Gautam Adani’s masterstroke, Ambuja Cements acquires…, big challenge for Kumar Mangalam Birla’s…
Ambuja Cement, a company under the Adani Group, has successfully completed the acquisition of a 37.8% stake in Orient Cement Limited (OCL), a CK Birla Group company. After this acquisition, Ambuja Cement, owned by the Adani Group, has become the promoter of OCL. In addition to the promoter group’s shares, Ambuja Cement has also acquired 1.82 crore (8.87%) shares from public shareholders of OCL. This brings Ambuja Cement’s total stake in OCL to 46.66%.
Orient Cement’s On Deal
Orient Cement informed the stock exchange that Ambuja Cement has completed the acquisition of 7,76,49,413 equity shares (37.79% of the equity share capital) from the promoter group. Ambuja Cement had announced its intent to acquire OCL last October as part of its expansion strategy, valuing the deal at Rs 8,100 crore.
Orient Cement operates three manufacturing plants located in Telangana, Karnataka, and Maharashtra.
Following change in the ownership, OCL also announced the resignation of its directors – Chandrakant Birla, Amita Birla, and Desh Deepak Khetrapal. Besides, OCL’s four independent directors have also resigned.
Its CFO, Prakash Chand Jain, has been replaced by Kajal Sarda with effect from April 23, 2025.
The board led by the new promoter has appointed Vaibhav Dixit as Executive Director. It has also appointed Vinod Bahety as Chairman & Non-Executive Non-Independent Director with effect from the conclusion of the meeting on April 22, 2025.
Besides, three independent directors — Sudhir Nanavati, Shruti Shah and Ravi Kapoor — also appointed on the board.
OCL further said, “Appointment of the Executive Director, Non-Executive Non-Independent Director and Non-Executive Independent Directors, as stated above, will be subject to the approval of the shareholders of the Company.”
The Adani group aspires to have 140 MTPA (million tonnes per annum) capacity by FY28 pan-India, which will help reduce overall lead distances and logistics costs for the cement business and improving market share in its core markets.
Earlier in June 2024 Adani had announced the acquisition of Hyderabad-based Penna Cement at an enterprise value of Rs 10,422 crore, which added 14 MTPA capacity to the country’s second largest manufacturer.
In December last year, it completed the acquisition of Saurashtra-based Sanghi Industries Ltd, at an enterprise value of Rs 5,185 crore.
OCL has 5.6 MTPA clinker capacity and 8.5 MTPA cement capacity along with statutory clearance to increase the clinker capacity by another 6.0 MTPA and cement capacity by another 8.1 MTPA.
Adani Group entered into the cement sector in September 2022, after acquiring controlling stakes in Ambuja Cements from Swiss firm Holcim for cash proceeds of USD 6.4 billion (about Rs 51,000 crore). Ambuja Cements owns a 51 per cent stake in ACC Ltd.
Later it also launched a Rs 31,000 crore open offer for the acquisition of 26 per cent additional stakes from public shareholders.
The Indian cement market is led by Aditya Birla Group firm UltraTech Cement Ltd, which has a consolidated capacity of 183.06 MTPA.
Kumar Mangalam Birla is the Chairman of UltraTech Cement, the cement flagship company of Aditya Birla Group. New acquisition by Adani will create a big challenge for Birla’s cement company.
(With Inputs From PTI)
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