| Dr. Vijay Mallya - Chairman and Team Principal | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 Dr Vijay Mallya is the charismatic businessman heading up one of India's largest and most significant business empires, the UB Group. With annual sales of over US $4 billion and a market capitalisation of approximately US $12 billion, the Group has diverse interests in brewing, distilling, real estate, engineering, fertilisers, biotechnology, information technology and aviation. It is also the largest Indian manufacturer of beer and spirits.In the late 80s, Dr. Mallya pursued global opportunities to transform the UB Group into India's first multinational company and in 1988, in a leveraged buyout, acquired the global Berger Paints Group with operating companies across four continents. In 1990, following the Government of India's liberalised economic policies, Dr. Mallya decided that the UB Group would only retain interests in businesses that were globally competitive. He also decided to focus on areas of core competence and transformed the vastly diversified UB conglomerate into a handful of key operating businesses including spirits, beer and Kingfisher Airlines. Kingfisher Airlines is today the market leader in India's booming aviation market. With the merger of Air Deccan and Kingfisher Airlines, the airline covers all segments of air travel from low fares to premium fares and offers the maximum number of flights offered by any single airline network in India. It has added international routes from Bangalore and Mumbai to London, Singapore, Dubai and Hong Kong to its armoury over a two year period. In 2007, United Spirits Limited, the flagship of the UB Group, also acquired a hundred percent of premium scotch distillers Whyte & Mackay and Liquidity Inc, a United States-based maker of speciality vodkas. In addition to his Chairmanship of several other corporations, Dr. Mallya has been the Chairman of Aventis Pharma India (previously Hoechst) as well as the Chairman of Bayer Crop Science in India (previously Agrevo) for over 20 years. Dr. Mallya has received several professional awards both in India and overseas. He was conferred a Doctorate of Philosophy in Business Administration by the Southern California University, Irvine, and has also been nominated as a Global Leader for Tomorrow by the World Economic Forum. One of Dr Mallya's major passions has however always been cars and motorsport in particular. He has had a longstanding presence in motorsport dating back to the 1970s and 80s when he participated in several club races and non-championship Grands Prix, including the Madras and Calcutta Grands Prix, in Mo Nunn-owned Ensigns. When Dr. Mallya was elected by shareholders as Chairman of UB in 1983 at the age of 28 business interests began to take considerably more of his time, he took to collecting and racing historic and vintage cars in the UK. In the late 90s Dr Mallya returned to Formula 1, this time as a sponsor. Kingfisher beer logos appeared on the Benetton Formula One Team in 1996 and 1997 and in 2007, Kingfisher Airlines was a sponsor of the Panasonic Toyota Formula One Team. During this time Dr Mallya's imagination was fired again for F1 and, spotting a unique business opportunity, he formed a joint venture company with Jan and Michiel Mol to purchase the Spyker Formula One Team at the end of 2007. Force India was officially launched in January 2008 and has since gone from strength to strength. |
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| Michiel Mol - Co-Owner | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 Michiel Mol, co-owner of the Force India Formula One Team, is one of Europe's most succesful e-businessmen of the past decade. Born in 1969 in Delft, The Netherlands, after his graduation from Leiden University with a degree in Computer Science and Mathematics, he founded his own company, Lost Boys international (LBi), that quickly became Europe's largest digital agency. It is currently listed on both the Dutch and Swedish stock exchanges.Michiel then went on to found two more companies in the digital world: Media Republic and Guerrilla Games, thus becoming involved in cross media and gaming. The games development agency, known for its efforts on the PlayStation 2 classic Killzone and PlayStation 2, PC and Xbox hit Shellshock: Nam '67, was sold to Sony in 2005. Michiel is always forward-thinking and sees opportunities for innovative projects. Currently he is a member (and largest shareholder) of the supervisory board at LBi and Media Republic and is involved in the recent start-ups Karami Games and Flogs. |
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