Religare Enterprises to raise Rs 2,500 crore for expansion

NEW DELHI: Financial services firm Religare Enterprises plans to raise up to Rs 2,500 crore for expansion, including investments in insurance business besides acquisitions. The firm, owned by billionaire brothers Malvinder and Shivinder Singh, has been on an aggressive expansion mode acquiring companies locally and overseas. Last year, it raised Rs 1,800 crore through a rights issue to partly finance its expansion. This, together with the proposed fundraising initiative, could see the company raising close to $1 billion over two years.

The company informed the stock exchanges that it will raise the fresh money by issuing capital . But it did not specify by when it plans to raise the money. Shachindra Nath, group CEO, said: “We are currently evaluating multiple options of fund-raising both in India and abroad.” The Delhi-based company’s share was down 1.64% at Rs 480, at the BSE in a firm market on Monday . After the Singh brothers sold their 35% stake in India’s largest pharmaceutical firm Ranbaxy three years ago, they have been aggressively scaling up their financial services and healthcare businesses.

In the financial services space, the group has announced plans to spend as much as $1 billion in buying firms involved in private equity and asset management, besides venture capital, among others, in both India and abroad. Last year, it acquired US-based private equity and venture capital investment manager Northgate Capital and Connecticutbased private equity and real estate investment company Landmark Partners.

The company will also increase the employee stock option pool from the existing 5% to 10% of the fully diluted equity share capital of the company for its and subsidiaries’ employees.