Azim Premji PE Fund PremjiInvest is said to be Interested
By Azam on November 7, 2008 
Azim Premji is said to be interested in picking up a stake in Captain GR Gopinath’s start-up — Deccan Cargo. The Billionaire from to Software ,Azim Premji Private Equity fund (Pramji Invest) is exploring investing a stake buy in Deccan Cargo, an integrated logistics entity seeking $50-60 million funding
“PremjiInvest may be comfortable with an exposure of $30-35 million, and be a co-investor,” a source added. When contacted, Gopinath said: “We have given mandate to Edelweiss for raising funds. I cannot comment anything further as it is premature.” PremjiInvest said it would neither confirm nor deny ongoing work on its potential transactions.
If the deal goes through, this will be Azim Premji’s second investment in a start-up venture by high-profile first generation entrepreneurs. In October, PremjiInvest picked up a $20 million stake in former Maruti honcho Jagadish Khattar’s Carnation Auto, a nationwide multi-brand automobile sales and service network.
Investment Transaction by PremjiInvest
Premji Invest, the private equity arm of the Azim Premji has been in the news for investing, in about 35 listed companies in addition to making private equity investments in five unlisted arms – Cicada Resorts, Healthcare Global, Subhiksha Retail, Carnation and National Stock Exchange. The total investments of the fund in these companies are now reported to be close to ($225M) Rs.900 Cores.
Previously, the old philosophy of Azim Premji was to buy and hold Wipro shares, every year, and cash in from the dividend received by him on Wipro shares. Of the total 146 Crore issued equity shares of face value Rs.2 each of Wipro, Azim Premji is holding about 116 Crore shares or close to 79.5% of shares, on top of which, he received dividend of amounting to about ($175M) Rs.700 Crores, last year as Wipro paid a dividend of 300 per cent.
In view of the present SEBI guidelines, which prohibits a promoter buying from the open market if he already holds 55% stake (otherwise open offer will trigger) Azim Premji, may have been forced reallocate and diversify his portfolio by buying shares other than Wipro. Azim Premji is being forced to make a wise decision by diversifying his holding and reducing significant risk attributed to single and specific risk in Wipro. Despite having profited considerably in the past, Azim Premji may come out ahead through the new portfolio of investments. Also, seeing the PE industry evolve in India and create a number of new opportunities for the entire Indian economy is a good sign of things to come in the future.
1 Crore is equivalent to 10,000,000 units
$1 USD has been trading in the range of 43-49 Rs in the past 12 months
Categories : IndiaTags : , Azim Premji, Carnation and National Stock Exchange, Cicada Resorts, Healthcare Global, Indian PE, NSE, PremjiInvest, Private Equity, Subhiksha Retail