Infibeam All Set To Launch Indian eCommerce’s First Ever IPO; To Raise Upto Rs 450 Cr At A Valuation Of Rs 2237 Crore

This is one of those historical, epic moments for the Digital industry, especially eCommerce, in India. Infibeam is about to accomplish a feat which its bigger, bolder rivals like Flipkart, Snapdeal are still planning.

Indian eCommerce sector’s first ever IPO (Initial Public Offer) would be launched by Infibeam on March 21st; which will make Infibeam the first Indian eCommerce firm to be listed on Indian Stock Exchange. At a price band of Rs 360-432 per share, the company is looking forward to raise around Rs 450 crore, at a valuation of Rs 2237 crore.

SEBI had cleared the deck for Infibeam’s IPO launch last year in October after the company filed draft red herring prospectus (DRHP) in June 30th. Initially, Infibeam had hired SBI Caps, ICICI Securities, Kotak Mahindra Capital and Elara Capital to manage their IPO launch; however, as per documents filed, ICICI Securities, Kotak Mahindra Capital withdrew their nominations for unknown reasons.

As per available data, Infibeam will use the IPO funds to expand their cloud data centre, shift their registered & corporate offices, open 75 new logistics centres pan-India, purchase software and for general corporate purposes.

Some interesting facts about Infibeam IPO:

– Infibeam hasn’t gone the Venture Capital funding route; instead, they opted for the IPO route to raise money. The only investment they received was from Bennett, Coleman & Co Ltd, for Rs 33.3 crore through the ad-for-equity investment platform Brand Equity Treaties Ltd (BETL). Bennett owns 1.8% stake in the company now.

– Infibeam was founded by Vishal Mehta, a former Amazon employee in 2010. The company is backed by an affluent family from Gujarat, which is a well known Toyota cars dealer (Infinium Motors)

– For the period April-September 2015, Infibeam reported net revenues of Rs 171.27 crore, with EBITDA of Rs 15 crore & net profit of Rs 6.5 crore. Last year, they had reported net loss of just Rs 10 crore

– Instead of focusing on B2C niche (and burning money to acquire customers), Infibeam focused on the lucrative and traditional B2B business via several products including their popular BuildABazaar.com platform.

– As of December 31, 2015, BuildABazaar.com had 48,724 registered merchants on their platform

– Infibeam.com, the ecommerce site, has 5000 registered merchants and 7.8 million active users.

Besides Infibeam, Bharat Matrimony may also launch their IPO very soon. SEBI had cleared their application in December last year.

Some other Internet companies which have successfully launched their IPOs in India are:

• InfoEdge (company behind Naukri.com)
• 99Acres
• JustDial
• IntraSoft (company behind 123Greetings.com)
• Rediff.com

Besides, MakeMyTrip is listed at NASDAQ; Koovs is listed at London Stock Exchange’s junior market AIM.

HomeShop18 was also rumored to launch their IPO at New York, but things are on hold as of now.

Flipkart is planning to launch their $5 billion IPO in New York Stock Exchange later in the year.

It would be really interesting to observe how traditional stock investors react to Infibeam’s IPO. Point to be noted here, that under Startup India, Standup India program, Indian Govt. has relaxed several rules pertaining to stock market listing. But Infibeam had applied last year, when all the rules were in full force.

Will you buy Infibeam’s stock? Do let us know by commenting right here!

Source: 1,2,3