Adani family infuses Rs 6,661 crore in Ambuja Cements, increases stake to 66.7%

New Delhi, Mar 28 (PTI) The Adani family, the promoter of Ambuja Cements, on Thursday announced an infusion of Rs 6,661 crore, increasing its stake by 3.6 pc to attain 66.7 per cent holding in the country's second largest cement company.

The fund's infusion will be instrumental for the cement business of the Adani Group, which has plans to enhance its capacity to 140 million tonnes per annum by 2028, said a statement from billionaire Gautam Adani-owned Ambuja Cements.

This investment follows an infusion of Rs 5,000 crore by the promoter into the company for exercising the warrants issuance approved by the board in October 2022.

"With this, Adani family have increased their stake in the company by 3.6 per cent to attain 66.7 per cent holding," said Ambuja Cements which also owns controlling stake in another cement firm ACC Ltd.

With this, promoters have infused Rs 11,661 crore in Ambuja post acquisition, giving Ambuja capital flexibility for accelerated growth, capital management initiatives and best-in-class balance sheet strength to accomplish its various strategic initiatives, the statement said.

"The additional investment will fortify the company's financial position, providing it with enhanced capabilities to pursue its ambitious growth plans and capitalize on emerging opportunities in the market," it said.

This investment shall also be instrumental in fuelling various strategic initiatives including undertaking debottlenecking capex to enhance operational capabilities to ensure scalability as well as bringing efficiencies across resources, supply chain.

"This shall also drive innovation and product enhancement through advanced technology integration for better service offerings to tap the growing requirements of the sector," it said.

Ambuja Cements CEO Ajay Kapur said this infusion of funds provides "flexibility for fast-tracked growth, capital management initiatives and best-in-class balance sheet strength".

"It is not only the testament to steadfast belief in our vision and business model but also reinforces our commitment to delivering long-term sustainable value creation to our stakeholders and this shall propel us towards setting new benchmarks accelerating our growth and continue to deliver on operational excellence, business synergies and cost leadership," he said.

Ambuja, with its subsidiaries ACC Ltd, has the capacity to produce 77.4 million tonnes of cements annually from 18 integrated cement manufacturing plants and 18 cement grinding units across the country. It had recently acquired Sanghi Industries Ltd.

In September 2022, Adani group has acquired controlling stakes of Ambuja Cement from Swiss firm Holcim for cash proceeds of USD 6.4 billion (about Rs 51,000 crore). Later it had also launched a Rs 31,000 crore open offer for the acquisition of 26 per cent additional stakes from public shareholders. PTI