WL Ross mandates OCM to get rid of losses by ’13

US-based global private equity investor Wilbur L Ross owns 94

percent stake in the textile manufacturer OCM India. Now it has asked the company to get rid of all losses by March 2013. W L Ross had invested about $37 million (Rs 201 crores) in 2007. Though the overall accumulated losses are less than what the investor had invested in OCM, industry insiders speculate that the investor wants to clear the losses before making an exit from the company. Nitin Jain, OCM’s chief marketing officer has however declined any speculations.

OCM is the second major investment for the US PE firm in India after SpiceJet. However, the PE firm had sold about 30 per cent of its stake in SpiceJet within two years of its investment in June 2010, making a profit of about 58 per cent out of the deal. The target for March 2013 also includes generating internal accruals enough to meet the capital expenditure and branding expenses of about Rs 100 crores over the next five years. The former S K Birla group company had about Rs 153 crores in revenues last year, achieving a growth of about 33 per cent compared to the previous year.

As a part of its revival plan, the company is looking at expanding the production capacity of its Amritsar plant from about 5.5 million metres per annum to about 6.2 million metres by March 2013 and about eight million metres by March 2014.