UK: Cobra Beer raised �27.5 million to develop businesses

Cobra Beer, owned by noted Indian-origin entrepreneur Karan Bilimoria, has raised 27.5 million pounds to expand its product range beyond Indian restaurants and accelerate growth in Britain and the Indian subcontinent, Kerala News communicated July 18.

The company will use the money to develop its South African and export businesses. It will also use part of the cash to redeem preference shares.

The amount raised includes 25 million pounds of unsecured loan notes issued by Och-Ziff Capital Management, the US hedge fund, and 2.5 million pounds via a placing of new shares to private and institutional investors.

"This is the biggest amount of money that we've ever raised at any one time. It will enable us to take the brands to the next level before we float the company," Bilimoria said.

His Cobra Beer is served in 90 percent of the 6,000 Indian restaurants licensed to sell alcohol in Britain. In 2005, it launched an alcohol-free beer, a low-calorie beer and King Cobra, the world's first double fermented strong lager, sold in champagne-style bottles.

Cobra is brewed under licence in Bedford, Belgium, the Netherlands and Poland, as well as in Rajasthan, in India.

The company is said to be in talks with three more Indian breweries to extend its distribution capacity and is about to start building its own 5.5 million pound brewery in Hyderabad.

Bilimoria, 44, will soon take his seat in the House of Lords after being made a crossbench peer in May by the House of Lords Appointments Commission.