Indiareit plans $800 million mop-up

Indiareit Fund Advisors, a Piramal Group-promoted real estate venture capital fund, will raise $700-800 million through an offshore fund to invest in the domestic market.

Piramal Life Sciences, the demerged research entity of the group's flagship company, Nicholas Piramal, is evaluating private equity and strategic partnership to dilute a marginal stake.

Piramal Group Chairman Ajay Piramal said, "The company will launch the second international fund of $700-800 million (Rs 2,800-3,200 crore), approvals for which are expected by April.

"UK-based 3i has committed $250 million (Rs 1,000 crore) for the fund that will invest in FDI-approved projects in India."

Currently Indiareit manages a total corpus of $450 million raised through two domestic and one offshore funds.

Piramal said Piramal Life Sciences was likely to be listed by June.

He said, "The promoters might dilute a 10 per cent stake in Piramal Life Sciences to private equity, strategic or international firms in the next 12 months.

"Lehman Brothers, Kotak and Enam Securities have independently valued the R&D pipeline in the range of $480-540 million (Rs 1,920-2,160 crore)."

Piramal was talking while announcing the group's new corporate identity. Nicholas Piramal will now be known as Piramal Helathcare, while Gujarat Glass and NPIL Laboratories and Diagnostics have been renamed Piramal Glass and Piramal Diagnostic Services respectively.

Explaining the rationale behind the rebranding, Piramal said, "There was a need for change as it has been 20 years since we entered the pharmaceuticals business. The group required to have common value as we are entering new businesses and expanding internationally too."

He indicated that following the name change, Nicholas Piramal may explore innovative avenues in the healthcare segment.

"We aspire to democratise the healthcare services as merely 30 per cent of the population has access to modern medicines. The market is growing at 12 per cent, while the company is expected to grow at 16-17 per cent," said Piramal.