TVS, GMR joint venture to go pan-India

CHENNAI/HYDERABAD: TVS and GMR, two of South India's most prominent family businesses, have been in a very silent joint venture in the aviation logistics space for more than a year-and-a-half now. Starting with the Hyderabad airport, where the JV is already operational, the plan is to go pan-national. Such a coming together of these two groups has never been discussed in the media until now. The tie-up is between TVS Logistics, whose MD is R Dinesh, and GMR Hyderabad Airport Resource Management. GMR Group head GM Rao's son Kiran Kumar Grandhi is one of the directors of the JV. The TVS company, which has a 51% stake, didn't share details. However, Hemanth DP, COO of the GMR group company, said the idea behind the alliance with TVS Logistics was mainly to tap road feeder services from and to the airport. "TVS is a very established player in the trucking business. We are developing the feeder services as more and more airlines are in need of an extension of their network," he said. "If you come in Lufthansa from Frankfurt to Hyderabad and go in a Jet Airways to Tirupati, technically you book one seat only but it is in two different airlines. Similarly, in the cargo business, we want to establish the road feeder network to connect the last leg. In some cases, it will be by road." The JV is currently operating Aero Express, the bus service that connects the airport to major locations in the city. This is a service that has been scaled up in recent times with more frequency and routes. Vikram R Jaisinghani, the GMR group company's CEO, said, "There is an opportunity for TVS to offer road feeder services and they may be one of the players in the logistics space at the airport." Then there are warehousing services, where GMR believes players like TVS can work with it. Jaisinghani was bullish about his company's plan to develop a cargo hub. The JV has its origins in a company called Radi Logistics, where some TVS members had minor stakes and an associate of Dinesh owned the biggest stake.

Stanchart, Jacob Ballas, Old Lane to invest $150 mn in GMR airport business

Bangalore based GMR Group is all set to raise $150 million from three PE firms. A consortium of three PE firms that include, Standard Charted Bank's private equity arm, Jacob Ballas & Old Lane will be investing in the company according to two sources familiar with the deal.

This is the second round of private equity fund raising by GMR for its airport arm, GMR Airports Holding. Last month, it had raised $200 million from SBI Macquarie Infrastructure Fund .

The company is awaiting government approval for the deal. According to the current regulations, any investment of or above Rs 1,200 crore in the aviation sector needs government approval. Since SBI Macquarie's investment was through an offshore vehicle, the new deal will breach the upper limit. However sources said that the company is optimistic that it will get the necessary approval.

The investments would be in the form of a compulsorily convertible structured product that will be convertible when the unit goes public. The private equity investment by SBI Macquarie was also through compulsory convertible preference shares.

'The approval process is underway. I am bond by the confidentiality agreement, so I won't comment on the names. As if now we are waiting for the FIBP approval.' said A Subba, chief financial officer of GMR Infra.

Standard Charted Bank declined to comment on the story.

GMR Airport Holdings operates two airports in India (New Delhi and Hyderabad) and one in Turkey (the Sabiha Gokcen International Airport, Istanbul). The airport arm accounts for as much as 46 per cent of GMR Infra's revenues. The private equity investment will be used to develop new projects.

GMR Infra has been battling a high debt of around Rs 15,300 crore, while its airport business itself has a debt of around Rs 9,200 crore. The fresh equity infusion could come handy in bringing down the company's debt-equity ratio.