The combine of Reliance Industries Ltd and Apollo Global Management which is leading the race to acquire UK medical chain Boots is in talks with various banks to raise $8 billion to sew up the deal. A report said the duo were in talks with a consortium of foreign banks that include Barclays Bank Plc, Deutsche Bank AG, HSBC and Standard Chartered Bank.

The board of Walgreens Boots Alliance — the US parent of Boots — may meet in the coming days where it could discuss the potential deal with the RIL-Apollo combine. If it gives the go-ahead, the board of Reliance Industries is expected to meet to give its approval to the transaction.

After the successful completion of the acquisition, Mukesh D Ambani is expected to integrate Boots services with Reliance Retail Ltd and bring it to India. Reliance had earlier acquired the online pharmacy player Netmeds in 2020. It had bought the Chennai-based online pharmaceutical retailer for a cash consideration of around Rs 620 crore.

The transaction saw Reliance Industries subsidiary Reliance Retail Ventures Ltd picking up a 60 per cent stake in Vitalic Health and a direct 100 per cent stake in three of its subsidiaries that included Netmeds Marketplace, Tresara Health Private Ltd and Dadha Pharma Distribution Pvt. Earlier, in 2018, a RIL subsidiary had invested in KareExpert Technologies, a digital healthcare platform.

Its other major acquisition on the retail front was in 2019: Reliance Brands, a subsidiary of RIL, bought the British toy retailer Hamleys for £67.96 million in an all-cash deal. Hamleys is one of world’s oldest toy retailer. Mukesh security The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to hear on June 28 a plea of the Centre challenging the Tripura High Court orders on a public interest litigation challenging grant of security cover to Reliance Industries chairman Mukesh Ambani and his family members in Mumbai.

A vacation bench of Justices Surya Kant and JB Pardiwala was told by Solicitor General Tushar Mehta that the high court has no jurisdiction to entertain the PIL as the state government has nothing to do with the security cover provided to the Ambanis by the Centre on the recommendation of the Maharashtra government. Mehta said he wants the appeal to be heard urgently as the high court has asked home ministry officials to appear before it on Tuesday with original records with regard to the threat perception to the Ambanis, and stated no more adjournment will be granted.