To invest over $100m in aerospace biz: Anand Mahindra

Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M) is betting big on the aerospace business. In an interview to CNBC-TV18, Anand Mahindra, MD of the company said that it is pumping USD 100 million in aerospace segment.

M&M has already spent about USD 35 million in acquisition of two facilities from Australia including a utility aircraft manufacturing company and component manufacturing company. The board has also given nod to spend an additional USD 70 million on further additions to manufacturing. Mahindra said further that the company has already sold one of its recently acquired aircraft Gippsland Aircraft Company in Sri Lanka and is eyeing more such deals. Speaking on the ESOP issue that has been hanging over the M&M stock, Mahindra added that the market concerns of a one time hit on the P&L would not materialise. Mahindra said, "I think the market has understood this and this was diverged quite a while back about this plan. These ESOP's are obviously to create a more collaborative environment within the company. We have a policy o sharing wealth with our people in everything we do and the amortization is over a period of five years, so markets concern about a one time hit is completely misplaced." Below is a verbatim transcript. Also watch the accompanying video. Q: Now that we are getting into the aero show season let me ask you a couple of questions about your investments. How large is the sector going to be considering you are betting big in that space? A: The aero space business by definition is a very vast area. So what we are spending now is not necessarily an indication of how large the business will go for us but we are going to be spending right in advance in excess of USD 100 million in the short-term on this. We have already spent about USD 35 million involved in the acquisition of two facilities from Australia, one utility aircraft manufacturing company and the other component manufacturing company and we have also gotten our board