Hexagon Nutrition gets Sebi nod for Rs 600 crores IPO

Hexagon Nutrition, backed by Somerset, has received the Securities and Exchange Board of India’s (SEBI) approval to raise Rs 600 crores through an Initial Public Offering (IPO), the company notified in a statement.

It said that the company had filed its draft prospectus in December 2021. The IPO consists of a fresh issue of shares worth Rs 100 crores and an Offer For Sale (OFS) of up to 30,113,918 equity shares, as per the company’s Draft Red Herring Prospectus (DRHP).

The OFS comprises up to 7,700,000 equity shares by Arun Purushottam Kelkar, up to 6,136,000 equity shares by Subhash Purushottam Kelkar (the promoter selling shareholders); up to 1,500,000 equity shares by Anuradha Arun Kelkar; up to 2,500,000 equity shares by Nutan Subhash Kelkar; up to 12,204,250 equity shares by SomeRs.et Indus Healthcare Fund I and up to 73,668 equity shares by Mayur Sirdesai (the other selling shareholders).

The proceeds from its fresh issuance worth Rs 33.5 crores will be utilised for the repayment or prepayment of borrowings, in full or part of all or certain borrowings for the company and subsidiaries; Rs 15 crores for funding incremental working capital requirements; Rs 19.17 crores for funding capital expenditure requirement for expanding the existing facility; Rs. 7.15 crores for investment in subsidiary and financing capital expenditure at the existing facility and general corporate purposes.

In 2016, Somerset Indus Healthcare Fund-I, along with Mayur Anand Sardesai, an adviser and Director, SomeRs.et Health Capital Advisors, had invested Rs 25 crores for a 10 per cent stake in the company. Somerset is an offshore private equity firm focussed on making healthcare investments in India.

Being a differentiated and research oriented pure-play nutrition company, it focusses on holistic nutrition products encompassing a wide range of nutritional and nutrition-enhancing products, that sells its products in around 70 countries, currently from its three factories located at Nasik, Chennai and Thoothukkudi, the statement mentioned.

In order to grow and diversify its business in the last three fiscals, the Mumbai-based company continued to leverage its ability to implement new product launches and/or introduction of products such as Penta Sure Fiber, Carboload and Penta Sure Whey Protein Max, in the branded nutrition product category, it added.

In 2019, it had set up a trading company in South Africa and has future plans to build a facility there. The company is also setting up a factory in Uzbekistan that is expected to commence operations by Q1 2022, the statement noted.

It also said that the revenue from operations grew 3.01 per cent to Rs 209.97 crores for the fiscal 2021 against Rs 203.84 crores for the fiscal 2020, primarily due to an increase in demand for B2B2C and ESG segment and increase in volume of premixes and therapeutic foods sold, while its net profits grew by 23.10 per cent from Rs 18.57 crores in FY20 to Rs 22.86 crores in FY21.

Equirus Capital and SBI Capital Markets are the book-running lead managers to the issue, the statement concluded.