Piramal Enterprises Ltd’s healthcare vertical will reduce its parent’s holding by 20% through issuance of fresh shares, the diversified conglomerate controlled by Indian billionaire Ajay Piramal told The Economic Times.
With the capital raised, the healthcare unit will seek to expand its portfolio of products, buy brands and/or leverage its distribution network across the US, Europe and Asia.
Of the group’s revenue of Rs 13,215 crore in 2018-19, healthcare accounted for Rs 4,786 crore, or 36%, with an 11% growth from the year-ago period. Over 90% of the healthcare revenue derives from complex generics, contract development and manufacturing.
With the capital raised through fresh equity issuance, the healthcare business will target contract research to India over-the-counter business to branded generics.
Separately, a UK-based business group is planning to enter the Indian aviation sector by acquiring a majority stake in Hyderabad-based Turbo Aviation, which is aiming to launch a new airline called TruStar to run commuter air services under the UDAN scheme starting next year, the Business Standard said.
"We had signed an agreement with a large UK business group to dilute a majority stake in Turbo Aviation in its favour. We will announce the name of our partner and other details once the security clearances are in place," Turbo Aviation founder V Umesh said.
The strategic investor has plans to pump in as much as 100 million pounds (about Rs 950 crore) in the airline operations over a period of five years. TruStar plans to launch its operations in February-March next year with an initial fleet of 10 planes. The company would also apply for pan-India operations soon after as the foreign partner would want to build a large Indian airliner over a period of time, Umesh added.
TruStar was awarded four routes in Uttar Pradesh, three routes across Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Goa, two routes between Hyderabad and Prakasham Barrage of Andhra Pradesh and between Chennai and Ramnad in Tamil Nadu and a large multi-destination route connecting Raipur, Rurkela, Jharsuguda, Jagadalpur with Bhubaneswar, Visakhapatnam and Hyderabad.
