Tata Steel on brink of buying Bhushan Steel, awaits NCLT, CCI green signal

KOLKATA: Tata Steel’s acquisition of Bhushan Steel is all but complete, with regulatory approval from the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) and the Competition Commission of India (CCI) left to be obtained.

The deal will mark the successful conclusion of the resolution process for the first of 12 big defaulters that the RBI had asked lenders to refer to the NCLT in June 2017 under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC). The company said on Friday it had accepted the letter of intent for Bhushan Steel under the corporate insolvency resolution process of the IBC. Earlier, it had emerged as the highest bidder for Bhushan Steel with a Rs 35,000-crore offer, paving the way for the acquisition of a five million tonne plant in Odisha with a product basket catering to high-value auto and consumer durable makers.

Growth Strategy
Tata Steel has beaten rival JSW Steel and a private equity backed group of employees.


“Tata Steel hereby informs that it has been declared as the successful resolution applicant by the committee of creditors of Bhushan Steel,” the company said in a press release. Bhushan Steel owed nearly Rs 56,000 crore to creditors.

The company didn’t respond to ET’s queries seeking details about how it would go about making the acquisition, including its structure.

The move is a key step forward in Tata Steel’s domestic growth strategy under new Tata Sons chairman N Chandrasekaran, a former top executive of the company said. Targeting Bhushan Steel was part of a well-thought-out strategy by the Tata group after assessing Bhushan Steel’s assets such as its mines and the age of its plant, which is relatively new and operational, compared with other stressed steel assets on the block, the person added.

Analysts tracking the sector said they were surprised by Tata Steel’s aggressive offer outbidding that of JSW Steel and one from about 400 Bhushan Steel employees backed by a PE firm. Tata Steel is also lead bidder for Bhushan Power & Steel, another of the dozen companies that RBI had instructed banks to initiate bankruptcy proceedings against.


“Tata Steel will almost double its capacity in India in the next four to five years if it manages to win both Bhushan Steel and Bhushan Power & Steel and after taking into consideration the second phase of its expansion in Kalinganagar,” ICRA senior vice president Jayanta Roy said.

Debt Restructuring
The Bhushan Steel resolution had its share of drama. At the end of January, Bhushan Steel promoter and vice chairman Neeraj Singal unsuccessfully sought to halt the process by writing to lenders and asking them to consider restructuring the Rs 56,000-crore debt under the sustainable structuring of stressed assets (S4A) mechanism by dividing the debt into sustainable and unsustainable parts with no haircut. The January 29 letter alleged that the company had been wrongly dragged into the IBC process despite the fact that debt restructuring under S4A was close to being decided.

Tata Steel had submitted an expression of interest (EoI) for Essar Steel as well, then said it would partner with Nippon Steel on this but eventually didn’t participate. However, bids are being sought afresh for Essar Steel with all those who submitted EoIs being eligible to try again. Tata Steel didn’t comment on queries regarding its participation in the rebid.

With Tata Steel tipped to enter into a joint venture with ThyssenKrupp of Germany for its European steel business, the focus is clearly back on India. Tata Steel’s domestic capacity is 13 million tonnes, which will be augmented by 5.6 million tonnes with the Bhushan Steel acquisition. Bhushan Steel makes flat products like hot- and cold-rolled coil (HR/CR coils) and galvanised sheets. It also collaborated closely with Sumitomo Corp., now Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corp. Incidentally, Tata Steel has a 51:49 joint venture with Nippon Steel for automotive steels that has a leading share of that market in India.

On March 7, Tata Steel said it had received a formal communication from the resolution professional of Bhushan Steel that it had been identified as the highest evaluated compliant resolution applicant to acquire a controlling stake in Bhushan Steel.