Adani Ports & SEZ acquires Karaikal Port for Rs 1,485 crores

Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone Ltd (APSEZ), the largest transport utility in India, has completed the acquisition of Karaikal Port Private Limited (KPPL) pursuant to NCLT approval. Earlier, APSEZ was declared as the successful resolution applicant under the Corporate Insolvency Resolution Process (CIRP) of KPPL, according to the company's release.
 
Karaikal Port is an all-weather deep-water port on India’s eastern coast that was developed on the Build, Operate and Transfer format under the Public-Private Partnership by the Government of Puducherry. The Karaikal Port was commissioned in 2009, and was developed in the Karaikal District of the Union Territory of Puducherry, around 300 KMS south of Chennai. It is the only major port between Chennai & Tuticorin, and its strategic location allows the port easy access to industrial-rich hinterland of Central Tamil Nadu.
 
The port gets a 14-meter water draft and has land area of over 600 acres. Its existing infrastructure includes 5 operational berths, 3 railway sidings, mechanized bulk cargo handling system including mechanized wagon-loading and truck-loading systems, 2 mobile harbour cranes and a large cargo storage space that includes open yards, 10 covered warehouses and 4 liquid storage tanks. With a built-in cargo handling capacity of 21.5 MMT, the port primarily handles, Cement, Fertilizer, Limestone, Steel & Liquids. The upcoming CPCL’s 9 MMTPA new refinery at Nagapattinam in Tamil Nadu presents an opportunity for Karaikal Port to handle an additional large volume of liquid cargo.
 
APSEZ will spend further INR 850 crores over time to upgrade infrastructure in order to reduce the logistics cost for the customers.
 
In FY 2023, Karaikal Port handled ~10 MMT of cargo and acquisition consideration of INR 1,485 crores implies an EV/EBITDA multiple of ~8x on FY23 EBITDA number.