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This is the second winery being bought by the number
one wine producer in India. Earlier it had bought Tandou winery in the
Riverland district last September and renamed it Thachi. Indage is the
only public limited company in India producing wine, which has public
holding of the shares as well.
McGuigan Simeon now known as Australian Vintage Ltd.
(AVL) , announced yesterday that it had signed a deal to offload its second-largest
winery to Indage within six months, after due diligence.
"We're pleased we're able to find a buyer and sell
at a price we're comfortable with," said AVL's chief executive, Dane
Hudson. The 90,000-litre facility in South Australia's Riverland is Australia's
fifth largest winery according to industry reports.
The deal follows the debt-ridden AVL's sale of its Griffith
winery to the Yellowtail winemaker Cassella Wines for A$10 million last
November.
Indage said its purchase of Loxton was part of its plans
of going global. Ranjit Chougule, MD of Indage had said in the annual
report that the Thachi purchase was the first small step towards a giant
stride ahead in a five-year plan to have production facilities in 10 countries.
Indage has 2630 hectares of vineyards in India and has
a market capitalization of $195 million, according to company sources.
It plans to establish production facilities in Argentina, France, Italy
and South Africa besides Australia.
While bulk of the wine from the Loxton winery would
be sold locally, some would be shipped to India and other countries and
bottled there, according to a company spokesman. It is already bottling
some of the bulk wine being imported from Thachi.
Owning the winery gives the company distinct advantage
in keping the import price very low and consequently save a bulk of import
duties and taxes legally.
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