Hospitality firm Hotel Leelaventure has said it will raise Rs 1,950 crore through the sale of equity and assets and foreign currency convertible bonds to partly repay its debt of Rs 3,800 crore.

“We expect an inflow of Rs 1,950 crore, which will be primarily used to reduce the current debt of Rs 3,800 crore,” the Hotel Leelaventure Vice-Chairman and Managing Director, Mr Vivek Nair, told reporters here today.

He said the company was close to concluding a preferential allotment of equity shares in the next 6-8 weeks to private equity investors.

“There would be stake sale of about 14.95 per cent to either one or two players for about Rs 600 crore,” Mr Nair said.

The stake sale will bring down promoters’ equity in the company from 55 per cent at present to about 50.5 per cent.

He, however, said the promoters will try to maintain their stakeholding in the company to around 55 per cent in future through creeping acquisitions as per SEBI guidelines.

We have also created business parks in Chennai and Bangalore next to our hotels, which we intend to sell in the next two months. The company is also building upmarket residential complexes in Pune, Hyderabad and Bangalore for selling,” the Managing Director said.

Asset sales would bring in another Rs 950 crore into the company. Besides, in the next 5-6 years, the company expects to raise Rs 400 crore through FCCBs.

The proceeds from stake and asset sales along with that from FCCBs would be utilised to serve the current debt, he said, adding that post reduction the company would have a debt equity ratio of 1.5:1.

Hotel Leelaventure had taken debt to the tune of Rs 3,800 crore to finance the setting up of new properties, including those in Udaipur and Chennai.

Meanwhile, the company scrip closed at Rs 43.05 per piece, up 4.36 percent from its previous close on the Bombay Stock Exchange.

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