SNJ which bottles for Bacardi, Radico Khaitan and Geoscope and sells its own brand of liquor - will pay Rs 302 crore to settle financial creditors and another Rs 127 crore to settle VAT dues. The company will also pay other dues , including employees' salaries. SNJ Group will also get Apollo Distillery, which is 92% owned by Empee. It will also get a distillery in Telangana and a unit in Kolar in Karnataka.
“Initially we will invest Rs 100 crore and the rest will be raised as debt," said S N Jayamurugan, CMD of SNJ Group. He said the distillery will be restarted and achieve peak production in a four-to-six months from taking full control. .. SNJ will now get access to 4.2 lakh cases of IMFL capacity in addition to its own nine lakh cases capacity. It will also get a beer capacity of seven lakh a month, in addition. Empee Distilleries, promoted by MP Purushothaman, has interests across liquor, hospitality, power and sugar. It ran into rough weather on the back of expansion into hospitality and glut in sugar business. In the first round of expression of interest, two companies — SNJ Distilleries and Mondovi Distilleries and Breweries Private Limited — were the bidders. The committee of lenders asked to increase the plan value. However, it did not come through. As a result, a second expression of interest was called where the lenders found the resolution plan values of SNJ Distilleries and Kals Distilleries Limited higher than others. Later, the committee of lenders unanimously selected SNJ Distilleries.