London, Mar 20
The Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) has reactivated its UK India Business Forum (IBF) in London as a platform for exchange of best practice and knowledge sharing to help expand the economic footprint of Indian businesses in Britain.
The forum, which had been dormant for some time, has been revived under the chairmanship of Keshav R Murugesh, the UK-based Group CEO of Mumbai-headquartered multinational business process management company WNS. The UK IBF is designed to actively tackle the challenges faced by the Indian business community operating in the UK and help champion new joint ventures and partnerships between both countries.
“This is a crucial time for both countries to extend cooperation in critical areas such as trade and investment, technology and innovation, climate action, the future of work, skills and education,” said Murugesh at a re-launch event for the UK-India Business Forum in London on Tuesday.
“By collaborating with the UK government, local businesses and academia, the UK IBF will strategically support Indian companies and champion ‘Brand India’ in the UK,” he said.
The Indian High Commissioner to the UK, Vikram Doraiswami, will serve as a patron of the forum and described the endeavour as perfectly timed to capitalise on the opportunities within the India-UK corridor.
“From the towels used in the Centre Court in Wimbledon, to the Jaguar Land Rover cars that ministers and royalty here drive, from hotels to technology companies, from medicines to 80 per cent of COVID jabs by the Serum Institute of India and Wockhardt in the UK, there is hardly any sphere in the UK that is not touched by the India relationship,” said Doraiswami.
“The UK IBF has huge value for us in plugging the knowledge gap, in creating a space in the relationship for the future through supporting business, investment and core strengths of our society which is openness, education, and the ability to take advantage of the brilliant innovation that happens in our labs and research institutes and bring it to market,” he said.
Against the backdrop of the free trade agreement (FTA) negotiations, which have been put on hold after 14 rounds until after the Indian general elections, the UK IBF is seen as a key platform to build on the escalating levels of bilateral trade, which currently stand at just over GBP 38 billion a year.
Indian companies, estimated at around 954 with combined revenues of GBP 50.5 billion as per the ‘India Meets Britain Tracker’ released annually by CII and Grant Thornton, are the second largest investors in the UK.
“The UK IBF is an exclusive group of corporate members, primarily Indian companies with existing or planned operations in the United Kingdom. With IBF 2.0, the platform provides an opportunity to raise shared concerns about policy and markets with relevant stakeholders,” said CII Director General Chandrajit Banerjee.
“The CII UK IBF has undertaken some important initiatives in the past and some of its recommendations have been positively viewed by the UK government,” he added.
Ravi Limaye, CEO of Wockhardt UK – a Mumbai-headquartered biotech company which has an industrial base employing over 400 people at Wrexham in north Wales – welcomed the new platform as a springboard for greater India-UK collaborations across pharmaceutical, healthcare and technology sectors.
“One-third of all medicines used by the NHS [National Health Service] come from India,” Limaye pointed out as he revealed that the UK is the largest overseas market for his company. The Indian business chief expressed optimism that the UK IBF would help build on such success stories, encouraging more Indian companies to expand their operations across different parts of the UK.
