Narayana Murthy ups stake in JV with Amazon; Actis may float new renewables entity

By Keshav Sunkara

  • 07 Feb 2019
Credit: Pixabay

Infosys co-founder NR Narayana Murthy’s family office has increased its stake from 51% to 76% in its joint venture with Amazon, which has made a corresponding decrease in its holding to comply with the new foreign direct investment (FDI) policy, The Economic Times reported.

Following Amazon’s reduction in holding from 49% to 24%, the joint venture called Cloudtail India Pvt. Ltd will restart selling on marketplace Amazon India from Thursday, according to the report.

Cloudtail India, one of the largest sellers on Amazon India, is a joint venture of Amazon Asia and Prione Business, a company owned by Catamaran Ventures, the family investment office of Murthy.

Amazon is planning similar restructuring in another top seller Appario Retail, the report said.

Appario Retail is a subsidiary of Frontizo Business Services Pvt. Ltd, a joint venture of Patni group (51%) and Amazon Asia Pacific Holdings (48%).

Separately, private equity firm Actis is looking to set up a new company for renewable energy assets, Mint reported.

Citing a person aware of the development, the report said the new firm may house Essel Group’s solar assets that Actis plans to acquire for around $600 million.

The new firm focuses on renewable power projects and may also hold road and transmission assets, the report said.

Actis is also looking to buy about 200 megawatts of solar assets from Shapoorji Pallonji group through its other firm Sprng Energy, according to the report.

In June last year, VCCircle reported Sprng Energy had finalised a deal to buy solar assets from a Shapoorji Pallonji Group company.

Last year, Actis sold its renewable energy platform Ostro to ReNew Power for an enterprise value of around Rs 10,000 crore.