Infrastructure India taps UK shareholders
INFRASTRUCTURE India has become the latest Indian firm to tap the UK markets for investment cash, raising £33m in a share placing.
Shares worth £25.5m at 60.5p each have been placed with existing and new investors and will start trading on AIM on Thursday, the firm said at the weekend.
Specialist energy investor Guggenheim Global Infrastructure has taken shares worth £2.5m in the placing.
Guggenheim will also take 111m Infrastructure India shares in exchange for handing over its majority stakes in an Indian hydropower developer and logistics firm said to be worth $191.5m (£119.7m) in total.
Guggenheim executives Tom Tribone, Sonny Lulla and Robert Venurus are set to joint the Infrastucture board if shareholders approve the deal at an EGM on 2 March.
Infrastructure’s directors Rupert Cottrell and Timothy Walker have taken 100,000 and 36,000 shares respectively. The share placing will more than double the total number of shares to 81.9m.
Cottrell, the firm’s chairman, said: “The Indian infrastructure sector continues to be a compelling story and we believe that there are significant opportunities in the sector which the Placing will enable the Group to pursue.
“The Placing will also further enhance the ability of the Group to bring both its existing investments to completion and full revenue generation.”
Infrastructure India listed on the Main Market of the London Stock Exchange in June 2008 and transferred to trading on AIM in November 2010.
Infrastructure India follows in the footsteps of Indian big-hitters including Jubilant Energy, which raised $85m with an AIM float in November, and SKIL Ports & Logistics, which raised $120m in October.
The main market has also seen a flurry of Indian cash-raising in the last year, with Essar Energy joining the FTSE 100 last May and miner Vedanta plotting a £4bn spin-off for its copper unit later this year.
ANDREW DAWBER
AKUR PARTNERS
Infrastructure India has kept its core team of advisers close since it floated. Akur Partners chief executive Andrew Dawber and managing director Tom Frost have advised the company since its IPO in 2008, when they worked for the UK branch of now-defunct Icelandic bank Kaupthing.
Akur was formed from the ashes of Kaupthing in 2009, and counts Shaw Group, New Britain Palm Oil and Whitbread takeover target Coffeeheaven among its clients.
Dawber began his career at Robert Fleming and Co, and spent time in the capital markets branch of Societe Generale, Collins Stewart and Numis Securities. He was most recently global head of equity capital markets at Kaupthing.
Frost is responsible for Akur’s new energy sector as well as running asset management services. He gained a PhD in climate change in 1999 and during his banking career has focused on companies involved in emissions trading, clean technology and agriculture. He previously worked for Numis and Kaupthing.
Akur managing director and qualified solicitor Anthony Richardson is also advising Infrastructure India. Richardson has 11 years of investment banking and corporate finance experience at KPMG, Taylor Wessing and Numis Securities.
Infrastructure India is also being advised by long-term broker Smith & Williamson, and has taken on Westhouse Securities as joint broker to aid the current share placing.