Morgan Stanley Private Equity Asia (MSPEA) has announced its first deal in India.The Asian private equity arm of New York headquartered Morgan Stanley has picked up a minority stake in castor oil maker Biotor Industries for Rs 182 crore. VCCircle was the first to report that Morgan Stanley will pick up a stake in Mumbai-based Biotor for Rs 240 crore. But since then the markets have crashed, and the deal took a little more time to close due to regulatory reasons. Biotor is one of the largest integrated manufacturer of castor oil and castor derivatives in the world.
At that VCCircle had reported that Morgan Stanley will pick equity and compulsorily convertible preference shares totaling about 30.4% of the post issue paid up capital of the firm, valuing it at a Rs 790 crore ($175 million).
Biotor has an integrated business model, with presence from contract farming of castor seeds to the manufacture of downstream derivatives. It has a distribution network in the US and Europe. The company reported revenues of Rs 1,000 crore in the last fiscal year.
Morgan Stanley is investing out of its third Asia focused fund, which raised commitments of $1.5 billion last year.
"Morgan Stanley Private Equity Asia raised $1.5 billion dedicated fund for Asia last year and we expect to deploy a significant amount of the fund in India over the next two years,” said Chin Chou, managing director and head, Morgan Stanley Private Equity Asia.
Rajesh Kapadia, managing director for Biotor Industries, said: “The investment will provide us access to Morgan Stanley’s global franchise and relationships, which will help us to increase international presence.”
Also read here.
