Optimum Group: Gupta-linked group moves to buy struggling Optimum for R2.15bn

Oakbay Investments Group's Tegeta Exploration and Resources has concluded a conditional R2.15-billion transaction to buy all the assets of Optimum Holdings, which has been in business rescue since August. Oakbay is linked to the Gupta family, with Atul Gupta its chairperson and his nephew Varun Gupta CEO. The deal was confirmed by the joint business rescue practitioners (BRPs), Piers Marsden and Peter van den Steen, and covers the Optimum coal mine, which supplies Eskom's Hendrina power station, the Optimum coal terminal and Koornfontein Mines. Koornfontein Mines was not in business rescue, but has a contract with Eskom to supply coal to the Komati power station, until the end of 2015.