State-owned Gail India is one of the few firms waiting eagerly to buy the energy assets of crisis-ridden Infrastructure Leasing and Financial Services (IL&FS), The Economic Times reported.
The assets could be worth around Rs 6,000 crore for IL&FS and will hold a controlling stake in the wind power plants that have an aggregate capacity of 873.5 MW. The once under construction will have a combined capacity of 104 MW, the report said citing two people with knowledge of the matter.
A source close to the development told Economic Times that Gail India is the front-runner to buy energy assets while Japanese investor Orix reserves the right of refusal to buy the stake if the valuation falls below a particular price.
There were 24 firms that submitted (EoIs), Tata Power, Adani Power and JSW Energy being the ones among them.
Though the company received 22 expressions of interest from investors, including Global Infra partners, KKR, Brookfield, I Squared Capital and Macquarie, the response in terms of binding bids were poor, as per the report.
The approximate value of the asset is around Rs 6,000 crore and the deal will help pare debt by Rs 5,000 crore, sources told the paper.
Gail is targeting to increase its installed capacity of 128 MW of wind power through mergers and acquisitions. They are also bidding for commercially-viable tariff-based and viability gap funding-based green power projects.
IL&FS, to combat its Rs 94,000 crore debt, is going to use renewable portfolio disvestment as its asset-monetisation strategy.
IL&FS’ energy assets hold a steady Rs 8,000 crore. The group’s board of directors said chalked out a plan to sell assets in education, roads, broking, etc.
Though the company received 22 expressions of interest from investors, including Global Infra partners, KKR, Brookfield, I Squared Capital and Macquarie, the response in terms of binding bids has been poor, said the report.
