Mumbai: Shapoorji Pallonji Group is looking to raise about $1 billion by selling stake in its solar unit to reduce debt. The Pallonji Mistry-led group will sell as much as 30 per cent stake in the solar engineering arm of Sterling & Wilson, said Jai Mavani, executive director at the company. The funds would be raised through a pre-listing stake sale followed by a public offering, according to a Bloomberg report.
The company is also planning to list Eureka Forbes, the water purification unit of publicly-traded Forbes & Co, and also consider sales of commercial real estate, he said. Part of the proceeds will be used to pare debt, he said. “We have leveraged ourselves to the level that we believe is sustainable but, beyond a point, we want to create equity for ourselves,” Mavani said in an interview, the agency reported. “Be it Sterling & Wilson or Eureka Forbes, their real value is a multiple of what’s in the balance sheet.”
The Rs 40,000-crore group, which built the Sultan of Oman’s palace and is now helming one of India’s biggest affordable home projects, plans to tap the market at a time when debt funding is getting scarcer after India’s worst liquidity crunch in two years.
