Idea capital raising panel to meet on Feb 21

The capital raising committee of Idea Cellular will meet on February 21 to approve details of company's plan to raise Rs 3,500 crore through qualified institutional placement, including the issue price and discount.

"..a meeting of the Capital Raising Committee of the Company is scheduled to be held on February 21, 2018, inter alia, to consider and approve the issue price including a discount, if any, thereto as permitted under the SEBI Regulations for the Equity Shares to be allotted to the qualified institutional buyers pursuant to the QIP," Idea said in a regulatory filing.

The floor price in respect of QIP, based on pricing formula, has been fixed at Rs 86.84 per share and the company may give a discount of up to 5 per cent on the floor price.
 

The face value of each equity will be Rs 10 for QIP, as per the latest filing.

According to industry sources, Idea has appointed Bank of America Merrill Lynch and Citi Group to manage QIP process.

On January 4, the board had approved a proposal to raise up to Rs 6,750 crore.

The company has already raised Rs 3,250 crore by allotment of shares to entities of promoter Aditya Birla Group (ABG).

The board of Idea on February 14 approved that the balance Rs 3,500 crore can be raised by issue of equities to eligible bidders through QIP.

The first tranche of fund raising had a bearing on the shareholding pattern of the company and also on its merger deal with Vodafone. The two parties have agreed that ABG will buy a minimum of 2.5 per cent of the merged entity from Vodafone for Rs 1,960 crore.

This equity sale transaction will reduce funding requirement on Vodafone Group from Rs 9,350 crore to Rs 7,390 crore to meet debt arrangement for the merged entity.

Infusion of Rs 3,250 crore, along with the proposed capital raise, will reduce Idea's net debt and as a result Vodafone's net-debt contribution to the merged entity will also be reduced.

The net debt of Idea as on December 31, 2017 stood at Rs 55,781.8 crore.