News Update

SoftBank-Backed Snapdeal in Talks Over $400 Million IPO

• ByStartupStory     |    September 4, 2021

Snapdeal Pvt, one of India’s e-commerce retail platforms had announced that it was considering initiating an initial public offering (IPO) that could raise around $400 million. This would put the retailer in the league with other Indian start-ups looking to capture the capital markets in the wake of India’s digital economy booms. The company is currently in talks with its investors about a potential listing in Mumbai. This could push the valuation of the company to around $2.5 billion, according to a report by Bloomberg.
The company is still in the midst of early discussions and the firm could potentially decide to not go ahead with the plan, said the report. Representatives from Snapdeal or its major investor SoftBank Group Corp. had declined to comment on the matter the report mentioned. Having said that, it could be possible that the digital retailer could see its IPO come to fruition as early as next year, said sources, who did not wish to be named. This comes in light of the fact that the details of the move are not yet public.
The company which is based in New Delhi, Gurgaon, was one of the country’s top three e-commerce firms along with Flipkart Online Services Pvt. and the Indian unit of Amazon.com Inc. The company offers more than 60 million products across 800 categories through its platform. It also has a significant delivery network of more than 6,000 cities and towns across India as per information on the company website.
In 2017, the company had walked away from a potential merger with leading e-retailer Flipkart. Since then, Flipkart has sold its controlling stake in Walmart Inc. and is on the way to its IPO. So far, the funds raised via IPOs in India in 2021 has already exceeded the total amount that was garnered over the last three years, mentioned the report. More upcoming IPOs this year include industry titans such as Paytm, Policybazaar and Nykaa to name a few.

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