Serendib Engineering new owners said to be investing in EAP Group assets

By Indika Sakalasooriya
In an interesting development, it has come to light that the Singaporean firm that recently bought the controlling interest in Serendib Engineering Group PLC (SEG) is the same party that is said to be investing in the assets of EAP Group to bail out the troubled ETI Group finance firms.

According to the disclosures filed with the Colombo Stock Exchange (CSE) during the last couple of weeks, Navara Capital Ltd, owned by Harsha N. De Silva, sold a 75 percent stake in SEG to Serendib Holdings Pte. Ltd, in a Rs.197 million deal.

The deal triggered a mandatory offer requirement and according to the mandatory offer document filed with the CSE last week, the sole shareholder of Serendib Holdings Pte. Ltd, an investment company incorporated in Singapore, is Blue Summit Capital Management Pte. Ltd.

Interestingly, Blue Summit Capital Management Pte. Ltd appears to be the same company that is said to be investing US $ 75 million in ETI Group. The ETI Group deal is said to be carried out in two tranches, with the first tranche amounting to US $ 43 million.  

Blue Summit Capital Management is said to have already remitted little over US $ 17 million to ETI Group, as an advance payment.

The deal will see the sale of some of the key ETI Group assets, which will include Swarnamahal Financial Services PLC, EAP Films and Theatres Private Limited, EAP Broadcasting Company Limited and Swarnamahal Jewellers, to Blue Summit Capital Management.

According to the mandatory offer document by Serendib Holdings Ptd. Ltd, on SEG, the shareholders and directors of Blue Summit Capital Management Pte. Ltd are Omar Siraj M. Qandeel, a Grenadian national and Rodrigo Don Cyril (Junior), a citizen of Singapore.

The mandatory offer document filed with the CSE contains detailed information about the professional careers of both Qandeel and Cyril.

According to its annual report, SEG, which was earlier known as Infrastructure Developers PLC (IDL), is a multifaceted engineering company. The controlling interest of IDL was bought by Navara Capital in 2011 and subsequently in 2013 it was renamed Serendib Engineering Group PLC (SEG).

As per the annual report, SEG, which services as the holding company of Serendib Engineering & Agencies (Pvt.) Ltd, CCC Plantation Engineering Ltd and Serendib Investment Holdings Ltd, focuses on telecom infrastructure engineering.

The group has also expanded its solutions to diversify the engineering portfolio, including railway, marine, public infrastructure, plantation, power generation, water supply, civil engineering, as well as pre-cast concrete poles, through its subsidiaries.

For the nine months ended December 31, 2017, SEG made a net loss of Rs.9 million on revenue of Rs.227.2 million.  The total assets of the company as per the same date stood at Rs.428.2 million.