Reliance Industries may rewrite recent history of rights issues: Here's how

The previous large rights issues by companies have typically had a strike rate of 25-28% from shareholders, which includes the top 10 rights issues including those of the Tata group.

The Rs 53,125 crore rights issue of Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) is scheduled to open on May 14 might rewrite the recent history of "rights". Shares of the company gained 3.4 per cent at Rs 1,615 on the BSE on Monday after the date was fixed for determining shareholders eligible to apply for its rights issue. The stock was trading close to its record high of Rs 1,618, and recovered 84 per cent from its 52-week low of Rs 876 on March 23.

The previous large rights issues by companies have typically had a strike rate of 25-28 per cent from shareholders, which includes the top 10 rights issues and all the large rights issues of the Tata group.

The Bharti Airtel rights issues launched in May 2019 with a size of Rs 24,939 crore got 15 per cent response from shareholders with 27,301 applications on the total number of shareholders at 186,000.

The Vodafone Idea issue in April last year received 26 per cent applications. The issue size was Rs 25,000 crore and out of the 339,000 shareholders, 87,248 shareholders applied.

ALSO READ: RIL fixes May 14 as record date for rights issue. Should you subscribe?

The issue of Tata Steel to the tune of Rs 12,704 crore received 39 per cent applications from shareholders as of the total of 740,000 shareholders, the number of applications was 291,000.

The Tata Motors issue in 2015 to the tune of Rs 7,497 crore received 25 per cent applications as 90,631 shareholders applied out of 366,000.

The Tata Power issue in March 2014 got 38 per cent applications as 89,840 applied out of 236,000 for an issue size of Rs 1,993 crore.

The TV18 issue in 2012 for Rs 2,700 crore got a 21 per cent response from 12,976 shareholders out of 60,373.

Reliance launches new road project to counter pushback against plastics

India, which uses about 14 million tonnes of plastic annually, lacks an organized system for management of plastic waste, leading to widespread littering.

Company News : Reliance Industries, India's largest petchem player, is launching a project to use plastics in road construction, amid growing concerns over pollution in the country of 1.3 billion whose major cities are often plagued with smog and litter.

India, which uses about 14 million tonnes of plastic annually, lacks an organized system for management of plastic waste, leading to widespread littering.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is urging India to end consumption of single-use plastics by 2022.

But Indians should focus on fighting pollution, not plastics, executives at Reliance Industries , whose chairman is Asia's richest man Mukesh Ambani, said during a launch event on Tuesday.

The company will seek to work with India's highway authority and individual states to potentially supply a plastics-infused mix to make some of the thousands of kilometers of roads Modi wants to build to upgrade India's creaking infrastructure.

Light plastics, the type used as carry bags or snack wrappers, are typically not viable to recycle and so end up in landfills, street corners or oceans. Reliance wants to shred these plastics and mix them with bitumen, a formula the conglomerate says is cheaper and longer-lasting.

"(This) can be a game-changing project both for our environment and our roads," Vipul Shah, the COO of the petrochemicals business, said at a company petchem plant in the western state of Maharashtra.

Shah was coy on details, saying Reliance had yet to work out the financial fine print in what he stressed would be a philanthropic endeavour.

Reliance's announcement comes as campaigners such as Greta Thunberg ramp up pressure on businesses to help tackle climate change.

"It is happening internationally and now has started percolating to India too, though it's at a very early stage," said Sunil Dahiya, an analyst at the Center for Research on Energy and Clean Air.

Maharashtra govt's move to ban use of plastic puts RIL in recycle mode

Company creating platform for building corpus and setting up full-fledged sustainability team.

Plastic Ban : The Maharashtra government’s decision in March to partially ban the use of plastic has put the country’s largest polymer producer in recycle mode. The Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries (RIL) is now creating a platform for recycling, building a corpus and setting up a full-fledged sustainability team.


“The ban from Maharashtra was more of a wake-up call for the industry,” said Vipul Shah, chief operating officer of RIL's petrochemicals business. RIL had homework in place over the last couple of years. The ban accelerated the process, he added.


“There was earlier a small team of two to three people working on a smaller project like bottle recycling. We now have a full-fledged department for sustainability of seven to eight people working full time and another 10-12 moonlighting,” Shah added.


RIL is the country’s largest producer of polymer, the main raw material required for making plastic items. Shah did not share details on how much of the company’s polymer production is consumed through plastic bags and other items banned in the state.


“The exposure to banned items is minimal, less than three per cent maybe. It is more likely to affect small enterprises. As for RIL, there are other segments to cater to,” said a person with direct knowledge of the business.


Part of the sustainability team’s job is to develop an extended producer responsibility (EPR) platform for the industry. “Being the largest polymer producer, we want to design something that is adaptable to India and not a copy from Europe. We want to design the whole chain from segregation, collection, secondary segregation, recycling, generating energy and oil,” Shah added.


The corpus, he said, would be funded through RIL’s petrochemicals business, not as part of its corporate social responsibility programme.

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