Allcargo Aims To Be Debt-Free By December

Allcargo Logistics, the largest private sector player in the segment, expects to be debt-free by December when it will conclude the sale of its warehousing unit to private equity major Blackstone. Allcargo Group Chairman Shashi Kiran Shetty also expects a brighter future for its Hyderabad-based subsidiary Gati that it had bought last December, by way of a tax writeback of around Rs 80 crore through the ongoing dispute settlement forum called the 'Vivad se Vishwas' scheme, and thus to close the financial year with a fatty bottomline. In January, Blackstone announced that it would buy 90 per cent equity in Allcargo's warehousing vertical for around Rs 1,400 crore and the Wall Street major has already invested Rs 380 crore as part of the deal which will be a mix of debt and equity. The partnership will help Allcargo's growing third-party logistics business into which it had invested around Rs 1,000 crore. Allcargo has a consolidated debt of Rs 1,000 crore currently, including both term and working capital loans, and the company hopes to retire all of this.