Coffee Day Enterprises Ltd (CDEL), the holding company of Coffee Day Group founded by the late V.G. Siddhartha, on Friday closed the deal to sell the Global Village Technology Park in Bengaluru to New York-based private equity giant Blackstone Group Llp.
Two people familiar with the transaction confirmed the development. The sale of the 90-acre tech park was finalized at ₹2,800 crore, according to the first person.
“The money will be credited to CDEL within the next week. ₹2,000 crore from the proceeds of the deal will be used to repay debts of CDEL and ₹800 crore will go into the books of CDEL to meet its working capital requirements,” he added.
A Blackstone spokesperson declined to comment.
CDEL—which owns Coffee Day Global Ltd (coffee business), Sical Logistics Ltd (integrated logistics), Tanglin Developments Ltd (realty), Way2Wealth (financial services), and Coffee Day Hotels and Resorts Ltd (hospitality)—had debt obligations of at least ₹7,653 crore as on 31 March.
The debt had come down after Siddhartha and two CDEL subsidiaries sold their entire stake in Mindtree Ltd to Larsen and Toubro Ltd for ₹3,200 crore, and used a part of the money to repay debt.
“Repayments between March and June-end too helped CDEL reduce loan obligations at a consolidated level. The asset sale will help CDEL pare its debt obligations from ₹4,400 crore to ₹2,400 crore, which will be further lowered via the sale of some of CDEL’s other assets over the next two months,” said the first person.
On 9 August, a little over a week after the alleged suicide of Siddhartha, the CDEL board had decided to sell the technology park, which is owned by Tanglin Developments.
On 1 August, Mint had first reported that CDEL was planning to selectively sell assets of the firm to pare debt incurred by the group’s 52 subsidiaries.
In an exchange filing on 14 August, CDEL had announced its decision to sell the tech park to Blackstone Group for ₹2,600-3,000 crore. Following a board meeting on the same day, CDEL had given in-principle approval for disinvestment in its subsidiary, AlphaGrep Securities Pvt. Ltd, in favour of Illuminati Software Pvt. Ltd for ₹28 crore.
Source: Mint