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Aion Capital joins race for LafargeHolcim’s cement assets

Private equity firm Aion Capital Partners has joined the race for LafargeHolcim’s 11 million tonnes of cement assets in India, two people directly involved in the deal said.

“A number of firms are interested in the assets, which includes small cement companies and private equity firms,” said one of the two people.

In February, LafargeHolcim announced its plans to sell its entire cement portfolio held under Lafarge India Pvt. Ltd in its bid to comply with anti-trust regulations. The second of the two people cited above said 14-15 firms have evinced interest, Aion being one of them.

Aion Capital is a joint venture between homegrown private equity firm ICICI Ventures and global private equity firm Apollo Global Management.

The two people spoke on condition of anonymity.

A third person, who also declined to be named, added that Aion Capital had even evinced interest when Lafarge was selling 5.15 million tonnes per annum (mtpa) of capacity to comply with the Competition Commission of India (CCI) norms in the wake of the global merger of Holcim Ltd and Lafarge SA to create the largest cement entity in the world.

Livemint.com