Larsen & Toubro has bought about 20% stake held by V.G. Siddhartha and Coffee Day in Mindtree through a block deal for about ₹3,210 crore. L&T has bought 32.7 million shares at ₹980 apiece.
The infrastructure and engineering major had said in March that it would make an open offer to buy an additional 31% stake in Mindtree after it entered into an agreement with Mr. Siddhartha to buy his 20.32% equity in the company for ₹3,269 crore.
Since then, the acquirer has been actively exploring ways to buy up to 66% stake in Mindtree for about ₹10,800 crore.
Mindtree founders and the management called L&T's offer “unsolicited” and termed it a “hostile acquisition bid” on a “culturally different” company.
Following this development, Mindtree had set up a committee of independent directors to evaluate the open offer.
The committee is expected to take its recommendations to its stakeholders by May 10 before L&T’s open offer begins on May 14. The offer will close on May 27.
