New Delhi: Gautam Adaniโs company announced on Sunday that it has reached an agreement to buy a majority stake in Holcim Ltdโs Indian assets for USD 10.5 billion, marking the ports-to-energy conglomerateโs foray into the cement industry.
Adani has expanded beyond its primary business of operating ports, power plants, and coal mines in recent years to include airports, data centers, and clean energy.
Last year, the group formed two cement subsidiaries: Adani Cementation Ltd, which planned to build two cement plants in Gujarat and Maharashtra, and Adani Cement Ltd.
The deal will make billionaire Gautam Adaniโs conglomerate the second-largest player in the domestic cement sector by acquiring the joint control of Holcimโs two Indian step-down firms ACC Ltd and Ambuja Cement.
With this, the Adani Group became the second largest cement producer in the country after the Aditya Birla Group owned UltraTech Cement, the company said in a statement. The JSW Group was also in the race to acquire the Ambuja-ACC combine.
Holcimโs latest attempt to minimize its reliance on carbon-intensive cement manufacture, an industrial process that creates significant amounts of CO2 emissions and has thus deterred many environmentally sensitive investors, is the divestiture of its India assets.
Forbes named Adani Asiaโs richest man after he signed definitive agreements to buy Holcim Ltdโs full stake in Ambuja and ACC via an offshore special purpose entity.
The Adani Group has expanded beyond its primary business of operating ports, power plants, and coal mines in recent years to include airports, data centers, and clean energy.
Last year, the group established two cement subsidiaries: Adani Cementation Ltd, which planned to build two cement plants in Gujarat and Maharashtra, and Adani Cement Ltd.
โOur move into the cement business is yet another validation of our belief in our nationโs growth story,โ said Gautam Adani, Chairman of the Adani Group. โNot only is India expected to remain one of the worldโs largest demand-driven economies for several decades, India also continues to be the worldโs second largest cement market and yet has less than half of the global average per capita cement consumption.โ
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