*New Delhi: *Educomp Solutions, the Gurgaon-based education content and service provider, is considering using a part of the amount raised through a qualified institutional placement (QIP) recently to scale up its school business. The company had raised about Rs 600 crore through the QIP.
In a conference call with analysts, managing director of the company Shantanu Prakash said, "The primary reason for us to launch the QIP was to take advantage of the new growth opportunities. Clearly, in K12 schools (Kindergarten to class 12) business, we have established the base ... response for it has been very good. So, a large part of the (QIP) money would go in growing that business." The company has allocated about $30-35 million to ramp up Educomp Infrastructure (K12 schools), $15-20 million to the Pearson joint venture and $25-30 million to the vocational vertical. "We want to spend more on Educomp Infra, so the current allocation can go up to $50-60 million over a period of 2-3 years, depending on the need," Sangeeta Gulati, chief financial officer said. The company would also use a substantial part of the QIP funds to scale up its JV with the Singapore-based Raffles Education for opportunities in the areas post K12. "We can also use some part of the money to pay off our high-cost debts, but we will take a collective call on that," Prakash added. Educomp Infrastructure currently works in 20 schools and plans to expand the network to about 100-150 over the next 3-4 years. Prakash said the Rs 1,000 crore debt on the company's books was not critical as half of it is through foreign currency convertible bonds (FCCB). "If you look at our debt profile, about half of it is from the FCCB. So if you expect this to be converted, then you are down to about Rs 400 crore. Out of that, about Rs 250 crore is in the long-term debt account. Now, if you take into consideration the Rs 600 crore raised from the QIP and Rs 80 crore from the Pearson JV, we are actually a net cash company," he added. http://www.dnaindia.com/money/report_educomp-will-use-qip-funds-to-ramp-up-k12-biz_1278571 -- *"The Future Of India" by Swami Vivekananda.* http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfSWa9bH1kY&feature=related --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups ""GLOBAL SPECULATORS"" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/globalspeculators?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
