Sekura in talks to purchase Ashoka Buildcon's $670M road assets

Sekura, which is an infrastructure platform owned by the Edelweiss Infrastructure Yield fund, has entered into exclusive negotiations for the acquisition of a portfolio of 11 HAM road projects from Ashoka Concessions, a division of Ashoka Buildcon, for approximately $670 million. The Ashoka roads portfolio has garnered interest from various bidders, including KKR, Sekura, Cube Highways, and Shrem InvIT. The estimated enterprise value of the portfolio is around Rs 55 billion with an equity value of up to Rs 13 billion. EY is advising Ashoka Buildcon on the sale process. Out of the eleven roads in the portfolio, seven are currently operational while the construction of the remaining four is underway. Ashoka is the sole investor in each of these projects, which are spread across states such as Punjab, Jharkhand, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Telangana, and Gujarat. The operating road projects include Kharar-Ludhiana, Ranastalam-Anandpuram, Vadodara Kim, Khairatunda-Barwa Adda, Belgaum-Khanapur, Tumkur-Shivamogga -I, and Kandi-Ramsanpalle. As per a corporate investor presentation, six of these roads generated an annuity income of 881 crores as of March 31. The four active projects are Basawantpur-Singnodi, Tumkur-Shivamogga II, III, and IV. At the time of writing, no response had been received for the emails sent to the Ashoka Group and Edelweiss. In a recent development, Ashoka's attempt to sell five toll roads to KKR in order to monetize them did not succeed. Under the terms of a contract signed in December 2021, Ashoka had agreed to sell the five toll roads housed under Ashoka Concessions to KKR for a price of 1,337 crores. However, the deal was mutually terminated by the parties. The transaction proceeds of 1,200 crore were intended to be used for SBI Macquarie's complete exit from the Ashoka Concessions platform. Also read: NMDC to invest in first gold block16 states receive Rs 560.41 billion for capital investment