WestBridge investing $18M in artificial leather maker Mayur Uniquoters

By Swet Sarika

  • 19 Mar 2014

WestBridge Capital has picked around 4 per cent in Jaipur-based Mayur Uniquoters Ltd for Rs 40 crore ($6.5 million) and simultaneously entered into a definitive agreement to invest Rs 70 crore ($11.44 million) in the firm through a preferential allotment.

The PE firm picked shares on Wednesday through open market purchase from the promoters.

In a separate market disclosure the company said WestBridge plans to acquire 1,486,000 compulsorily convertible participating preference shares at a price of Rs 471.06 per share.

The deal is struck through its WestBridge Crossover Fund. Post preferential issue the PE firm will own around 10 per cent of the public listed company.

Mayur Uniquoters said that it is raising capital to augment the resources for general corporate and capital expansion purposes, including setting up a PU plant.

Established in 1994, Mayur Uniquoters is a textile company and is engaged in manufacturing and export of artificial leather and poly vinyl chloride (PVC). The promoter Poddar family has been in the business since 70s, starting with distribution of artificial leather products and later set up a plant to supply for door pads of Maruti cars.

As per its website, Mayur Uniquoters has a total capacity of 1.85 million linear metres per month which is fully used, making it one of the top manufacturers of artificial leather/PVC vinyl in India. It has four Italian coating lines and is planning to set up the fifth and sixth lines within a year which would increase the monthly capacity to 3.05 million linear metres.

The fifth coating line is coming up in a new facility 22 km ahead of its current facility in Dhodhsar, Jaipur.

The company’s products are used in applications, including automotive, footwear, furnishings, and garments and accessories. It clocked revenues of Rs 122 crore for the quarter ended December 31, 2013, up 30 per cent over the year-ago period. Net profit rose around 40 per cent to Rs 14 crore in the same period.

For WestBridge this is the second investment since January 1. Earlier it said it is picking around 24.9 per cent stake in Delhi-based snacks maker DFM Foods for Rs 65 crore.

WestBridge added $325 million to its public markets focused fund last September taking the corpus of WestBridge Crossover Fund to $825 million after its initial $500 million fundraising in 2011.

WestBridge Capital also manages two legacy venture capital funds from 2000s which takes it overall assets under management to $1.2-1.4 billion.

The PE firm was revived in 2011 when four MDs at Sequoia Capital India-Sumir Chadha, KP Balaraj, Sandeep Singhal and SK Jain-moved out to set up a platform for public market investments. They revived their earlier avatar, WestBridge Capital, which was acquired by Sequoia Capital for its India entry along with the team in 2006.

(Edited by Joby Puthuparampil Johnson)