KUALA LUMPUR (Dec 14): Sapura Energy Bhd announced late tonight that its single largest shareholder Tan Sri Shahril Shamsuddin, who is also the president and CEO, has decided to put in an additional RM100 million to subscribe in full the rights issue that is sweetened with free warrants.

In a filing with Bursa Malaysia, Sapura Energy said it received irrevocable undertaking from its direct substantial shareholder Sapura Technology Sdn Bhd (STSB) for RM400 million worth of rights shares, and from Jurudata Sdn Bhd, which will also be applying for excess rights shares besides its entitlement.

STSB holds a 16.81% stake in Sapura Energy.

This supersedes the letter of undertaking earlier, in which STSB had provided an irrevocable undertaking to subscribe to a minimum of RM300 million worth of rights shares with warrants.

On top of that, the group's other senior management have given their undertaking in writing for the massive cash call, which aims to raise RM4 billion at 30 sen per rights share.

Senior management who have given their undertaking are Ahmad Zakiruddin Mohamed (Senior Vice President, Operations — Engineering and Construction and Group Supply Chain), Chow Mei Mei (Senior Vice President, Financial Advisory and Portfolio Planning), Datuk Kris Azman Abdullah (Senior Vice President, Exploration & Production), Reza Abdul Rahim (Group Chief Financial Officer; Senior Vice President, Group Finance and Strategy), Raphael Michel Francois Yves Siri (Senior Vice President, Drilling Business and Group Performance), Vivek Arora (Senior Vice President, Business Acquisition — Engineering and Construction) and Lew Sue Li (group company secretary). They will be subscribing for entitled and excess rights shares with an aggregate value of not less than RM15.6 million.

"The above undertaking shareholders have confirmed that they have sufficient financial resources to fulfil their commitments pursuant to their respective irrevocable undertakings," said Sapura Energy in the filing.

Sapura Energy is undertaking the rights issue of shares and Islamic redeemable convertible preference shares (RCPS-i) to raise RM4 billion, an amount that is double the group's current market capitalisation of RM1.98 billion.

The rights issue is an important part of the group's recapitalisation exercise to pare down its huge borrowings of RM14 billion.

Permodalan Nasional Bhd (PNB), the group's second substantial shareholder, has been supportive of the cash call.

In total, PNB will fork out RM2.56 billion for the rights issue of shares and RCPS-i as it has given the undertaking to subscribe for some of the unsubscribed shares and RCPS-i. PNB will turn out to be the single largest shareholder of Sapura Energy holding 40% upon completion of the rights issue.

Sapura Energy's share price closed at 33 sen today for a market capitalisation of RM1.98 billion.