The Chennai-based Shriram Group continues to win over private equity investors. Merrill Lynch, ChrysCapital and Cambridge Place Investment Management have picked up a total of 30 per cent stake in the group’s retail finance company Shriram City Union. The three of them have invested Rs 192 crore ($42 million) in the company in return for [...]

(Editor’s note: This guest column is written by Shantanu Surpure, partner at Economic Laws Practice, a Mumbai-based law firm specialised in venture capital, private equity and cross border transactions. Yashojit Mitra and Devyani Singh, associates at ELP, assisted in writing this article. The above guest column is meant for public discussion and informational purposes only [...]

Anil Ambani has for the first time gone on record on the Hutch acquisition bid. Addressing a press conference in Mumbai on the group company FLAG Telecom’s new initiatives, Ambani digressed for a while on his company’s plans to acquire Hutchison Essar. I watched the press conference on CNBC TV18 live. Key points below:
–Reliance Communications [...]

–The UB group says it’s earmarking anywhere upto $1 billion for foreign acquisition. A Business Standard report says that the UB group may complete a $500 million acquisition in Scotland next year. The idea is to become a significantly large player in the “premium whisky and scotch” segment in the world. The group was reportedly [...]

The Middle East-based fund of funds Evolvence Capital is raising a close-ended fund from London’s Alternative Investment Market. The Evolvence India fund, domiciled in Isle of Man, will initially invest in six Indian private equity funds.
It plans to raise $105 million (

ICICI Venture, India’s largest homegrown buyout firm, plans to increase its ticket size. In an interview to Bloomberg, Renuka Ramnath, Managing Director of ICICI Venture, said that her fund would invest as much as $125 million at a time probably with the help of co-investors. Currently, ICICI Venture invests a sum not bigger than $25 [...]

If the government has its way, the foreign direct investment policy in retail may see some changes. The department of industrial policy and promotion (DIPP) is preparing a detailed policy for further liberalisation of FDI in the country, reports The Economic Times. This is likely to be announced before the Union Budget in end February.
The [...]

Private equity fund Actis wants to exit Punjab Tractors Ltd (PTL). According to a report in The Economic Times, Indian tractor companies like Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M) and Chennai-based TAFE may be interested in buying Actis’ 28.4 per cent stake in PTL. They are believed to be in talks with Actis. Citigroup is advising Actis [...]

The latest from the race for the Hutch stake is that Hutchsion Telecom International (HTIL) has set a floor price for its stake. It has set a minimum price of $14 billion for its 67 per cent stake in Hutch Essar, according wire reports quoted by CNBC India. So any bid below $14 billion will [...]

GVFL has exited Scicom Technologies, a software services provider of oil and natural gas industry, a statement from the Ahmedabad-based fund said. This is GVFL’s 46th exit of its 58 investments so far.
GVFL, formerly known as Gujarat Venture Finance Ltd, had invested Rs 15 million ($333,000) in the Noida-based company in 2000. It has has [...]

It’s holiday time. Wish all readers a very merry Christmas and a happy new year!
I would be slow on blogging next week till the new year.

UTI Venture Funds has closed another investment before the year ends. The Bangalore-based fund has put in $10 million in Shriram EPC, a privately held company and part of the $3 billion Shriram Transport Finance group, reports Business Standard. Shriram EPC provides design, engineering, procurement, construction and project management services.
UTI Venture CEO Raja Kumar would [...]

Matrix Partners India has invested Rs 20 crore ($4.5 million) in vJive, an out-of-home media and digital signage network owned by Digital Music India Pvt Ltd.
Matrix’s Rs 20 crore is an initial tranche of an overall Rs 100 crore investment plan for the company, a statement from the company said. It’s however not clear if [...]

- The latest is that the potential acquirers of Hutchison Essar are expected to put in their bids today 6 pm, says a report by CNBC. Hutch will evaluate these bids and then take the Indian partner Essar into concurrence on the deal. It’s getting interesting.
- Hutchison Essar board has met today, but there hasn’t [...]

Exclusive: VC Circle learns that US venture fund Mayfield is investing $12 million in optical networking products company Tejas Networks. Sources say Mayfield’s investment is part of the $20 million venture capital Tejas is raising from various investors led by Sandstone Capital, a Boston-based India-focused fund, and the existing investors Gururaj “Desh” Deshpande, Battery Ventures [...]