Coffee Day repays Rs 1,644 cr to lenders after getting sales proceeds of tech park

Coffee Day Enterprises Ltd (CDEL) has repaid Rs 1,644 crore to its 13 lenders after concluding a deal with Blackstone Group to sell its technology business park, the company said on Friday.

With the repayment, the CDEL debt has come down to around Rs 3,200 crore from Rs 4,900 crore earlier. The company has been paring debt through the sale of non-core assets after the death of its promoter V G Siddhartha.

CDEL in September last year had announced the sale of its Global Village Tech Park in Bengaluru to global investment firm Blackstone and realty firm Salarpuria Sattva at an enterprising value of Rs 2,700 crore. It has received the first tranche of Rs 2,000 crore from the deal.

Out of the money received in 1st tranche, the Company has paid-off its debts in full including principal and interest amounting to Rs 1,644 crore, to the lenders, despite difficult economic conditions, CDEL said in a regulatory filing.

Axis Bank, Standard Chartered, Piramal, YES Bank, RBL, Bajaj Finance and Indiabulls are among the lenders who have received the full money.

CDEL expects balance amountto be received after the receipt of few statutory approvals of the deal.

Post this payment, the consolidated debt of the company and its subsidiaries stands at Rs 3,200 crore as on March 27, 2020, it added.

This includes debt of Rs 1,400 crore of its subsidiary, Sical Logistics Ltd, where disinvestment process is in progress, it added.

The company and subsidiaries have repaid around Rs 4,000 crore to the lenders since the beginning of this financial year.

CDEL paid full principal and interest to all the lenders on Friday even as the economic activity and credit markets have reached a grinding halt following the Covid crisis. This would be the largest M&A deal closure in a frozen market, said a company spokesperson.

The company's overall debt stood at Rs 7,200 crore at the beginning of the current financial year.