Glomac to make foray into India

Glomac to make foray into India


By BERNAMA

BANGKOK: Glomac Bhd is planning a mixed township in Pune, India's biggest second-tier city, and the emerging “Detroit of India”.

Managing director Datuk Fateh Iskandar Mohamed Mansor said the group signed a memorandum of understanding with Vescon, a Pune-based developer in April this year, and hoped to formalise all arrangements by end of this year.

He said the project, with a development value of more than RM800mil, would be located on a 30-acre site.

“Our management team had been going to almost all the major cities in India for the past three years to seek the right business and partner. Maybe we are slow compared to other major developers in Malaysia but we want to be sure before setting our foot overseas,” Fateh Iskandar said in an interview here.

Located in the state of Maharashtra, Pune is the eighth largest city with a population of 4.5 million. Many automobile, software and information technology (IT) companies are setting up their plants there.

Glomac ventured overseas in 2006 with the purchase of an office building costing A$30.5mil (about RM90mil) in Melbourne, Australia. It also set up a joint venture with Thailand's Warehouse Asia Alliance Co Ltd to build a RM110mil warehouse in the Samuprakarn province near here, which was leased to pharmaceutical company Diethelm Ltd for 15 years. For the financial year ended April 30, Glomac announced a pre tax profit of RM50.7mil and net profit after minority interest of RM32.2mil, on revenue of RM293.2mil compared with RM285.5mil previously.

He said the group was also looking at other opportunities in the region, with focus on developing countries like Vietnam.

To date, the group has completed about 10,000 residential and commercial units worth more than RM3.5bil. With about 1,000ha, the group's interest was currently mostly in the Klang Valley area, as well as in Malacca and Johor.