Sahara India, US-based Turner Construction Company and a special situation investment and development firm, Acropolis Capital Group have formed a construction joint venture that plans to build projects worth $25 billion over 20 years in India.

Trilegal was the principal Indian legal advisor on the transaction. Trilegal team was led by Partner Delano Furtado along with Counsel Shruti Sahu and Associates Naresh Pareek and Siddharth Sharma.

U.S. law firm Peckar and Abramson acted as International legal advisor for Turner. The team was led by Partner Robert S Peckar.

The construction JV is expected to provide construction management and project management services to township projects undertaken by Sahara Prime City in India worth $ 2.5 billion in the next 5 years. 

Speaking to Bar & Bench on the transaction, Mumbai Partner Delano Furtado said, “The demand for high quality real estate infrastructure built on international standards is huge in India.  However, international best practices and high quality construction at an affordable cost are lacking in the Indian real estate Industry. The collaboration between the Sahara Group and Turner Construction through the JVs formed seeks to bridge this gap by leveraging off Sahara's extensive land bank and township projects in the pipeline, with Turner's leading construction management and project management expertise”. 

Delano added, “Heavy documentation, tax efficient structuring given the various offshore entities involved in providing construction management services and manpower from the Turner group and being able to provide Turner with a safe investment structure in view of the foreign investment restrictions in the real estate industry and other associated risks were some of the challenging aspects of this assignment”.

VCCircle reports, Sahara India will initially invest $100 million and will hold 63 percent of the joint venture.

Sahara, with assets of $26 billion, has global interests in finance, infrastructure and real estate, hospitality and media and entertainment. Turner, a subsidiary of German construction group Hochtief, builds about $8 billion worth of projects every year.

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