Tata - Jaguar-Land Rover deal: What's next?
04 Jan 2008
In the next course of action towards sealing the Jaguar Land Rover deal, 40-50 agreements are likely to be signed and intellectual property rights issues need to be sorted out, reports Raja Rajeshwari, CNBC-TV18. Ford may retain a residual stake, like in the Aston Martin deal. Also, its role as power train supplier and short-term servicing needs to worked out.
If the Tatas do manage to close the deal with Ford, what are the financing options available to them?
All eyes are on how this deal is going to be financed and of course, going by the Tata way, this is likely to be through a special purpose vehicle (SPV), though the question remains about the equity that would need to be pumped in to this SPV.
Analysts say, this is likely to go the Corus way. There will be a SPV where Tata Sons and Tata Motors will pump in some equity. If that is the case, one would need to examione the equity component that both will bring. Secondly, one also needs to know is in whose books is it going to be leveraged on - Tata Motors' or Tata Sons' books.
It's more likely going to be Tata Motors' balance sheet that is likely to be leveraged because, unlike in the case of the Corus SPV, where the debt was taken in SPV, and financed from the profits that Corus was making, here we are looking at the asset going into an SPV and the asset itself not making profits for one or two years. So, a balance sheet of a company which is making profits has to be leveraged.
