Norasco was founded by young Indian entrepreneur Ajay Goyal in 1993 in Cyprus.

Ajay Goyal graduated from National Institute of Technology, Kurukshetra cum laude as Mechanical Engineer.

After working for a year and half in Fortune International, a leading Indian export company and Mekaster Group, a telecom company in Delhi, India, Ajay was raring to go rogue. He founded a new partnership to start business in Soviet Union in 1988. Ajay also worked on Indian National TV DoorDarshan as an anchor. His interest in media was to culminate a decade later in creation of a newspaper and media company in Russia.

Ajay moved to Moscow in 1989 and in time became familiar with all countries of Soviet Union and forged lasting relationships with entrepreneurs and future leaders of the region.

Ajay pioneered a number of businesses including a software/ IT company in India in 1990. He moved swiftly into private equity as Russian privatization got underway spotting opportunities and managing them hands on in a manner few others could. He already had a up close insight into the workings of Russian enterprises - he knew the true risks and never allowed greed or excess to influence his decisions. As he led risk capital from high worth individuals into heart of Russian industry in a balanced and conservative manner he built a unique record of staying independent and always making clean profitable exits from every single project. In time, few foreign investors in Russia in 1990s will boast such consistency, confidence and security of business and such clean exits.

His true achievement was in ensuring not just high profits but also security of investments and harmony with stakeholders. He always knew which opportunities to turn away from and in hindsight that has been his biggest gain. In an era of lawless vacuum he applied high ethics, integrity and principles of honesty and fairness to business. In 1997 foreign capital was flooding into Russia and the new Russian stock market was full of promise of over 300-400 percent return. Ajay went against the tide, allowed his own instinct to direct decisions over commonplace mass euphoria about Russia that prevailed in western banks and media. He exited all Russian investments sensing grave systemic troubles even as economists and analysts led billions into the Russian market. That decision was to prove prophetic as Russia defaulted in 1998. Hedge Funds and investment banks crumbled with tens of billions in losses and foreign capital and expatriates hastened to exit Russia. 

Ajay used the respite from Russia to focus on India but Moscow once again presented a new and unique opportunity. After the collapse of Russian economy in 1998, Ajay made a second bet on Russia and brought back his investor group, his experience and tremendous resources to take rich pickings in 1999. He also invested in creation of a media company and became Publisher and Chief Editor of The Russia Journal newspaper. His instinct and timing proved right again. He predicted the turn of politics correctly too and soon Russia was moving away from the anarchy and robber capitalism to a more disciplined albeit controlled market economy. The stock market outperformed all other world markets within 5 years.

In 2005 Ajay decided to pursue other passions, exited Norasco and gave up all day to day responsibilities making a final exit from Russian investments, only taking up advisory roles in some significant projects. He has founded a film production company Norasco films with a US$100 million slate of feature films in Europe, Russia, India and the US.

He advises Norasco on new opportunities and his advice for the decade of 2010 is on clean technologies, green growth and renewable energy in India.

Ajay Goyal, 45, lives in London and divides his time between London, Delhi and Copenhagen.