Pininfarina SpA, the Italian designer of Ferraris and producer of niche vehicles, said India’s Tata Motors Ltd is interested in participating in its share sale.
MILAN: Pininfarina SpA, the Italian designer of Ferraris and producer of niche vehicles, said India’s Tata Motors Ltd is interested in participating in its share sale.
Turin, Italy-based Pininfarina will open an engineering venture in India with Tata — which last month agreed to buy Jaguar and Land Rover from Ford Motor Co for $2.3 billion — by the end of this year, it said in a statement distributed by the Italian exchange on Thursday.
India’s largest truckmaker will hold a minority stake in the venture, to be based in Pune, while Pininfarina will hold the rest, the company said in a statement as it presented its industrial plan to analysts in Milan.
Tata has “expressed interest” in buying some of the new shares Pininfarina plans to sell, the company said.
The designer announced last month that it will sell €100 million ($153 million) of new shares to existing investors and French billionaire Vincent Bollore as it seeks to break even next year.
Pininfarina, which has designed sports cars for Ferrari for 50 years, is seeking to expand its wengineering and design business to become less dependent on auto manufacturing contracts. The company is producing five new models, including Ford Motor Co’s Ford Focus Coupe Cabriolet and Fiat SpA’s Alfa Brera.
The company is raising money as part of a restructuring plan to revive its flagging business.
The restructuring includes a joint venture with French financier Vincent Bollore to build an electric car.
Bollore is also expected to take part in the capital increase and could become the second biggest shareholder after Pininfarina’s founding family.
The family of the same name has a 55% stake but is prepared to reduce it to allow other investors to enter the company. It would nevertheless keep a controlling stake of more than 30%.
Although famous for its work for Ferrari and other sports car makers, the Turin-based company is losing money.
Like Germany’s Karmann and companies in the sector, it is suffering from the latest trend among big car makers to develop models by themselves rather than seek outside help. — Bloomberg. Reuters contributed to this story.
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