Profile of the Adani Group

Business Today has a detailed profile of the infrastructure focused Adani Group.

Having established itself as India’s leading private sector port operator, the Adani Group is betting big on power. It has lined up investments of Rs 45,000 crore over the next 5-7 years to set up 10,000 MW of generating capacity (see The Biggest Bet).

Here, too, he has followed the Mundra Port model—pioneered in India by the late Dhirubhai Ambani—of integrating his value chain backwards to the source of raw materials. The group has acquired coal mines in Rajasthan and Indonesia, which will feed his projects in Gujarat, Maharashtra and Rajasthan. “But our biggest strength in the power sector is the time to completion,” says Ameet Desai, Chief Financial Officer, Adani Group, who is overseeing the power initiatives. “We plan to complete the entire projected generating capacity by 2012-13,” he says. In fact, he expects the 1,320 MW project at Mundra to go on stream in stages next year itself.

Adani’s plans will bring him into direct competition with the Tata Group and Anil Ambani’s Reliance Power, but he is unfazed. “Work on many of our projects is already underway. We will leverage our backward linkages, the port, the group’s execution capabilities and our experience in power trading to forge ahead in this sector,” says Desai. The group is today a leading private sector power trader in India and commands a 13 per cent market share. The group is also evaluating the potential of entering the power trading business in neighbouring countries like Bhutan, Nepal and Bangladesh.

Arun Natarajan is the Founder & CEO of Venture Intelligence, the leading provider of information and networking services to the private equity and venture capital ecosystem in India. View free samples of Venture Intelligence newsletters and reports.