Bharat Highways InvIT's Rs 2,500-Crore IPO Opens On Feb. 28
The net proceeds will be utilised towards providing loans to the project SPVs for repayment or prepayment of outstanding loans.
Bharat Highways InvIT, backed by Aadharshila Infratech Pvt., will hit the primary market on Feb. 28 and offer units worth Rs 2,500 crore to investors.
The initial public offering will close on March 1 and units will be allotted to eligible unitholders on March 7, according to offer documents filed with market regulator SEBI. The price band and the minimum bid size will be announced two working days prior to the IPO opening.
An infrastructure investment trust is a type of investment similar to a mutual fund that enables the direct investment of money from individual and institutional investors in infrastructure projects to earn a small portion of the income as a return.
The InvIT is designed as a tiered structure with a sponsor setting up the InvIT, which in turn invests in the eligible infrastructure projects—either directly or via special purpose vehicles.
At present, there are 23 InvITs registered with SEBI and seven listed on the bourses.
Sponsor Aadharshila Infratech's initial portfolio assets consist of seven road assets, all operating on a hybrid-annuity model in Punjab, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh. All of the InvIT assets are awarded by the National Highways Authority of India and the revenue stream is primarily through annuity payments from the NHAI.
The investment manager is GR Highways Investment Manager Pvt. Bharat Highways InvIT was registered in August 2022.
The net proceeds from the IPO will be utilised by the InvIT towards providing loans to the project SPVs for repayment or prepayment of their respective outstanding loans and for general purposes. As of Feb. 1, the project SPVs had a total outstanding external borrowing of Rs 3,568.2 crore.
The lead managers of the issue include ICICI Securities Ltd., Axis Capital Ltd., HDFC Bank Ltd., IIFL Securities Ltd. and KFin Technologies Ltd.
GR Infraprojects To Sell Road Assets
GR Infraprojects Ltd. on Wednesday said it has entered into a share purchase agreement with Bharat Highways InvIT for sale of seven wholly owned subsidiary companies that operate road assets and are worth Rs 1,130 crore.
Upon the sale, the company will receive units of Bharat Highways InvIT. The units will be issued at such price as may be determined, through the book-building process under the SEBI regulations.
The sale will be completed on or before March 15.
