Mahanagar Gas to acquire Ashoka Buildcon's city gas arm Unison Enviro

Mahanagar Gas (MGL) on Friday signed an agreement to acquire rival private sector city gas distributor Unison Enviro from its promoters and existing shareholders Ashoka Buildcon and an investment fund managed by Morgan Stanley India Infrastructure, for an undisclosed sum.

Unison Enviro is a subsidiary of highway developer Ashoka Buildcon and is into city gas distribution in the districts of Ratnagiri, Latur and Osmanabad in Maharashtra, and Chitradurga and Davanagere in Karnataka, to domestic, commercial, industrial and transport sectors.

This acquisition will enable MGL, which is a subsidiary of gas major Gail, to expand into these five new markets. Currently it has licence to sell natural gas only in Mumbai metropolitan region and also in the neighbouring Raigad district.

''This transaction is of strategic importance as the extended footprint will scale our business activities across a larger network and customer base,'' Ashu Shinghal, MGL managing director, said.

The acquisition will help MGL expand its network within and beyond Maharashtra and offer its services to a broader customer base, thereby contributing towards long term growth, he added.

Ashish Kataria, a director at Ashoka Buildcon and chairman of Unison Enviro, said, the group entered city gas distribution in 2016 and within a short period of time won three licences and commissioned these networks.

Shyamsundar Gurumoorthy, managing director of Morgan Stanley India Infrastructure, said they invested in Unison Enviro in 2019.

Over the past 28 years, Mahanagar Gas has been serving over 2.1 million households, around 0.91 million vehicles including 4,488 commercial and industrial establishments with compressed natural gas (CNG) and piped natural gas (PNG) to domestic, commercial, and industrial consumers in Mumbai, Navi Mumbai, Thane and the adjoining areas as well as in Raigad district.

Ashoka Buildcon is a Fortune India 500 company and one of the leading highway developers. Over the past 28 years it has executed/been executing 41 PPP projects and has presence over 20 states.

Morgan Stanley Infrastructure is the infrastructure investing platform of Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partners.

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