Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw led global bio-pharmaceutical firm Biocon Ltd plans to launch its proposed QIP (qualified institutional placement) shortly to raise up to Rs 4,500 crore, maybe as early as this week, three persons in the know told Moneycontrol.
"The deal has been in the works for a while and it may be launched very soon," said one of the persons quoted above.
Two other persons added that investment banks Kotak Mahindra Capital, Goldman Sachs and BofA Securities are advising on the capital raise, which is aimed at reducing the Bengaluru-based firm's debt and strengthen its balance-sheet.
All the three persons above spoke to Moneycontrol on the condition of anonymity.
When contacted, Biocon had no comments to offer. Goldman Sachs and BofA Securities declined to comment while email queries to Kotak Mahindra Capital remained unanswered at the time of publishing this article.
On April 23, Biocon's board approved raising up to Rs 4,500 crore through the issue of securities via methods including qualified institutional placements, rights issues, or other permissible routes, in one or more tranches.
Later, on May 14, in an interview to Moneycontrol, executive chairperson Shaw said the company aims to close the fundraising exercise in three to four months.
“Now that we are on a strong growth trajectory, why should we have the overhang of structured debt?” she said. “If we convert that venture debt into promoter equity, you have a much healthier balance sheet.”
Biocon has a net debt of around $1.2 billion, which excludes structured instruments.
“The IPO market is not very predictable right now,” Shaw elaborated in the interview to Moneycontrol. “If we are not going to get value for an IPO, then why should we do it? If a merger is a better option, we will do a merger.” She was referring to the potential merger of its biosimilars arm, Biocon Biologics, with the parent company.
“We are just being transparent,” she said. “If things suddenly change and it makes it very attractive to have an IPO, we will have an IPO. Otherwise, we will merge.”
Biocon registered a healthy set of numbers in the fourth quarter of FY25, with net profit after exceptional items rising by 154 percent to Rs 344.5 crore, compared to Rs 135.5 crore a year earlier. Revenue rose by 12.8 percent year-on-year to Rs 4,417 crore, beating expectations of Rs 4,168.6 crore. On the other hand, EBITDA increased by 17.7 per cent YoY to Rs 1,078.2 crore versus Rs 915.9 crore in the same quarter last year.
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