4 minnows bid for Lanco Infra, banks fear steep haircut

Mumbai: Four little-known companies have shown interest in acquiring Lanco Infratech, the holding company for several power and infrastructure projects, stoking concerns among the lenders that they might have to accept a steep haircut to resolve this loan totalling more than Rs 45,000 crore.

The four bidders are OPG Group, Prem Energy, Goyal Group and Diva Group, said two persons familiar with the development. Lanco Infratech, which faces total claims of Rs 50,652 crore from financial and operational creditors, is now in the midst of bankruptcy proceedings. IDBI Bank referred it to the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) last August. Lenders say that a successful resolution of Lanco Infratech will depend on a turnaround of the subsidiaries.

"OPG Group has been in talks to acquire Lanco even before it was referred to NCLT, but not much is known about the other three entities - Prem Energy, Goyal group and Diva Group," said one lender. Lanco Infratech is a listed company with promoters led by Madhusudan Rao owning 58.5% stake, while the balance is owned by public.

The resolution professional, Savan Godiawala, while inviting expression of interest, has not asked for a minimum capital requirement from applicants to be eligible to submit a resolution plan.

Financial creditors have made a claim of Rs 45,263 crore, while claims amounting to Rs 5,389 crore from operational creditors have been admitted.

The majority of the claims made by operational creditors are from group companies of Lanco. There are a total of 12 claims from related parties amounting to Rs 7,164 crore. However, Godiawala has admitted Rs 4,324 crore of related party claims so far.

The highest related-party claim is from Lanco Babandh Power of Rs 1,318 crore, followed by Lanco Vidharbha Thermal of Rs 975 crore.

OPG Group, founded by Om Prakash Gupta, has interest in power, steel, food and logistics, according to the information on its web site. This company had earlier given a proposal to acquire the power vertical of Lanco Infratech, but the deal did not go through since all lenders did not pass the resolution.