HCL founder Shiv Nadar honoured with UK's 'Businessperson of the Year' award for 2009

The UK Trade & Investment (UKTI) conferred Shiv Nadar, HCL founder and chairman and chief strategy officer, HCL Technologies, with the prestigious 'Businessperson of the Year' award for 2009.

The award was presented by the UK minister for trade, investment and business, Lord Mervyn Davies, in the presence of the British High Commissioner in India, Richard Stagg at a high profile award ceremony at the Hotel Taj Palace & Chambers, Mumbai.

The award recognises an individual who with his business vision and acumen has overcome intense competition and a challenging business environment to achieve significant business success. The award is in recognition of HCL's pioneering investments in the UK and for Shiv Nadar's direction in establishing HCL as a leading global technology player.

Responding to the recognition, Shiv Nadar said, ''Even as India and UK as nations have deep historic ties, UK holds a special place for us at HCL. It is where HCL pioneered the very concept of on-shore delivery with our investments in Northern Ireland. And I believe over the years we have been able to add our own bit perhaps, to the local economy. Our work in the UK has grown not just in volume but the value we are able to deliver to our partners in UK; and from UK to the rest of the world. About 90 per cent of our Europe presence is out of UK. Many of our recent large transformational partnerships are with UK companies; and what I believe is a game-changing acquisition - Axon, is a UK company. We are proud now to be there as HCL-AXON.''

HCL established business presence in UK as early as 2001 with the acquisition of the the BT Apollo Contact Centre, strategic transformational partnerships with large UK companies such as DSG and Skandia; and most recently, the largest ever acquisition in the tech space by an Indian corporate, of Axon.