Wednesday, February 15, 2006

Anil picks up 44% in DTDC

The Telegraph - Calcutta : Business: "Anil Ambani today forayed into the express and courier business by picking up a 44 per cent stake in Bangalore-based DTDC Courier and Cargo Ltd for Rs 70 crore.

Cash-rich Reliance Capital funded the buyout — its fourth since the warring brothers reached a settlement in June last year to carve up the Rs 100,000 crore Reliance group. Earlier, Reliance Capital had picked up a stake in animation company Prime Focus and splashed out Rs 360 crore to pick up a 51 per cent stake in Fame Adlabs, a films-to-entertainment company.

Anil-run Reliance Capital had also bought out general insurer AMP Sanmar for over Rs 100 crore. AMP was recently renamed Reliance Life Insurance.

DTDC is promoted by Subhasish Chakraborty, a first generation entrepreneur. He is the only Bengali who had a good presence in the highly competitive express industry.

Chakraborty will retain a 56 per cent shareholding in the company and will continue to lead the management team. RCL acquired this stake through its division — Reliance Private Equity.

While RCL did not specify the mode through which this stake was obtained, an RCL press statement only said that DTDC “obtained equity capital from Reliance Private Equity’’.

At present, DTDC revenues on a stand-alone basis are Rs 125 crore and the company aims to grow to Rs 500 crore by 2010.

DTDC also has an international presence with offices, joint ventures and associates in New York, New Jersey, London, Dubai, Dhaka and Colombo among other countries. "

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