The Hindu Business Line : Will open nine Central malls in 18-24 months: Biyani

Pantaloon Retail's board has approved raising Rs 1,000 crore over a period of 18 months. The funds will be used to finance the company's expansion plans.

The Managing Director of Pantaloon Retail India, Mr Kishore Biyani, says that the company is looking at a preferential allotment of around Rs 200 crore and equity shares or a follow-up issue or QIBs of around Rs 260 crore.

The company is opening up another eight to nine Central malls in the next 18-24 months, he further adds. Excerpts from CNBC-TV18's exclusive interview with Mr Biyani.

You are planning to raise Rs 1,000 crore over the period of next 18 months; Rs 400 crore of this will be raised via divesting stake in some subsidiaries like Home Solutions, Future Media and Future Solutions. The rest Rs 600 crore, how do you plan to raise that?

We are looking at preferential allotment of around Rs 200 crore and equity shares or a follow-up issue or QIBs of around Rs 260 crore.

There has been some talk in the press of ICICI Ventures being interested in a stake as well, could you give us any clarifications on that?

We are looking at private equity players and there is nothing specific, which we are working at.

One of the things that the board has decided is that it's looking at hiving off Central businesses into a 100 per cent subsidiary; there is a talk of you converting Crossroads mall in Mumbai into a Central, can you give us some plans on that subsidiary front?

The three Centrals this year would do around Rs 450 crore of business. We are opening up another eight to nine Centrals in the next 18-24 months. Crossroads is also one of the opportunities for Central, which we are currently working on.

Have you been taking steps to acquire land for yourself in key locations in the cities in which you plan to set up in?

As a strategy, we have always been aggressive on land and opening up of new stores. We have signed in excess of 16 million sq ft of retail space for the company. We have another 30-40 million sq.ft. being developed by Kshitij and Horizon Real Estate Fund, on which we can also look at opening about some of our formats. So, we have a good strategy pipeline of real estate waiting for us.

Major tie-ups

You have also said that company is going to be looking at major tie-ups for businesses, we heard you announced one earlier with an insurance major. Can you give us an idea on what sort of tie-ups you will be looking at in the future?

I think we as a company were always looking at all the consumers spending on food, fashion, general merchandise, home, media, entertainment, communication, health, beauty and wellness. We are working on the health and beauty side lately.

We have tied up with Talwalkars for the gym business and for health services business with the Manipal Group. Now, we are there in all the categories of consumption more or less and we believe it is the time to open up as many stores as possible now.