Agro-chemical firm Bayer CropScience Ltd has signed an agreement with Deccan Fine Chemicals (India) Pvt Ltd to sell its Gujarat-based chemical manufacturing facility for a total consideration of Rs 127 crore ($20 million), as per a stock exchange disclosure.
The company said this is part of a board decision taken on July 30, 2013 to sell either whole or in part the manufacturing unit and facilities of the Gujarat unit.
Bayer CropScience, part of Germany’s Bayer AG, operates three business segments—crop protection, bioscience and environmental science—in India.
The company's share price closed at Rs 1,506, down 1.07 per cent on the BSE in a weak Mumbai market on Friday.
Hyderabad-based Deccan Fine Chemicals had previously attracted investment from Japan’s Mitsubishi Corporation and Belchim Management International Holdings, a private agrochemical company based in Belgium. Both the investors picked around 19.5 per cent stake each by investing Rs 16.7 crore put together four years ago. The firm is led by DVS Narayana Raju.
In July this year, in the same space, Coromandel Agrico Pvt Ltd entered into a definitive agreement to buy the agro formulation unit of Punjab Chemicals and Crop Protection Ltd (PCCPL).
Last year in July, in a cross-border acquisition, agrochemicals major United Phosphorus Ltd acquired Netherlands-based SD Agchem (Europe) NV, a wholly owned subsidiary of Mumbai-based PCCPL.
(Edited by Joby Puthuparampil Johnson)
