Annapoorna, a 50-year old masala brand owned by Coimbatore’s Sree Annapoorna Group (SAG), will now move from the group and be part of a new joint Venture between SAG and Hyderabad’s Gemini Edibles & Fats India (GEFI). Through the JV, GEFI is also foraying in to the masala business.

As per the JV announced at a press meet on Tuesday, a sum of ₹70 crore has been invested for branding and distribution, and another ₹50 crore will be invested in the next two years, said Akshay Chowdhry, Group Vice President, GEFI.

Vijay Prasad, Managing Partner SAG will be the CEO of the joint venture, called GEF Foods India Pvt Ltd. In this JV, 70 per cent share will be held by GEFI and the rest 30 per cent by SAG. The JV expects to clock revenue of ₹100 crore in the first year of operations, and ₹1,000 crore in five years, said Prasad.

With 50 years of experience in the masala business, SAG has nearly 45 products. The manufacturing facility in Coimbatore has a daily capacity to produce 30 tonnes of masala with 40-45 per cent utilisation at present. With the joint venture, the capacity will increase significantly, he said.

SAG, which has a revenue of around ₹45 crore, with sales mainly in the western region of Tamil Nadu. With this JV, the Annapoorna masala will be taken to across the southern states, and then to pan India, he added.

Prasad said the JV company in future plans to have a 100 tonne manufacturing facility closer to supply (chilly) regions between Guntur and Hyderabad.

Chowdhry said through the JV, there will mutual support for distribution of products of both the companies, and also cross selling of both brands.

According to Chandra Shekhara Reddy, Senior Vice President, Sales and Marketing, GEFI, with the JV, the group is foraying in to the masala business. This is an extension of the group’s business activities in branded oils (sunflower, rice bran, mustard and ground nut); institutional (palmolein, fats for industries and lauric fats) and bulk oils (palmolein, sunflower and palm products).

“We hope to close this fiscal with revenue of around ₹12,000 crore, up from ₹9,500 crore in the previous financial year,” he said. GEFI’s products include Freedom cooking oils, Be-Rite refined sunflower oil, First Klass refined palmolein oil and Sri Krupa deepam oil. Some of the company’s partners include JioMart, Metro Cash & Carry, Reliance Retail, More, Walmart, bigbasket. Its products are also sold on Q-commerce platforms like zepto, amazonfresh, blinkit, Swiggy Instamart, D Mart ready and Flipkart Minutes, he said.

In sunflower oil, out of the total 2 million tonne manufacturing capacity in the country, GEFI has a 21 per cent market share. It operates three port-based manufacturing facilities – two in Kakinada and one in Krishnapatnam – on the east coast in Andhra Pradesh. It is a subsidiary of Golden Agri-Resources, one of the world’s largest vegetable oil companies.