Epicurean Events and Services, a Chennai-based wedding planner and food services company, has acquired a 51 per cent stake in Nalas Aappakadai, a multi-cuisine restaurant chain owned by Annamalai Foods.

NS Udayakumar, Managing Director of Epicurean Events, confirmed the acquisition to Business Line, but refused to divulge the financial details of the deal.

Usually, a company's market value could be two-three times its turnover, depending on the brand equity and scalability of the business, says a merger and acquisition consultant. Nalas Aapakadai, “run by professionals”, currently has 14 outlets across Chennai and Coimbatore and three in Dubai, London and Paris. It caters to more than 1.5 lakh guests every month, and has a turnover of ₹36 crore.

Udayakumar, who has two decades of experience in the food business, had earlier promoted an industrial catering services company, Epicurean Services. UK-based €15-billion food services firm Compass acquired Epicurean Services in 2009 and renamed it Compass India. Udayakumar continued as the managing director of Compass India till recently, which grew from ₹30 crore in 2009 to ₹200 crore now, he said. After completing five years , “I wanted to venture into the food business again. When this offer came my way, I grabbed it.”

He wants to expand the Nalas chain.. “Besides expanding our horizon to cover tier II cities in Tamil Nadu, we target to go pan-India with outlets in all major cities in the next three-four years with at least 50 outlets, and the turnover will exceed ₹100 crore,” said Udayakumar.

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