Adani Group has completed the acquisition of 23.5% interest in Mumbai International Airport (MIAL) from two South African firms.
With this stake acquisition, Adani has gained a majority control in the second-busiest airport in India.
Adani Enterprises, in a stock exchange notification, stated that its airports unit had bought 13.5% interest from Bidvest and a 10% stake from Airport Company of South Africa, for a consideration of Rs16.85bn ($312m).
As well as marking the exit of foreign investors, the transaction is a culmination of the firm’s two-year effort to buy a stake and gain majority control of the airport.
Under the privatisation exercise, Adani Group has taken over the operations of six Airport Authority of India (AAI) airports. These are Ahmedabad, Lucknow, Mangaluru, Jaipur, Thiruvananthapuram, and Guwahati.
In August, it agreed to acquire its 50.5% stake in Mumbai Airport from GVK.
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By GlobalDataThe deal also included purchase of a 23.5% stake held by the South African firms.
Under the deal, Adani Group will take over Rs25bn ($462.9m) of debt owed by GVK Airport Developers, which is the holding company of MIAL.
With the conversion of the debt into equity, Adani gains a controlling stake in the Mumbai Airport.
In January 2021, AAI gave approval to Adani Group for the acquisition of GVK Group’s 50.5% in MIAL. A few more government approvals are yet to be received.
Following the signing of the agreement, Adani Group chairman Gautam Adani then said: “We see our airport portfolio as a critical level to help converge tier-I cities with tier-II and tier-III ones, in a hub and spoke model.”
“The addition of MIAL and Navi Mumbai to our existing portfolio of six airports provides us a transformational platform that will help shape and create strategic adjacencies for our other B2B businesses.”
