Indian billionaire Anil Agarwal plans $25 billion Vedanta expansion over three years

Indian billionaire Anil Agarwal said his Vedanta group plans to invest about $25 billion over the next three years to expand its metals, mining and energy businesses, as he targets revenue of about $50 billion.

Most of the money will go into expanding existing operations rather than buying new ones, Agarwal, Vedanta's founder and chairman, told a business audience in Kolkata on Wednesday. "Current capex plans are for organic growth in aluminium, copper, zinc, oil and gas," he said.

The group, which now has 10 major companies, wants to grow its business from about $30 billion today to $50 billion within two to three years, with profit of about $20 billion. Agarwal said the spending can be paid for out of the group's own cash, and that the group also wants to become one of the world's leading silver producers and a major miner of critical metals within three to four years.

He said Vedanta Resources, the London-based holding company through which he controls the group, has about $5 billion of borrowings against assets worth more than $100 billion, and that dividends from its listed companies are enough to service that debt. Agarwal added that the group is open to buying state-owned assets if they come up for sale, though its focus remains on its existing businesses.

Plans for West Bengal

Agarwal also said Vedanta is studying an aluminium smelter and power plants in West Bengal, which could involve investment of ₹70,000 crore to ₹80,000 crore ($7.4 billion to $8.4 billion) over three years, subject to feasibility and state support. Asansol, an industrial city in the west of the state, is being considered because of its coal supplies, infrastructure and closeness to Vedanta's aluminium smelter at Jharsuguda in neighbouring Odisha.

"The demand for metals and minerals is growing in India, and we have all the resources to meet it," Agarwal said. "Our hard-earned money is going outside the country because of imports."

The group already has about 5,000 megawatts of renewable energy capacity and plans to add another 5,000 megawatts within 18 months.

Shares rise after results

The plan came as Vedanta's newly separated companies reported their first results for the July to September quarter. Shares of Vedanta Power rose as much as 17% in Mumbai on Friday after it swung to a net profit of ₹83 crore ($8.7 million) from a loss a year earlier. Its revenue rose 38% to ₹2,908 crore ($305 million), and power sales climbed 26%.

Vedanta Oil and Gas rose about 18% in early trading after posting net profit of ₹746 crore ($78 million) on revenue of ₹2,486 crore ($261 million), helped by a 40% rise in the price it got for its crude, even as output fell 19%.

Vedanta Aluminium Metal, the largest of the new companies, more than doubled its net profit to ₹5,167 crore ($543 million) as revenue rose 41% to ₹22,066 crore ($2.3 billion) and aluminium output hit a record 649,000 tonnes. Vedanta Ltd., the parent that still owns a controlling stake in zinc producer Hindustan Zinc, reported net profit of ₹3,650 crore ($383 million) on revenue of ₹26,356 crore ($2.8 billion).

Agarwal split Vedanta in June into five listed companies, spinning off its aluminium, power, oil and gas, and iron and steel businesses. His family keeps majority control of each.

Outside India, the group owns Konkola Copper Mines in Zambia, which it took back in 2024 after a long legal fight with the Zambian government, and the Gamsberg zinc mine in South Africa's Northern Cape, where it recently doubled processing capacity.

Agarwal, 72, started out as a scrap-metal trader in Mumbai in the 1970s. Forbes puts his net worth at $6.1 billion, ranking him 41st on its 2026 list of India's richest people.