India's Tata Group has given a huge $50 million to the prestigious Harvard Business School (HBS) here to fund a new academic and residential building on its campus, the largest gift received by the institute from an international donor in its 102-year-old history.
The gift comes from Tata companies, the Sir Dorabji Tata Trust and the Tata Education and Development Trust, the philanthropic entities of the group. It comes days after Anand Mahindra, Vice-Chairman and Managing Director of Mahindra and Mahindra Group, gave $10 million to the Humanities Centre at Harvard. A Harvard alumnus, Mahindra gave the gift, the “largest” in the Centre's history, in honour of his mother Indira Mahindra.
Ratan Tata, Chairman of Tata Sons, attended Harvard's Advanced Management Programme, one of three comprehensive leadership programmes offered by the Harvard Business School's (HBS') Executive Education, in 1975. He had also received the School's highest honour, the Alumni Achievement Award, in 1995.
The School said it would use the $50 million gift from the Tata Group to fund a new academic and residential building on its campus for participants in its broad portfolio of Executive Education programmes.
HBS hopes to break ground for the building, which will be named Tata Hall, next spring. It is expected to be open for use by late 2013.
