Canadian pension fund Ontario Municipal Employees’ Retirement System (OMERS), private equity fund Actis Llp and Brookfield Asset Management Inc. have submitted bids to buy SoftBank Group Corp.’s stake in SB Energy Holding, two people aware of the development said.
SB Energy, a joint venture between SoftBank and Bharti Enterprises, has a 7.7 gigawatts (GW) solar power portfolio in India. SoftBank owns 80% in the JV, with Bharti holding the rest.
Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB), which had earlier shown interest in the solar portfolio, is also expected to submit its bid. Bank of America (BofA) and Barclays are managing the stake sale process, one of the largest in India’s clean energy space.
A SoftBank spokesperson in an emailed response said, “Since its inception in 2015, SB Energy has grown significantly in terms of footprint, with SoftBank Group investing over $800 million in the business in the past five years. Now, SB Energy is exploring potential co-investment partnerships to accelerate global growth of its leading renewable energy platform.”
Asked whether SoftBank is offering its entire stake for sale, the SB Energy spokesperson said, “We never comment on speculation.”
Mint reported on 6 July about SoftBank Group’s plan to sell its entire stake, in a change from its earlier approach for finding a ‘significant’ minority investor, and being in separate talks with Brookfield, CPPIB and Abu Dhabi government’s sovereign wealth fund Mubadala Investment Co. interested in the same.
Spokespersons for OMERS, Brookfield Asset Management, CPPIB, Barclays Bank India, Bank of America and Bharti declined to comment. Queries emailed to an Actis Llp spokesperson on Tuesday night remained unanswered.
The sale plan comes in the backdrop of SB Energy dropped its move to raise $600 million through a dollar bond.
Japanese conglomerate SoftBank started investing in India in 2011, buying into several consumer internet companies and making unicorns out of several of them.“Actis, Omers and Brookfield have put in their bids. CPPIB which was earlier interested may also submit its bid,” said one of the two people cited above, both of whom spoke on condition of anonymity.
This potential deal comes in the backdrop of fund-starved electricity distribution companies (discoms) going tariff shopping, with the Indian clean energy facing issues related to land acquisition, regulatory and financial closures. Falling clean power tariffs have put an already awarded 16.8GW solar and wind energy capacity in limbo, Mint reported earlier. State discoms are unwilling to sign contracts with intermediary procurers for these previously awarded projects at a comparatively higher tariff. India’s solar power tariffs touched a record low of ₹2.36 per unit at a recent auction conducted by state-run Solar Energy Corp. of India Ltd.
