Carlyle, Bain Capital keen to acquire Intelenet as Blackstone sets for exit

Two-and-a-half years after it brought back Intelenet Global Services from UK-headquartered Serco Plc. for $383 million (about Rs 2,558 crore), Blackstone once again wants to leverage the asset with an exit.

The private equity major has started the process to sell its stake in the Mumbai-headquartered back-office services provider. Most of the top global private equity firms including Carlyle and Bain Capital are understood to have shown interest to acquire the company which employs around 55,000 people worldwide, with majority in India.

“The process has started and the top 4-5 global funds are certainly there engaged in the discussion,” senior industry sources privy to the process, said.

According to another source, Blackstone wanted the bids to be submitted by February end, but there has been some procedural delay. “The way it is progressing, it can take multiple shapes. They can either sell the entire company or only the international business while keeping the domestic one, or even there could be two different buyers,” it added.

One of the reason why Blackstone may be planning to sell it for the second time is things may not have played out as per their expectation, sources said, especially as the team is not the same that they leveraged before it got sold out to Serco. Besides, they may have paid back the debt by now and now wants to leverage the investment. “It’s (Intelenet) a solid cash generating company, at the end of the day,” said the source mentioned above.

Spokespersons of Intelenet and Blackstone could not be reached for their comments despite several attempts.

Intelenet has seen many changes in ownership since it was founded as an equal joint venture between TCS and HDFC in 2000

Intelenet has seen many changes in ownership ever since it was found as an equal joint venture between Tata Consultancy Services and Housing Development Finance Corporation Ltd. (HDFC) in 2000. After TCS divested its stake in 2004, Barclays Bank Plc. one of its biggest became the largest investor in the company.

In 2007, the Blackstone Group made an entry as an investor when it supported a management buyout and successfully steered the company to grow until 2011 when Serco bought out Blackstone, con-investor Barclays and the promoter group for around $634 million, making it one of the largest deals in the domestic BPO space at that time.