Netherlands FMO to pump in $100 mn in India

New Delhi, Sep 15: The Netherlands Development Finance Company (FMO) today said it will invest another 100 million dollars in the mid-tier firms in India engaged in the steel, cement and financial sectors.

''FMO has so far invested 100 million dollars in India and aims to pump in another 100 million dollars over a period of one and a half years,'' FMO Director Asia Wim Wienk told reporters here on the sidelines of a signing agreement between FMO and SREI Infrastructure Finance Ltd.

The Dutch development bank, specialised in financing the private sector in Africa, Asia, Latin America and Central and Eastern Europe, will provide a long-term syndicated loan worth Rs 210 crore (45 million dollars) to SREI Infrastructure to fund infrastructure development in India.

''FMO expands SREI's funding basis by attracting long-term investors -- Belgium's Fortis Bank, Canada's Cordiant Bank -- in the syndicate,'' SREI Infrastructure Vice Chairman and MD Hemant Kanoria said.

The syndicate loan will be used to finance the infrastructure equipment side of the three core segments -- infrastructure equipment finance, infrastructure project finance and renewable energy products finance -- of the company in the next six months to one year.

All the three banks will contribute 15 million dollars each in the 45 million dollar syndicate, which will collectively come under the FMO umbrella, Mr Kanoria added.

FMO holds a 10 per cent stake in the infrastructure equipment finance arm of the company namely Quipo Infrastructure equipment Ltd. Besides, it recently divested its 8 per cent stake in SREI Infrastructure Finance Ltd.

FMO has been a stakeholder of the company since the last ten years. This amount will also provide it with the funds to extend assistance to small and medium enterprises (SMEs) involved in the infrastructure sector in India, Mr Kanoria said.

Mr Wienk and Mr Kanoria described the contract as ''the strengthening of an intensive cooperation for the financing of infrastructure investments in India.'' FMO, a joint venture between the state of the Netherlands and the Dutch private sector, aims to stimulate the economic and social progress of developing countries by contributing to the advancement of productive enterprise in these countries.

SREI Infrastructure Finance Ltd is one of the leading private sector players among the non-banking financial institutions in India.

UNI