Cube Highways

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An IFC equity investment is proposed for setting up the Road Holdco as an investment vehicle in collaboration with ISQ (“Project”). ISQ is an independent global infrastructure investment manager focusing on energy, utilities, and transport in North America, Europe, and select high growth economies. ISQ has a presence in New York, Houston, London, New Delhi, Singapore and Hong Kong. To complement its diversified portfolio of global infrastructure assets, ISQ is forming this Road Holdco, which will be based in Singapore, to acquire operational road assets in India. The company will acquire a diversified portfolio of operational road assets in India. In addition to operational road assets, which are expected to form a majority of the portfolio, it is expected that the company may also acquire other transportation and logistics assets like parking facilities, logistics infrastructure, etc. ISQ is currently in an advanced stage of evaluation of multiple operational toll road SPVs. These assets, if they meet the Road Holdco’s selection criteria, may be acquired by it. In addition to the proposed equity, IFC is also considering providing debt for refinancing acquired roads. The SPVs are operating toll road companies with 4-lane road assets ranging roughly between 50 kms to over 100 kms. These 4-laned or 6-Laned toll roads have been in operation for approximately 3 to 5 years. Some of the SPVs were accorded provisional commercial operation clearance subject to completion of some pending work.  Remaining works in most cases are primarily related to completion of parts where encumbrances have not yet been removed by the concessioning authority. The company has since commitment, acquired the following 7 assets. Jaipur Mahua Tollway Private Limited (JMTPL): The Jaipur-Mahua road stretch of NH-11 connects Jaipur, Bikaner, Fatehpur-Sikri-Agra. The length of the project road is 109 km starting from km 120.012 to km 229.100, falling across the districts of Dausa and Jaipur in the state of Rajasthan. This was the first asset acquired by Cube Highways and has been described in some detail in the ESRS. The highway four laning was completed in the year 2009. Mahua Bharatpur Expressway Limited (MBEL): The Bharatpur-Mahwa road stretch of NH- 11 connects Bharatpur to Mahwa and popular destinations such as Jaipur and Agra. The length of the project road is 57 km starting from Km 62.295 to Km 119.600 (57.305 kms) falling across the district of Bharatpur in the state of Rajasthan.  The road stretch was strengthened and widened from existing 2-lane road to 4- lane divided highway in the year 2009 Western UP Tollway Limited (WUPTL): The Meerut- Muzaffarnnagar is an operational road stretch of NH- 58 and connects Meerut to Muzzafaranagar and popular destinations such as Rishikesh, Haridwar and Dehradun. The length of the project road is 80 km starting from chainage 052+250 and ending at 130+560 falling across the districts of Meerut and Muzaffarnagar in the state of Uttar Pradesh. The road stretch was strengthened and widened from existing 2-lane road to 4- lane divided highway in the year 2011. Andhra Pradesh Expressway Ltd. (APEL): The ‘four lane’ operating road asset is located at Kotakatta Bypass to Kurnool between 136.007 km (end of Kotakatta By pass) to 211.000 km (Kurnool Town) on NH-7, traverses through districts of Mahbubnagar (Telangana) and Kurnool (Andhra Pradesh). The length of the project road 75 km. The road stretch was strengthened and widened from existing 2-lane road to 4- lane divided highway in the year 2009. Narketpally-Addanki-Medarmetaka (NAM) highway: The project road starts from national highway (NH) 9 junction at Narketpally in Nalgonda district in Telangana at Km 0.000 and ends at NH 5 junction at Medarametla at Km 212.500 in Prakasam district of Andhra Pradesh. Around 87 km of the project road falls in the state of Talengana and the remaining 125.5 km falls in the state of Andhra Pradesh. The road was a single-lane road (in each direction) until 1998 when it was converted to a two-lane State Highway (SH). Following successful bidding, a concession agreement (CA) was signed between the Government of Andhra Pradesh (GoAP) and NAMEL in July 2010 to develop the four-lane toll road. The four-lane road has been operational since March 2014 when the project obtained provisional commercial operation date (PCOD) for 190.38 km of the road. Subsequently, additional length of 5.825 km, 6.6 km and 1 km was allowed for tolling by the Authority in September 2016, May 2018 and March 2020 respectively. Thus, total tollable length as on date is 203.805 km. 6. Farakka Raiganj Highways Limited (FRHL): FRHL is an operational four lane road starting at Km 294.800 (near Farakka barrage) and ends at Km 394.980 (after Itahar Junction) in the state of West Bengal. The project involves 100.18 kms of road of which 79.57 kms received provisional commercial operation date certificate in Oct 2016. Ghaziabad Aligarh Expressway Private Limited (GAEPL): GAEPL is an existing four-lane 126.3 km road stretch of national highway (NH) 91 between Ghaziabad to Aligarh in the state of Uttar Pradesh which needs to be expanded from a 4-lane configuration to 6-lane. The project will involve: (i) expanding from four to six lane effectively for about 83.4 km (as the remaining length includes: flyovers which are already built as per six lane configurations; 20 km of Aligarh bypass which will be retained as 4-lane; and a planned 9.3-km greenfield bypass road as described below); and (ii) operations and maintenance (O&M) of the road. The greenfield bypass road is planned to be constructed by the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) in order to replace a stretch of approximately 7.1 km of the existing road falling within the premises of a super thermal power plant to be constructed at Khurja (the “Khurja bypass”). NHAI will hand over the constructed and ready to operate bypass to the concessionaire.  Provisional completion certificate for the existing road was received from NHAI in June 2015 for 106.5 km and in November 2016 for the remaining 19.4 km stretch.  Further details related to each of these seven assets, their respective environmental and social aspects and their respective action plans have been provided in the attached ESDDs/ESIAs  disclosed with this update of the ESRS.