Anil Ambani Group company Reliance Capital is backing a merger deal between Grover Vineyards and smaller rival Valle de Vin to create India’s second largest wine company. The financial services company will join Singapore-based wine investor Ravi Viswanathan as a key stakeholder in the combined entity, Grover Zampa Wines.
The merger creates a new challenger to industry leader Sula Vineyards in the still nascent domestic wine market swelling over 1.5 million cases annually. Reliance Capital will have 18% stake in Grover Zampa. This would be its second wine investment after buying stake in the now troubled Indage Vintners.
The Grover family and Valle de Vin promoters—Ravi Jain, Deepak Roy and Neeraj Deorah—will together own a little over 50% leaving the rest with new investors. Even as Reliance Capital and Ravi Viswanathan checks into the new entity, some initial investors in Grover Vineyards, like former Citi banker Jerry Rao and champagne house Veuve Clicquot, have made an exit. But celebrated oenologist Michel Rolland will continue to be an investor in the combined firm. Ravi Viswanathan, a strategic investor, hit headlines last December when he bought the most expensive champagne—the 170-year-old Veuve Clicquot—for a whopping $40,402 at an auction in Finland.
Alcobev industry veterans Jain and Roy co-founded Valle de Vin under Zampa brand, along with entrepreneur Neeraj Deorah, six years ago at Nashik in Maharashtra. Grover Vineyards, one of India’s oldest wine makers, came up at Doddaballapur near Bangalore in the ’80s pre-dating the hype around wine consumption. The combined operations will have vineyards in the two largest grape producing states of Maharashtra and Karnataka, which are also the leading consumption markets. “The deal gives both Grover and Zampa a fighting chance in an industry where the smaller players have struggled after over investing in a slowing market,” said wine expert and writer Alok Chandra.
Source: Times of India