Flush With Funds, No IPO Plans For At Least A Couple Of Years: Aman Gupta

Having secured INR 500 Cr from Warburg Pincus and Malabar Investments last October, Indian D2C electronics giant boAt is not in a rush to go for an initial public offer (IPO), according to cofounder and chief marketing officer (CMO) Aman Gupta.

Gupta said that while the D2C electronics brand will go for a public listing in India, the company does not have any plans to do so in the next couple of years, given that it has already secured the funding.

“There is no urgency [for the IPO]… [Earlier] we had decided to go for an IPO next year, but then we raised funds. We had thought of raising INR 500-900 Cr via the primary [part of the IPO] but then we raised funds from Warburg. So, we have no need for additional funds for the next two to three years,” Gupta said, speaking at Inc42’s ‘The D2C Summit 4.0’.

“We may think about the IPO next year,” Gupta added.

Incidentally, boAt filed its draft red herring prospectus (DRHP) in January last year for an INR 2,000 Cr public issue. The IPO received SEBI’s green light in May 2022 and everyone expected the Aman Gupta and Sameer Mehta-led brand to go public by the end of the year.

At the time, according to the IPO documents, both founders held 28.26% of the equity share capital on a fully diluted basis, giving them control of the company. However, the shareholding pattern in the company might have changed with the entry of Warburg and Malabar Investments.

Notably, 2022 was a difficult year for tech startup stocks on the bourses, as companies listed in 2021 saw an absolute routing during the year. The likes of Paytm, Zomato and many others recorded all-time lows on the stock market, prompting several startups, including boAt, to defer their IPO plans.

Sharing his long-term ambitions, the Shark Tank judge said the D2C brand is planning to take its revenue to INR 10,000 Cr in the next two to three years and is currently in the process of building a roadmap for the same.

“We did INR 4,000 Cr in revenue this year (FY23), we will do INR 5,000 Cr next year (FY24). While we haven’t planned what we’ll do the year after that, we will become an INR 10,000 Cr company in the next two to three years,” Gupta said at The D2C Summit 4.0.