21 January 2008: NITCO Group has decided to hive off its realty business into a separate company. Till now, NITCO is into tiles and real estate and distribution both. At present NITCO real estate arm is at 500 crore. NITCO will list NITCO Realties when its real estate arm achieves sales of Rs 1,000-1200 crore.
Mr. Vivek Talwar, MD, NITCO, said, “Hiving off and listing of the real estate arm will be a transition we are looking into. But it will happen in the next two years or so. Nothing has been finalized yet”.
According to relevant sources, NITCO is also looking to enter into a joint venture or a strategic partnership to complete its real estate projects. It is developing residential and commercial projects including an IT complex which it plans to rent out. Mr. Talwar declared that talks are on with a few parties for a possible JV. He added that the company may think of entering into a private equity deal, if required. Talwar didn’t reveal further details. The company is identifying land for acquisition in Mumbai and Goa for its realty projects. NITCO, through its promoter group companies, owns pockets of land at several places in Maharashtra.
NITCO has a land bank of 1.37 million sq ft. It has eight projects in south Mumbai, Alibaug and Thane. Most of them will be completed and start reflecting in revenues by year 2010 and 2011.
