Adani Group Chairman Gautam Adani has emerged as the highest wealth gainer, as per Forbes India Rich List 2024
Our Bureau
Mumbai
Adani Enterprises Limited (AEL) on Thursday said it has successfully completed the qualified institutional placement (QIP) of equity shares of face value of Rs 1 each of AEL (“Equity Shares”) aggregating to approximately Rs 4,200 crores (USD 500 million).
According to Adani, a total of 1,41,79,608 Equity Shares were allocated at an issue price of Rs 2,962 per equity share through the QIP.
The transaction was launched post-market hours on 9 October 2024 with a deal size of approximately INR 4,200 crores (USD 500 million) and closed on 15 October 2024.
The QIP saw overwhelming demand, receiving bids of approximately 4.2x of the deal size from a diverse group of investors, including global long-only investors, major Indian mutual funds, and insurance companies.
This underscores AEL’s position as India’s largest listed incubator of scalable and large businesses in core infrastructure which addresses the needs of India.
AEL’s current incubation portfolio includes airports and roads in the transport and logistics sector, new energy ecosystem (including solar and wind manufacturing) and data centers in the energy and utility sector. AEL’s other businesses including copper, PVC, defense and specialized manufacturing, focus on import substitution and addresses India’s vision of Atmanirbhar Bharat.
The proceeds from the QIP will be utilized for funding capital expenditure, debt repayment and general corporate purposes. SBI Capital Markets Limited, Jefferies India Private Limited and ICICI Securities Limited were the book running lead managers for the Issue (“BRLMs”).
Further Cantor Fitzgerald & Co. acted as an advisor in connection with the issue. Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas acted as Legal Counsel to AEL as to Indian law and Trilegal and Latham & Watkins LLP acted as Legal Counsels to the BRLMs as to Indian law and international law, respectively.
Meanwhile, Adani Group Chairman Gautam Adani has emerged as the highest wealth gainer, as per Forbes India Rich List 2024. The increase is more than the combined gain in the net worth of Reliance Industries Limited Chairman and Managing Director Mukesh Ambani and Savitri Jindal, OP Jindal Group Chairperson Emeritus – the top three names on the list.
Gautam Adani’s net worth increased to USD 116 billion–USD 48 billion higher than the previous year’s and highest by any Indian in a year. With this, his net worth valued by Forbes is now at USD 116 billion.
As per the list, second biggest gainer was Mukesh Ambani. He gained USD 27.5 billion during 2024, taking his net worth to USD 119.5 billion.
This helped him maintain the top position as per Forbes, albeit the lead has fallen significantly with Adani to only USD 3.5 billion.
Savitri Jindal surpassed Shiv Nadar (third richest Indian as per Forbes in 2023), gaining USD 19.7 billion. Savitri Jindal is India’s richest woman and is MLA from Hisar.
Google announces AI-led collaborations for health, sustainability and agriculture
Our Bureau
Bengaluru
Google has unveiled a series of new AI-powered partnerships aimed at advancing healthcare, sustainability, and agriculture in India. The tech giant is collaborating with both local and international organizations to implement AI-driven solutions in diabetic retinopathy screening, urban waste management, and agricultural development.
According to Google, these announcements were made during a roundtable in Bengaluru, marking the fifth anniversary of Google’s Research Lab in the city. This follows the 10th edition of the Google for India event, which showcased the potential of AI to benefit individuals, businesses, and society at large.
Dr Manish Gupta, Research Director of Google DeepMind, stated, “Collaborating with key Indian organizations, our focused research in India across language understanding, healthcare, agriculture, and sustainability is helping tackle many of the country’s unique challenges and creating AI-led solutions that will improve billions of lives.”
Google is working with Forus Health and AuroLab in India and Perceptra in Thailand to provide 6 million AI-assisted screenings for diabetic retinopathy over the next decade.
These screenings aim to detect and prevent blindness in diabetic patients, particularly in resource-limited communities. The AI model has already supported over 600,000 screenings worldwide, with initial research and deployment carried out in India.
Sunny Virmani, Group Product Manager, Health AI Research at Google, remarked, “From our initial research to the first patient screening in Madurai, India, we’ve been committed to translating AI’s potential into meaningful change for people globally. And now the partnerships with Forus Health, AuroLab, and Perceptra are helping us expand on this commitment, as a global network of innovators comes together to eradicate preventable blindness due to diabetic retinopathy.”
Google’s CircularNet, an AI-driven computer vision model for waste management, is being deployed in partnership with Bengaluru-based Saahas Zero Waste.
