ICICI Ventures, IFC may exit Bharat Biotech; transaction may value company at 1000 crore

Investment banker Avendus has been mandated by ICICI Ventures to find suitors and the initial process has begun, sources in the know said.

By Rajesh Chandramouli & Swati Bharadwaj-Chand, TNN | Updated: Oct 21, 2011, 10.27 AM IST

CHENNAI/ HYDERABAD: Private equity investor ICICI Ventures and multilateral lender International Finance Corporation are looking to exit Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech. Both investors hold 9% each in the company and an exit may potentially value Bharat Biotech at Rs 1,000 crore.

“It is true that they want to exit because the fund is closing but they have been very happy with us. But I don’t know anything about the timeline or valuation,” Krishna Ella, chairman and managing director of Bharat Biotech said.

Investment banker Avendus has been mandated by ICICI Ventures to find suitors and the initial process has begun, sources in the know said. On the valuation expectations, Ella said: “For me valuation has no meaning at all. I don’t understand on what basis they have arrived at this figure.”

Set up in 1996, Bharat Biotech International is a privately held biotech firm and is jointly promoted by the husband and wife duo of Dr Krishna Ella and Suchitra Ella. The company has an annual turnover of Rs 350 crore.
Bharat Biotech develops and manufactures affordable next generation vaccines and bio-therapeutics at its facility at Genome Valley on Hyderabad’s outskirts adjacent to ICICI Ventures’ knowledge park.

The company recently created quite a stir in the market when it announced that it would be developing the world’s cheapest rotavirus vaccine at $1 a dose for the public markets as against $8 per dose being supplied by multi national companies to the public markets and at around $60 a dose in private markets.

A scientist-turned-serial entrepreneur, Dr Ella has also recently forayed into the agri-bio business and has founded Innova Agri Bio Parks Ltd. Innova Agri Bio Parks has set up a 100-acre integrated food park at Kolar district of Karnataka and is also pilot-testing its packaged food brand ‘Farmer’s Gift’ in select retail outlets in Bangalore.

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