One97 Communications, the India-based owner of payments platform Paytm backed by corporates Alibaba, Ant Financial, SoftBank and MediaTek, filed today to go public on the Securities and Exchange Board of India.
The company intends to raise up to Rs 16.6bn ($2.2bn) in an initial public offering which would entail it issuing $1.1bn in new shares while its shareholders will divest the same amount.
Selling shareholders in the IPO will include founder and CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma, e-commerce group Alibaba and its financial services affiliate Ant Group (through Antfin Netherlands Holdings), Elevation Capital, SAIF Partners India and Berkshire Hathaway.
Founded in 2010, Paytm is a mobile platform which enables users to conduct online transactions and obtain credit. It also provides various related financial offerings including an e-commerce-focused payment gateway, insurance brokerage and digital gold assets.
The IPO proceeds will be used to boost One 97’s payments offering, develop new business ideas and conduct strategic acquisitions. It has earmarked 75% of the net offer for qualified institutional buyers, of which 60% has been set aside for the cornerstone investors.
One97 has received more than $3.3bn in funding. Paytm was reportedly in discussions to raise more than $100m in series G funding from software provider Microsoft in April 2020 but the deal does not appear to have gone through.
Paytm had previously secured $1bn in a late 2019 series G round valuing it at $16bn. It was led by asset manager T Rowe Price and backed by internet and telecommunications group SoftBank’s Vision Fund, Ant Financial and Discovery Capital.
Chipmaker MediaTek provided $60m for the company in 2016 before Ant and Alibaba jointly bought a 38% stake from conglomerate Reliance Industries’ Reliance Capital subsidiary in 2017.
SoftBank then injected $1.4bn through a primary and secondary deal later the same year. Berkshire Hathaway reportedly supplied $300m in funding for One97 at a $10bn valuation in 2018.
Alibaba vehicles Alipay Labs (Singapore) and Alipay Singapore E-Commerce, food and beverage technology provider Eatgood Technologies and app developer Infinity Transoft Solutions are among the principal shareholders of One97 while SAIF Partners India IV and mobile advertising technology developer Socomo Technologies also hold notable stakes.
Morgan Stanley India Company, Goldman Sachs (India) Securities and Axis Capital are the joint global coordinators for the offering, and are lead underwriters together with Icici Securities, JP Morgan India, Citigroup Global Markets India and HDFC Bank.
