Tuesday, January 2, 2007

BE Billimoria & Co. receives funding from Indivision

Indivision, the private equity fund promoted by Future Capital, has acquired a 26% stake in Mumbai-based contract construction company BE Billimoria & Co. for an estimated Rs. 75 crores. This is the $425 mn-fund’s first investment in the real estate sector and Future Capital has announced plans to enter the hospitality sector. The management of BE Billimoria estimates turnover for this year to be around Rs. 200 crores and is looking at trebling this figure in the next five years through a pan-India presence. The company is also considering a possible IPO in a year.

Currently, the promoters, Kaiyoze Billimoria and Digant Kapadia, each hold 16.5% stake in the company, while the rest is held by Merrill Lynch Capital Markets (4%), Indivision (26%) and other equity investors.

BE Billimoria has worked on residential and commercial projects with different partners. Some of the major projects that that the company has completed are IDBI Towers, Imax Theatre, Hotel Leela, Hotel Hyatt Regency and Reserve Bank of India among others, in the commercial space and Cadbury House, Hinduja Plaza and Palm Beach are some of the company’s projects in the residential space. The company has partnered with HDFC, Sun Group, IDFC and other real estate funds for various projects. This is the first time they have received private equity funding. The real estate sector, valued at $12 bn, is growing at 35-40% per annum. The sector has seen some large equity deals in the last few months with nearly $350 mn in investments flowing into the sector.

Read the article from The Economic Times.

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