Esmark made headlines in Indian pink papers early last year when Essar Steel put in a bid to buy the American steel company but was later upstaged by its Russian peer Severstal. Few knew that Esmark was a consumer products company in the 1980s and was later revived by the Bouchard brothers as a steel firm through a string of acquisitions. When the two brothers revived the company in 2003, Esmark had revenues of $4 million. By 2008, it had ballooned to $3 billion and had grown to be the fourth largest steel company in the US.
America for Sale; by Craig T. Bouchard
& James V. Koch; 210 pages; $35.96
(This story appears in the 18 December, 2009 issue of Forbes India. To visit our Archives, click here.)