Future Group to bring financial service businesses under JV

Future Group, the company that promotes India’s largest publicly-traded retailer, Pantaloon, is planning a joint venture company by bringing together Future Money, its consumer finance business; Future Generali, its insurance business; and Centrum Direct, the foreign exchange service provider. The JV, under a single management, will provide its service through the stores of Pantaloon Retail.

This is part of the restructuring that Future Group is going through, to segregate its business under retail, financial services and allied services. The company has appointed accountancy company Ernst and Young and domestic investment bank Enam Financial Consultants to work out the plan.

Future Generali is a JV between Future Group and the Italy-based insurance company, Generali Group. Future Generali and Future Money respectively provide insurance plans and consumer credit through the stores of Pantaloon Retail. Future Group holds a 50.1 per cent stake in Centrum Direct.

“These companies are functioning separately; the JV will provide them the single management,” said a senior executive at Future Group familiar with the development. He did not wish to be identified. “We expect financial and operational benefits out of this restructuring,” he said. He refused to quantify the financial benefits.

Consumer finance and insurance are the two businesses where the company has been under pressure to bring better synergy. The insurance business lost about Rs 120 crore last year.

The group is also hiving off its flagship Big Bazaar stores, into a separate subsidiary. The retail chain accounted for 65 per cent of its annual revenue of Rs 6,347 crore revenue in the last financial year. Pantaloon currently operates 119 Big Bazaar stores and plans to raise the number to 275 by 2014.

Pantaloon raised about Rs 500 crore last month by selling stake to institutional investors. It needs another Rs 1,800-2,000 crore to expand in the next two years. The company is planning a public issue for Big Bazaar, post the restructuring.

The allied services for the company includes businesses such as Future Brands, that creates private labels in consumer products, Future Knowledge Services, a retail technology service provider, and Future Learning and Development, a retail training unit. These are also likely to be clubbed after the restructuring.