International Finance Corporation (IFC) is looking to provide debt funding of up to $65 million to Mumbai-based Alliance Tire Group, which manufactures off-highway tyres. The money will be used for its $160 million capex plans, including setting up a greenfield plant in Gujarat and expanding the existing plant in Tamil Nadu.
Alliance Tire Group was formed after Yogesh Mahansaria (former CEO of Balkrishna Tyres) and his father Ashok Mahansaria tied up with private equity major Warburg Pincus to acquire Israel’s Alliance Tire Company Ltd for $150 million in 2007.
The private equity firm currently owns a majority stake in the firm, with the rest being held by the Mahansaria family. Warburg Pincus had pumped in additional capital in Alliance Tire in 2009 when it acquired the assets of the US-based GPX International Tire Corporation for a reported $38.3 million, which gave it the Galaxy and the Primex brands (besides the existing Alliance brand).
Post-acquisition, the company set up a manufacturing facility in an SEZ near Tirunelveli in Tamil Nadu. The plant has a capacity of 48,000 tonnes per annum, which is being expanded to 61,000 TPA. With the current capex, this facility will be further expanded by 29,000 TPA.
Alliance Tire Group is also building a greenfield plant with a capacity of 50,000 TPA at Jhagadia in Gujarat, near the Hazira Port. The company also owns a 35,000 TPA plant in Israel besides dedicated contract manufacturing facilities in China and Taiwan.
Alliance Tire caters to various industry segments like agriculture, forestry, construction and earth-moving equipment. According to its website, the company is present in more than 120 countries across six continents and aimed to cross global turnover of $500 million in 2011.
