Financial services entity Religare Enterprises expects to close its first Rs 600-crore private equity fund, launched in joint venture
with UK-based Milestone Capital, by April next year.
“The fund raising work is in progess… We hope to close the fund by April 2010,” Religare Enterprises President Health Care Amit Varma said.
Further, the company would be looking at exercising the green-shoe option of raising another Rs 200 crore for the fund — India Build out Fund I — depending on market conditions.
The joint venture entity is in discussions with various institutional investors for funds.
“When we started the fund in June (this year), we had a corpus of Rs 100 crore. Today, we have raised about Rs 300 crore,” he said.
Currently, the firm is in advanced discussions to commit Rs 125 crore for two hospitals and an MBA preparatory school. The deals are expected to be finalised in the next four to six weeks.
“For the three (proposed) deals, we have earmarked about Rs 125 crore. Out of the total amount, Rs 85 crore would go into health care (the two hospitals) and the rest to the education sector (preparatory school),” Varma said.
In June, Religare Venture Capital, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Religare Enterprises, entered into a joint venture with Milestone Capital for managing the fund.
Source: Economic Times