US-based fund TFCC tops India's PE fund investor list of 2021

In a ranking of the top ten fund managers of PE funds last year, US-based fund TFCC came out on top in terms of the money invested here, according to research by VCCEdge which tracks private equity investments.

In December, TFCC acquired a 46 per cent stake in little known Chennai-based Ramcharan which is currently in chemicals distribution. However, it will now invest in the environment, energy management systems, and renewable energy system devices.

This catapulted TFCC to the top of the list with investments of $4.1 billion. For TFCC, which has a portfolio of $20 billion invested in South Asia, this was its first foray in India.    

The top ten fund managers who run the PE funds have collectively invested over $12.18 billion. This accounts for around a fifth of the total investments for which public announcements on the specifics have been made by PE players in the country last year.

As VCCEdge’s study was based on what fund managers of these various funds had invested in the country, many PE groups such as Blackstone, which has numerous companies and funds under management, has three of its funds featuring in the top ten.   

In second place is CPP Investment Board, a global investment management organization which invests the assets of the Canadian Pension Plan. With a fund size of $541.5 billion, CPP has invested in multiple projects. To mention just two, it has invested $257 million in the infrastructure investment trust set up by the National Highways Authority of India for the acquisition of brownfield road projects and $800 million in Flipkart, its largest investment in 2021.

Baring Private Equity Asia was also very active, coming in third on the back of its acquisition of the healthcare services business of Hinduja Global Solutions at an enterprise value of $1.2 billion.

But Blackstone has three different entities run by different managers who are among the top 10. The total investment made by the three entities is a substantial $2.48 billion. For instance, last year Blackstone acquired Embassy Industrial Parks from Warburg Pincus and the Embassy group in what is one of the largest logistics transactions in the country at an enterprise value of $700 million.

It has also been a year of aggressive deals for Advent International. The company bought up to 72.56 per cent of Eureka Forbes for an enterprise value of Rs 4,400 crore from the SP group; it bought ZCL Chemicals at an enterprise value of $275 million; and it followed this up by buying a majority stake in Encora, a global digital engineering services company with innovation labs.

Some notable names are missing from the VCCEdge top ten list. One is SoftBank which has not made public the level of its investments. Another is Prosus, the digital investment arm of Prosus, which does not invest by raising funds and therefore is also not on the list.