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Ashok Amritraj's Hyde Park Entertainment is setting up a multi-million dollar fund in Asia for the production of feature films. The fund aims to raise $55-$73 million. Hyde Park's Asia offices will be based in Singapore. Hyde Park will produce or co-produce three to four films per year, which will include a mixture of English and local or regional language films to target international as well as national or regional market. The company aims to establish long-term producing partnerships with local production houses in India, Japan and South Korea. The fund has positive support from Singapore's Media Development Authority, though it is not going to put in money behind the fund. Singapore's Media Development Authority CEO Christopher Chia said that he expects the production funding to raise Singapore's position as a global media city. […]
Venture investment in India had a relatively quiet first quarter — VCs invested $99 million in 16 deals, according to a new report from Dow Jones VentureSource. That’s an 80 percent drop from the same period last year, but that plummet tells us more about the investment spike in early 2007 than whether the recent quarter was particularly terrible. It’s also a 27 percent drop from the fourth quarter of 2007. (Yeah, last year was a record-breaking time for venture investment in India.) Interestingly, the amount of deals held relatively steady — it’s the deal size that shrank. That’s pretty much the exact opposite of what happened in China (the other country seen as the standard-bearer in overseas venture growth), where the number of deals fell, but the amount of money per deal grew, causing a 46 percent year-over-year boost. How big is the difference? In India, the median deal size was $4.1 million; in China, it was $10 million. The United States fell in between, with a median size of $7.1 million. […]
Subhash Chandra, owner of the Essel group, has exited from Centrum Capital Ltd, a listed financial services firm that offers project finance, investment banking, wealth management and brokerage services. Chandra, who is believed to have picked up about 14% stake in Centrum through a preferential offer in late 2006 or early 2007, sold his stake in the stock market in tranches in March. At an average price of Rs1,304 per share of Centrum in March on the Bombay Stock Exchange, Chandra could have realized some Rs111 crore for his stake. Chandra’s acquisition price is not known though one person familiar with the transaction said, “he has made good money.” Shares of Centrum, which used to be known as Centrum Finance, closed at Rs850 a share on the Bombay Stock Exchange. Their 52-week high was Rs1,670 a share. Chandra, who is also chairman of Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd, was not available for comment. Following Chandra’s exit, Indivision Fund of the Future Group, which owns thePantaloon and Big Bazaar chain of retail stores, acquired a 14.9% stake in Centrum, initially by buying 10% through a preferential allotment and later by buying shares from the stock market.Meanwhile, people familiar with Chandra’s thinking said the media baron initially bought the Centrum stake through trading companies to enter financial services. […]
SIDBI Venture Capital (SVCL), which manages two venture capital funds with total corpus of Rs 600 crore, is gearing up for more investments. Speaking to FE on the sidelines of announcement of his company’s investing Rs 30 crore in Mumbai based Centaur Group, Ajay Kapur, CEO, SVCL, said that “We are in harvesting mode nowadays and there was no chance of exiting from any of the funds we have invested at this moment”. The only fund which was exited by the SVCL in recent past was the NCR-based retail chain retail chain, Sabka Bazar which is promoted by a Muradabad-based firm. The SVCL, which had invested a sum of Rs 6 crore in the firm, sold off its entire stake to Spinach Group. Kapur said, “Most of the firms we have invested in our young and performing well, so we would like to wait for 3-4 years before deciding to exit. Out of our commitments to invest Rs 500 crore as SME Growth Fund within a period of three years, we have already invested Rs 375 crore so far in sectors like auto, textile, pharma, speciality chemical, industrial adhesive and others.” […]
Idea Cellular said on Thursday private equity Providence Equity Partners would buy a fifth of its unit Aditya Birla Telecom for $640 million, the latest deal in the world's fastest growing wireless market. The deal, which values the telecom firm at $3.2 billion, is subject to regulatory approvals, and expected to close by August. The funds will be used for network rollout and ongoing operations of Aditya Birla Telecom (ABTL), which has a licence in eastern Bihar and Jharkhand states, Idea Cellular said. Idea will transfer its 16 percent holding in tower company Indus Towers — a joint venture with top telecom operator Bharti Airtel and Vodafone –to ABTL. “ABTL has got growth opportunities in one of the biggest telecom circle going forward (Bihar service area) and also 16 percent equity in Indus Towers,” Managing Director Sanjeev Aga said, explaining Providence Equity's interest in the firm. DSP Merrill Lynch was the sole advisor to Idea on the deal. […]
Sidbi Venture capital (SVCL), the venture capital arm of Small Industries Dvelopment Bank of India, is planning its third fund this year, which will focus on early and growth stage companies across various verticals, a top official said. “We will come up with more funds in the current fiscal year. The focus is set equally across different segments that have growth potential,” SVCL's Chief Executive Officer, Ajay Kumar Kapur, told reporters here. However, he declined to divulge further details about the fund. SVCL had launched its first fund–National Fund for software and IT– with a corpus of Rs 100 crore, Kapur said, adding, “the fund has already been deployed fully in various firms”. The second fund, which is an SME Growth Fund, has a corpus of Rs 500 crore and had attracted investments from nine parties including Sidbi. […]
In an attempt to bridge the gap between investors and technology companies, Yen Expo Pvt Ltd for the first time, is organizing an unique event for technology companies, Bangalore Technology Equity Fair (BTEF) 2008. The event will be held on 27th June 2008 in Sigma Room, Chancery Pavilion, Bangalore. BTEF 2008 will provide a unique forum for technology companies to access the Private Equity market. This unique event will allow technology companies seeking equity funding to make presentations to and meet directly with Private Equity & Venture Capital investors. Yen Expo will screen and shortlist 10 high quality technology companies seeking capital for growth. Yen Expo will then work closely with the short-listed companies to make them investor ready prior to the event. […]
Non-resident Indians are increasingly looking at private equity (PE) funds as an alternative investment avenue. While the PE space has traditionally been the domain of institutional investors, now there is an increasing trend of high networth NRIs investing in such funds, said Mr Sonjoy Chaterjee, Executive Director, ICICI Bank. Mr Chaterjee, who is in charge of the bank’s International Banking, said that for NRI investors, this gives an opportunity of indirectly participating in growing sectors such as real estate and infrastructure. Mr Chaterjee told Business Line that the bank has successfully raised money from NRI investors in West Asia and the UK for two of ICICI Venture’s funds, India Real Estate Fund and the India Advantage Fund. Some other funds that attracted interest from NRI investors were the ones launched by JM Financial and the healthcare fund launched by Ajay Piramal’s group. […]
M&M, India’s largest utility vehicle maker, has signed a term sheet with Kinetic Motors, the Pune-based two-wheeler manufacturer, in its bid to acquire a majority stake in the company. A term sheet is a non-binding agreement setting forth the basic terms and conditions under which an investment is to be made in a company. M&M is looking to acquire 76% stake in the company valued at about Rs 120 crore. It is doing due diligence of Kinetic’s books and assets. A deal could fructify in the next two months if the due diligence proceeds smoothly, sources said. ET first reported on May 15 that M&M has been in talks with Kinetic Motors to acquire a majority stake. At present, though, there are no PE players in the race to invest in Kinetic Motors. M&M is one of India’s leading manufacturers of general-purpose utility vehicles, light commercial vehicles, tractors and SUVs. Kinetic Motors has presence in both motorcycles and scooters. […]
Johnson Matthey is likely to invest in the JV through its Dutch subsidiary Matthey Finance BV either by subscription to fresh shares or purchase of existing shares of Macred India from Dr Reddy’s or both, it is learned. The JM group which controls about a third of the world market in bulk opiates provides technology to only those companies in which it could get a substantial stake. It has no other partner in India. The JM group has the capacity to meet 31% of the world’s morphine demand and 29% of the world’s codeine requirement.The government has received a request from the UK-based company for picking up 49% stake in Marced India, government sources said. The application is to be considered by the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) this week. […]
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