NAME: C. SIVASANKARAN AGE: 48 DESIGNATION: Chairman COMPANY: Sterling Group

He is one of India's best known deal makers, regularly hitting the headlines for buying and selling companies. Even as the Tata-Birla deal over Idea Cellular hogged the headlines, NRI tycoon C. Sivasankaran was quietly negotiating to sell his 1.7 per cent stake in the company to unnamed foreign investors for Rs 150 crore. Earlier, in January, he had sold Aircel, his mobile telephone company, to a consortium led by Malaysian telecom company Maxis for Rs 4,860 crore. It was third time lucky for Siva, as his associates call him. Two earlier attempts to sell the company to the Hutchison Group of Hong Kong and afk Sistema of Russia had fallen through. But the wait was worth it; he pocketed an estimated 60 per cent more than what he might have had either of the earlier deals gone through. In 2004, he sold Dishnet DSL to VSNL for Rs 270 crore. "I sell businesses not just to make money, but to get a better return on management," Sivasankaran, who did not speak to BT for this profile, had told this magazine in January.

The man first hit the headlines in the eighties when his Sterling Computers launched a low-price pc. The model succeeded for a while, but he could not sustain his early success and shut the company down. "Not to make profits is a sin; but to be sentimentally attached to a business for ever is foolish," he's said on umpteenth occasions. He's also repeatedly proved that he's nobody's fool, cashing out of companies he either bought or promoted at huge premiums to his entry price.

Sivasankaran's latest business passion is foods. He owns the Barista coffee chain, and has now turned his attention to Aiwo, a health food chain, which specialises in low-calorie foods cooked in olive oil. So, has he finally washed his hands off the telecom-technology sector? Not by a long shot. He's investing in the Wi-Fi business in a big way and is also believed to have acquired mobile licences for seven circles in eastern India. Is he now going to build a foods-to-technology empire? Knowing Siva and his penchant for deal making, he might just build up critical mass only to sell out again to the highest bidder.