B'lore firm eyes top slot in rose market

Bangalore: In a bid to become the world's largest rose grower, city-based Karuturi Networks (KN) is looking at acquiring a large rose farm in Africa.

"We are looking at acquiring a large rose farm in Africa and hopefully by March we would have achieved closure on the deal. This would make us the largest rose grower in the world,” said Managing Director of KN, Ramakrishna.

Ramakrishna, who did not reveal the name the African farm, however, said that it was owned by a Dutch national.

The firm has raised USD 25 million by FCCB (Foreign Currency Convertible Bonds) issue through the UTI bank.

“Apart from this the bank (UTI) has also given us the ECB (External Commercial Borrowing) limit of $20 million,” he said.

KN, Ramakrishna said, is also keen on acquiring production facilities in Latin America, Africa and Asia and is looking at verticals like plant propogation, plant breeding, horticulture cultivation including flowers, ferns and foliage.

The firm, which has been cultivating roses for the past 13 years occupies a 15 per cent share of the domestic rose market estimated at about Rs 1,000 crore, which is expected to reach Rs 10,000 crore by 2017," he said.

Its main rose export markets are UK, Japan, Australia, Singapore and Middle East while it also exports to Brunei and Spain.

"Our top line last year was Rs 45 crore and bottom line Rs 15 crore. This year we hope to achieve a topline of Rs 100 crore and a bottom line of Rs 40 crore,” Ramakrishna said.

Karuturi Networks cultivates 65 million roses on 60 hectares of land, out of which ten hectares is on the outskirts of Bangalore while 50 hectares is on the outskirts of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, he said.

The firm outsources flowers including carnations, Anthurium, Bird of Paradise, Liliums, Gerbera from Kodagu, Himachal Pradesh, Udhagamandalam, Kolhapur, Sholapur and Sangli (Maharashtra).

While the floriculture market in India is quite nascent, there is a lot of potential.

"Flowers are a calculated purchase in India and not an impulse buy like the western countries where it is a way of life. We are slowly moving towards that,” Ramakrishna said.

To tap the potential, the firm has pioneered a retail format 'Flower Express' where it is working on building a chain of retail florist outlets all over India and Middle East.

"Our demand driver is the young population and the middle class,” he said.