family,^[1] whose ancestors came from Russia, Poland and Romania.^[2] Sorrell was educated at the independent Haberdashers' Aske's Boys' School then Christ's College, Cambridge, and has an MBA from Harvard University.^[3]

He joined Glendinning Associates, and James Gulliver and then worked for sports agent Mark McCormack.^[4] He joined Saatchi & Saatchi in 1975, and was group finance director from 1977 until 1984. Often referred to as "the third brother",^[5] he designed and carried out many of Saatchi's agency acquisitions. Sorrell undertook this by refining the practice of the ‘earn-out’.

WPP[link]

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In 1985, Sorrell privately invested in Wire and Plastic Products, a British wire shopping basket manufacturer, and joined it full-time as Chief Executive in 1986. He began to acquire "below-the-line" advertising-related companies, purchasing 18 in three years, including in 1987 when he stunned the agency world with a $566 million "hostile" takeover of J. Walter Thompson. Sorrell followed this in 1989 with another dramatic hostile $825 million buy of Ogilvy and Mather. Since 2000, WPP has also acquired two more integrated, global agency networks, Young & Rubicam Brands and Grey.

WPP is regarded as the driving force for the period of consolidation which has been going on within the communications industry for the last ten – fifteen years. His WPP group has amassed the largest media buying group in the world, GroupM. Together with the creative agency networks, JWT, Ogilvy and Mather, Young & Rubicam and Grey, WPP is one of the three major players in the global advertising market.

WPP’s stock price soared and although the company then went through difficult times, during which it was on the verge of collapse, Sorrell’s determination and business acumen brought it around.

WPP has become one of the world's leading communications services and advertising companies valued by the UK stockmarket at £5 billion. With billings of £37 billion and revenues of £7.5 billion, WPP's operating companies provide national, multi-national and global clients with advertising, media investment management, information and consultancy, public relations and public affairs, branding and identity, healthcare communications, direct, digital, promotion and relationship marketing, and specialist communications services. WPP employs 140,000 people in 2,400 offices in 107 countries. He owns a substantial stake in the company through a series of pay awards and his own purchases of shares. Until recently he had never before sold shares in the company; his shares are worth around £70 million.

Sorrell himself is widely respected throughout the advertising industry, with his words being scrutinised and quoted by many within the marketing sector. Many industry observers credit him with the fact that the UK still has an independent, vibrant communications industry. His famed remark that the advertising recession in the early part of this decade was "bath shaped" was one of the most repeated quotes in the 2003 – 2004 period.

On 18 November 2008, WPP technically re-incorporated itself as an offshore entity in Jersey (Jersey is considered as a fiscal paradise by the OECD) in order to reduce an annual tax bill of more than £200million.^[6]

In 2003, after 33 years of marriage Sir Martin Sorrell split from his wife Sandra. Lady Sorrell was awarded £23million in cash, a Georgian townhouse, £2 million of bank deposits and two parking slots at Harrods (worth nearly £200,000).^[7]

Other interests[link]

Martin Sorrell in 2008

In 1997, he was appointed an Ambassador for British Business by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and subsequently appointed to the Office's Panel 2000 aimed at rebranding Britain abroad. In 1999 he was appointed by the Secretary of State for Education and Employment to serve on the Council for Excellence in Management and Leadership.

He is a Governor of London Business School, and a member of the Advisory Boards of both the Judge Business School in Cambridge, UK and IESE in Spain. He is also Chairman of the Global Advisory Board of the Centre for International Business and Management (CIBAM), at the University of Cambridge, UK.^[8] In 1998, he was appointed to the Board of Directors of Associates of Harvard Business School and to the Board of the Indian School of Business.^[9]

Criticism[link]

In 2005 Sorrell sold £9m of shares in WPP at the end of a restricted stock holding period. He also agreed to change a contract with the company which had been much criticised by institutional shareholders in WPP as being unfairly written in Sorrell's favour. Under the previous agreement if Sorrell had been terminated, it would have led to a very large payout; the new agreement provides him instead with no termination payment.

In 2005 his pay was £2.42 million including cash and bonuses.^[10] Further he exercised £52 million in share options, is entitled to a further £5.8million in stock, and deferred further options on another 2.65 million shares valued at £15 million until 2008.^[11] In 2011 Sorrell's pay package increased by 70% to £4.5 million after WPP's pre-tax profits rose 28%.^[12] In October 2011 Sorrell went on the BBC to defend large increases in his and other CEO pay packages^[13] at a time when real average wages in the Western world are declining.^[14][15]

Shareholders have criticised aspects of corporate governance at WPP. This came to the fore again in 2006 with the advent of two court cases revolving around alleged corruption in an Italian subsidiary and contract disputes with the US launch of the OK! magazine.

In June 2008 WPP drew strong criticism for the involvement of an agency, 'Imago', in which WPP's Y&R subsidiary held a minority interest, with the ZANU-PF presidential campaign in Zimbabwe. A report by the Financial Times^[16] found out that Imago was employed by Robert Mugabe's campaign for reelection to the presidency of Zimbabwe. WPP subsequently divested Y&R's minority interests in Zimbabwe.

Recognition[link]

He was knighted at the New Year Honours 2000 Orders, decorations, and medals of the United Kingdom.

On 27 September 2007, Sorrell was awarded the Harvard Business School’s highest honour, the Alumni Achievement Award, by Dean Jay O. Light. The award was also given to: Ayala Corp. chair Jaime Augusto Zobel de Ayala, A. Malachi Mixon of Invacare, Donna Dubinsky and Hansjorg Wyss of Synthes.^[17]

Personal life[link]

Sorrell is married to Cristiana Falcone, Media & Entertainment Industries Director at the World Economic Forum.

Sorrell was previously married to Sandra, with whom he has three sons, but the marriage broke down in 2003. In October 2005, Sorrell cashed in £12 millon of shares in WPP to satisfy paying their £30 million divorce settlement,^[18] where represented by Nicholas Mostyn QC she was awarded: a £3.25m Georgian townhouse; two Harrods underground car parking spaces worth £200,000; £2m in bank deposits; £23.4m in cash; plus stocks and shares.^[19]

Despite the divorce settlement, Sorrell still had 13 million shares an estimated £80m valued stake in WPP at the time of the divorce, which represented around 1% of the company, plus his 2005 pay settlement award.

See also[link]

• List of British Jews

References[link]

External links[link]

• WPP website
• Interview with the New York Sun
• Cool Earth
• WPP moves to a fiscal paradise
• [2]

Sunil Bharti Mittal
Sunil Bharti Mittal at the World Economic Forum in Davos, 2007
Born	(1957-10-23) 23 October 1957 (age 54) Ludhiana, Punjab, India
Residence	South Delhi, India
Nationality	Indian
Alma mater	Punjab University[1]
Occupation	Chairman and Group CEO of Bharti Enterprises
Net worth	$8.3 billion (2011)[2]
Religion	Hinduism
Spouse	Nyna[1]
Children	3[1]
Website
www.airtel.com
Notes [3]

Sunil Bharti Mittal (born 23 October 1957) is an Indian telecom mogul, philanthropist and the founder, chairman and Group CEO of Bharti Enterprises. The US$8.3 billion turnover company runs India's largest GSM-based mobile phone service and world's fifth largest wireless company with over 190 million customers across 19 countries in Asia and Africa. He is the son of SatPal (former MP) and Lalita.^[1]

In 2007, he was awarded the Padma Bhushan, India's third highest civilian honor.^[4]

Early life[link]

Sunil Mittal was born in Ludhiana, Punjab, India. His father, Sat Pal Mittal, had been the Member of Parliament (M.P) from Ludhiana. He first joined the Wynberg Allen School in Mussoorie,^[5] but later attended Scindia School at Gwalior and he graduated in 1976 from Punjab University, Chandigarh, with a Bachelor of Arts and Science for which he studied in Arya College for Boys, a local college in Ludhiana.^[6] His father died of cardiac arrest in 1992.^[1]

Entrepreneurial ventures[link]

A first generation entrepreneur, Mittal started his first business in April 1976^[7] at the age of 18, with a capital investment of 20,000 (US$399) borrowed from his father. His first business was to make crankshafts for local bicycle manufacturers.^[8]

In 1980, he along with his brothers Rakesh, Rajan started an Import Enterprise named Bharti Overseas Trading Corporation.^[5] He sold his bicycle parts and yarn factories and moved to Mumbai.^[8]

In 1981, he purchased importing licences from exporting companies in Punjab.^[7] He then imported thousands of Suzuki Motors's portable electric-power generators from Japan. The importing of generators was suddenly banned by the then Indian Government and just two licences to manufacture generators in India were issued to two companies.^{[citation needed]}

In 1984, he started assembling push-button phones in India,^[7] which he earlier used to import from a Taiwan company, Kingtel, replacing the old fashioned, bulky rotary phones that were in use in the country then. Bharti Telecom Limited (BTL) was incorporated and entered into a technical tie up with Siemens AG of Germany for manufacture of electronic push button phones. By the early 1990s, Mittal was making fax machines, cordless phones and other telecom gear. Mittal says, "In 1983, the government imposed a ban on the import of gensets. I was out of business overnight. Everything I was doing came to a screeching halt. I was in trouble. The question then was: what should I do next? Then, opportunity came calling. While in Taiwan, I noticed the popularity of the push-button phone -- something which India hadn't seen then. We were still using those rotary dials with no speed dials or redials. I sensed my chance and embraced the telecom business. I started marketing telephones, answering/fax machines under the brand name Beetel and the company picked up really fast.".^[1] He named his first push-button phones as 'Mitbro'.^[5]

In 1992, he successfully bid for one of the four mobile phone network licences auctioned in India.^[1] One of the conditions for the Delhi cellular license was that the bidder have some experience as a telecom operator. So, Mittal clinched a deal with the French telecom group Vivendi.^{[citation needed]}

He was one of the first Indian entrepreneurs to identify the mobile telecom business as a major growth area. His plans were finally approved by the Government in 1994^[7] and he launched services in Delhi in 1995, when Bharti Cellular Limited (BCL) was formed to offer cellular services under the brand name AirTel. Within a few years Bharti became the first telecom company to cross the 2-million mobile subscriber mark. Bharti also brought down the STD/ISD cellular rates in India under brand name 'Indiaone'.^[7] IndiaOne was India’s first private national as well as the international long-distance service provider, and, thus, became a major factor in Bharti's success by providing services cheaply.^{[citation needed]}

In November 2006, he struck a joint venture deal with Wal-Mart, the US retail giant, to start a number of retail stores across India.^{[citation needed]}

In July 2006, he attracted many key executives from Reliance ADAG, NIS Sparta and created Bharti Comtel.^{[citation needed]}

In May 2008, it emerged that Sunil Bharti Mittal was exploring the possibility of buying the MTN Group, a South Africa-based telecommunications company with coverage in 21 countries in Africa and the Middle East. The Financial Times reported that Bharti was considering offering US$45 billion for a 100% stake in MTN, which would be the largest overseas acquisition ever by an Indian firm. However, both sides emphasize the tentative nature of the talks, while The Economist magazine noted, "If anything, Bharti would be marrying up," as MTN has more subscribers, higher revenues and broader geographic coverage.^[9] However, the talks fell apart as MTN group tried to reverse the negotiations by making Bharti almost a subsidiary of the new company.^[3]

In May 2009, Bharti Airtel again confirmed that it was in talks with MTN and the companies agreed to discuss the potential transaction exclusively by 31 July 2009. Bharti Airtel said in a statement "Bharti Airtel Ltd. is pleased to announce that it has renewed its effort for a significant partnership with MTN Group".^{[citation needed]}

Talks eventually ended without agreement, some sources stating that this was due to opposition from the South African government.^[10]

Personal life[link]

Mittal resides in Delhi. He is married and has three children.^{[citation needed]}

Awards and Recognition[link]

• Transforming India Leader, NDTV Business Leader Awards 2008.
• GSMA Chairman's Award 2008.
• Padma Bhushan in 2007, from the President of India.
• Asia Businessman of the Year, Fortune Magazine 2006.
• Telecom Person of the Year, Voice & Data, 2006.
• CEO of the year 2005, at the Frost and Sullivan Asia Pacific ICT awards 2006.
• Best Asian Telecom CEO, Telecom Asia Awards 2005.
• Best CEO, India, Institutional Investor, 2005.
• Business Leader Of The Year, Economic Times, 2005.
• Philanthropist of the Year Award 2010 at The Asian Awards^[11]
• INSEAD Business Leader Award 2011^[12]

Philanthropy[link]

Mittal has also been working towards educating India through the Bharti Foundation. The foundation has established over 200 schools on its 2009 list of the world's top 25 philanthropists.^[13]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Sunil Mittal

• Profile at Bharti Enterprises
• Profile at Forbes
• Sunil Mittal collected news and commentary at The Times of India
• Sunil Mittal Profile and Photographs