NEW DELHI:
HFCL Limited (HFCL), a leading innovation led telecom enterprise has raised ₹600 crores via QIP issue. The QIP has shown an overwhelming response from the Institutional investors like Reliance Ventures, Quant Mutual Fund, IIFL Wealth, Elara India, Discovery, Segantii, Millennium amongst others who participated in the fund raise program of the Company.
The QIP proceeds shall be predominantly utilized towards funding of capital expenditure requirements for setting up of new manufacturing facilities, capacity expansions and expenditure on R&D and product development.
Earlier, the Board of Directors of the Company at its meeting held on September 03, 2021 had passed an enabling resolution to raise funds by way of private placement or preferential issue or public issue or rights issue or qualified institutional placement or through any other permissible mode and/or combination thereof, which was also approved by the shareholders in their 34th annual general meeting held on September 30, 2021.
The Fund Raising Committee of the Board of Directors of the Company decided to raise funds through QIP and the Issue was opened on December 06, 2021 and was closed on December 09, 2021.
The Fund Raising Committee of Directors at its meeting on December 10, 2021, approved the issue and allotment of 8,72,72,727 Equity Shares of ₹ 1 each to 21 qualified institutional buyers at the issue price of ₹ 68.75 per Equity Share (including a premium of ₹ 67.75 per Equity Share), aggregating to ₹ 600 crores. The trading of the newly allotted equity shares will commence from today i.e. December 14, 2021 at the National Stock Exchange of India Limited d BSE Limited.
Commenting on closure of QIP issue, Mahendra Nahata, Managing Director, HFCL said, “HFCL has successfully raised ₹600 crores via QIP and I am thankful to all the investors for their overwhelming support and faith posed in HFCL’s long term growth strategy. This capital raise will help in accelerating Company’s plan for setting up of new manufacturing facilities, capacity expansions, R&D initiatives and new product development. With the establishment of new plant for manufacturing of telecom products and the capacity expansion of Optical Fibre, Optical Fibre Cable while also augmenting our Goa and Chennai plants, recent strengthening of the global leadership team and our new investments in product development, HFCL is geared up to capitalise on the upcoming growth opportunity in the decade of digital transformation that we are seeing across industry verticals. With the capacity expansion, the Company would reap rich dividends in form of revenue, market share and profitability gains. The PLI scheme announced by the Government, creation of 5G network, expansion of BharatNet Programme, rapidly growing fiber to the home segment and additional spectrum allocation to the telcos are set to amplify our opportunity spectrum. He also added that the capital expansion will also help in building up of new plant for the manufacture of products for supplies to Defence sector under AtmaNirbhar Bharat / Make in India initiatives and will enable the Company to capture opportunities in Defence segment as well”.
With the proactive Government policies, the Company expects the telecom sector to perform exceptionally well with creation of new 5G network and increased in broadband penetration in India which is expected to grow rapidly. Policies like BharatNet (wherein the Government has taken the initiative to connect every village with optical fiber cable), PLI scheme in telecom and networking products will boost the Country’s manufacturing capabilities, exports and promote the “Atmanirbhar Bharat” initiative and provide impetus for the development of the telecom sector.